Death, fairness, lessons, etc.
Last Wednesday night, as I was reading myself to sleep, I groggily noted the presence of a couple of Columbus police "ghetto birds" circling nearby. Orbiting helicopters are a regular feature of the weekend small hours here, out on the northern fringe of the the sprawling OSU sphere of influence. But this was a weeknight, so something unusual was happening. Still, I didn't give it any more thought. But sleep eluded me.
A couple hours later, still awake, I flipped the TV on to try droning myself to sleep. No such luck. Breaking news: a shooting at the Alrosa Villa, at least three dead. Well, that's definitely unusual, and it certainly explains the helicopters. The Alrosa is as close to a roadhouse as you're likely to find on this side of Cowtown, and it seems to have had its share of petty violence over the years, but three dead--that's a little more hardcore than its usual clientele.
Turns out the initial body count was a bit low. The guitarist for the heavy metal band Damageplan, a roadie, a bouncer, a fan, and the shooter all went down. Two others wounded, one critically. The quick-responding cop is a real hero. Two minutes after he got the call, he dropped the gunman with a shotgun--while the gunman had a hostage in a headlock--likely preventing another death or two. The shooter was a deranged fan. Have we heard that somewhere before--yes. John Lennon. Twenty four years ago, to the day.
I'd never heard of the band and the guitarist's name didn't ring a bell, though it was certainly distinctive: Dimebag Darrell. I wonder if he partied? Hmmm, said my inner cynic, looks like someone smoked that Dimebag. I haven't had much use for heavy metal since I was an inchoately angry 15-year-old (okay, maybe since I was an inchoately angry 20-year-old). That was the era of proto-metal, the first wave--when Blue Oyster Cult, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath et al. were the baddest dudes around. For young metalheads, this is the music their grandparents hated.
For my tastes, metal took quite a turn for the darker after its energetic rush through the 1970s had dribbled out, in the 1980s, into a hair-farmer treacle of poppy guitar rock. Its resurgence in the 1990s, though, was something else. Those guys, when they showed you their devil's horns, they meant it. By then my drugs of choice favored gentler music.
Very big news the next morning. I indulged into a little research. Turns out Dimebag Darrell had been the driving force behind Pantera. Now, them, I'd heard of. Skulls, tattoos, rebel flags, screechy speed metal. Do-it-yourself nihilism kits for $15.98 at your nearest record store. I remember initially thinking that it was no real surprise that one of their "fans" bought into the philosophy they were selling. But no one deserves to get snuffed on stage.
I tuned into a few blogs and message boards. Real grief, lots of it. A fair bit of denial, and a good bit of inarticulate rage at the shooter. I gradually became aware that "Dime" had been every bit as influential in his genre as, say, Eric Clapton or Bob Dylan had been in theirs. A virtuoso, even. Many mourners cited his distinctive riffs as the reason they picked up guitars and began to play, or noted that Pantera was the music that helped them through a rough stretch of adolescence.
Universally they expressed disbelief that something like this could happen. You use metal to help work out your aggressions, not culture them, they said. I guess that makes sense. I'd never looked at it that way. But it makes sense. The style may have changed since I was a kid, but it's still catharsis, even if you stand a better chance of getting a whiplash these days.
I downloaded a few of their more popular tunes. You know, I can see the appeal. Catchy. Sounds better the louder you turn it up. Still not my cup of tea, but I could hear some pretty skillful stuff going on with that guitar. Pretty impressive in its own way. I can see how in the metal community, this could very well be their 9/11.
I went by the Alrosa Villa on the way out Thursday afternoon and shot a couple of pics. Here's the best one. The band's name was still on the marquee at that point. This was apparently before the rush began; the makeshift shrine grew quickly and there was a huge vigil Thursday evening. Amidst the grief, a little bit of humor shone through. That's a Dead Guy Ale there front and center in the midst of the yellow roses. I think Dimebag would have appreciated that.
By all accounts, Darrell Abbott was a stand-up guy, very accessible and generous to his fans. A hard, hard partier, that's for sure. But a nice guy. No, it wasn't fair. But still, even if you don't have a destructive streak, the pace of the lifestyle will kill you sooner or later unless you have the constitution of Hunter S. Thompson or Keith Richards. It's all over in the blink of an eye either way.
Ultimately, it could have been a good career move. Once the grief passes, his dramatic on-stage murder--hell, he died with his guitar in his hands!--is sure to become the stuff of mythic rock legend. Sure beats drowning in your own vomit in a bathtub. I give it a year, two years tops, before Dimebag Darrell Abbott is inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
But culture of nihilism or not, it's still not right. RIP, Dimebag. \m/, as they say.
Unbeknownst to me at that point, there was another death that evening. This one was much closer to where my head lives, if not my body. Longtime SabMag listmember Ed Rogers collided with a car driven by an 18-year-old woman at a busy intersection in New Brunswick, New Jersey at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday. Severe chest and leg injuries. He died at the hospital 2:30 a.m. Thursday morning. Luck of the draw, huh? He was on a motorcycle. Everyone knows they'll kill you. I'm sure a lot of people aren't a bit surprised.
Well, Ed was not a typical biker, if there is such a thing. He was a motorcyclist who took his sport seriously. When I say Ed was a safe rider, I don't just mean that he wore safety gear and had safe riding habits, which he did. He was an outspoken proponent of proactive riding safety in our forum, sometimes to the detriment of his popularity with the go-fast crowd. Didn't bother him a bit. Ed's convictions showed in deeds as well as words--he trained hundreds of riders as a Motorcycle Safety Foundation rider coach. In a parallel vein, he served in the mobile ministry that is the Christian Motorcyclist Association. He left his mark.
A software engineer, husband, father of four, including three young children. A profoundly faithful Christian. I hope his family's faith will bring them some measure of peace. It's certainly brought a too-familiar outpouring of grief on the Sabmag list, as well as an oddly familiar sense of denial that this could happen, especially to Ed, no doubt one of the safest riders we know. But Ed's exposure was greater than most of ours; he was a four season all-weather rider. I don't believe he used a car much. Hundreds of thousands of miles.
Ed is the sixth known Sabmag rider to die in action in as many years. As others have pointed out, they represent a wide spectrum of experience and riding styles. The fellow who died in March of this year was probably statistically overdue. I didn't know Ed well, but enjoyed his perspective and common sense when he shared it. I did get to visit with him in the midst of the hectic Mid-Ohio events this past summer. A stand-up guy. We'll miss him. And it's definitely not fair. Godspeed, Ed.
So two guys, about as different as could be, died violent and unexpected deaths between Wednesday night and Thursday morning. I suppose there are lessons to be drawn from both. Neither fits very well with my view of the way the world should be, but I've proven to myself time and again that that view has little to do with cold fate and reality. At any rate, I hope that anyone who sees Ed's death being as predictable as I saw Dimebag's is capable of moderating their views a bit.
A couple hours later, still awake, I flipped the TV on to try droning myself to sleep. No such luck. Breaking news: a shooting at the Alrosa Villa, at least three dead. Well, that's definitely unusual, and it certainly explains the helicopters. The Alrosa is as close to a roadhouse as you're likely to find on this side of Cowtown, and it seems to have had its share of petty violence over the years, but three dead--that's a little more hardcore than its usual clientele.
Turns out the initial body count was a bit low. The guitarist for the heavy metal band Damageplan, a roadie, a bouncer, a fan, and the shooter all went down. Two others wounded, one critically. The quick-responding cop is a real hero. Two minutes after he got the call, he dropped the gunman with a shotgun--while the gunman had a hostage in a headlock--likely preventing another death or two. The shooter was a deranged fan. Have we heard that somewhere before--yes. John Lennon. Twenty four years ago, to the day.
I'd never heard of the band and the guitarist's name didn't ring a bell, though it was certainly distinctive: Dimebag Darrell. I wonder if he partied? Hmmm, said my inner cynic, looks like someone smoked that Dimebag. I haven't had much use for heavy metal since I was an inchoately angry 15-year-old (okay, maybe since I was an inchoately angry 20-year-old). That was the era of proto-metal, the first wave--when Blue Oyster Cult, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath et al. were the baddest dudes around. For young metalheads, this is the music their grandparents hated.
For my tastes, metal took quite a turn for the darker after its energetic rush through the 1970s had dribbled out, in the 1980s, into a hair-farmer treacle of poppy guitar rock. Its resurgence in the 1990s, though, was something else. Those guys, when they showed you their devil's horns, they meant it. By then my drugs of choice favored gentler music.
Very big news the next morning. I indulged into a little research. Turns out Dimebag Darrell had been the driving force behind Pantera. Now, them, I'd heard of. Skulls, tattoos, rebel flags, screechy speed metal. Do-it-yourself nihilism kits for $15.98 at your nearest record store. I remember initially thinking that it was no real surprise that one of their "fans" bought into the philosophy they were selling. But no one deserves to get snuffed on stage.
I tuned into a few blogs and message boards. Real grief, lots of it. A fair bit of denial, and a good bit of inarticulate rage at the shooter. I gradually became aware that "Dime" had been every bit as influential in his genre as, say, Eric Clapton or Bob Dylan had been in theirs. A virtuoso, even. Many mourners cited his distinctive riffs as the reason they picked up guitars and began to play, or noted that Pantera was the music that helped them through a rough stretch of adolescence.
Universally they expressed disbelief that something like this could happen. You use metal to help work out your aggressions, not culture them, they said. I guess that makes sense. I'd never looked at it that way. But it makes sense. The style may have changed since I was a kid, but it's still catharsis, even if you stand a better chance of getting a whiplash these days.
I downloaded a few of their more popular tunes. You know, I can see the appeal. Catchy. Sounds better the louder you turn it up. Still not my cup of tea, but I could hear some pretty skillful stuff going on with that guitar. Pretty impressive in its own way. I can see how in the metal community, this could very well be their 9/11.
I went by the Alrosa Villa on the way out Thursday afternoon and shot a couple of pics. Here's the best one. The band's name was still on the marquee at that point. This was apparently before the rush began; the makeshift shrine grew quickly and there was a huge vigil Thursday evening. Amidst the grief, a little bit of humor shone through. That's a Dead Guy Ale there front and center in the midst of the yellow roses. I think Dimebag would have appreciated that.
By all accounts, Darrell Abbott was a stand-up guy, very accessible and generous to his fans. A hard, hard partier, that's for sure. But a nice guy. No, it wasn't fair. But still, even if you don't have a destructive streak, the pace of the lifestyle will kill you sooner or later unless you have the constitution of Hunter S. Thompson or Keith Richards. It's all over in the blink of an eye either way.
Ultimately, it could have been a good career move. Once the grief passes, his dramatic on-stage murder--hell, he died with his guitar in his hands!--is sure to become the stuff of mythic rock legend. Sure beats drowning in your own vomit in a bathtub. I give it a year, two years tops, before Dimebag Darrell Abbott is inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
But culture of nihilism or not, it's still not right. RIP, Dimebag. \m/, as they say.
Unbeknownst to me at that point, there was another death that evening. This one was much closer to where my head lives, if not my body. Longtime SabMag listmember Ed Rogers collided with a car driven by an 18-year-old woman at a busy intersection in New Brunswick, New Jersey at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday. Severe chest and leg injuries. He died at the hospital 2:30 a.m. Thursday morning. Luck of the draw, huh? He was on a motorcycle. Everyone knows they'll kill you. I'm sure a lot of people aren't a bit surprised.
Well, Ed was not a typical biker, if there is such a thing. He was a motorcyclist who took his sport seriously. When I say Ed was a safe rider, I don't just mean that he wore safety gear and had safe riding habits, which he did. He was an outspoken proponent of proactive riding safety in our forum, sometimes to the detriment of his popularity with the go-fast crowd. Didn't bother him a bit. Ed's convictions showed in deeds as well as words--he trained hundreds of riders as a Motorcycle Safety Foundation rider coach. In a parallel vein, he served in the mobile ministry that is the Christian Motorcyclist Association. He left his mark.
A software engineer, husband, father of four, including three young children. A profoundly faithful Christian. I hope his family's faith will bring them some measure of peace. It's certainly brought a too-familiar outpouring of grief on the Sabmag list, as well as an oddly familiar sense of denial that this could happen, especially to Ed, no doubt one of the safest riders we know. But Ed's exposure was greater than most of ours; he was a four season all-weather rider. I don't believe he used a car much. Hundreds of thousands of miles.
Ed is the sixth known Sabmag rider to die in action in as many years. As others have pointed out, they represent a wide spectrum of experience and riding styles. The fellow who died in March of this year was probably statistically overdue. I didn't know Ed well, but enjoyed his perspective and common sense when he shared it. I did get to visit with him in the midst of the hectic Mid-Ohio events this past summer. A stand-up guy. We'll miss him. And it's definitely not fair. Godspeed, Ed.
So two guys, about as different as could be, died violent and unexpected deaths between Wednesday night and Thursday morning. I suppose there are lessons to be drawn from both. Neither fits very well with my view of the way the world should be, but I've proven to myself time and again that that view has little to do with cold fate and reality. At any rate, I hope that anyone who sees Ed's death being as predictable as I saw Dimebag's is capable of moderating their views a bit.