Inert Atoms
Last night, I was at the Magnetic Fields concert. I think the Neptune Theater was a good venue. It's large enough for their number of fans, but small enough to be intimate. Plus you don't need to sit; standing right in front of them, I think, is a better experience than sitting down and watching them from afar.
THERE WERE SO MANY COUPLES. And the singles were just walking around, seemingly searching for a pair, some desperately, some nonchalantly. And I'm the only one staying put (well, me and the girl in the pink tutu, orange blouse, neon blue tights, oversized glasses and pigtails). Some were moving fast, in an excited state, while others were dragging their feet. And still, there were the couples, all stable and stationary and lovey-dovey.
It got me thinking about Chemistry.
What if some people are like Hydrogen atoms, desperate enough to bond with someone, anyone with a -1 charge? These are the people who like entering a corrosive relationship with Chlorine, or agreeing to a one-sided affair with an oxygen atom who likes having two hydrogen atoms at a time, or even degrading itself into joining a hydrocarbon organic compound orgy.
Perhaps some people are down-to-earth metals, who create strong bonds with Halogen atoms. When they meet for the first time, fireworks explode, and they form stable compounds of love.
I have come to think of myself as an inert gas. Sure, I'm pretty to look at (hwee), but I'm totally happy without anyone to bond with. What if I'm doomed forever to be a noble, inert gas?
As if to support my "inertness", the opening act was a solo performer named Bachelorette. She had a British accent (Welsh, maybe?) and she is her own band. She uses pre-recorded music as well as live music that she records onstage and sets to loop throughout the song to create an eerier, more serious Imogen Heap sound.
The Magnetic Fields finally came out. They were very interesting, obviously a group of introspective, socially awkward individuals who were brought together by their love of music. Their banter was very amusing, but at the same time I felt they were consciously disconnecting themselves from their audience, which isn't such a bad thing anyway.
Their lovey-dovey marriage songs outweighed their sad, death songs, which may explain the increased number of couples in attendance. I was disappointed that they didn't perform "Papa was a Rodeo", but I think I have a new favorite, "Andrew in Drag".
At the end of the (very short) set, I took the bus back home, observing a number of people exiting with me:
- A ginger guy wearing a handlebar moustache and a fez waxed poetically about "classical" electronic music, like Devo and Depeche Mode.
- A hipster all in black complaining about the "bad sound"
- A former New Yorker telling his friend how he was glad to move out of New York (It's a completely different pace. People there live to work. My coworkers here do paintball every Friday.)
- A girl in a long brown skirt and oversized green hoodie barely covering her bright, multi-colored hair (I nicknamed her Delirium Girl) complaining about how buses shouldn't stop for commuters who manage to chase down the bus just when it's about to go.
- A middle-aged gay couple, very sweet with each other.