Readers, listeners, please forgive that I missed Martin Monday. Will try to make up for it.
I’m sitting here listening to a great rock band, Rush, on my Spotify. Rush is one of those bands that can really polarize opinion. I don’t think anyone questions their musicianship certainly. Neil Peart was universally recognized as a great rock drummer. Alex Lifeson enjoys a similar reputation amongst guitar fans. And Geddy can flat out play. I think what can split opinion on Rush is that their songwriting isn’t usual rock and roll fare. Now I like all sorts of rock and roll, from straight out ridiculous, sexually charged, let’s get it on pompous metal to psychologically scarred, angst driven grunge. Rush is unique even toward the angsty end of that spectrum. They are just different for a commercially successful band.
I was listening to my favorite Rush tune, “Subdivisions”. “Subdivisions” is one of those “road less taken” type songs to me. Lyrics tell a tale of not fitting in, struggling to find a place in a planned community kind of society. A future of conformity, intellectual and emotional straightjackets, and what it means to risk standing out from the crowd. The city, the bright lights, the crowds all provide comfort, while beyond the suburbs is a unlit, dangerous, lonely unknown.
I don’t know that the guys were inspired by Nietzsche when writing these lyrics, but I suspect they were. Check this famous Nietzsche quote: “The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.”
These are so appealing to me. I’ve always struggled to figure out where I fit. I wanted to fit in, be in those bright lights. Yet I found conformity to the tribe stifling. I wasn’t sure how that could be. Socrates said, “to thy own self be true”. But hey, that can also mean staying home alone on Saturday nights! I couldn’t reconcile the competing forces. Certainly the time I was young, and when the song was written, was a time of conformity. As much as I love the 80s, it was a time where “be cool or be cast out” was the norm.
Finally, I feel I can say with confidence, I figured out a little bit of it. I do what I want, and realize that although I live in the suburbs, it is a compromise I can live with, because I don’t have to have “suburb opinions” and be afraid of the “far unlit unknown”. I got brave enough to tell my kids to just be themselves and forget what anyone thinks. The really cool folks will still come around. And you will own yourself and the price will be well worth it.
So here’s a link to our Nietzsche episode on Spotify. You can also listen on Apple, Google, Amazon, iHeartRadio, youtube and Podbean. Give a listen and see what I’m on about. We’ll also have a rock and roll episode coming in the future.
