Rock This

"One half of me is a proud escapee from the science of life. I cut loose from the George Strait jacket. I am physically incapable of blushing. I am not subject to linear thought. I think in poetry. I prefer the backseat to shotgun. I apologize to insects before I kill their asses. I cannot swim, nor do I feel the need to learn.

The Other half of me falls victim to the typical urges, hopes, and dreams of the humanoids. I want to be rich. I want to be big and famous. And above all, I want to love and be loved. In these ways I am a slave like all the rest. I want to rock it like a slut with bad shoes. I want to be thigh-high in Ted Nugent nostalgia.

Like most men, I think about sex every six seconds. But unlike most men, every seventh second I think about how the girl would look wearing the burlap pantsuit that my show business money afforded her."

The AnomoliesThus rants Luster, the jerri-curled gotta-be who fronts new jack Joey Goebel's The Anomalies (MacAdam/Cage $22), a book - and a band - that's literally off-the-hook. I quote him at length for two very good reasons: 1) he's a gas, as trippy and flippy as a helium kiss, & 2) it's the best way for you, dear reader, to get a bead on the book - and the band - that he fronts.

Let's meet The Anomalies.

Backing-up Luster but in every way his equals are Opal, an 80-year-old (sic) sex-crazed rocker chick who'll go out of her way to say what she means and to say it mean; Ember, the 8-year-old (siccer) good fun of a bad seed with "a crudload of potential"; Aurora, the knockout daughter-of-a-preacher-man and constant phase-shifter (stripper, Satanist, invalid); and Ray, an Iraqi may-be gay blade in short-shorts who won't be truly satisfied until he apologizes in person to the soldier he shot during Desert Storm.

Hence Kentucky.

And hence The Anomalies.

Alone, they'd be easy targets for the prejudiced and pea-brained; together they're a thicket of kindling just asking - no, daring - for a match. 'Cause once they go up, all those prejudices go out in flames.

Burn, baby, burn.

Rare is the arsonist who's got regeneration on his mind. Then Goebel is the rare arsonist, a fire starter who knows some things need to be torched before we can begin to build. That his conflagration comes in the form of a rollicking, rocking (sorry), rags-to-war story only shows how bright a torch he wields.

The story's simple - elegantly simple. Five ultra-sane crazies from the wrong side of nowhere collide to rock the wild world. If the wild world happens to fall into enlightenment, so much the better. To say their smearing of multi-culti lines and crossing of generation gaps is boldly going where no band has gone before could very well be the understatement of this scary new century. Consider it said. Then consider how much courage it takes to be an Anomaly.

Told from the (disad)vantage point of friend and foe alike, it's as if Goebel really, truly wants to get into - and under - the dirty skin of all character. Every angle gets a word in edgewise, and few angles are right. Kinda just like how it is. But fret not, The Anomalies is the kinda quick-witted fix that puts the mend to what's broken. Then breaks it up all over again.

Misconception.

Misperception.

Ignorance and apathy.

Ambivalence and duplicity.

Broken into a million little pieces.

And exposed by The Anomalies.

Just goes to show: Like minds need not always look - or think - alike. They need just to have mutual dislikes.

And a wise guy to give 'em voice.

But don't think for a minute that Goebel's all positive and light. He knows better. There's only so far ahead ("the future is what's for dinner") and only so much honesty ("you are what you pretend to be"), and we'll not even mention fellow humans ("you give people the benefit of the doubt, and they disappoint you every time"). He also knows you gotta go out and try anyway.

What's the worst thing that could happen?

Nothing.

Indeed.

Screw the stalwarts, damn the tuxedos, and take your hate and shove it. If there's something to look forward to in this backwards-sighted world it's a time when The Anomalies make it on - and win - American Idol, and young guns like Joey Goebel get to hit the bestseller lists.

By the way, what's for dinner?

Note: This article was first published online in the now defunct Bully Magazine. Supplied with immense thanks to Ken Wohlrob.

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