A Life of Music in Jackson

The club was dingy. It was dark, but it was a fun place to be; it was the place to go, if you were interested in making it big, as far as the local scene was concerned. The club played host to droves of teenagers from Jackson High School. They came either to play, watch, or chill.

The Basement (that was the name of the place) used to be a furniture showroom, back in the 60’s, and was big and airy. All over the walls there were posters for bands, some of which had been dead for twenty years. Then there were red Christmas lights strung throughout the place, and lots of couches and tables, though they were rather old. There was a disco ball too. The place had a real retro look, which was beast. Over by the bar you could predictably get something to drink…. Soda, that is. There were alcoholic drinks and stuff… but only people aged rightly could get them of course.

Another progressive metal band – My Black Soul is Dark - was just finishing a set. The vocalist’s grunts and squeals echoed through the room, and the guitars shrieked as their players exploited their righteous skills at sweep picking.

“Grunt, Grunt, Grunt, Scream!”

[Guitars scaled downward]

“Your blood feels good on my hands – Aiii!”

“Grunt…. Scream… Grunt… Gurgle….”

[Gratuitous use of splash cymbals]

The band finished, and began to dissemble their gear. Everybody clapped, and started talking. Most of the bands that came through here were progressive metal, nu-metal, or some kind of metal whatever they went by at the time. Jackson was a small rural town, which was directly west of the larger cities where a thriving music trade existed. Jackson was the kind of place where everybody liked pretty much anything that caught their ear. Though people here stuck to their favorite genre solidly, they made raids into other styles freely.

Aside from metal, there were a lot of country fans, a good deal of gangster rap fans, and of course the indefatigable fans of trendy pop music; these people especially enjoyed their share of High School Musical songs, Maroon Five, or James Blunt. That was fine though. It was all good there. People who favored classic rock though were in short supply. When I say that I mean to say that people who listened to it all the time, and didn’t just listen to a few songs when they came on at football games. The same went for punk; punk, as in real punk. The Sex Pistols, the Ramones, the Damned… they were generally unheard of by most.

There was a lot of revival punk going around, but it wasn’t quite the same.

The next band to go on was an apparently “Indie” band, Green Grapes. The lead singer wanted to name the band The New Yorkers, but the rest of the band persuaded him that it didn’t makes sense, since they’d never been to New York. They started to play, and their guitars chimed, the drums made modest beats, and the bass was unthreatening. It was very harmonious, to say the least.

“I like to kiss you

Just the way we used to.

I don’t like to miss you,

To reminisce.”

[sparse guitar, simple drums]

[trendy lyrics meant to imply a

supposed sense of individuality]

It may have been a far cry from the indie music that was the early 90’s product of 80’s bands who maintained independence from fads, but hey, it was catchy.

A cool place to be, all around. It wasn’t just high school either. There was the community college, where a lot of kids went, since they couldn’t afford the ridiculous costs of a university. The oldest person there was the owner, Mr. Zonferelli, who had in his day been a rockabilly fanatic; he never got on stage anymore but he knew a thing or two about the music business. He was tall and lanky, and had thick glasses. His hands were especially long and gnarled, like tree roots, and implied a mastery of the semi-hollow body. He originally acquired The Basement back in the 80’s, as an intended place for kids to come hang out. It transformed the town. Before The Basement, it was just another little Southern town, with nothing to do, and nothing to think about or talk about.

A generation or two later, and everyone talked about music. Nearly everyone in town between the ages of 14 and 24 was in a band, or played something, or regularly wrote. It was a great place to be. For all the creative energy going through the air though, there were some downsides; amongst them a breed of analytical criticism that was pervasive in all, and merciful toward none. Jim was around that night.