Prince

On April 22, 2016 By Luther M. SilerIn Music3 Comments

When the news dropped, last week, that Prince’s plane had made an emergency stop and he’d been rushed to the hospital, I said this:

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So I guess I have some work to do.

I bought two cassette tapes the first time I ever deliberately spent money on music. One of them I’m just a teeny bit ashamed of now; it was George Michael’s Faith.

The other one was Purple Rain. Now, if I’m being honest, Faith probably got more listens, and given my age when it came out, since this would have been just before hiphop colonized my young white suburban brain, Purple Rain didn’t get the attention it genuinely deserved. But it’s the truth: the first music I ever spent money on was Prince’s most famous album.

He didn’t really carve out his own space in my head until high school, when Diamonds and Pearls and came out. , in particular, is an album that I genuinely can’t imagine what high school would have been like without. There are only a couple of others that rise to that level– Dr. Dre’s The Chronic and, ridiculously, a Best of Monty Python collection that I only just recently got around to purchasing on MP3. So while most people think of the Revolution as Prince’s best backup band, for me personally the prime Prince years are the two New Power Generation albums.

I have prized memories of driving places with a car full of people, 7 blaring on the stereo, all of us singing our hearts out at the top of our lungs. The weird thing? I still can’t really tell you what the song’s actually about. That said, it was supposedly inspired by the book of Revelation, so who knows if Prince even really knew what the song is about.

My favorite Prince song is Gett Off, by the way.

Goddammit.

Thirty years ago today

On January 28, 2016January 28, 2016 By Luther M. SilerIn Uncategorized4 Comments

I was in fourth grade. This morning is one of my first real memories, and the prologue to Skylights is pure autobiography.

Rest in Peace: Ellison Onizuka, Christa McAuliffe, Greg Jarvis, Judy Resnick, Mike Smith, Cmdr. Dick Scobee, and Ron McNair.

#Bowie

On January 11, 2016January 11, 2016 By Luther M. SilerIn Music, Uncategorized4 Comments

Goddammit.

On July 31, 2015 By Luther M. SilerIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

I would not have expected that hearing about the death of Rowdy Roddy Piper would hit me quite this hard. But it has. I’m genuinely upset right now.

Is it too much to hope that he’s saying that to St. Peter right now?

Rest in peace

On May 15, 2015 By Luther M. SilerIn Music2 Comments

…knew it was coming, but that doesn’t make it any easier.

I don’t even think I have anything to say. I’m just gonna spend an hour or so before my wife and kid get home listening to music.

RIP, Leonard Nimoy

On February 27, 2015 By Luther M. SilerIn Stories5 Comments

There are many, many pictures of Mr. Nimoy being shared on the Internet at the moment; I would genuinely like to think I found the WTFiest of them all.

I’ll be honest: I would not, three days ago, have described myself as either a big Star Trek fan (although I’ve had my moments) or a big Spock/Nimoy fan. So I have a lot of trouble explaining why, when I found out this afternoon that he had passed, I had to shut my office door for a few minutes because I was struggling to hold back tears. You are a mean, nasty, vicious motherfucker, February, and I will quite glad to see the end of you.

Uncle.

On December 7, 2014 By Luther M. SilerIn Uncategorized10 Comments

Last weekend, a former student died in a car accident. He was 15. When I went to tell a co-worker who I thought had known him about it, he told me about a friend of his who had just the night before accidentally shot another friend of his, killing him, while cleaning a gun.

On Thursday, a former co-worker from my other job, a man who I’ve known for twenty years, passed away after a long illness. He leaves behind a college-age daughter and a high school-aged son.

On Friday, my boss’ father died.

And last night, the wife of a co-worker from my previous school was struck by a car as she was crossing the street after a family party. She passed away at the hospital. They had two young daughters; I don’t know if the girls were present when she was hit by the car.

That’s enough for now, universe.

Everybody, go hug your families. Right now.

My Robin Williams story

On August 11, 2014 By Luther M. SilerIn movies, Television7 Comments

mork_and_mindy_s3 I flat-out didn’t believe the news when I heard it, for the record. The Internet has killed Robin Williams more times than I can count over the past few years, at least once by suicide; the idea that the story might be right seemed incomprehensible, and I found out fast enough that any available confirmations were coming from places that I wouldn’t take seriously on their best day.

I was born in 1976. This means that Mork and Mindy was airing when I was practically larval; I don’t know if the show had any real life in syndication/reruns back then, but the episode I’m about to talk about came out when I was four. These are thirty year old memories, here; it’s kind of ridiculous that this story has stuck with me for this long.

I liked the show. Appealing to the sense of humor of a four-year-old isn’t terribly complicated, but Mork and Mindy managed it. Until (and I’ve looked this detail up; my memories aren’t that specific) the first episodes– an hour long premiere and a “part two”– of the third season, where– and I may be the only human being alive who can write these words and mean them– Mork and Mindy scared the overloving shit out of me.

You probably don’t remember– in those two episodes, the boss dudes on Ork decided that Mork was getting too human, and sent (amazingly, I remembered this title correctly) the Ancient Elder to Earth to straighten him out.

I don’t remember what they said about the Ancient Elder, other than he was, well… old. I do remember that I was terrified at what he was going to look like. I remember hiding my damn eyes when the egg floated into their apartment. Since it was a two-parter, I’m gonna guess the actual reveal that the Ancient Elder was, like, ten appeared in the second episode, and I feel like part of the reason this is so burned into my head 34 years later is that I spent the entire week in between the two episodes intermittently freaking out about it.

And then he was ten, and not actually ancient, because that’s how Mork and Mindy rolled, you dumbass little kid, and I can still remember feeling stupid about that, too.

Most of the Robin Williams stories you’re going to read over the next couple of days are not going to involve pants-shitting terror, I think. What can I say; I like to be different.

Oh. And I’ll have every word this dude said memorized until I die, too: