Kincaide Show

I must be getting old. Kincaide performed at my bar last week, reinforcing my notion that I am out of touch with teenagers.

The opening bands were in their late teens, scruffed in neo-punk clothing, barely old enough to be performing in the club. I didn't understand the necessity of the lead singer screaming indecipherably into the microphone for minutes on end. This parlayed to the impression I got from the customers at the bar was that I was "The Man." The stench in the room pervade a strong sense of anti-establishment, and somehow the bar staff were lumped in with parents, teachers and authority. Put a black dress shirt on my back and I may as well have been an alderman.

The music I grew up around never made me want to rebel; it only made me want to get nice stuff and wear shiny Hammer pants. The rap that I grew up on, Biggie, Puff Daddy, Busta Rhymes, Mase, never really spoke to me. I couldn't relate to living in the projects, or in areas festering with violence. My definintion of a 'ho' would be the girl in the grade below me who had sex with her long-term boyfriend long before many of the guys in my group of friends popped their cherries. Violence and the tragedy of broken homes was not a factor in the interminable suburbs of the Pacific Northwest. Not that Puff Daddy would know anything about either, which brings me to my point - I missed out on socially literate music during my formative years. Where was my Bob Dylan?

Through the cheap earplugs stuffed into my ear canal, I could not make the translation from what the artists were saying on stage to what those kids were feeling, heads bobbing in the crowd. I can't fathom the lyrics, or understand why anyone would enjoy the cockeyed screaming. By gauging the rebellious and standoffish propensity of the crowd I can only hope that whatever it was that was being screamed on stage that night, it was important enough to make them angry.