A few important lessons that I learned while watching Ted Leo & the Pharmacists play a set at Lee's Palace last night:
- As much as people have been preaching that rock music is dead for the last ten years, Ted Leo, with his new album The Hanged Man, is here to prove that the rumours of its demise have been greatly exaggerated. I firmly believe that any time a critic emerges to once again harp of rock falling out of the record chart, Ted Leo will pop and piss in that person's face. As part of my year-long "5 Songs and 5 Stories" plan, I've been thinking about if me writing guitar-based punks songs is really urgent at all. Ted Leo grabbed me by the shoulders, slapped my face and said "Write some friggin' riffs you jamoke."
- With how many terrible things are happening the world-over and how stupid mainstream media discourse about those things has gotten, I sometimes feel isolated because I think most people I meet don't feel the same way as me. It seems like most people aren't critical of what they read at all and mindless regurgitation of Facebook has now taken the place of being informed. Ted Leo, that beautiful leftist power-pop messenger, reminded me that I'm not alone out here.
- Life can be shitty sometimes. More often than not, it's work that gets me down because I feel like I'm too burnt out to do that the things that I enjoy and find fulfilling. Surprise, surprise, after I spend two weeks seeing bands that I love and doing things that I like, I find it easier to write and I feel more inspired. Enjoying your life isn't about blindly ignoring bad things to keep a positive attitude. It's crucial to remember all the shitty fucking things in the world to get the full picture. But we also have to appreciate the perfect things we get to experience, like Ted Leo playing for an hour and forty five minutes, and revel in them because they make it worth it to bear all the terrible things.
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