Henry Rollins on Net Neutrality and Freedom of Speech
December 14, 2006 11:57 AM   Subscribe

Oh, Henry! Soft spoken Henry Rollins says a few words about internet freedom. (NSFW)
posted by birdhaus (208 comments total) 3 users marked this as a favorite
 
Pretty realistic machinima there. The veins on his neck even pulse to the screed.
posted by hal9k at 12:05 PM on December 14, 2006


Christ, what an asshole.
posted by koeselitz at 12:05 PM on December 14, 2006


He has a point, but I don't like how he expresses it. All that venom is unhealthy. It's beyond the upper limit set by Elvis Costello.

He said telcos want to charge for putting up a web site. It's not free to put up a web site now, so that doesn't make sense.
posted by Listener at 12:10 PM on December 14, 2006


Hi I'm Henry Rollins. and these are my pecs.

He's a choad.
posted by jonmc at 12:10 PM on December 14, 2006


I like Henry. He's the entire opposite of Chuck Norris: sane, intelligent and can act.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:10 PM on December 14, 2006


Fuck yes.

Also - Join the EFF and vote folks.
posted by Bael'Gar at 12:12 PM on December 14, 2006


Right on, Hank!
posted by wsg at 12:13 PM on December 14, 2006


I like Henry. He's the entire opposite of Chuck Norris: sane, intelligent and can act.

Get off the crack, man. I'm not saying he's wrong here, but he's also a megalomaniac and a blowhard and a has-been. He's the ultimate countercultural yuppie. He has this company and that project. More Donald Trump than Keith Richards in him, that's for sure.

What happened to rock stars who drank and shot dope and screwed three groupies at a time? This is what we get instead, lectures from some steroidal Anthony Robbins with a freak neck? I'll pass.
posted by jonmc at 12:18 PM on December 14, 2006 [3 favorites]


Here's his letter to Ann Coulter.
posted by bob sarabia at 12:19 PM on December 14, 2006


All yall dissing his testosteroni with bullonese need to recognize the marketing genius in the attempt to get masculistas behind this cause, or behind any defense of rights. It makes little sense that the ACLU, EFF, et al are publicly positioned as erudite and effete.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 12:20 PM on December 14, 2006


Maybe him and Ann should made and create a Japanese movie monster--Mouthzilla.
posted by jonmc at 12:22 PM on December 14, 2006


What happened to rock stars who drank and shot dope and screwed three groupies at a time?

Contemporize, man! /hippievoice
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:22 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


what the hell does 'contemporize' mean?
posted by jonmc at 12:25 PM on December 14, 2006


What happened to rock stars who drank and shot dope and screwed three groupies at a time?

They're dead, mostly.
posted by birdhaus at 12:25 PM on December 14, 2006 [5 favorites]


Wow, what a renegade. He's really fighting the system, spewing anodyne, superficial arguments in the studios of the Independent Film Channel, a subsidiary of General Electric, the largest corporation in the United States. Which invited him there precisely for that purpose.

Here's the thing. Henry Rollins will never convince anyone about anything. If you agree with him, you agreed with his point beforehand anyway. If you don't agree, or you think this issue is more subtle, Henry isn't going to sway you.

Basically, blowhards like this are offered up by the vested corporate interests to convince the individuals in society that other people, who are really angry and really passionate, are already fighting the system for us. Furthermore, because he's on television, we think we have a voice in the media.

Forget Henry Rollins, and wake up. Which side of this issue do you think General Electric, Rollins' benefactor two or three times removed, going to take?

You have to ask yourself why guys like this, and O Reilly or Michael Savage on the other side, get TV shows. And writers, professors, etc (professional thinking people) don't.
posted by Pastabagel at 12:25 PM on December 14, 2006 [3 favorites]


And writers, professors, etc (professional thinking people) don't [get TV shows].

Because on the whole they're generally unattractive, boring, condescending, incomprehensible and rarely feature naked women.
posted by jonmc at 12:29 PM on December 14, 2006


Why did they use only a single thread to move both his hands?
posted by jouke at 12:31 PM on December 14, 2006


What happened to rock stars who drank and shot dope and screwed three groupies at a time?

crushed under nixon's boots.
posted by 3.2.3 at 12:33 PM on December 14, 2006


Even though I agree with him on this issue, his screed on the telcom/anti-neutrality lobby here is horribly simplified at best. It doesn't really explain the roots of the issue, or even the reason why these measures were taken to congress in the first place - which is a shame, cause that's the same type of astroturfing we're used to from the other side.

Oh yeah, and he's an asshole
posted by tiger yang at 12:41 PM on December 14, 2006


Aww, does Pastabagel want a teevee show?
posted by interrobang at 12:42 PM on December 14, 2006


Ever seen that Black Flag footage where somebody in the audience throws a full can of beer and it hits Rollins right in the head?

Wee hee hee, it sure is funny. Even better than Danzig getting sucker punched. He goes completely nuts. I'm surprised that didn't make the heckling thread.

Anyways, yes, a true goof is he.
posted by stinkycheese at 12:42 PM on December 14, 2006


Aww, does Pastabagel want a teevee show?
posted by interrobang at 3:42 PM EST on December 14


No, I want a chocolate cream pie. But it's not about that right now.

unfortunately
posted by Pastabagel at 12:48 PM on December 14, 2006


Rollins never made a whole lot of sense to me as an 'author', but I did like Black Flag's 'TV Party'. Now he's got his very own TV Party, which he evidently sees fit to use as a sounding board for adjective-laden screeds against easy targets.

"Ann Coulter can be my supercalifragalisticexpialidocious BITCH! Ha!"

Go, Hank.
Please, go.
posted by Pecinpah at 12:53 PM on December 14, 2006


Wee hee hee, it sure is funny. Even better than Danzig getting sucker punched

I don't think anything can be better than that.
posted by spaltavian at 12:59 PM on December 14, 2006


Wow, lotta Rollins hate here. I've always liked the guy, even when I don't agree with his messages I've found his passion inspiring. I like that he is an old punk who likes to read and follows politics. Further, I like that he lays out his opinion clearly without relying on talking points or euphemism. And he's not afraid to say "fuck" in front of a camera. That's good too.

All that venom is unhealthy.


Actually, if you watch his show, you notice that it really only comes out in that "Teeing Off" opening segment. When dealing with guests he is always very soft spoken and charitable.

What happened to rock stars who drank and shot dope and screwed three groupies at a time?


If my memory serves, Rollins has always been straight edge, even back when he was a rock star.

Here's the thing. Henry Rollins will never convince anyone about anything. If you agree with him, you agreed with his point beforehand anyway. If you don't agree, or you think this issue is more subtle, Henry isn't going to sway you.

This is true. Though it pleases me that there are still people willing to speak up, even if they are never going to be heard.
posted by quin at 12:59 PM on December 14, 2006


stinkycheese: Every time I hear people say that some punk outfit is harder or tougher than some other band, I think of Steve Albini. You ever see Big Black's Pig Pile video? Dude loses his last guitar pick, so he starts playing with a razor blade, and by the end of the show, he's spattered in blood. Basically Albini > Rollins, fwiw.
posted by boo_radley at 1:00 PM on December 14, 2006


I wonder how he feels about ass painting.

“What happened to rock stars who drank and shot dope and screwed three groupies at a time?”

Must I be a rock star to do that, or...?
posted by Smedleyman at 1:01 PM on December 14, 2006


Also, I'm pretty sure that like Bruce Banner and the Hulk, when Richard Dean Anderson gets really, really angry, he turns into Henry Rollins.
posted by quin at 1:02 PM on December 14, 2006 [4 favorites]


If my memory serves, Rollins has always been straight edge,

Strike 1! It's 'sex, drugs & rock and roll' Hank, get with the program.

And he's not afraid to say "fuck" in front of a camera.

The five six people past infancy in the post-cable TV universe are trembling with fear. On Metachat the other day, we were discussing punk rock and what had changed about it. Rollins and his ilk kind of epitomize what went wrong. Punk was originally the glue-sniffing losers clubhouse and now the honor roll kids are sneaking because they have to acheive and excel at absolutely everything. Sorry but hank sounds more like a self-guru with some tats than a rock star.
posted by jonmc at 1:07 PM on December 14, 2006


Everything else aside, one must deride him for the way he turned Black Flag from gold to shit.
posted by koeselitz at 1:07 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


This is true. Though it pleases me that there are still people willing to speak up, even if they are never going to be heard.
posted by quin at 3:59 PM EST on December 14


There will always be people on TV who convey the impression that they are outsiders/renegaders/the lone voice speaking out. Networks are programmed to make sure there's someone like this on the air. When henry goes away they'll find someone else. Just like when O'Reilly goes away, they'll replace him with someone else. On both fronts, the replacement will convey the impression the yare slightly more in touch with what's happening now, but in reality they'll just be slightly dumber and slightly louder.
posted by Pastabagel at 1:10 PM on December 14, 2006


You have to ask yourself why guys like this, and O Reilly or Michael Savage on the other side, get TV
shows.


... or Jon Stewart, or Limbaugh, etc. Don't get me wrong, I love Stewart, but he, like all of the above mentioned folks are entertainers! Hello, didn't you get that already?! That's their job! They spout off about whatever, support the charity du jour, flash their naughty bits, blah blah blah. They all have a bit of truth (or truthiness) in what they say, but come on people, if you're letting these jokers influence your constitutional rights or responsibility as a citizen, parent, or even thinking person, then you, sir or madame, are too damn stupid for those privileges.

That neck-vein-throbbing rant aside, I've always liked Rollins. His rants always seemed honest, if a bit theatrical.

If my memory serves, Rollins has always been straight edge, even back when he was a rock star.

And I've personally seen him down half a bottle of JD at a show and leave with a couple of barely legal purple-haired girls, so lets not make him a saint. I was soooo damn jealous.
posted by elendil71 at 1:12 PM on December 14, 2006


What happened to Henry?
posted by Max Power at 1:15 PM on December 14, 2006


I don't promote the use of drugs and alchohol, but it seems to me that Henry really went downhill when he quit. He was always full of himself, but now he's worse than the wacky Christians he's railing against.

His psuedo-intellectualism and wanna be autodidact thing really put the icing on the cake. Loser.
posted by snsranch at 1:17 PM on December 14, 2006


He has this company and that project.

Yeah, running a book publishing house and a record lable, what an asshole!

While I'm not crazy about everything he does (and that Coulter thing is painfully unfunny), I like Henry Rollins. At least he's always done his own thing, and not fallen for the punk rock cliche (that, honestly, was a marketing gimmick from the word go).

And really, Keith Richards has more Donald Trump than Keith Richards in him these days.
posted by Bookhouse at 1:17 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


So some famous person stands up and speaks truth to power. What a jackass. Doesn't this idiot know -

1) His band sucks
2) His neck is funny
3) He's rude
4) His message is too simple

Such a person would really have to be a loser to think he can forcefully state his opinion. After all we'd much rather get this sort of message from professional thinking people.

Professional thinking people.
posted by Bael'Gar at 1:20 PM on December 14, 2006 [2 favorites]


... or Jon Stewart, or Limbaugh, etc. Don't get me wrong, I love Stewart, but he, like all of the above mentioned folks are entertainers!

O'Reilly is on the Fox News Channel. Michael Savage was on MSNBC, a news channel. Only Stewart is on a network that is hoilding itself out to be entertainment. Everyone else is trying to bill themselves as something else other than entertainers.

Once upon a time, there was CNN's crossfire. Now we still have crossfire, but it broke into two seperate shows on two seperate networks, and the people on the shows now don't actually have any political or policy experience.

The networks provide us with entertainment centered on the news the way E! gives you entertainment about hollywood. The difference with E! is that it assumes you actually watched the movies or shows or celebrities they discusses. These infotainment networks are providing you with this entertainment, as you say, without actually providing you with any news to establish context.

So as Henry makes clear, every issue becomes reducible to comprehension to the dumbest viewer through some quips and punchlines, and its outcome should be obvious. The only distinction is which channel you happen to be watching.
posted by Pastabagel at 1:22 PM on December 14, 2006


Yeah, running a book publishing house and a record lable, what an asshole!

and a fucking TV show. He can give management seminars to aspiring moguls and shit. Overachievers, stay away from punk rock, please. Let us losers have one preserve of our own, huh?
posted by jonmc at 1:24 PM on December 14, 2006


Let the cliques enjoy their exclusivity!
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 1:29 PM on December 14, 2006


Peace Grandma is more hardcore than Rollins ever was.
posted by homunculus at 1:30 PM on December 14, 2006


Bookhouse: "At least he's always done his own thing, and not fallen for the punk rock cliche (that, honestly, was a marketing gimmick from the word go)."

Certainly he is to be commended for that. Along with everybody else who's ever not been a punk. But the trouble with it is: he never really was a punk in the first place. Well, yeah, he was in a hardcore band, but he was a crappy singer and a crappy songwriter, so it's really no surprise that he had the "balls" to live beyond "that part of himself."

It's not really a big deal when no-talent, unintelligent, angry, careless hacks who should've ended up bouncers at cheap rock clubs but instead got insanely rich have the "courage" to "go beyond boundaries." It's a fuck of a lot more meaningful when honest, thoughtful, great musicians who don't get much money or recognition see beyond the categories they're put in.
posted by koeselitz at 1:30 PM on December 14, 2006


I always liked punk because I thought it was smart-- all that "think for yourself, don't trust authority" stuff. :)
posted by jokeefe at 1:32 PM on December 14, 2006


Let us losers have one preserve of our own, huh?

Well, you had it but---you lost it.
posted by birdhaus at 1:32 PM on December 14, 2006


Erm, that was in response to jonmc up there. Y'all are too fast for me.
posted by jokeefe at 1:33 PM on December 14, 2006


Let the cliques enjoy their exclusivity!

It's not about exclusivity, man. Punk, to me at least, was about what Tom Carson said about the Ramones:

"Punks in the original sense of the word , were the sort of people who were such hopeless losers that they couldn't even be convincing as outlaws; far from romanticizing that status, the Ramones glorified their own inadequacy....and yet they were genuinely sexy,too; in spite of everything they were cool."

It was a place where being that 'sort of people' was OK. Type A personalities like Henry Rollins come along and turn it in to yet another horse race or sales drive. Thanks loads, Hank.
posted by jonmc at 1:34 PM on December 14, 2006


I always liked punk because I thought it was smart-- all that "think for yourself, don't trust authority"

The best punk had very little truck with politics or intellectualism at all. It was a rebellion against the over-intellectualizing of rock and roll. Songs about sniffing glue and meeting girls in the Burger King and throwing up, not the fucking motivational speeches with powerchords that Rollins trucks in. I don't want to be motivated, I wanna be sedated.
posted by jonmc at 1:37 PM on December 14, 2006


To sum it all up:

Punk rockers should NOT be named "Henry".
posted by wendell at 1:37 PM on December 14, 2006


A big fat yay when I heard this. Spread the word. Democracy is under attack in America by a handful of transnational media corporations and a fascist government who have no interest in the well-being of the general public or in the truth.
posted by dropkick at 1:40 PM on December 14, 2006


Bael'Gar: The guy is a fucking dick. A friend of mine was physically threatened by him at a club for dancing a bit "too close to the stage." This isn't really news, since the guy seems to do it all the time; punk is filled with stories of Henry Rollins threatening and condescending to people. (One of them, the Maxim interview thing, has been linked.) The neck isn't so bad as what it represents to him: the ability to throw every part of his weight around. He loves talking about how rich he is, how strong he is, how big he is, how better he is. When people challenge him on this, saying it's a power trip, his response is invariable: I can do this because I earned it. His "achievement" line is really little more than an excuse for his own love of control, and he flexes that controlling muscle every moment that he can. That kind of superiority complex is something that punk rock, to say nothing of the world at large, really doesn't need.

So it's not really so surprising that people will react negatively to him no matter what he says. If somebody posted a link to George W. Bush saying "I like little kittens," people would still say "fuck off." And everybody here who thinks it's silly to run down a guy for saying what Rollins says in that link above probably could stand to learn a little about who he is as a person.
posted by koeselitz at 1:41 PM on December 14, 2006


I don't want to be motivated, I wanna be sedated.

Today I've learned that Punk is whiny, selfish and depressing.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 1:42 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


Today I've learned that Punk is whiny, selfish and depressing.

onetwothreefour!

Well I'm against it
I'm against it
Well I'm against it
I'm against it
I don't like politics
I don't like communists
I don't like games and fun
I don't like anyone
And I'm against...
I don't like Jesus freaks
I don't like circus geeks
I don't like summer and spring
I don't like anything
I don't like sex and drugs
I don't like waterbugs
I don't care about poverty
All I care about is me
And I'm against...
I don't like playing ping pong
I don't like the Viet Cong
I don't like Burger King
I don't like anything
And I'm against...
Well I'm against it
I'm against it
posted by jonmc at 1:44 PM on December 14, 2006


As long as Fat Mike doesn't become a motivational speaker, Henry can do whatever the fuck he wants.
posted by mullingitover at 1:47 PM on December 14, 2006


knock yourself out. but leave us slobs alone so we can do the same.
posted by jonmc at 1:47 PM on December 14, 2006


jonmc has it - this guy, muscles aside, was a jock. And jocks do not good punk rock make.

Anyone not convinced of the utter lameness of Hank would do well to try & sit through his Talking From The Box. I saw this when it came out (with bunch of friends, not my choice), and I'm still struck by the sheer overwhelming shamelessness of this guy's ability to SUCK over a decade later.

He's basically a drill sargeant, only he's cool, right? No thanks.
posted by stinkycheese at 1:49 PM on December 14, 2006


But jon, cursing Henry Rollins for killing punk, for turning it into "yet another horse race or sales drive" is like cursing 5 dolla noobs for killing Mefi. Bleeding edge culture can't, CANT, remain bleeding edge without eventually becoming subsumed by the wave of popular culture behind it. Everything is a commodity, and eventually the people who hype commodities will buy into it and popularize it. Punk was no different than, say, disco before it and grunge after it.
posted by muddgirl at 1:49 PM on December 14, 2006


My goal in life is to get big and strong and tough enough so I can kick Henry Rollins' ass.
posted by papakwanz at 1:50 PM on December 14, 2006


jonmc has it - this guy, muscles aside, was a jock. And jocks do not good punk rock make.

A jock in his highschool's theater program. So where do you draw the line at what 'good punk rock make?'
posted by NationalKato at 1:53 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


I've been to Black Flag shows that were riots and Ramones shows that were rote.

Everyone grows old. Not everyone gets to say fuck you to McCain's inane intarweb proposals on T.V.
posted by Max Power at 1:53 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


Bleeding edge culture can't, CANT, remain bleeding edge without eventually becoming subsumed by the wave of popular culture behind it.

That's not what I'm talking about, muddgirl. I could give a frogs fat ass about the bleeding edge. What I'm saying is that, punk in it's original form (Ramones, Dictators, Dead Boys, MC5, Stooges) was a refuge for losers and misfits and fuckups, not yet another arena for overacheivers to fucking excel. Fuck excelling. Punk is about embracing your own mediocrity.
posted by jonmc at 1:54 PM on December 14, 2006


What I'm saying is

off-topic and wrong.
posted by and hosted from Uranus at 1:57 PM on December 14, 2006 [2 favorites]


Punk was stillborn.
posted by sonofsamiam at 1:57 PM on December 14, 2006


All I know is: posting on the blue is so fucking punk rock.
posted by NationalKato at 1:58 PM on December 14, 2006


Am I alone in never having thought of Rollins and Black Flag as straight Punk? When did Hardcore and Punk become the same thing? Yeah, it's an "offshoot" (for lack of a better word), but I thought the whole point of adding the word Hardcore was to differentiate it from "regular" punk--and not just in sound.

Also, jonmc, you once took me to task for calling out Dick Manitoba for selling out punk ideals when he sued Dan Snaith, yet you seem perfectly fine blaming Rollins and others of his ilk for ruining a good thing. I'm afraid I don't follow your logic.

I'm not much of a fan of (contemporary) Rollins, but I'll take him over Manitoba and those of his ilk (ie, the litigious) any day.
posted by dobbs at 2:01 PM on December 14, 2006


I don't know what they have to say,
It makes no difference anyway,
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
No matter what it is or who commenced it,
I'm against it.

Your proposition may be good,
But let's have one thing understood,
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
And even when you've changed it or condensed it,
I'm against it.

I'm opposed to it,
On general principle, I'm opposed to it.

[chorus] He's opposed to it.
In fact, indeed, that he's opposed to it!

For months before my son was born,
I used to yell from night to morn,
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
And I've kept yelling since I first commenced it,
I'm against it!

--Groucho Marx
posted by Joe Invisible at 2:01 PM on December 14, 2006


O'Reilly is on the Fox News Channel. Michael Savage was on MSNBC, a news channel. Only Stewart is on a network that is hoilding itself out to be entertainment. Everyone else is trying to bill themselves as something else other than entertainers.

I understand Pastabagel. My point was that people should understand that most media (esp. televised) is entertainment. Simply because there's a Talking Head doesnt mean what they saying is true or even remotely representative of objective facts. It's well-crafted opinion. And yes I'm aware of the subjective nature of every kind of reporting, so lets not dwell on the semantics of that.

My critique, as it were, was leveled at the culture of personality that assumes that the utterances of celebrities, has-beens or not, seem to hold more weight and are of course more easily available to the majority of our citizens, compared to the available information out there, much of it quite available with a bit of responsible curiosity and a few finger-clicks.

I did not intend a derail. I actually like Henry Rollins spoken word stuff quite a bit. I appreciate his energy and candor. But his words hold about as much weight as Bono blathering on about whatever he blathers on about on a daily basis.
posted by elendil71 at 2:01 PM on December 14, 2006


But his words hold about as much weight as Bono blathering on about whatever he blathers on about on a daily basis.

Global poverty and hunger?
posted by NationalKato at 2:05 PM on December 14, 2006


If you agree with him, you agreed with his point beforehand anyway. If you don't agree, or you think this issue is more subtle, Henry isn't going to sway you.

And in the linked video, he's practically poster child for some of the caricature the right loves to make of the left.
posted by namespan at 2:08 PM on December 14, 2006


Punk was the Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle
posted by IronLizard at 2:10 PM on December 14, 2006


jonmc, you're making punk sound like the Special Olympics of rock.
posted by Bookhouse at 2:11 PM on December 14, 2006 [2 favorites]


I like Henry Rollins. His interview with Herzog is a good watch.

I don't get why people are calling him a jock. He seems extremely articulate and well spoken. He tempers his, well, temper with pretty good arguments and his simplification of certain issues is no worse than what the opposition is doing. Hell, part of one his stand-ups is decrying the people who don't read and imbrace ignorance as a virtue. That's something I can really get behind, regardless of whether you like the guy or not. I also pissed myself listening to his letter to Ann Coulter.

Never listened to his music, though. You can take that to mean that my opinion doesn't count, 'cause I'm not harcore, straight edge or home with the downies or whatever the fuck it is you people are arguing about.
posted by slimepuppy at 2:12 PM on December 14, 2006


Embrace ignorance. And teh spellings.
posted by slimepuppy at 2:14 PM on December 14, 2006


i got his autograph once

in non-cursive, non-signature style he simply wrote

Rollins

tell me thats not punk rock
posted by tsarfan at 2:14 PM on December 14, 2006


It's not free to put up a web site now, so that doesn't make sense.

Sure it is. Just not a very slick web site.
posted by IronLizard at 2:14 PM on December 14, 2006


Wow, I don't think I've ever been in this much agreement with jonmc before. It's a beautiful dream, and I don't want to wake, so I won't double-check - I think I agreed on nearly every point.

Further, I would say that the general rule of thumb my friends and I (all of us ignorant, none of us music PhDs) used to mark the line between punk and hardcore was the very transformation that you describe. And Hank? Very much part of it.

But perhaps you don't agree. Perhaps you'll rail. Perhaps I should have treaded more lightly. This moment, it was beautiful, no?
posted by rush at 2:16 PM on December 14, 2006


Fuck excelling. Punk is about embracing your own mediocrity.
posted by jonmc at 3:54 PM CST on December 14


I like you as a poster-- and I know you hate it when threads become About You-- but that line sounds like it came from an Ayn Rand villain.
posted by COBRA! at 2:17 PM on December 14, 2006


If you agree with him, you agreed with his point beforehand anyway. If you don't agree, or you think this issue is more subtle, Henry isn't going to sway you.

I am not sure that's true. I agree he's not convincing to those of us with formed opinions already, but serious question: does Henry appeal to the 15 year old glue sniffers in Alabama anymore?

Because the only other people who speak with conviction to these kids (who are 3 years away from signing up for Iraq duty) are the evangelists and whatever lame ass band is on VH1, eg. Korn. Despite the fact that I have always hated Rollins' LA attitude, I am glad he's at least there.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 2:17 PM on December 14, 2006


jonmc: "Punk is about embracing your own mediocrity."

Which is why it's inferior to metal, which is about transcending your own mediocrity.

But, in the end, doesn't it get a little hard to believe in punk rock? Not "believe in punk rock" as in "like the music," but as in "believe that it is a thing with objective existence?" It seems to me that the Ramones and the Dictators were just really great people. They were surrounded by a certain squalor, and they were so far outside the norm as to be incomprehensible to it, and yet they not only lived great lives, they thrived. And they were genuinely good people; the kind of people I wish I had a chance to meet. Not a small part of a huge historical movement that was sidetracked; just people. Like David Byrne and Patti Smith and Johnny Rotten and Sid and the rest. We never "had" punk so that people like Henry could take it away; there were just some good people who said and sang some sensible things.

Lots of styles of music have silly notions of movements attached to them, and punk is one of them. Metal is another. There are those who get very upset about the mere existence of Venom, or who rag on Metallica for selling out, or what-have-you. I have a feeling Metal has been better about this, partially because it's lasted for ten more years than Punk, but it's the same problem. Haven't you ever felt like subcultural insularity is a bad thing? Isn't this "this is our thing, fuck them for destroying it" attitude the root of it?
posted by koeselitz at 2:18 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


Even better than Danzig getting sucker punched.

That wasn't a suckerpunch. Danzig shoved Danny back and stood there waiting for a response. Danny responded. This is the difference between fighting and posturing. In a fight, if you wait for anything, you end up on the floor.
posted by davelog at 2:19 PM on December 14, 2006


jonmc: i think rollins would argue the "punk is mediocrity" premise is designed to keep the diaffected from working at making a difference.
posted by keswick at 2:22 PM on December 14, 2006 [2 favorites]


Well, for my first post, I've gotta say this has been pretty interesting. I thought it was about the issues that Rollins was raising about the people who are trying to control the internet, and maybe about the style in which he says it. I had NO IDEA it would turn into a debate about punk rock. I guess these things are organic in taking their own direction, eh?

I thought there was at least a little humorous irony in Rollins profanity filled rant about censorship and control, though I know irony as a form of humor is often misunderstood nowadays. And isn't there something cathartic about having someone say things you agree with in such an over the top way? Not so much, if you don't agree, but, oh well . . . .

Anyway, I'm glad it stimulated such a passionate discussion.

Oh, and Joey Ramone was probably rolling over in his grave when they used a Ramones' song in a fucking commercial!!!
posted by birdhaus at 2:37 PM on December 14, 2006


Rollins' diatribe here (linked above) sounds just like the angry dwarf played by Peter Dinklage in Elf. Somebody more talented than I needs to put those together and slap it on youtube.

[Finch:] Hey, jack weed,

I get more action in a week

Than you've had your entire life.

I've got houses in I.e., Paris, and Vail,

Oh. Each one of them

with a 70-inchplasma screen.

So, I suggest you wipe

That stupid smile off your face

Before I come over there and smack it off!

You feeling strong, my friend?!

Call me elf one more time!

[Whispers] He's an angry elf.
posted by craniac at 2:38 PM on December 14, 2006


Dude loses his last guitar pick, so he starts playing with a razor blade, and by the end of the show, he's spattered in blood

inasmuch as i share your view that steve albini is a lot more of a badass than that meathead rollins, i wish this were true because it's harDCore, man!

but i'm afraid to report that this, along with lots of other versions of this story, is apocryphal. what actually happened is that some knave in the front row kept squirting albini with fake blood, as he himself reported in forced exposure.

TheMore You Know!
posted by Hat Maui at 2:40 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


I am pretty sure, based on this thread, that Metafilter has been replaced by some other forum's members who are running a phishing attack.
posted by srboisvert at 2:40 PM on December 14, 2006


Oh yeah, and he's an asshole

No one ever called Pablo Picasso an asshole.

No, wait a minute...
posted by ZenMasterThis at 2:40 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


As I remember it, what killed punk rock was all the people insisting on defining it.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 2:41 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


Closer to topic, that was a lot like Keith Olberman with "fuck" sprinkled in there.
posted by Navelgazer at 2:53 PM on December 14, 2006


"Punk" seems to serve as a rorshach test for those who try defining it.
posted by drezdn at 2:53 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


Seems like a good show, went over to IFC and watched some clips. So far most of the videos and talk's that I've heard from Rollins have been pretty good. And he does touch on points of news that many people dont hear about in the mainstream news, regulation of the internet and the bill that died.

But for the whole punk/hardcore music, not my cup of tea.
posted by IronWolve at 2:54 PM on December 14, 2006


I liked Rollins in Full Metal Challenge on TLC, and in the movie Feast. I also saw him do a "stand-up" routine that was painfully unfunny. His music never did much for me. I don't know that he makes a very convincing spokesman for anything, but he is kind of the anti-Franken lib., which is something (not quite sure what, though).
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:00 PM on December 14, 2006


But his words hold about as much weight as Bono blathering on about whatever he blathers on about on a daily basis.

Bono's blathering is bringing money and attention to problems that nobody wants to talk about.
posted by weretable and the undead chairs at 3:00 PM on December 14, 2006


Henry was always a poseur, but it always seemed to redeems him i my eyes that Ian McKaye still considers himself to be one of his good friends.

Keith Morris was a much better frontman anyway.
posted by psmealey at 3:01 PM on December 14, 2006


hat maui: why don't you go kill the easter bunny now that you've killed one of my beliefs about Steve :(
posted by boo_radley at 3:11 PM on December 14, 2006


i love metafilter
posted by Hands of Manos at 3:13 PM on December 14, 2006


Yeah, be sure and let me know all the things you are doing to bring aid to Africa.
posted by weretable and the undead chairs at 3:13 PM on December 14, 2006


Please, jonmc. Do you have to reflex-refresh-repeat-reply to any thread somewhat maybe perhaps slightly related to (rock) music? We all know your position on this subject by now.
posted by ethocin at 3:17 PM on December 14, 2006


straight edge, is and has always been a fucking stupid idea.

jonmc has it right, punk has fuck all to do with ideology, or rules for that matter.

i 'm not even a fan of punk rock. but i can get behind the sentement.

although i guess i would call myself hillbilly punk if thats a word, i don't know.

but yeah , straight edge? fuck that. if you don't drink or do drugs cause you're to good to , or cause you're to smart to, you value your self to much to be a looser of my caliber.
posted by nola at 3:23 PM on December 14, 2006


Do you want the family man or do you want the swinging man?
posted by Flashman at 3:25 PM on December 14, 2006


I'd much rather that punks grow up to be Henry Rollins than jonmc.
posted by 235w103 at 3:25 PM on December 14, 2006


Also, jonmc, you once took me to task for calling out Dick Manitoba for selling out punk ideals when he sued Dan Snaith, yet you seem perfectly fine blaming Rollins and others of his ilk for ruining a good thing. I'm afraid I don't follow your logic.

The logic is that Dick Manitoba* and Adny Shernoff (and Stiv Bators and The Ramones for that matter) never claimed to carry the flag for any ideals. The kind of punk they played had zero to do with ideals beyond loud music, drugs and fucking. Rollins, with all his ambition and ideology sounds more like some kind of hippie or art rocker.


But, in the end, doesn't it get a little hard to believe in punk rock?


To me punk was always about living without ideologies, rules, beliefs as expresed in the Ramones song I quoted above.

jonmc, you're making punk sound like the Special Olympics of rock.

That's actually not a bad analogy. Guys like Joey Ramone, Dick Manitoba, Jonathan Richman...these guys were losers, fuckups, dropouts, not mini-captains of industry like Rollins. They were the typoe of guys derided by every in-group: they were ugly, dumb, graceless, vulgar, and proud of it. And when I see them I see myself.

There's a great quote from Iggy Pop about the first time he heard the Velvet Underground. "Their singer couldn't sing. I couldn't. Let's sing together." That's called embracing your own mediocrity.

jonmc: i think rollins would argue the "punk is mediocrity" premise is designed to keep the diaffected from working at making a difference.

and he'd sound like some guidance counselor telling me that I'm not living up to my potential, when I know damn well I don't any for anything I'd want. And if I wanted to hear that shit I'd've paid attention in class. I used to believe all that idealistic crap, but the bands I refer to are about realizing that there really isn't a goddam thing you can do to really make a difference and surviving in the face of that.

And they were genuinely good people....David Byrne and Patti Smith and Johnny Rotten and Sid

I'd really hesitate before including Sid Vicious in a list of 'good people."

*Id agree that the lawsuit was an uncool move, but plenty of great artists have made uncool moves and his contributions to mucisc far outweigh one minor gaffe.
posted by jonmc at 3:26 PM on December 14, 2006


sorry, boo. also? the tooth fairy is actually mark foley.
posted by Hat Maui at 3:26 PM on December 14, 2006


And before I forget, disco sucks!
posted by birdhaus at 3:26 PM on December 14, 2006


got his autograph once

in non-cursive, non-signature style he simply wrote

Rollins

tell me thats not punk rock


that's not punk rock. that's branding. maybe he can get together with puff daddy and they start a line of sportswear.
posted by jonmc at 3:30 PM on December 14, 2006


Anyone notice that all jonmc's posts are favorited by flarbuse?
posted by beta male at 3:33 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


I flagged them all as mediocre.
posted by brain_drain at 3:35 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


"I flagged them all as mediocre."

Okay - that's just funny. I don't care who you are.

/gitterdun
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:36 PM on December 14, 2006


Anyone notice that all jonmc's . . .

not until you mentioned it , now i can't stop thinking about it.
posted by nola at 3:38 PM on December 14, 2006


Say it loud, say it proud: Anti-corporatism is the new corporatism.
posted by damn dirty ape at 3:39 PM on December 14, 2006


Anyone notice that all jonmc's posts are favorited by flarbuse?

Well, either he's drawn to my charisma and bottomless sex appeal, or more likely, he's creating a base of evidence that I'm an imbecile.
posted by jonmc at 3:41 PM on December 14, 2006


Anyone notice that all of flarbuse's favorites are jonmc posts?

Eerily still, they are contained to this thread.
posted by Leather McWhip at 3:43 PM on December 14, 2006


sockpuppet.
posted by nola at 3:44 PM on December 14, 2006


Doesn't seem to be.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:46 PM on December 14, 2006


(Based on comment history.)
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:47 PM on December 14, 2006


jon, remind me to ask for your approval next time I want to call something Punk Rock. I don't want to violate the rules.
posted by eyeballkid at 3:55 PM on December 14, 2006 [2 favorites]


craniac : Peter Dinklage in Elf.

Well, I suppose if we can't come to a concession about Rollins, can we at least all agree that Peter Dinklage is awesome? (Elf aside.)

I mean the guy was Leflore, and you just don't get much cooler than that.

[stalking down hotel lobby with sledghammer, talking to himself] "Who's the man? Who's the man?"
posted by quin at 3:56 PM on December 14, 2006


Yeah - you tell 'em! Bill Gates uses tax loopholes for the rich, too - the fucker. He can go fuck himself, too. The Countries Du Jour don't want any of Gates' and Bono's fucking millions, anyway. They only want your pure, pure $4.95.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:58 PM on December 14, 2006 [2 favorites]


Uh, net neutrality?

Freedom of speech?

Henry Rollins?

Oh, nevermind . . . .
posted by birdhaus at 4:00 PM on December 14, 2006


Henry Rollins used to front for Bono and Bill in their first band, The Loopholes, back before net neutrality issues killed punk. Sheesh! Keep up!
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 4:04 PM on December 14, 2006


you forgot to add, fandango_matt, to have Bono supply every African child with a pair of $500 sunglasses, like the ones he wears..

Otherwise, what you said.
posted by elendil71 at 4:08 PM on December 14, 2006


Yeah, this thread really lost the plot quick didn't it?
posted by destro at 4:10 PM on December 14, 2006


There was a plot? That's not very punk.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 4:16 PM on December 14, 2006


This thread is a total poseur.
posted by brundlefly at 4:22 PM on December 14, 2006



As I remember it, what killed punk rock was all the people insisting on defining it.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 2:41 PM PST on December 14 [+ 2 favorites] [!]


Perxactly! Marketing killed punk rock.
posted by YoBananaBoy at 4:25 PM on December 14, 2006


jon, remind me to ask for your approval next time I want to call something Punk Rock. I don't want to violate the rules.

ebk, that's the point. Rollins was all about rules and orthodoxy, and, (shudder) ambition. That led to endless debates about what was and wasn't punk enough (enough for who, god only knows). That why I don't like him.
posted by jonmc at 4:28 PM on December 14, 2006


Punk's a hall of mirrors. It was only what people imagined and hoped it would be as they worked out their confused, grasping for meaning youth. There was never a pure point from which it was subsequently corrupted. Never.

I do not exclude myself in this.
posted by jokeefe at 4:48 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


Wow, I'm having an attack of middle-age today, aren't I?
posted by jokeefe at 4:49 PM on December 14, 2006


The bums lost. The bums will always lose.

Thank God.

I wish I could get jonmc a television show. It'd be wonderful to get some loser out there to consistently praise mediocrity and powerlessness as positive values. You'd have to add humor to misdirect the attack but it'd work. Nothing's more rebellious than sniffing glue. We certainly don't want an actual rebellion. jon you should call the Comedy Channel. All the stupid college students who watch Stewart would probably stick around for your schtick. I think your 'nothing's cooler than being a witless loser' message would resonate. Instead of mocking politicians you could mock Hollywood and 'Type A' people. You'd be the Anti-E! enterainment show. It'd be a great way to turn kids on to celebrity worship. The idea has legs.

As for net neutrality it's a done deal. The internet is built on private property and private property is private. It's charming that the geeks would make this their political cause but everybody knows this is theatre. It makes the geeks feel good and prods the average sop to higher flights of apathy. The political efficiency of geeks is zero. As for the net companies with real money they need to buy in and stop being so arrogant. Media and telecom are not going to quietly hand the game over. Google and Microsoft and Yahoo should play ball instead of trying to conquer the fucking world. Net neutrality makes sense for them because anything that raises the barrier of entry is good for the monied elite. There's no reason Google shouldn't be willing to spread a little wealth around. It's not like the telecom companies can't be trusted. For the right price they'll make sure there'll never be another Google again.

Politically the democrats would do well to cast this as a market thing and then stand by and let the market do its thing.This is about corporate strategy and not a rights issue. Nobody ever blamed a congressman for doing nothing.They might even gain some points.
posted by nixerman at 4:50 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


Wanna get drunk and break shit, Jon? Bonus points if I can talk about the coming social revolution while you spraypaint stuff.
posted by jokeefe at 4:50 PM on December 14, 2006


The internet is built on private property and private property is private.

The net was also built in universities, which are generally public, don't forget.
posted by jokeefe at 4:52 PM on December 14, 2006


intstead of quibbling over definitions of 'punk rock', why don't all the involved parties just list the bands they think qualify?

then we can turn this thread towards its real destiny, a nice 'your favorite band sucks' discussion.
posted by localhuman at 4:57 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


nixerman is silly
posted by localhuman at 5:03 PM on December 14, 2006


Wanna get drunk and break shit, Jon?

Yes.

Bonus points if I can talk about the coming social revolution while you spraypaint stuff.

No.

I wish I could get jonmc a television show. It'd be wonderful to get some loser out there to consistently praise mediocrity and powerlessness as positive values. You'd have to add humor to misdirect the attack but it'd work. Nothing's more rebellious than sniffing glue. We certainly don't want an actual rebellion. jon you should call the Comedy Channel. All the stupid college students who watch Stewart would probably stick around for your schtick. I think your 'nothing's cooler than being a witless loser' message would resonate. Instead of mocking politicians you could mock Hollywood and 'Type A' people. You'd be the Anti-E! enterainment show. It'd be a great way to turn kids on to celebrity worship. The idea has legs.

Not enough tits. I'm not praising them or condemning them. Mediocre powerless losers are what most of the population is, like it or not. I merely accept that I'm one of them. (I guess ubermenschen like yourself are excluded, huh, nixerman? Pheh) And there's a certain freedom in that. A certain lack of presssure.
posted by jonmc at 5:04 PM on December 14, 2006


“These infotainment networks are providing you with this entertainment, as you say, without actually providing you with any news to establish context.” - posted by Pastabagel

Well said.

Hey, papakwanz, you want me to fuck him up for ya?
--------
Smed (with mohawk): “Hey, Henry, nice show. Good noise, man.”
*moves closer & closer*
Rollins: “Thanks, thanks m’man....where do I know you from?”
Smed: “Yeah, no, uh. Yeah, I’m from Metafilter.”
Rollins: “Metafilter?”
Smed: “Yeah, Metafilter.”
Rollins: “What the fuck is Metafilter?”
Smed: “It’s a weblog anyone can contribute a link or a comment to, uh, it exists to break down the barriers between, uh, people and extend, y’know, and to foster discussion with members. Costs like $5 bucks to join. It’s a tight community.”
Rollins:*quizzical look* “Get out of here before you get hurt, man. *flicks cigarette* I don’t want any trouble, ok. I’m not paying anything to anybody for..”
Smed: “No, it’s not like that, uh..”
*moves closer*
Rollins: “Get the fuck out of here, man.”
Smed: “Alright scumbag” *throttles Rollins* “papakwanz says hello!”
Rollins: “Ack!”
*Bouncers and show security pound Smed into broken puddle of goo before the police cart him off to the penitentary*
----------

Hmmm...y’know tkchrist is much closer to California than I am.
posted by Smedleyman at 5:05 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


As long as Bono is trying to do something positive, I'll applaud the work. He certainly doesn't have to do jack shit. That said, I will no longer derail the thread.
posted by weretable and the undead chairs at 5:21 PM on December 14, 2006


At this point, the only way to derail the thread is to actually discuss the Rollins video.
posted by brain_drain at 5:35 PM on December 14, 2006


Once, while in Scandinavia, I saw Henry Rollins eating breakfast.
posted by Tube at 5:52 PM on December 14, 2006


Once, while in Scandinavia, I saw Henry Rollins eating breakfast.

This sounds like spy code for something.
posted by brundlefly at 5:57 PM on December 14, 2006


WWHRD?
posted by Doublewhiskeycokenoice at 6:03 PM on December 14, 2006


"At this point, the only way to derail the thread is to actually discuss the Rollins video."

Thank you, and good night!
posted by birdhaus at 6:05 PM on December 14, 2006


WWHRD?

Probably flex his neck muscles and the do another Mac ad.

"What's on your mac?
A list of people I'm cooler than."
posted by jonmc at 6:10 PM on December 14, 2006


Well...he's not wrong in the video...I greatly prefer the Judge Dread version. If you don't watch it, your dead. Dead to me anyway. (And do you know who I am, man? I'm fucking Smedleyman. I'm a headliner, baby. I've played every blog in this part of the country and for top dollar too!)

"Once, while in Scandinavia, I saw Henry Rollins eating breakfast."

Get over there against the wall Britischer pig, you're going to die!
No, no, nein, I was not head of Gestapo at all...I make joke.
posted by Smedleyman at 6:15 PM on December 14, 2006


Hmmm...y’know tkchrist is much closer to California than I am.

Ok. So there was this time I got First Class vouchers down to LA. I was excited. I drug my self silly when I fly. Ah. Sweet Mr. Valium. And combined with first class flying... well, flying is fun again.

So I'm sitting there in that nice plush leather seat digging in my shaving kit for my vallium stash when this bulging dude plops down in the seat across the isle from me. I see the tats - the short dark cropped hair - I think hey I know this cat.

It's Henry Rollins. I won't say I'm a fan, but I always thought the guy was intriguing.

Mostly I was still distracted and excited about getting my valium on. I grab the Sky Steward. Yes. Sky Steward. And I ask him "Hey, man, can I get a Whiskey or something?" To chase my dear little nap-in-pill down. He says sure. I hear Rollins kind of "hurumph." Wha?

I think maybe I breeched etiquette getting service before the cabin celeb. So I smile at him and shrug. He looks "Maybe you should go to a meeting."

Huh? Oh. Shit. yeah. It's 8am. He thinks I am an alcoholic.

So I say. "No man. I don't usually drink. It's not like that... I need something to wash down my valium."

Um. That did'nt sound right.

Rollins looks at me in total disgust. "None of my biz, bro" he says.

Now. I'm kind of ashamed but getting, as is my way, predictably angry. Why I want the GODDAMNED VALIUM IN THE FIRST PLACE! So I can drift into semi-lucid uncounsciousness un-molested by people.

Any way. I say, like I actually need to explain myself to the guy, calmly "I don't fly well. So I try to make it a little altered mini-vacation."

He gives me the polite guy nod. He makes himself busy getting out all his business stuff. But I'm still kind of stewing.

About twenty minutes after take-off I say "hey, I have your poetry book. I got a favor?"

"You want me to sign it?"

"No. I want my money back."

He laughs.
posted by tkchrist at 6:17 PM on December 14, 2006 [11 favorites]


HEY ALL YOU JACKOFFS

IT CRACKS MY SHIT UP THAT MCJON THINKS I GIVE MANAGEMENT SEMINARS TO SEAGULLS. I HATE BIRDS AND I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT MANAGEMENT. I HAVE STUFFED NERDS IN LOCKERS THOUGH SO MAYBE YOU BETTER WATCH OUT HUH. YEAH I SNIFFED GLUE BUT THAT WAS ONLY TO STICK SOME DORK'S BALLS TO HIS UNDERWEAR.

I HAVE BEEN THROUGH A LOT IN MY LIFE. I HAD BEER CANS THROWN AT MY HEAD AND BOY THAT HURT. GETTING ALL THESE TATTOOES HURT A LOT TOO. I HAVE HAD FOUR NECK VEINS REPLACED, HAVE YOU.

YEAH KOOKOSHLITZ I YELL AT PEOPLE WHO GET TOO CLOSE TO ME WHEN I AM ON STAGE. WHAT YOU MAY NOT KNOW IS THAT THEY ALL SCORED LESS THAN 1400 ON THEIR SAT AND I DO NOT WANT PEOPLE LIKE THAT TO COME NEAR ME AND MAKE ME STUPID. I AM ELITE AND SMART AND LOOK DOWN ON PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT ELITE AND SMART SUPERMENSHEN LIKE ME.

I HAVE EATEN BREAKFAST IN SCANDANAVIA, YES.

I WILL WRAP UP BY SAYING THAT METAFILTER IS INTERESTING BUT I COULD BEAT IT UP IF I WANTED TO. I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT BONO.

ROLLINS
posted by HENRY ROLLINS at 6:25 PM on December 14, 2006 [36 favorites]


now he's worse than the wacky Christians he's railing against

that's going a little far.
posted by mrgrimm at 6:42 PM on December 14, 2006


He moves his hands too much.
posted by greasy_skillet at 6:44 PM on December 14, 2006


I've said it before, and I'll say it again:

Rollins/McKay '08
posted by Relay at 7:04 PM on December 14, 2006


and so another thread even tangentially related to music or musicians becomes a jonmc chip-on-the-shoulder fest. What the fuck. You're at the point where even parody of your shit comes off as nothing less than snobbery. Stop telling people what is and isn't punk, or rock, or cool or counter culture. You act like the world is out to condemn your music and tastes when the only person in here condemning anything is you.

Cue the response: Punk Rock is about condemnation.

Sure, when it's not about being condemned. The punk rock you carry like a flag is exactly what went wrong with punk. It's not the overachievers, it's the hypocrites who were too busy talking shit about other bands to make any more good music of their own. If you want to go around talking about how nobody does it like the ramones anymore, then you better realize that the ramones wouldn't fucking be in here acting the way you do. They had BETTER THINGS TO DO than constantly whine about how nothing's punk enough for them. Punk was always about precisely the kind of anger rollins demonstrates, and also about precisely the kind of celebration of the self, warts and all, that the ramones were sometimes known for. What it wasn't was an incessant and high pitched whine at all times. Whining about what punk is and what's punk is where punk went wrong, not black fucking flag.

Wasn't it one of the ramones who said "I don't know what everybody's talking about. A punk is the guy who gets assfucked in prison?"
posted by shmegegge at 7:19 PM on December 14, 2006 [6 favorites]


I met Peter Dinklage on Halloween a few years ago, the day after seeing "The Station Agent."

He was a pretty cool guy.

I didn't ask for his autograph, but if I had, he would've signed it real tiny like.

Seriously, what's more movie-star-dwarf than that?
posted by Navelgazer at 7:22 PM on December 14, 2006


fuck it. i just favorited MY OWN GOD DAMN COMMENT.
posted by shmegegge at 7:28 PM on December 14, 2006 [2 favorites]


They had BETTER THINGS TO DO than constantly whine about how nothing's punk enough for them.

Duh. That's what I've been trying to say this entire thread. It's the constant not-punk-enough posturing (and tedious activism) that Rollins and his ilk introduced that turned me off. Jesus H. Christ.
posted by jonmc at 7:31 PM on December 14, 2006


and if you must know, I'm really just drunk and bored. It's of no consequence. But it's funny that yet again, I'm accused of saying the exact opposite of what I was trying to say.
posted by jonmc at 7:33 PM on December 14, 2006


Everything every one of us says amounts to a hill of crap, fandango. Dosen't mean we can't have some fun with it.
posted by jonmc at 7:45 PM on December 14, 2006


There's nothing special about Henry. Plenty of rock stars get the "quit while you're ahead" thing wrong. Just ignore them and they'll go away.

Rollins' performance on Damaged speaks for itself, no matter what a cob he turned out to be. What made My War punk as fuck was how much of a middle finger it was to Black Flag's old audience (and everyone else in the world). Without My War, there would have been no Melvins. Without the Melvins, there would have been no Nirvana.

At the same time, without the Ramones, there would have been no Black Flag, so there you go.

...and punk is like love, art, or porn: hard to define but you know it when you see it.
posted by FreedomTickler at 7:54 PM on December 14, 2006


If my memory serves, Rollins has always been straight edge, even back when he was a rock star.

Lest we forget the time he moved in with Ginn's parents and ratted his bandmate out for smoking pot.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 8:19 PM on December 14, 2006


Punk is a used tampon, and jonmc sucks it.

Which is sooooo punk!

Except it's a stoopid conceptual tampon, soaked with stoopid conceptual gooey slimey blood! Which is, for low-budget-cinematic/ jonmc-masturbatory purposes, composed of Hershey's and Karo. Because -- wake up, jonmc! -- you're stuck on something that's long gone by.

So please please please, for the love of Christ on the cross, shut the fuck up about your fetish for authentic mediocrity. Please.
posted by vetiver at 8:42 PM on December 14, 2006


This thread is proof that net neutrality doesn't exist.
posted by birdhaus at 8:47 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


wake up, jonmc! -- you're stuck on something that's long gone by.

fine with me.
posted by jonmc at 8:54 PM on December 14, 2006


So please please please, for the love of Christ on the cross, shut the fuck up about your fetish for authentic mediocrity. Please.

And what about this? Really, you're long beyond tiresome.
posted by vetiver at 9:08 PM on December 14, 2006


Metafilter: Authentic Mediocrity™
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 9:17 PM on December 14, 2006


for my money, birdhaus wins at #167.

and for the record, Rollins fucking rules. For going on thirty years the man has maintained a constantly high level of integrity, intensity, and raw emotion that most of us will never even approach.
posted by ab3 at 9:24 PM on December 14, 2006


I just want to know if tkchrist got his money back. Seriously, people, that's a great story.
posted by jokeefe at 9:40 PM on December 14, 2006


Anyone notice that all of flarbuse's favorites are jonmc posts?

In this thread, yes, I noticed. It is odd and disturbing.

Also, the ROLLINS sockpuppet would have been funny if someone with the writing skills to actually sound a bit like Henry Rollins while they brought the comedy had dropped the 5. As it is, bit of a wasted opportunity.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 10:07 PM on December 14, 2006


YOUR FAVOURITE SOCKPUPPET SUCKS.
posted by gompa at 10:16 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


I went to a moshpit the other night and a Metafilter thread broke out.
posted by strangeleftydoublethink at 11:08 PM on December 14, 2006


And what about this? Really, you're long beyond tiresome.

What about it? Quoting yourself and bemoaning that someone didn't find your snark worth responding to is pretty much the epitome of tiresome.
posted by and hosted from Uranus at 11:12 PM on December 14, 2006


The first rule of punk rock is; you do not define punk ro... Oh shit.
posted by jouke at 11:28 PM on December 14, 2006


This thread was cooler 10 years ago.
posted by Uther Bentrazor at 11:38 PM on December 14, 2006 [1 favorite]


This thread was better before everyone else got into it.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 12:16 AM on December 15, 2006


Stop defining this thread! You're ruining it! Oh, look, there it goes. You've done ruined it.
posted by tehloki at 12:20 AM on December 15, 2006 [2 favorites]


Simply because there's a Talking Head doesnt mean what they saying is true or even remotely representative of objective facts.

When I have nothing to say, my lips are sealed.
Say something once, why say it again.

Psychokiller.
Qu'est-ce que c'est.
posted by sparkletone at 12:21 AM on December 15, 2006


You get up on your little twenty-one forty-two inch screen, and howl about America and democracy. There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and ITT Microsoft and A T and T and Dupont, Dow, Union Carbide Monsanto and Exxon. Those are the nations of the world today. What do you think the Russians Iranians talk about in their councils of state--Karl Marx Ali Shariarti? They pull out their linear programming charts, statistical decision theories and minimax solutions and compute the price-cost probabilities of their transactions and investments just like we do. We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies, Mr. Rollins. The world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable by-laws of business. The world is a business, Mr. Rollins! It has been since man crawled out of the slime, and our children, Mr. Rollins, will live to see that perfect world in which there is no war and famine, oppression and brutality--one vast and ecumenical holding company, for whom all men will work to serve a common profit, in which all men will hold a share of stock, all necessities provided, all anxieties tranquilized, all boredom amused. And I have chosen you to preach this evangel, Mr. Rollins.

Because you're on television, dummy.
posted by thecaddy at 12:27 AM on December 15, 2006 [2 favorites]


Well, as a fairly soused mefite myself I'll just throw a few more things in.

1) I'm a former punk in the same way I'm a former kid. Punk is all about youth, all about the rejection of the adult world with its rules and responsibilities. But, jonmc has this part wrong, punk isn't the rejection of rules and responsibilities in themselves, but a rejection of those who make and enforce them. Punk was a form of empowerment: a rejection, but also a creation of an ethic. What the ethic was, wasn't important, what was important was who created it and why.

2) Henry Rollins is an asshole, but he's doing what he thinks is right, and for that I respect him, asshole or not.

3) Mediocrity has nothing to do with punk. Anyone who thinks punk was nothing more than embracing their own powerlessness has got the whole thing wrong. To be punk is to rebel, to be a kid, to embrace youth and all its possibilities

4) Fuck Bono.

5) How many punk rockers does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

6) Three: One to get on the ladder, one to kick the ladder out from under him and one to say "That's sooo punk rock."

7) I wonder if jonmc is projecting his own feelings of powerlessness on those who actually are in the position to use power to follow through on their own ideals.

8) I forget what 8 was for

9) Punk is dead, long live punk

10) For EVERYTHING EVERYTHING EVERYTHING
posted by elwoodwiles at 12:38 AM on December 15, 2006 [8 favorites]


elwoodwiles has said what I would have said, if I'd been drinking, and therefore feeling a little less aging and a little more punk. He is wise.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:46 AM on December 15, 2006


sparkle tone: baa bap bap baaa bap bap bap bap baaa baaa yeah
posted by tehloki at 12:58 AM on December 15, 2006


Are we transcribing Ramones songs now? Here, I've already completed the guitar tabs:

chord chord chord chord chord chord
other chord
posted by Leather McWhip at 1:59 AM on December 15, 2006


Bono and the rest of his bandmates can all go fuck themselves with their exhortations for us all to ease the suffering of the Country Du Jour while they take advantage of tax loopholes to avoid paying the taxes that fund the programs they claim to support, loopholes which only people of their great wealth can afford to find.

Was that just an extended lecture out of your ass, or you have something to back that up other than "that's what rich people do, duh"?
posted by dreamsign at 4:05 AM on December 15, 2006


Oh, and

run run run run run, run awaaaaaay oooooooh oh oh
posted by dreamsign at 4:06 AM on December 15, 2006


One of many, many good parts in Michael Mann's film Heat is the scene when Al Pacino beats the hell out of Henry Rollins.
posted by Prospero at 5:29 AM on December 15, 2006


Ya know, this thread kinda turned out ok.
posted by and hosted from Uranus at 6:05 AM on December 15, 2006


So please please please, for the love of Christ on the cross, shut the fuck up about your fetish for authentic mediocrity. Please.

And what about this? Really, you're long beyond tiresome.


Oh, some anonymous chick on a website finds me tiresome. It breaks my fat old heart that you disapprove, vetiver, really. Whatever shall I do?

Simple answer: No. I will not STFU. I could say 'Hello' and some snarkmonkey would find a reason to object because it's tagged with my name, so I'm just gonna say what I really think whether anybody likes it, or even understands it, or not.

And if you despise me as much as you seem to, I don't even understand why you even care, cupcake.
posted by jonmc at 6:13 AM on December 15, 2006 [1 favorite]


Punk cupcakes.
posted by and hosted from Uranus at 7:38 AM on December 15, 2006


When I die, I want my corpse to be crushed into an infinitely small singularity, a black hole that will violate the laws of time and space as we know them. Because not even G.G. Allen defied the laws of physics, and what could be more punk rock than that?
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:14 AM on December 15, 2006


Mediocre powerless losers are what most of the population is, like it or not. I merely accept that I'm one of them. And there's a certain freedom in that. A certain lack of presssure.
posted by jonmc


Underachiever and proud of it, eh jon?

elwoodwiles has it right: Mediocrity has nothing to do with punk. Anyone who thinks punk was nothing more than embracing their own powerlessness has got the whole thing wrong. To be punk is to rebel, to be a kid, to embrace youth and all its possibilities

jon, do you really think The Ramones worked any less hard than Henry Rollins? Johnny Ramone was a driven A-Type Personality who forced the band to tour nonstop and refused to let them change their hairstyles because it would alter the carefully-constructed image of the Ramones brand.
posted by Fuzzy Monster at 8:33 AM on December 15, 2006


jon, do you really think The Ramones worked any less hard than Henry Rollins?

In terms of physical labor, no. I nterms of ambition, yes. They were content to stay the same old Ramones rather than try and remake the world. It's one thing among many that I like about them.

Underachiever and proud of it, eh jon?

Damn straight.
posted by jonmc at 8:40 AM on December 15, 2006


*pokes raging cartoonish clowd that is this horrible punk discussion with a stick*

Are you guys almost done? We kinda wanted to talk about free speech and the internet.
posted by tehloki at 8:46 AM on December 15, 2006 [1 favorite]


Stand by, tehloki. Just a little bit more...

They were content to stay the same old Ramones

Johnny forced them to stay the same old Ramones. When the others didn't like it, they were replaced.

Johnny was a driven, hardworking authoritarian Type-A personality: just like Rollins.
posted by Fuzzy Monster at 9:01 AM on December 15, 2006


At least we are still free to talk about past countercultural movements while using excessive profanity, I guess. Hooray free interblogotubesphereweb!
posted by tehloki at 9:27 AM on December 15, 2006


Punk: mediocre, unchanging, powerless and content with the status quo? Sounds boring. And it doesn't sound like most of the punk rock I've listened to. And part of the reason almost no-one listened to or gave a shit about most of the music the Ramones released after, say, 1986 (I'll be generous and give them "Bonzo Goes To Bitburg") is precisely because they were "content to stay the same old Ramones", year after year, tour after formulaic tour, album after formulaic album, just like any other oldies group working the state fair circuit.
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:53 AM on December 15, 2006 [2 favorites]


Johnny was a driven, hardworking authoritarian Type-A personality: just like Rollins.

This shouldn't be a surprise to anyone that's ever been in a band, or been around them. This certainly goes for all of your favorite rock stars regardless of how technically proficient you think they are as musicians. This was as famously true for Paul Westerberg in how he led his sloppy drunken bar band was it was for Kurt Cobain. As much as Kurt had a reknowned reputation for being a sensitive, mopey and indifferent. In the rehearsal space, he was a monster. He shaped the musical vision of that band.

At any rate, can you guys get drunk again tonight and start this whole argument over again? I enjoyed this thread to an absurd degree last night and this morning.
posted by psmealey at 10:54 AM on December 15, 2006 [1 favorite]


More drunk, less punk.

I like my punk bands to "keep it real". They have to be dirt poor, all live together in a run down house in the ghetto, wear the same clothes for a week at a time, throw drunken parties where fights break out, and not know anything about music beyond 4 chords and thrash strumming. Oh, and the drummer has to only know 3 breaks and the cymbals have to be louder than the singer so I don't know what he's screaming into the microphone about, since, well, it's all unintelligable childish whining about being too punk rock.

Oh, wait, that was those 10 years in Richmond at the punk bar. I think I'm over that now.

Instead I'm just going to go to the Double Down.
posted by daq at 12:00 PM on December 15, 2006 [1 favorite]


I love the way jonmc keeps insisting he's "punk rock" and "embracing his mediocrity" from his computer desk at his salaried job.

extremely low salary. I'm a clerk. I was actually laid off six months ago, but they keep pushing the date forward and won't let us leave. I mostly pretend to work at this point, actually.
posted by jonmc at 1:01 PM on December 15, 2006


please don't feed the troll anymore, folks. to quote the man himself:

That's why I love bursting the balloons of the people there who get all worked up over some issue, like they're actually doing something instead of just shooting their mouths off.
posted by shmegegge at 1:13 PM on December 15, 2006


If pretending to work at your low-paid job while posting on MetaFilter is punk rock, jonmc is...well, it doesn't get any punker than that.
posted by you just lost the game at 1:14 PM on December 15, 2006


you have something to back that up other than "that's what rich people do, duh"?

Bono, tax dodger: Labour Party finance spokesperson Joan Bruton. "Having listened to Bono on the necessity for the Irish government to give more money to Ireland Aid ... I'm surprised that U2 are not prepared to contribute to the exchequer on a fair basis along with the bulk of Irish taxpayers."

Ireland's finance minister announced a ceiling of $319,000 on tax-free incomes, and six months after that, U2 opened its Amsterdam office. The relocation of U2's music publishing will halve taxes on the band's songwriting royalties ... David "the Edge" Evans, said, "Of course we're trying to be tax-efficient. Who doesn't want to be tax-efficient?'"

Those rebels The Rolling Stones are also based in a tax haven in the Netherlands. The former article mentions that It emerged last month that over the past 20 years, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Charie Watts have paid just 1.6% tax on earnings of £242 million. Under Dutch law, there is no direct tax on royalties.

Mick Jagger isn't hectoring me to fork out more cash for foreign aid.
posted by meehawl at 1:40 PM on December 15, 2006


Y'all are depressing me. I've learned some stuff about myself today:

1. I'm an overachiever like Henry Rollins, and that's baaaaad

2. My first two book titles shouldn't have invoked Riot Grrl, 'cause that's also baaaaad... everything should stay the same forever, just like the Ramones, and nothing should ever change or be inspired by anything or whatevs... and the fact that I was inspired by Riot Grrl to make my living with DIY stuff (as opposed to DIY music) -- well, I'm just not cool enough, am I?

3. At this point I'll never get to do my "Tom Waits and Henry Rollins have a talk show. Hilarity ensues." comic book because clearly, no one in the whole entire universe likes Rollins.

(: sarcasmfilter off)

Damn it, I like Henry Rollins! I like his spoken word (the "when you get dumped" thing which involves dressing up like Ronnie James Dio / his Tom Waits ambulance story / his love of Ween), I like his books, I like the books he puts out at 2.13.61 (NICK CAVE. End of story)... And I like that he's at least making an effort to educate about net neutrality.

Why the hate, man? Why the hate? Jonmc, you crack me up on a regular basis, but damn... this thread's bumming me out something fierce.
posted by bitter-girl.com at 2:32 PM on December 15, 2006 [1 favorite]


I'm not claiming to know the exact moment punk ceased to exist, but the mock defining of "that's soooo punk rock" can trace its death to this thread.

Say it with sunken eyes: that's soooo passé.
posted by Leather McWhip at 2:54 PM on December 15, 2006



I love the way jonmc keeps insisting he's "punk rock" and "embracing his mediocrity" from his computer desk at his salaried job.

extremely low salary. I'm a clerk. I was actually laid off six months ago, but they keep pushing the date forward and won't let us leave. I mostly pretend to work at this point, actually.


So, the more of a loser you are, the more you rock?

I am a fucking god.
posted by IronLizard at 2:56 PM on December 15, 2006


man, george bush is so punk rock
posted by tehloki at 3:23 PM on December 15, 2006


I just want to know if tkchrist got his money back. Seriously, people, that's a great story.

Well. You know. I did not.

I know Rollins and I talked a bit more but I don't remember because I was moon-walking through the fog of valium and booze.

That. And I didn't REALLY own his book. Funny, huh?

I was trying to start something. But he just laughed. He's smart and experienced enough to know when he's being baited. And then I got all high and happy and fell in love with him. And everybody else on that flight.

Though I got a bizarre coincidence story:

I HATE to waste this story on a dead end thread (so I may repeat it), a couple of weeks later a the mother of good friend of mine— who is somewhat well known Feminist writer and lecturer— ended up on the SAME flight next Rollins (he must go back and forth regularly or something) and THEY got to talking and exchanged books. If anything he is sincere, completly.

She gave him her book about rape or whatever and he gave her his Poetry.

I guess he sat there leaning on the arm rest, like a giddy kid waiting for a haircut, and wanted her to read it and then give him honest feedback there on the flight. But she knew better.

I bet a million dollars he read her book when he got home.

When we ran into her at her lecture here in Seattle... she gave me ME his book! "Here" She said. "I met this interesting fellow on the plane... It's poetry. I surmise He likes to lift weights."

How about THAT.
posted by tkchrist at 3:33 PM on December 15, 2006 [5 favorites]


tkchrist, I just fell in love with you all over again.

As per usual, please don't tell my boyfriend.
posted by bitter-girl.com at 3:43 PM on December 15, 2006


shouldn't you identify the source of your quote, there, thecaddy?

if i didn't know any better, i'd say your unattributed meanderings were as articulate as paddy chayefsky.
posted by Hat Maui at 4:19 PM on December 15, 2006


... punk isn't the rejection of rules and responsibilities in themselves, but a rejection of those who make and enforce them. Punk was a form of empowerment: a rejection, but also a creation of an ethic. What the ethic was, wasn't important, what was important was who created it and why.

This bears repeating. The punk DIY stuff would not have happened if punk were about not accomplishing anything.
posted by brundlefly at 4:28 PM on December 15, 2006


if i didn't know any better, i'd say your unattributed meanderings were as articulate as paddy chayefsky.

I'm so punk rock, I don't even properly cite shit.
posted by thecaddy at 7:01 PM on December 15, 2006


“I grab the Sky Steward.”
WTF!?!?Sky Steward!?!?!
“Yes. Sky Steward.”
Oh, ok.

Metafilter: Yea, we got $5 bucks from HENRY ROLLINS

Metafilter: i just favorited MY OWN GOD DAMN COMMENT

Metafilter: Everything every one of us says amounts to a hill of crap

...I wonder if Rollins likes Bukowski.
posted by Smedleyman at 7:18 PM on December 15, 2006


(I also wonder if he ironically eats those candy bars)
posted by Smedleyman at 7:19 PM on December 15, 2006


anodyne, superficial arguments

Go check FCC internet regulations on private carriers.

He's on top of it.
posted by pwedza at 8:56 PM on December 15, 2006


Yes, but according to jonmc, if you excel at being a loser, you're no longer punk rock. So you have to be mediocre at being a loser.

See this shit? I can't even win at losing.
posted by IronLizard at 11:54 PM on December 15, 2006


man, george bush is so punk rock

Wow! That should have buried this thread right there!

Seriously, what I learned from posting this thread is:

Punk rock is about being a lazy, glue huffing nerd (which is what my dad thought I was when I was 15),

Henry Rollins must fly an awful lot,

And no one gives a shit about net neutrality or freedom of speech.

Did I miss anything?
posted by birdhaus at 2:27 PM on December 16, 2006


I’ve never listened to Rollins’ music, but he does some of the best stand up comedy (he calls it ‘spoken word’ since apparently over in the US articulate, smart people doing stand up isn’t routine?) I’ve ever seen. I have time for him just because of that.
posted by Aidan Kehoe at 1:45 AM on December 20, 2006


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