2B — Thursday, October 20, 2016
the b-side
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
EMI
We’re gonna build a wall and Pink Floyd is gonna pay for it.
Ten prominent rectangular
windows,
often
coupled
in twos or threes; a single,
decorative glass eye in the
center; two protruding columns
announcing the porch; yes,
yes indeed, this is, objectively
speaking, relatively horrifying.
I will give Wes Craven that.
Choosing this house, as opposed
to the swaths of other stately
suburban homes all lined along
Lincoln Avenue, was by and
large the right choice. (Whether
other such artistic choices in
“Scream 4” were equally as
potent is up for debate, and by
debate I mean general critical
consensus would have us to
believe that the lion’s share of
other choices he made were, on
the whole, a failure).
Given
the
calendar
date,
the increasingly glum faces of
people on the street, and the
faint Wilhelm scream my bank
account makes at the sight of
Espresso Royale, it’s safe to
assume that Fall is here, and
so, therefore, is Halloween. A
controversial holiday, perhaps
— less so for the satanic under-
tones and more so for the inevi-
table rifts among parents and
children which will arise when,
you know what I heard, Tommy
and Cathy next door are trick-
or-treating for UNICEF, now
isn’t that great? What wonder-
ful children they are, truly. How
giving, how selfless. Now kids,
wouldn’t you want to be that
selfless? No, mom, I don’t, I just
want my damn Now-and-Laters.
The predictable destruction
of the nuclear family aside, Hal-
loween is a great holiday. It’s the
only one which seems to rec-
ognize that even when we say
we don’t, everyone loves to be
afraid. It’s primal, and now that
we’ve decided as a society that
living fully clothed and hav-
ing our food served to us on an
Ikea plate is preferable to hunt-
ing down wildebeests, we need
some of that primal feeling in
our meek, weak lives.
So in celebration of the holi-
day, I decided that I needed to
experience some of my own
primal fear. Not just some con-
trived sound effects and fake
screams — some real, instinc-
tual,
out-in-the-actual-world
fear. For those who don’t know,
or really even care, parts of
“Scream 4” were filmed in our
very own Ann Arbor. Figuring
that a horror director would
know where to find some fear, I
paid a visit to that filming loca-
tion along Lincoln Avenue (I
won’t divulge the exact address
out of concern that some creep
would walk all the way out there
for the sole purpose of staring at
the setting of a fictional hor-
ror movie, which is just a house
that real people live in, so stop
staring at their home, creeps).
But realizing that staring at an
unknowing family’s home for
an inordinate amount of time
would probably lead to some
uncomfortable interaction with
the Ann Arbor Police Depart-
ment, I quickly realized I need-
ed a new plan.
How else could I experience
that real, primal fear? Accord-
ing to World Star Hip Hop, my
most trusted news source ever
since the New York Times start-
ed to cause me visceral, physi-
cal reactions, Killer Clowns
are having a bit of a field day.
They’ve been sighted by schools,
outside homes and in those
creepy woods your mom told
you not to go to, so I set out to
see if I could coax one of these
fiends to come give me a good
old fight-or-flight response to
really get the heart pumping.
Always concerned with aes-
thetics, I needed everything to
be perfect for this hypotheti-
cal Killer Clown interaction. I
imagine Elliot Smith is playing
in the headphones of someone
who gets jumped by a murder-
ous, Halloween-inspired mad-
man — he’s sparse enough so
that the details of such an event
can be heard as clearly as they
need to be (not too clearly, but at
least with some sense of clarity)
and melancholy enough that the
aesthetic of the event wouldn’t
be too generally disturbed by
the music playing in the vic-
tim’s headphones. Elliot Smith
it was. Everything else seemed
to check out: alone, occasionally
sad-looking Jewish kid whose
hair looked really good this eve-
ning just in case he was in for an
attack.
I reach the nearest park — the
first place where I assumed I
could find some Killer Clowns.
Looking
around,
I
don’t,
unfortunately,
immediately
see any, so I do some walking,
hunting for a good killing. Alas,
they don’t seem to be here on
this particular Tuesday night,
so I move on, though I did
find a bunch of hooligan high
schoolers all hanging around
a
playground,
which
was,
obviously, just as horrifying.
I decide I need to put myself
into the oversized red Converse
shoes of a Killer Clown — really
try understand their psyche.
If I was a Killer Clown, what
would I like? Homicide, clearly,
but also, perhaps, a bit of fun.
Where could I find such a thing
in this godforsaken town? I’d
once heard that Pinball Pete’s
was a provider for the swaths
of angsty high schoolers and
the
even
larger
swaths
of
angsty Metal Frat members, so
I decided to change my course
and give it a try.
“You’re
a
winner! You’re
a winner! You’re a winner!”
Jesus Christ, this is horrifying
— perfect. I’m attacked by
stimuli on every end, and in
every sense. There’s a chorus of
jingles, coins, and an awkward
teen couple trying to figure
out intimacy in a corner. But I
hone in my focus: I must find
a clown. No, not ill-prepared
GSIs, or everyone who has ever
lived in or interacted with East
Quad — a Killer Clown. Focus,
focus. Besides the increasingly
uncomfortable teen couple, I
don’t find anyone who fits the
bill. I consider asking the bored
looking,
scraggly-bearded
man behind the prize counter
for some tips, but I haven’t
interacted with another human
in at least an hour, and I couldn’t
ruin that now. I move on.
I become all too aware as
I walk down the street that
everyone seems to be staring at
me. Or is it that I’m just staring
at them, actually being aware
of my surroundings? It’s hard
to tell. Either way, people are
looking at me, and it’s definitely
fulfilling
the
goal
of
the
escapade, which was to become
so frightened that I’m rendered
immobile. But that causes more
staring, so I figure I ought to
just keep going.
Completely consumed by this
discovery — but it’s OK, because
my hair looked good anyways
— I realize that I somehow
have ended up in the Diag. Who
knew? I seem to be running
into every kind of clown but
the one I’m after (killer), but
since I’m here, I figure I might
as well give it the college try
and do some perusing. Again, I
don’t see a six-foot tall sharp-
toothed knife-wielding clown
like I was hoping. I begin to
wonder whether this whole
clown business isn’t going to
materialize; if, just this once,
the internet lied to me.
But all isn’t lost in the realm
of crippling fear. I’m beginning
to see the happenings around
me with a newfound sheer
terror. A girl walks by, turns
angrily
to
her
friend
and
complains, “literally his only
hobby is smoking weed with his
idiot friends.” Which is more
terrifying: that this girl just
doesn’t seem to understand the
sacredness of male bonding, or
that male bonding does seem
to generally and innately have
staunch undertones of laziness
to it? Existentially, I’m in crisis
mode. My hands are shaking.
I can’t keep stopping in the
middle of the street, dammit.
When I finally gather myself,
I start to pass the all-female
dormitories by the Union. What
goes on in there I don’t know,
but whatever it is I’m sure it
would make me shudder. Group
chants? The burning of phallic
symbols? Satanic rituals? Hell,
I’m already shuddering (and
enjoying it of course). And
there’s a couple holding hands
— I’m not sure I’m going to keep
it together. I’m wonderfully
distraught, horrified. Don’t they
know that love was invented by
Hallmark? Why didn’t she have
the sense to make him change
out of that ill-fitting letter
jacket? Doesn’t he understand
that when they’re not together
she sits around a table at
Aventura while all her friends
try to convince her that he’s
no good? That literally his only
hobby is smoking weed with
his idiot friends? That she can’t
keep pretending to be a Raiders
fan just to make him happy?
Don’t they get it?
I’ve
practically
completed
my walk by this time. I almost
get run over by a Jeep Grand
Cherokee, which amounts to
be the least interesting part of
the evening. No Killer Clowns
were found, but I did manage to
scare the shit out of myself more
than a few times, so I’d rank it
to be one of my more successful
Tuesday nights.
It turns out that you don’t
need a contrived new click-
bait phenomenon to celebrate
Halloween the right way —
just some time with your own
thoughts.
FEAR
From Page 1A
In my room, there is a colos-
sal poster that encompasses the
entirety of one wall. Printed
over a brick wall background,
it consists of every single song
(and the corresponding lyrics)
from Pink Floyd’s The Wall
album. The poster came with
a corresponding record, which
was given to me for my 18th
birthday by my mother. She
winked handing me the record
and the poster over my celebra-
tory dinner, and while the rest
of my family members did not
understand why I clutched both
items so reverently, I knew my
mother and I were both think-
ing back to the same memory:
The year is 2006, and my mom
had just picked me up from the
bane of my 4th grade existence
(violin lessons). We are driving
home. It is a gorgeous fall day,
and sunlight is filtering through
the windows, striking the air
around me to gold. At a red light,
my mom abruptly changes the
“Top 40 Hits” (much to my
pre-teen dismay) that had been
playing on the radio to a song I
had never heard before: “Hey
You” by Pink Floyd.
The song was dark with a
cutting guitar baseline layered
with disturbing lyrics, and I
was confused as to why my gen-
tile mom seemed to genuinely
enjoy a song that contained the
line “and the worms ate into his
brain.”
I pulled my legs into the cra-
dle of my chest and rested my
head on my knees as I looked
over at my mom in the driv-
ers seat. The dreariness of the
song was completely at odds
with the brightness in the car
and the brightness in my mom’s
eyes. A soft, contemplative
smile played at the corner of
her mouth while she off-hand-
edly tapped her fingers on the
steering wheel in time to the
beat of the song.
I had never seen this side
of my mother before, which I
guess is what prompted me to
quickly reach over and grab her
free hand resting on the arm-
rest between us. She glanced
over and beamed at me, and
I remember in that moment I
was struck by how perfectly
connected we seemed to be;
I didn’t know why this song
was so important to her, or
even what the lyrics meant,
but I did know how, paradoxi-
cally, everything seemed to fit
so faultlessly together in that
sunlight-drowned car, on that
random fall afternoon.
That afternoon in the car
helped me realize how little I
actually knew about the woman
my mother had been before she
filled the placeholder of “mom”
in my life
— which subsequent-
ly prompted the choice to reli-
giously listen to only “Hey You”
for the next two months as a
way to both try and understand
the meaning of the song and
also to try and understand my
mother. That obsessive phase
ended when the image of worms
invading a man’s head outside
a desolate brick wall started
to make an appearance in my
nightmares. I deemed my hell-
bent mission unsuccessful, and
the inner workings of my moth-
er still remained shrouded in
obscurity. But I never really let
go of Pink Floyd completely.
My mother remained an
enigma to me. Growing up, she
seemed constantly composed,
untouched by her elusive past
half a world away. I didn’t know
many of her past experiences,
and while she was never cold
or aloof because of her poise,
I still hungered relentlessly
for more information; Sunday
afternoons were filled with
furtive glances into the pages
of old black and white photo
albums or sneaky escapades
into the depths of my mother’s
closet, fingers gliding over
old fur coats and polka dot-
ted skirts, always wonder-
ing what stories of my mother
these objects held. Because
while my mother is the warm-
est and most welcoming per-
son I know, she is also selfless
to a fault; selfless to the point
of never talking about her past
experiences because she never
deemed them important enough
to be brought to the forefront.
She was always ready to bring in
other family members, always
ready to put other people before
herself. That one afternoon in
fourth grade was one of the first
times I had seen her indisput-
ably put her interests and his-
tory in the spotlight, separate
from anybody else.
I listened to “Hey You” again
as a junior in high school, curi-
ous to see if the years that had
passed would help me solve
the riddle that was my mother.
While she still remained largely
unsolved, I did notice that my
interpretation of the lyrics had
shifted. When I was young-
er, I remained fixated on the
descriptions of grotesque death,
taking everything quite literally
and morbidly. However, as time
passed, I found myself looking
past the surface level bleakness
to the song’s underlining theme
of perseverance and yearning
for closeness that shone out
like light escaping from cracks
in a wall; a contradiction in all
aspects, this song seems to gain
strength from its own vulnera-
bility. I like to think my mother
does the same.
I recently called my mother,
desperately looking, like most
college kids, for yet another
piece of advice on apartment
living. Toward the end of our
conversation she did not hesi-
tate to inform me that Roger
Waters, an old member of Pink
Floyd, is stopping in Michigan
for his 2017 tour. My mother
still hasn’t told me exactly why
she has such a connection to
Pink Floyd, or even why to “Hey
You” in particular, but I’ve
found that my need-to-know
desire and wild daydreams
have significantly diminished
since the early days of fourth
grade. I do not need the entire-
ty of my mother’s memoir laid
out before me in order to under-
stand her. All I need is the
excitement in her voice mak-
ing the phone line between us
dance and leap as she tells me
about tickets on sale. All I need
is the fact that when I smile,
despite the miles between us, I
know she’s smiling too.
SHIMA SADAGHIYANI
Daily Arts Writer
‘Hey You’ helped navigate the labyrinth of familial love
What Pink Floyd’s ‘The Wall’ taught
me about my mother’s inner life
For a moment, Maggie
Rogers seems to be singing
just for herself. Meandering
through a field of knee-high
foliage, the singer is free of
inhibition and preying eyes.
She soon finds herself amidst
a sparse clearing, sprinkled
with slender trees and blan-
keted in freshly-cut grass.
It’s there that her movements
begin to mimic the music
— they are jumpy, slippery
and elegantly jagged. Rogers
flicks and twirls her wrists,
at the end of which are deli-
cately-pinched fingers. She is
now walking and moving with
purpose, juxtaposing the airy
nature of her voice.
But Roger’s isn’t left alone
for long. Following her
motions, three female back-
up dancers slide into view
and join her in her jaunting
strut. From there, the bodies
and energy start to multiply.
By the second chorus, the
clearing has transformed
into a multi-colored party
scene, filled with smoke,
smooching lovers and smil-
ing friends. This Technicolor
scene continues for the rest
of the video, giving audiences
glimpses into the seemingly
glamorous, young lives of
those dancing along to Rog-
er’s melodic, sweet voice. The
video ends just as it began
— with Rogers sauntering
alone through brushes and
brambles — linking her and
her music to all things free.
- CARLY SNIDER
MUSIC VIDEO REVIEW
A
“Alaska”
Maggie Rogers
MAGGIE ROGERS
Bruno Mars has sold 12
million albums worldwide
since 2010, won four Grammy
Awards and headlined the
Super Bowl. His clean-cut
persona and starry-eyed sing-
a-longs won him hearts far
and wide, old and young. Why
would he switch up his style?
Perhaps he was inspired by
the immense success of last
year’s collaboration with
Mark Ronson — “Uptown
Funk” — because on his new
single, “24K Magic,” he’s
seeking old-school coolness.
The song shares its title
with the Bruno Mars’
upcoming album and is an
electric arrival at a groovy
scene. Vibrant synths and
thick bass strums strike
like lightning as Mars
struts across their boogie
line with Prince-level
swagger, boasting upon his
arrival: “Pop pop, It’s show
time!” The second verse is
dedicated to “gangsters,
hustlers, bad bitches and
[their] ugly ass friends” in
an ironically explicit turn
for the usually-proper pop
star, but his energy makes
the lyrics’ intention clear:
this is a booty-shaking
anthem time warped from
the 1980s. Bruno Mars is
just playing the part, cuban
links, designer minks and
braggadocio included. The
world should forever be
grateful that he has decided
to do so.
- SALVATORE DIGIOIA
SINGLE REVIEW
A-
“24K Magic”
Bruno Mars
ATLANTIC RECORDS