Breaking Old Ground

Man, it hit me hard last night.  I went to the new House of Blues on Lansdowne Street to see Bloc Party. Before the show we’d been talking about the music scene in Boston, and how it’s changed.  Someone mentioned Mama Kin, Aerosmith’s old Lansdowne Street club that I used to go to in college.  And of course the House of Blues is built on the spot that used to be Avalon and Axis and many more longtime Boston music venues before them.

I guess I’ve been in Boston for a long time, but I rarely stop to think about it.  Going to college here in the mid-nineties, all I did was go to shows around town.  All these old clubs.  A lot of them still there, some of them now the House of Blues.

Standing at the Bloc Party show got me thinking.  The kids down in front jumping up and down to the music; college sophomores that’ll hop on the T after the show and go back to their dorms.  Those kids used to be me.  That’s a fairly generic and clichéd thought—but not one that I have very often.  The thing that fucked with me is that I was those kids when I was in college, and that was a long time ago at this point.  Going on fifteen years ago, my god.

The funny thing is, that period of my life—all that time I spent bouncing around clubs in Boston—lead pretty directly to where I am now.  I met people through that scene that ultimately lead to me getting a job in the music industry.  A job that I still have.  I’ve been at this gig for the better part of a decade at this point, which I guess is no small feat given the insane changes the industry has gone through during that time.  I mean right now, in 2009, it’s hard to imagine the iTunes Music Store not existing.  It’s downright insane to remember the fact that the iPod didn’t even exist when I started this job.

It’s also crazy to realize that the kids jumping up and down in the front rows of the Bloc Party show were maybe 12 years old when I started this job, because it doesn’t feel like that long ago.  And I don’t feel that different.

Fifteen odd years is a good chunk of time, especially when it’s from your late teens to your early thirties. Don’t get me wrong, this is no “oh to be young again” lament.  I like right where I am.  I’ve been lucky. I’m still going to the same clubs and walking down the same streets—except now I’m trying to remember where I parked the car and wondering if I’ll make it to the encore, instead of trying to remember what time the last train leaves.