#44 The Gun Club - Death Party

Sympathy Records, 2004 (reissue - original Animal Records, 1983)

Genre: Alternative, Gothic Folk Punk

I chose this one special tonight. Technically it's out of order, because I have listened to other records that I still need to update on, but I wanted to write about this one in real time.

Listening to this record tonight is scratching multiple itches. I'm feeling really anxious about going back to in person learning tomorrow (on a cart, no less) amid the madness of omicron outbreak, so there is an element of macabre humour in listening to "Death Party". On a more practical level, though, I find this record soothing. It reminds me of departed friends---outsiders who lived large and didn't blend in, but with whom I resonated on a spiritual level. Thinking of them, I feel reinforced, like I can handle anything. I am reminded that life is strange and absurd, and we all find our way to some end or other, so we might as well move with poetry and act with grace.

I don't mean to be dramatic---I recognize that it is highly unlikely that contracting omicron will be my end; but there is something so final in being told by my employer that I must go, and that I will be infected. After two years of avoiding getting sick, I'm being mandated to attend what is essentially a chicken pox party. It's so bizarre.

Since I really have no other recourse, I might as well spin one of my favourite records, have a whiskey, and gather the spirit that's fueled me through other hard and strange days.

Sláinte.

Comments

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