I Know It When I Hear It

Here's an essay I just finished. It's a true story about audio obscenity, an idea that I can't find any definition of anywhere on the internet. I may end up expanding on it, so consider this rough draft.

I Know It When I Hear It

I joined Delayed Reaction in the winter of my 8^th grade year. Delayed Reaction played punk rock music and consisted of three members: Ryan played guitar and sang, John played bass and sang, and I played the drums. Our role models were bands like Rancid, Screeching Weasel, and the Vandals. We put out three albums between 2002 and 2004, all which showcased our best shot at offending as many people as possible. The back sleeves of our CD’s were riddled with songs like “Hot For Substitute,” “Jesus Was a Hit,” “Fuck You Wheaton,” and “Emancipation Masturbation.” Delayed Reaction practiced in my parents’ garage in Aurora, Illinois just a block away from Waubonsie Valley High School. We were good friends, and played gigs regularly with Evil Empire, a local satanic, political ska band. We played gigs in garages and basements, and every now and then we would play at a local dive bar. We never played to a crowd of more than fifty people, yet.

We sat on the curb in front of my parents’ house during a break from practice in the summer of 2003. A rusty, red Ford Ranger passed us once. It made one more pass before parking on the curb beside us. Its bed was piled high with tools. The driver’s door screeched open, and a lanky middle-aged man hopped out.

“You guys in a band?” He said, quickly walking toward us.

“Yeah,” we all said at once, anxiously smiling.

I assumed he was an angry neighbor. It would not have been the first time we would be asked to stop playing.

“Were we playing too loud?” I said.

“No, not at all.” He pulled a small card out of his pocket and handed it to me. “I’m Jim O’Malley. I’m running the Fall Pig Roast at Waubsonsie this year. I’ve been doing a lot of work on the field over there for the past few weeks, and it sounds like you guys are always practicing. What’s your music like?”

“We play punk rock music,” I said. “Like The Ramones and The Clash.”

I was lying. I saw this encounter as an opportunity to play a show, a really big show. If I told Jim we sounded like Screeching Weasel one of two things could have happened:

1. He would not have any clue of what I was talking about.

2. He would have a clue of what I was talking about, and he would drive off with our chances at a huge gig.

“Ah, the Ramones. That brings me back. Well, would you guys be interested in playing The Pig Roast this year?”

Butterflies shot out of my chest. The Pig Roast was huge. Anyone at Waubonsie Valley who played a fall sport, including friend and family, was invited to The Pig Roast. Furthermore, this was my last summer in Aurora before moving. I looked at this gig as my chance to break a champagne bottle on the side of a giant ship before its maiden voyage.

“Yes. Absolutely.” I said.

“Well great.” Jim scribbled some stuff on a piece paper and handed it to me. “Here’s everything you need to know. You guys don’t swear in your songs do you?”

“No,” we all said at once.

We were all lying. We figured no one would be able to hear our lyrics. After all, no one could ever understand our words at our shows because of several faulty house P.A. systems.

Jim greeted us, on the day of the show, with an expensive looking P.A. system and a stage: two things we had never had before. The stage was set up at the head of Waubonsie’s varsity field. We were there to set up about an hour before the event officially began. Many of our friends, including Evil Empire, came just as early to shoot the breeze. More and more attendees began showing up as the start time drew nearer and nearer. Eventually, hundreds of people were swimming in a sea of the smoke of several table-sized grills. There was every type of person in the crowd: punks and jocks, students and adults, infants and the elderly. Start-time. I was extremely nervous for two reasons:

1. I have never, even to this day, played a show in front of that many people.

2. I knew everyone was going to hear what we had to say whether they liked it or not.

We took it head on. Ryan shredding his permanently distorted guitar, John pounding his synonymous bass, and me pummeling my drums; we played an entire set until I realized we got much less than a delayed reaction out of the audience. In fact, we got almost no reaction at all. The audience had almost completely ignored us. We took a break behind the stage and discussed the lack of interest in the crowd. We talked with our friends and family who all said we played great. Band morale was low, and we had to play another set. Start-time. We decided to cover songs we had never played before, which went fine, but we still received the same negligent response out of our audience. After playing Choking Victim’s “Infested” we called upon Ben, the lead singer of Evil Empire, to come up and improvise to a song we had no lyrics for. Ben agreed. He jumped on stage and grabbed Ryan’s microphone. Ben’s singing is better defined as screaming. Ben would often burst blood vessels in his eyes from yelling so hard during Evil Empire sets. Ryan’s voice held attitude, but it lacked the urgency that Ben’s provided. Delayed Reaction wanted to be heard, and Ben was just the guy for the job.

“I support terrorism,” Ben said into the microphone.

The phrase echoed off the bodies of everyone in the crowd. I watched a sea of smiling suburbanites boil from behind my drum set. Their heads turned as instantly as their smiles clouded. The group of happy pig roasters, who were once ignorant of the fact that a band was even playing, now turned into an angry mob rushing the stage like bulls on parade. The next few minutes were a blur to me. Video documentation reveals a song about anarchy, devil worship, statutory rape, and smoking crack cocaine. It also reveals a lengthy, collective “boo!” Among the mob were cops, deans, and Waubonsie’s Principal. Our power was shut off. We were escorted off the stage and asked not to come back. No arrests were made.

Every citizen of the United States of America is entitled to the freedom of expression. This freedom means that one is able to manifest and convey his or her ideas as something experiential without interference by the government. However, there are limits to this freedom, which are in place to protect a citizen from expression that can be considered harmful to his or her mental or physical well-being. Obscenity is one of many limits to our freedom of expression. It may famously only be known when seen, but obscenity can easily be howled and heard. Audio obscenity is composed of three parameters: volume, tone, and message. The louder a sound is the more obscene that sound will be. A loud sound has the potential to drown out all other sound and stop internal thought or external dialogue. The tone in which a sound is conveyed determines the emotions the recipient will experience upon receiving. Dissonance and discord typically invoke feelings of anxiety, anger, and sadness; whereas consonance and harmony typically invoke feelings of calmness, pleasure, and happiness. If the message conveyed through the sound comes in the form of words, then the message is the easiest parameter to measure; words can easily be obscene because the human voice is easily relatable. However, if the message of the sound is non-verbal, then the line between message and tone can be blurred. All three parameters must be equally engaged for a sound to be deemed obscene. Audio obscenity, like all obscenity, is subjective. The audience receiving the sound has the authority to determine whether the sound is obscene or not. Music is a harbor for audio obscenity; its volume can be turned up to 11, its tone can be solely din, and an artist can pretty much say whatever he or she wants by agreeing to slap a “parental advisory” sticker on the album cover. Music can offend some people with ease, and some people thoroughly enjoy offensive music. I happened to belong to the later group during my adolescence. In fact, I did not just listen to offensive music, I wrote and preformed it as well.

The audience’s reaction implies that Ben’s one song with Delayed Reaction was more obscene than an entire Delayed Reaction set, but why? The reason lies within the parameters of audio obscenity. Punk rock music is traditionally played at blaring volumes. Playing at such high levels of sound is almost a rite of passage. Ben’s singing was easily much louder than Ryan’s. A Delayed Reaction set without Ben may have been more obscene if Ryan’s voice were a little bit louder. Couple blaring music on top of deafening vocals and you get an altogether intensely loud sound thus fulfilling the volume parameter of audio obscenity. The tone of punk rock is traditionally chaotic and edgy. Punk rock guitarists mimic the sound of torn amplifiers with distortion pedals, which they fully utilize, and punk rock drum rhythms traditionally incorporate lots of discordant cymbals. Ben’s vocal tone was much more harsh than Ryan’s. Ben’s screams sounded like ripping many layers of construction paper at once, whereas Ryan’s singing was discernibly melodic and composed. Musically, both Delayed Reaction sets were virtually identical. It was, however, the din of Ben’s voice paired with the music that fulfilled the tonal parameter of audio obscenity. The message of punk rock is traditionally full of angst and rebellion. Many punk rock bands belong to a counterculture that adopts these attitudes as guiding principles. Punk rock lyrics rely on taboo words and ideas to depict messages. The messages of many Delayed Reaction songs were comparatively much less taboo than Ben’s messages. Ben started out by telling his audience, blatantly, that he supports terrorism at a time when only one full year had passed since the Al-Qaeda attacks on the Twin Towers. He also ranted about consuming highly illegal drugs and engaging in sexual activity with minors. Delayed Reaction’s lyrics contained many taboo words and dealt with many taboo subjects, but they were generally light-hearted and had a humorous message behind them. Delayed Reaction’s musical message and Ben’s broadcast of hate fulfilled the message parameter of audio obscenity.

While Delayed Reaction’s performance with Ben at the Waubsonsie Valley Pigroast satisfied all three parameters of audio obscenity, it also exemplified its subjectivity. The pig roasters were introduced to a challenging style of music, which howled blaring messages that did not agree with their values. Delayed Reaction was never kicked off stage prior to this show, and they were never kicked off stage after this show; not surprisingly, The Pig Roast was the only show whose audience was composed mainly of people who did care for punk rock music. Our freedom of expression was limited when the performance was, justly, cut short. Delayed Reaction certainly exercised their freedom of expression to the fullest, but they never exceeded it. No arrests were made.