17th
Wild Rose
Bands don’t have geographies anymore… merely influences. Any “swedish sound”, “florida death metal”, etc…. these things were established before information became the fluid currency we know it as today. People bonded socially, and geographically, over the music they made- and the music ouroborically reflected this bond. It responded, and became the regional sound, the export, the representative of a scene or culture.
Today scenes or cultures are dominated by genres- dominated by notions of history, by the memory of the above, neatly categorized by media and by bored generation after generation. A person can quit their job, download 5 terabytes worth of music, and spend a month doing nothing but listening to early late 70s prog from the UK, becoming a complete expert on the genre; or as much as any person can be without actually being there, smelling the shitty bars the bands played, meeting the asshole promoters and excited or angry youth that played or was played by the music itself. He or she then forms a 70s UK prog project and voila, shit sandwiches emanate from said artistic outlet until it’s “exhausted” in that persons eyes… when along comes another genre, worthy of exploration. The process begins anew.
So many of my friends have left the city and region I am from in the time I have been alive. I often joke that I could easily book a tour across Canada contacting only friends from Calgary. There is nothing wrong with exploring, and there is nothing wrong with finding a new home. I congratulate those people on their journeys, and I admire them, to a person, for their desire to see new things, taste new things, bring their love for what they do to new places.
But I am from Wild Rose…. Wild Rose is my grave.
