The Big Shiny Prison by Ryan Bartek - HTML preview

“Everything’s fucked. You might as well have fun before everything goes to shit and this

entire country’s a police state and we’re not even able to make music. Shit’s gonna suck really

bad really soon, so we might as well just be complete bums and drive around the country and do

what we love and hopefully people are hip to it. Merry Christmas, that’s what it’s all about.”  

“How long’ till that happens?”

“You tell me, you’re the conspiracy theorist…”

 

* * * * *

 

Just Neil and I, rolling back to his home in Hazel Park, not far from 11 Mile, and proud of it too.

Everyone else has departed, and as Mr. P parks his Escort, I open the passenger door, take three

steps, and collapse on the front lawn… 

I did it. Just sit -- breathe… It’s over, it’s done… The puppet with cut strings stretched

out for a brisk autumn chill, staring upwards at the bare tree appendages curling about the

Michigan blackness, brightly illuminated moon in the upper right corner of my vision… 

I’m just gonna sit here forever. Nothing, no possible convulsion, no terrorist attack or

zombie Armageddon can shake me from this hard-fought pinnacle of Zen… 

“Hey Bartek,” the voice calls from inside the house.

“…”

“Bartek.”

“Yeah.”

“Smackdown’s on.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 305

EPILOGUE

 

For the wide-ranging counterculture in all its splintered forms -- in every artistic, socio-political,

and common day life-&-love-&-career sense – here is the roadmap of the future: The best overall

city in America is Seattle. The best metropolitan environment is The Bay Area. The city with the

most potential for growth is Detroit. 

The two best locations for a serious touring band to base their operations on the West

Coast are divided between two regional hemispheres -- either Portland/Seattle in the Northwest,

or West Oakland, which is primely located smack-dab in the middle of California. The third

possible West Coast location is Los Angeles, particularly a low-ball satellite city thereof.

However, apart from the pristine climate and high-grade connections you will inevitably

make, SoCal is an altogether rancid stinker. I say this unrepentantly as my firm conviction --

alongside New York, Los Angeles is bar-none the worst city for a band attempting to relocate and

break it big. It’s a fairy tale – the greatest prank ever pulled -- and you will be eaten alive. It’s

only real usefulness is as a strategic tour-routing location for the hit-and-run band living like

gypsies out of a van & low-rent sympathizer safe houses.

The best relocation spot in the Southwest is a definite toss-up between Austin

(TX)/Albuquerque (NM). The finest Mid-Western area is Metropolitan Chicago (IL), Tampa (FL)

in the Deep South, and Denver (CO) in the Great Plains. The strongest East Coast colonization

target is somewhere wisely selected within the Tri-State area, not far from the stretch of NYC. In

this you have a handful of major cities -- Boston, Jersey City, Philadelphia, Rochester, etc. Which

of these is most desirable I cannot testify.

On an ironic note, the two best overall cities for a writer, artist, or filmmaker of any kind

are both New York and Los Angeles. Accumulating experience for convincing literature or

casting actors are one thing, sweating it out in dive bars and pay-to-play gigs a totally separate

realm… 

 

The best venue in the United States is the Theatre Bizarre (Detroit). The greatest punk hangouts

are the unholy trinity of Burt’s Tiki Lounge (ABQ), The Funhouse (Seattle), and the [now

defunct] 2500 Club (Detroit).

The milestone goth/industrial nightclub for pure dirgy, darkened filth is The Leland City

Club (Detroit), and the classiest is Mephisto’s Detroit (Hamtramck, MI). The best metal bar is

Duff’s Brooklyn (NYC). The scummiest, most dangerous, and greatest metal venue in the USA is

Harpo’s Concert Theatre (Detroit), which no good local band will ever open, but every amazing

crowd-drawing headliner will pack to the rafters. If you are a metal band of any sort and can’t

win over that crowd then throw in the towel, because you are worthless and stand no chance of

longevity. 

The best park in America is Golden Gate (San Francisco). The strongest record stores for

pure vinyl and the widest underground selection are Amoeba (Los Angeles), Amoeba (Hashbury,

Frisco), and Rock of Ages (Westland, MI). The highest-echelon annual marijuana “protest-ival”

is The Seattle Hempfest.

The comic book store that feels most like home is Green Brain (East Dearborn, MI). The

scummiest motel in the United States is Dr. Fun’s (Inkster, MI), open “25 hours a day, 8 days a

week,” and sells whip-its at the front counter. The greatest milk-shake in the world is the

Chocolate Blast from Baskin Robbins. The best coffee house is still The Zone in East Dearborn

(MI), and it closed down in 1997. The greatest breakfast burrito in the world is from Si Senor on

the corner of  48th & El Cajon Blvd, San Diego CA 92115.

 

 306

On a gross accumulation of $3,500 dollars I traveled through 35 states, lived on the streets of a

dozen major cities, spent roughly 606 hours on Greyhounds, traveled over 20,000 miles, recorded

two EP’s & a full-length LP, and somehow pulled off two spoken word tours… 

I lived amongst bums, mixed it with con men, drug dealers, strippers, skinheads and

prostitutes; panhandled with crusties, chilled with rock legends, movie stars, politicians,

intercontinental businessmen, and ‘In-House Exorcists’… 

Having analyzed society to a great extent amidst this voyage, my final opinion is that

there is no country. It’s the same piecemeal mosaic that exists in all political spectrums, that

identical Truman Show vibe I’d encountered as a Hollywood newbie. This is why I now relate a

long-dead and absurd catch phrase: “Il Duce Ha Sempre Ragione,” translated quite simply, “The

Duce is always right.” And he was, but not in any direct sense... 

During the course of this book I found myself reading lengthy studies about Fascist Italy

as a propaganda state. Mussolini was definitely an imposter, an actor, and a mountebank who

governed by press statement. He was not a good man, and anything but “the greatest statesman of

the 20th century.” Yet Benito understood propaganda… 

As the first modern political stage-actor, he’d built the entire Corporate State edifice on

the charismatic pizzazz of a huckster prank that was borne equally of desperation and media

manipulation. Fascism was an ambiguous political faith which stood for militant nationalism

above all, and was so loose in its application that it could mean anything to anyone. It was a

blanket-theory state socialism that promised a strong centralized government and to unite all of

the Italian people under a single banner.

Amazingly it did, at least until WWII. While that abstract Italy crumbled to ruin, all the

major catchphrases and images of the iron-hard state were found totally empty. In the end,

Mussolini was revealed to his countrymen as the sort of Wizard of Oz that he always was – just a

tired old man in a drained little body, a gruesome hangover from another era; a haunted,

powerless, Sawdust Caesar with no other course then absolute subservience to the gun Adolf had

long pressed against his head… 

Even though a “Duce” is a non-entity in the United States, the Wizard of Oz is still very

real. Ours is not a single individual, but rather a multi-headed hydra of Corporate CEO’s, CIA

puppet masters, Senators, Power Elite, and Pentagon Brass.

We’ve had it drilled into our skulls that America is this strong, indivisible Union guided

beneath an iron-eagle federal government which adheres to the declaration of independence as a

definitive moral compass -- FBI, CIA, MIB, Homeland Security, Coast Guard, National Guard,

Navy, Army, Marine Corp; local fire and policemen, teachers, principals, crossing guards, hall

monitors. The omniscience and uniformed omnipresence of the great Electric Eye... 

 

But that’s just not the case. It only exists on paper. America is essentially a propaganda state that

only takes its form by virtue of its population’s instinctive morality and sense of reality. True

democracy in the form which we pay lip service to only materializes when the people themselves

take the initiative.

Radicalism is generally a non-entity outside of major cities, and in average America the

backbone social-fabric mentality is that of those “this is my hometown forever” people who never

travel anywhere.

Take for instance The Bible Belt versus The Pacific Northwest, or Southern California

contra The East Coast -- totally different mainframes, massively different ethics both politically

and in the justice system. Where some poor schmucks like the West Memphis 3 would be burned

at the stakes as satanic, child-killing monsters in rural Tennessee, this would never happen in a

place like Seattle, where DNA evidence would be collected, sincere research would be

collaborated at all official levels, and the jury would view them simply as harmless weird kids in

metal t-shirts at the wrong place and the wrong time.

 307

The only real thing holding America together outside the vast apparatus of authority is

this social/cultural homogenization derived from television, radio, media, “national values,”

religion, and the infrequent backlash waves of patriotism that stem from disasters such as 911,

Pearl Harbor, or Hurricane Katrina. 

The USA is essentially a loosely connected mess of consumer-dependent Wal-Mart

tribes, and in many cases solidified only on terms of religion and patriotism, familial tradition, or

compulsory entertainment addiction. The iron-fisted nuts and bolts of the operation are the

universal fear of prison, domestic militarization, and the spin persuasion of public opinion in the

interest of mass crowd control.

What are we moving towards then, if the homogenization is ever actually completed?

Well, Manhattan of course -- a total meltdown of all cultures into one boiling pot, where no

answer is ever the answer, and there is no room for severe concern about how weird the guy next

door really is, and no real environment that would foster religious fundamentalism over the long

course of human history & evolution…  

 

Much in the same way that there is no true, unified form of nationalism within the context of

American sociology, the counterculture is just as entirely flimsy and malleable. Take for instance

black metal, which is but one subculture (splinter movement) within the greater design of the

overall counterculture (all subcultures combined as one mass entity). 

Although you can trace black metal’s origins to Venom and Bathory, the main context

assumed these days’ roots back to what happened in Norway. The music and imagery of

Mayhem/Burzum/Darkthrone/Immortal were transmitted worldwide, and have therefore become

the unavoidable bedrock of the foundation. That solid bedrock – devoid of any precise ideology

except that it was dark, extreme, and pro-heathen/anti-Christian -- became an “up-for-grabs”

manifestation that assumed its form by whatever personal impression its audience adjusted. 

Black metal then became (for lack of a better analogy) a sort of non-corporate

McDonalds franchise – international, with it’s own basic “menu,” but no direct rules on

implementing the menu, advertising, food preparation, store hours, etc. Something up for grabs

that could mean anything to anyone, and this is what creates the general disparity best

summarized between a character like Nihilist from In Memorium or Edwin from Kettle Cadaver.

Whereas Nihilist is the sort of open-minded, jovial guy addicted to dark art and heavy

music, you have an Armageddon-pursuing fanatic like Eddie – an Odinist ne plus ultra side-show

freak from hell. It is the same disparity evident in punk rock, whereas a Jello Biafra rests on one

side and a GG Allin resides on the other, line firmly drawn in the sand…

What it comes down to is being impressionable at an early age, what the music means to

you, and the people with whom you associate that ultimately colors your understanding of it. And

because there are so many people pushing for individuality at all costs, this creates the inability of

a coherent line. To have a coherent line would just create another uniform, and the deep-seated,

gut-propulsion to escape conformity is why the counterculture exists in the first place. 

 

So what is the solution? If a coherent line is unattainable, can there be any real continuity in the

underground? What masthead would have to be utilized to create a sort of quasi-nationalism?

And could it ever bridge over into a viable form of “Pan-Tribalism,” as in a sort of non-

hierarchical, apolitical, ambiguous socialism within the counterculture? 

My only answer is perhaps a universally shared code of respect. Brotherhood, utopia –

that’s just taking things too far. It failed in the 60’s, and flower-power radicalism is dead. All

hope in terms of underground unity today rests squarely upon the shoulders of respect for one

another’s own identity, a general emphasis on communication instead of competition, and a

repulsion for violent control over others. 

 308

We all got into this to get away from the bullies, the ones trying to control our lives and

tell us how to think, how to look, how to act. That’s where the emphasis should primarily lay, and

in order to harvest the grain you’ve got to cut the weeds…

 

* * * * *

 

2008 now, not all that far from the coming decade. Many people ask me, as a professional big-

shot journalist guy, my ultimate opinion of what the next big thing is in music, or in terms of the

counterculture. I honestly don’t have the slightest clue. It will remain as always I’d assume – a

deepening obsession with individuality at all costs, which will only create a higher

manufacturing-line procession of unique weirdoes and fanatic nut jobs that will inevitably create

more subcultural splinters through the cult of personality.