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I see steampunk as a conscious revival of the optimistic futurism of a time when they we’re first becoming aware of the accelerating pace of progress. Since the real future we got is less interesting in many ways (and actually a bit of a dystopia), it’s a way to rediscover the excitement of progress.

If you’d like some pointers, I can help; steampunk and retrofuturism are big research interests of mine. The seminal work is probably The Difference Engine, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling–though there were precursors for over a decade before.

As for Metallica, yeah, I’m a pretty big fan. As I said in that article, I first got into them in the mid-eighties and have seen them live four times. (The first time was with Cliff, about five months before he died. Glad I got to see the classic lineup.) I have pretty much everything they’ve done, both good and not so good.

I now have them at my desk at work. A couple of people have expressed an interest, but no takers. Cowards.

The job is going well. My boss said the other day that he thinks I’m fitting in just fine. Whew!

The reason I write here is not only to praise this amazing record and this great review, but also because I would greatly appreciate any input from anybody reading this. I have a serious dilemma. I happen to play music in a duo, and my bandmate has views similar to those of that guy “Bjarni” here- he’s WAY too narrow to “get” some stuff. I guess their view is a little more “empiric” than mine- I tend to FEEL music, and let it take me to wherever it might go, instead of trying to force it to go somewhere by already expecting something from it and being greatly dissatisfied because the music/art doesn’t fit their expectations- if that makes sense.

In any case, I’m suffering quite a lot because, needless to say, my bandmate and I are butting heads like crazy when it comes to writing music together. He’s just too damn narrow. He just doesn’t “get it” when I try to break it down to him. How can we make this band work if as songwriters we can’t seem to understand each other that well?

This guy is hilarious, sometimes I show him music and he disregards it immediately, only to come back to me months (or sometimes years) later after he “discovers it”, to say “man, I love this record/band, they’re great!” and I think to myself “no shit Sherlock”… I find myself having those “duh” moments with him a lot, and the worst thing is that he always thinks he’s right- he’s one of those guys that talks too much shit and is unintentionally funny by making himself look like an ass in front of everybody…

Any input would be greatly appreciated!!!

Gawd, I don’t know where to begin. The assertion that I’m an elitist, just because I appreciate it when one of my favorite bands decides to stretch out a little? The implication that I’m only claiming to like Lulu because I want to be “different” and “superior”? The underlying assumption that nobody could REALLY like it and must therefore have ulterior motives for saying they do? The idea that I’m setting myself above all those silly “metalheads”, even though I make it very clear both here and in my article that I’ve been a fan of Metallica for over 25 years?

What all this boils down to is, I don’t hate it like you do, and so I must be destroyed. And since I used the word “artier”, that gives you an opening to paint me as some kind of snotty bohemian type, looking down my nose at all of you proletarians. So sorry that I compromised my metal-fan bona fides by using words of more than two syllables.

Don’t you realize how insulting it is to metal fans to imply that we’re incapable of appreciating something that goes beyond simple headbanging?