Laughing away sunburn.

In Ben Fold’s iTunes originals series, he does an Elliot Smith cover and before he plays it, he says a little bit about Elliot Smith, what a loss his death was and so on. But Ben also says one of the most profound things Elliot ever told him was “If you grow up with yelling in your house, the last thing you want to do is make records of yelling.” Ben goes on to talk about how this little rule might sum up what’s so wrong with modern rock music: “yelling as recreation”.

But, that quote made me think a lot about punk rock in general, not modern rock. There’s just as much yelling, so why are so many drawn to it, in this day and age of 60% divorce rate? Because it really does that, it draws you in. You remember it. You were there. That feeling of complete curiosity, but total knowledge at the same time. Because, if only for 5 minutes, your adolescent self found a comfort zone.

Maybe they yell because no one else is. Maybe it's about what isn't said in your house growing up.

I’ve always considered my punk rock discovery as particularly unique because of being from Raton. In larger cities, I would assume it would be easier. Lots more access to CDs, knowledge, locals shows, but in Raton, It was a special breed. But also isolated. Hardly anyone came in from the outside to disturb what me and my friends deemed “punk enough”. We evolved on our own, made it our own. Nothing was outlawed; skateboards, ska, metal, pop... Matt Floyd, the man who got me into Rancid, was a cheerleader in high school.

Most of the time when me and Matt hung out, the first thing he would do was get into my car and remove whatever CD I was listening to, no matter what it was, and play something he wanted to hear. Then, we'd spend an hour or so circling the streets of Raton, back and forth, back and forth, talking about music and whatever girl he had his eye on. And then one day, he left his copy of "...And Out Come the Wolves" in my CD player. Normally, as soon as his CD left my player, I put mine back in. But this time, I kept it in. I heard it, it was there, and I'll always remember it. I went home and used my fantastic dial-up connection to order every one of their albums on interpunk.com.


And ever since then, they've been it for me. No, they're not the most prolific or complicated of bands. Some of their songs could even pass as pop. But I have always found them to be honest. And most importantly, I found them. And they've been there for everything. Leaving Raton, starting college, difficult breakups, boys who never worked out, my parent's divorce, my dad's re-marriage, graduating college, and most recently, the fire at the bar and Annie. When I left town for a few days after Annie died, the first thing on my iPod was my "Down and Out Rancid" mix.

The first time I saw them live was at Warped Tour in 2001 in Denver. It was pouring rain. The interweb tells me Denver got an inch and a half of rain that day, and I'd say most of it fell during Rancid's set. I spent their set hiding under a pizza box with my friend Winnie.

I saw them a few more times at Warped Tour, which are really just teaser sets, since they only get half an hour. The first time I saw them in Albuquerque was in December of 2003. They played with Tiger Army and I went with Marky and Andy. It's important to note that I have always been a Tim person. I think there are Tim-Rancid fans, and Lars-Rancid fans. I have always been and will always be a Tim fan. My blog from that day: "Rancid kicked. Me in my face. With a damn smile. I ended up in the front row, dead center, staring at Tim's glowing body thier whole set. I almost dies from being smashed, but as I was so grandly reminded, when the music hits, I feel no pain at all.

The pain totally paid off. Not only did I get what I believe to be the best view of the show, but Tim looked directly at me and smiled. It was the best thing ever. No, the best thing ever is that he gave Mark his pick and Mark gave it to me. So, now, I have Tim's pic in my greedy little hands. Weee!

Me and Tim will run away and fall in love very soon I'm sure."


Thus begins the story of the orange guitar pick, my constant companion for the next 2 years. I never, ever took it off until I did my chest project. I started wearing it as a bracelet and somewhere in the next few days, I lost it. Heartbroken is the choice word, but I tried to not to think about it and pretended that it was just somewhere lost in my room.

But somehow, another two years later, of all the hands that reached out to touch Tim Armstrong looked straight at me, grabbed my hand, and slid another orange guitar pic into it. He pointed and smiled at me, and ran backstage.

At that point in my life, everything was changing. And that specific night, I was running on fumes, I hadn't slept more than an hour in 3 days, I had just come back from camping. So, I just completely lost it. I tell everyone I was like a 15 year old girl at a N*Sync show.


I really don't need to explain. I know everyone reading this has that, had it, knows exactly where I'm coming from. Tonight I'll be there again, screaming lyrics and fighting for air. And hoping for another orange guitar pick.