A Riff on Joy and Pain
On February 4 this past week, one Harry Whittington died at the age of ninety-five. Seventeen years ago Whittington’s Warholian fifteen minutes of fame received a literal shot in the arm when he was actually shot in the face – and elsewhere - by our illustrious then-Vice President, Dick Cheney.
It’s not my intent here to rehash the dubious circumstances of the so-called quail-hunting accident, or the fully loaded satiric ridicule to which Cheney was subjected except to say it was the shot heard ‘round the world.
The recent mention of Whittington in news media evoked memories of my own guilty indulgence in schadenfreude, at the time repeatedly listening to Cheney’s Got a Gun, Bob Rivers’ parody of the Aerosmith song. In fact, I just brought it up on YouTube and listened to it again. It’s an excellent parody. Rivers sufficiently nails Steven Tyler’s hard rock singing style to make it work.
The triggering of memories didn’t stop there, though. Dick Cheney and his weapon of mass destruction was forgotten as I felt an urge to revisit another Aerosmith music video, one I hadn’t listened to in many years, Amazing.
Call it my state of mind, but the song called out to me - a rock and roll anthem evoking not hilarity and schadenfreude but the tearful emergence into the light from the dark spaces I’ve lately been.
It's amazing.
With the blink of an eye, you finally see the light.
Sure, the graphics are dated and cheesy by today’s CGI standards; but they’re not the point, at least not for me.
The video depicts teen lovers, their lips passionately engaged and limbs entwined atop a motorcycle careening full tilt on roads and through space, feats of raw abandon only safely accomplished in fantastic virtual reality settings.
It evoked for me the poignant emotions of loneliness and longing; remembrances of the heady flight through time and space that is romantic love; the melancholy of adult knowing that such love doesn’t last; that things change and come to an end; but also, as Tyler entones at the end of the song, 'remember: the light at the end of the tunnel may be you.'
It's amazing.
When the moment arrives that you know you'll be alright.
It's amazing.
And I'm sayin' a prayer for the desperate hearts tonight.
This is the function of art, this being an instance of the evocation of thought and emotion that the best art of any kind can do. Sometimes even bad art can do it - if the humanity of the artist somehow connects with that of the experiencer of the art; that is, to connect with the light at the end of the tunnel. Or, to be the light oneself.
Will this evocation and mood last? Will this just be another dated rock song in my mind later?
Life's a journey, not a destination,
And I just can't tell just what tomorrow brings.
All I can say about life right now is, it’s amazing. And I’m saying a prayer for all desperate hearts tonight.
Darren Braun, photographer
Leslie Baldwin, photo editor
T. J. Tucker, Art director
Cover for the Bum Steer edition
of Texas Monthly
