Music and Personality blurs into a mention of THE IBA
Music is funny. We do not always listen to the music for what it is, but rather we look to the singer before we listen to the song. We are all victims of it. We want our rock stars to be cool. We want to be able to identify with our singers. Then on the other side of the coin...from my earliest memories I can recall judging music before I heard it by seeing the fans who opted to identify with each band and their music. Pink Floyd, The Grateful Dead, and Rush were all bands that I could not even stand before I heard them. In the 70's growing up they left their mark on the kids growing up. Those baseball tour shirts and the non-running running shoes were too much for me to get past....well on top of that the hair styles and the styles across the board had no appeal to me...no appeal to anyone...except for others within their very odd subculture. Eventually I was able to get past the fashion and the fans and listen to Pink Floyd and the Grateful Dead (going to St Mary's College of Maryland durning a crunch time may have opened my eyes) but I was never able to get past the RUSH fans (or Getty Lee's voice and the Ayn Rand psuedo deep lyrics)
What may have opened my eyes to Pink Floyd being cool may have been a flim of theirs...not THE WALL....but rather....Live at Pompeii. Now I see Dark Side of the Moon as one of the greatest albums of all time.
let me hope tangents here....
St Mary's College of Maryland, a college that I attended for 4.5 years between the years of 1984 and 1990. This school had a party atmosphere, right now it has a greater reputation for high SAT scores and education, but before US News and World Reports was ranking it as some sort of Mid Atlantic Liberal Arts Something or prior to this SMC was being written up by Playboy as a Party School.....or so I was told. I have not gone through the archives of Playboy for that information...well....if I have I got distracted. College was a fun time, I recall the campus store selling shirts that said ST. MARY'S COLLEGE and RESORT. I do not think that my college experience was all that different from most people's. St Mary's may have partied more than other colleges, but how would I know...I only went to one college. We drank. We drank a lot. We drank a lot very often, very very often. The weekend started on Wednesday night and ended on Tuesday night. Most of the women at St Mary's could out drink the obnoxious frat boys from Universtity of Maryland. The women at St. Mary's were nothing to brag about.....there were some cool ones...all of them were crazy...must have been something in the water. St Mary's was not only know for a party atmostphere...but it was also known as "a safe place to send your boyfriend." (that is to say it was not known for its ladies) During my time in college there was a subculture of people that existed that I witness from a far. There was a throwback to the 70's hippie culture. The modern world had not hit SMC (St Mary's) when I had arrive. Paved paths around the campus had just been installed, right in time for me and my skateboard. Things were clearly more online with a Dead Show than the Punk Show. In 1985 my dyed hair was more than many of the students could take, they had accepted the "dirt dogs," but were not ready for the punker side of things. But, this tangent rant is not about me....it is about a funny aspect of the SMC Hippie culture that had me laughing to myself as I walked my dogs in the woods this morning.
and this is it....
While in college there was this elite club that hosted parties and formals....they had their group houses which had their off campus parties. This group was called IBA. The IBA was known to be a once school sponsored club know as I Believe in America, but to the students it was better known as International Bong Association. I know very little of the inner workings of this club. But they had some very basic notions that seemed to work for them. Work hard/Party Hard was their motto, well actually it was the meaning of their motto, the actual motto of the IBA was DO B's...GET A's! Honestly, I do not think I could tell you who was in this group and who was not. I could not tell you when their functions were held, or if the group and their functions formal or informal actually ever happened. But there is some great lore in their somewhere. And I thought that the idea should be shared while it is fresh in my mind.
that should be enough for now
just wanted to get that whole IBA thing into the BLOG
I am in no position to document such information
but someone should definitely try to document it
as ORAL HISTORY (or BLOG ENTRIES) may be the only way to get this stuff documented
I can recall playing Ultimate Frisbee on land that is now covered by a building or a parking lot
there were acoustic guitars strumming "friend of the devil"
and someone was complaining because his dog was throwing up from eating his magic mushrooms
I am not sure if he was bummed that his dog was sick
or more likely that he no longer had those mushrooms
in any case.....
it was then in my life that I heard the music that I had previously had distain for
the music was fine
I maintained my overall feeling for Deadheads... most of them were hypocrites and flakes
then again I never cared for anyone who joined a fashion to state identity
I loved going to hardcore shows...but Punks? Never cared for them either....I always felt that Punk was a '77 thing. It was here and gone by the '80s. DC Hardcore was Post Punk.
Lisa and I went to the Bread and Puppet Festival in Vermont a few times....
we always had a great time
always met great people
it was a very earthy experience
but the hypocrisy of the so called Deadhead was alive and well all over the place
it is hard to put my feeling in words
it all goes back to my notion of taking the best of any or all trends and not fully commiting to just one trend to form an identity
be no trends be all trends
for someone to be punk, hippie, or whatever always seemed so limiting
in high school I was not going to not play sports or not dye my hair or not go to a high school dance because it did not fit into some cookie cutter identity that someone else created
I can be a hypocrite
I like to flip flop
I am still trying to figure out adolescence
and I am 37 years old
not sue what I was trying to say
the wine may have clouded my brain
Music is funny. We do not always listen to the music for what it is, but rather we look to the singer before we listen to the song. We are all victims of it. We want our rock stars to be cool. We want to be able to identify with our singers. Then on the other side of the coin...from my earliest memories I can recall judging music before I heard it by seeing the fans who opted to identify with each band and their music. Pink Floyd, The Grateful Dead, and Rush were all bands that I could not even stand before I heard them. In the 70's growing up they left their mark on the kids growing up. Those baseball tour shirts and the non-running running shoes were too much for me to get past....well on top of that the hair styles and the styles across the board had no appeal to me...no appeal to anyone...except for others within their very odd subculture. Eventually I was able to get past the fashion and the fans and listen to Pink Floyd and the Grateful Dead (going to St Mary's College of Maryland durning a crunch time may have opened my eyes) but I was never able to get past the RUSH fans (or Getty Lee's voice and the Ayn Rand psuedo deep lyrics)
What may have opened my eyes to Pink Floyd being cool may have been a flim of theirs...not THE WALL....but rather....Live at Pompeii. Now I see Dark Side of the Moon as one of the greatest albums of all time.
let me hope tangents here....
St Mary's College of Maryland, a college that I attended for 4.5 years between the years of 1984 and 1990. This school had a party atmosphere, right now it has a greater reputation for high SAT scores and education, but before US News and World Reports was ranking it as some sort of Mid Atlantic Liberal Arts Something or prior to this SMC was being written up by Playboy as a Party School.....or so I was told. I have not gone through the archives of Playboy for that information...well....if I have I got distracted. College was a fun time, I recall the campus store selling shirts that said ST. MARY'S COLLEGE and RESORT. I do not think that my college experience was all that different from most people's. St Mary's may have partied more than other colleges, but how would I know...I only went to one college. We drank. We drank a lot. We drank a lot very often, very very often. The weekend started on Wednesday night and ended on Tuesday night. Most of the women at St Mary's could out drink the obnoxious frat boys from Universtity of Maryland. The women at St. Mary's were nothing to brag about.....there were some cool ones...all of them were crazy...must have been something in the water. St Mary's was not only know for a party atmostphere...but it was also known as "a safe place to send your boyfriend." (that is to say it was not known for its ladies) During my time in college there was a subculture of people that existed that I witness from a far. There was a throwback to the 70's hippie culture. The modern world had not hit SMC (St Mary's) when I had arrive. Paved paths around the campus had just been installed, right in time for me and my skateboard. Things were clearly more online with a Dead Show than the Punk Show. In 1985 my dyed hair was more than many of the students could take, they had accepted the "dirt dogs," but were not ready for the punker side of things. But, this tangent rant is not about me....it is about a funny aspect of the SMC Hippie culture that had me laughing to myself as I walked my dogs in the woods this morning.
and this is it....
While in college there was this elite club that hosted parties and formals....they had their group houses which had their off campus parties. This group was called IBA. The IBA was known to be a once school sponsored club know as I Believe in America, but to the students it was better known as International Bong Association. I know very little of the inner workings of this club. But they had some very basic notions that seemed to work for them. Work hard/Party Hard was their motto, well actually it was the meaning of their motto, the actual motto of the IBA was DO B's...GET A's! Honestly, I do not think I could tell you who was in this group and who was not. I could not tell you when their functions were held, or if the group and their functions formal or informal actually ever happened. But there is some great lore in their somewhere. And I thought that the idea should be shared while it is fresh in my mind.
that should be enough for now
just wanted to get that whole IBA thing into the BLOG
I am in no position to document such information
but someone should definitely try to document it
as ORAL HISTORY (or BLOG ENTRIES) may be the only way to get this stuff documented
I can recall playing Ultimate Frisbee on land that is now covered by a building or a parking lot
there were acoustic guitars strumming "friend of the devil"
and someone was complaining because his dog was throwing up from eating his magic mushrooms
I am not sure if he was bummed that his dog was sick
or more likely that he no longer had those mushrooms
in any case.....
it was then in my life that I heard the music that I had previously had distain for
the music was fine
I maintained my overall feeling for Deadheads... most of them were hypocrites and flakes
then again I never cared for anyone who joined a fashion to state identity
I loved going to hardcore shows...but Punks? Never cared for them either....I always felt that Punk was a '77 thing. It was here and gone by the '80s. DC Hardcore was Post Punk.
Lisa and I went to the Bread and Puppet Festival in Vermont a few times....
we always had a great time
always met great people
it was a very earthy experience
but the hypocrisy of the so called Deadhead was alive and well all over the place
it is hard to put my feeling in words
it all goes back to my notion of taking the best of any or all trends and not fully commiting to just one trend to form an identity
be no trends be all trends
for someone to be punk, hippie, or whatever always seemed so limiting
in high school I was not going to not play sports or not dye my hair or not go to a high school dance because it did not fit into some cookie cutter identity that someone else created
I can be a hypocrite
I like to flip flop
I am still trying to figure out adolescence
and I am 37 years old
not sue what I was trying to say
the wine may have clouded my brain