It occurs to me that I have not linked to Conrad Zero for a while.

It’s not that he hasn’t had anything worth linking to.  After all, I enjoyed his entry entitled “No, I never Slept with Diablo Cody” enough to comment on it.

It’s probably mostly because I am mortified that I am sometimes described as “the first fan of Jagged Spiral who is not married to them or related by blood”.  Yet I have not been to a single solitary one of their live performances.

Ever.

Mostly because they keep having them on nights when I have to work, and my husband is out of town, and I’m tired afterwards, and someone has to go home and make sure the kids are still alive and check their homework, and get to bed early enough to wake up at 5:30 AM make them a hot breakfast and get them to school on time.

You would think I’d be able to excuse myself with the above reasons, but I can’t.  What kind of “first fan of the band to DEFINE the genre of northern gothic epic rock” begs off because she has to check homework, she’s too tired, and she has to get up early?

But I finally have to admit it.  I’m a fraud.  Don’t get me wrong, I like their music a lot, and I find their personalities and personal details very fun and compelling, but those are just the beginnings of fandom.

Fan is short for “fanatic”, after all – and a “fanatic” would make it out to a bar on a weeknight and leave the kids a bottle of Jack Daniels and a book of matches to amuse themselves with for another couple of hours.

I DID vote for them numerous times on “Rock the Dash” (and you can too.  The Band is Jagged Spiral.  The songs are "Let it out" and "Not Enough Bullets" You can vote once per day).

But I’m afraid it’s too little too late.

Well, there.  Now THAT’s out of the way.  I feel a great sense of relief, and though it was difficult to come to terms with it, I think my energy that was previously directed toward denial will be more useful in overcoming my enduring sense of shame and loss.

And I think I can begin to link to Conrad again from time-to-time.  Now seems like a good time.

Conrad has re-defined his war on emo.  He now defines it as a war on emo music, not a war on emo kids.  Because having a war on emo kids would be lame…and he’s right, of course.

But as someone who has passed difficult passages of time sustained only by The Cure and (naturally)  Gary Newman, I really feel that I must speak up in defense of Emo (and yes, Screamo) music.

I’m reminded of a prim little English teacher who once pontificated that vulgarity was the last refuge of the illiterate.  In other words, if you couldn’t find words to express yourself appropriately, you resorted to vulgarity.  I didn’t raise my hand an point out that there were, in fact situations for which there WAS no appropriate vocabulary except vulgarity.  Mostly because I wanted to nip out for a smoke on a pilfered bathroom pass, and figured that calling attention to myself would be strategically counter-productive.

But I have long since stopped smoking, and Conrad can’t send me to the principal’s office, so I’d like to just raise my hand here and say that there are some days where you just can’t find a better way of expressing your feelings than to flop onto the couch and play a ten-minute spot of Bright Eyes…or slip on the gloves and work the heavy bag to a half album of Lincoln Park.

It might not be the best choice, or the socially acceptable choice, but sometimes it’s just plain the only music that does the job.