![]() ![]() A cartoonishly broad smile took over my face. All I know is, my body and my mind (and my soul, perhaps?) reacted to the music. Maybe I experienced the equivalent of an ayahuasca journey. But I swear to you, on a stack of my precious Captain America comics, that I cannot explain what happened to me when that song started. The goal of putting these columns together is to use words skillfully to describe important moments in my life. This is going to sound like a complete cop-out, considering I'm passing myself off as a writer. Then that first chord of "What's The Frequency, Kenneth?" exploded out of the speakers. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, ready to be the patient friend. But boy, I was definitely bummed.īurt started the car. I was doing my best not to let on that I was bummed. As I climbed into the Montero's passenger seat, I was already dreading the next twenty minutes. Because that meant we were going to listen to it all the way back to the office. So there we were, Burt proudly presenting Monster. With a snobbish air straight out of High Fidelity, I turned away from R.E.M. To be honest, it annoyed the crap out of me. Despite it being their biggest hit, it did not click with me. But then "Losing My Religion" hit the airwaves. Years later "Stand" became the theme song for Chris Elliott's "Get A Life", so my love for the show also extended to the song. ![]() Eventually, when I was in college, I heard "Radio Free Europe", and I liked it, but it didn't really make an impact. I completely missed them when they first hit the scene, as my musical exposure was limited to whatever I heard on Top 40 radio. See, at that point in my life, I wasn't an R.E.M. And when he held up Monster, the new album from R.E.M. Because he'd found something better, a CD he'd been eager to get. I wanted to brag about my finds, but Burt didn't care. Success!Īfter about an hour of shopping, we reconvened at the register, and compared our swag. As I recall, this was the day I found an amazing Prince bootleg, and an imported Queen CD single I'd been looking for. We split up and scoured the racks, looking for things to add to our collections. So when we walked into the store, I was ready to do some serious digging. Just being away from my computer had already improved my mood. I dropped a lot of hard-earned money on the treasures I found nestled in their racks. We'd escape from the building and go there all the time. Burt found it one day, and after that the store became our secret getaway. BB's was a small, independent music store tucked into a tiny space in a local strip mall. ![]() And he said those four magic words that made everything better.Īh, BB's! BB's was our Mecca. Playing hooky with him was a blast.Īnd it came to pass that on one particularly work-sucky day in the fall of 1994, Burt appeared in my cubicle doorway. We'd drive forty miles to get free Violent Femmes tickets. We'd pile six guys in the Montero and go eat at the crappy Chinese buffet. So thanks to his adventurous nature, we began making "field trips" at least once a week. When he hit a wall, he'd have no qualms about jumping into his Mitsubishi Montero and hitting the road. God bless Burt and his rebellious spirit. No, you sneak out of the office for hours at a time, that's how you cope. By drinking heavily at your desk? Good idea! But. ![]() By talking to a sympathetic Human Resources manager about your concerns? Uh-uh. So when work is getting you down, how do you cope? By rolling up your sleeves and powering through the tough times? Nope. Throughout the company, things were tense. I actually had it easy compared to the team working on the billing engine we'd developed. Management was making some bone-headed moves (with many more to come), and those of us on the technical side were suffering from the fallout. Things at the company began to - pardon my French - suck. But unfortunately, the salad days didn't last. One of his co-workers told him there was a guy on the programming team that might take it off his hands. And Erasure was, to put it mildly, not his jam. He accidentally received an Erasure CD in a big Columbia Record Club order. Coincidentally, Burt and I met because of music. Things were really lining up for ol' Liz Lemon.Īnd I was lucky enough to be surrounded by a passel of new friends. ![]()
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