Punk Finally

I'm writing this from a new laptop because I returned from Barcelona after flying many long hours—still vaguely sick—to find that somebody had kicked in my back door and made off with my two laptops. As far as I can tell the laptops and a bucket of change was all they took (cost to Justin after deductible: $500). I've been burgled many times in the past so before I left, I made sure the place was locked up and weighed whether or not leaving my car parked out front would be a deterrent to a potential burglar. However, since somebody ran into my parked car one night last month (cost to Justin after deductible: $500), I was a little skittish about leaving it on the street unattended for a week. I guess I made the wrong choice. I can't say that I was all that surprised about being broken into yet again. I have accepted that the world is populated with self-interested assholes, so it's almost refreshing when one of these assholes fails to take the opportunity to rob me blind. It's a good day for me when I can come back from a ten day vacation and find that nobody decided that it was okay to come inside and take what they wanted because I wasn't around to tell them no. To be sure, this burglary could have been worse. This is, in fact, the second burglary in a row where I didn't lose any musical instruments, a welcome change from the previous three burglaries. Not losing any guitars was probably more the result of not being able to fit anything large back through the small hole the burglar created in the back door than it was anything approaching a conscience.

Now since I'm in a bad mood, I'll take the opportunity to trash a band. In this case, Austin's own Finally Punk. When going out to watch Melt Banana a couple weeks ago, I once again managed to catch both opening acts. This meant sitting through as much Finally Punk as I could stand. I'm not sure what the point of Finally Punk is, but as near as I can tell, they dress up in what they perceive as 80s outfits and play loud music, the most charitable description of which would be that it sounds wooden. These four girls rotate instruments and take turns singing songs about their boyfriends. I'm not looking to get into a protracted discussion about what is and is not punk, but to paraphrase Justice Potter Stewart, I know it when I see it. And Finally Punk are not it. If you wear legwarmers, you are not punk. If you define yourself in relation to your boyfriend, you are not punk. If you have your friend stand onstage videotaping your performance, you are not punk. A good rule of thumb when trying to determine whether or not you are punk would be to ask yourself, “Would Iggy Pop do this? Even the recently lame-ish Iggy Pop?” If the majority of your answers come up “no,” then you are not punk. Fortunately, I didn't have to stand through the entire Not Quite Punk set, since this was Emo's and there was an inside stage, where I was able to watch a lovely metal band who could actually handle their instruments competently. Bless you metal band, whoever you were.