Caught in a Mosh

Have you ever had one of those days where just felt like running around in a circle, slamming into 5,000 of your closest friends; kicking up a cloud of dust in an expressive fit of chaotic abandon for about (3) minutes?  That’s the kind of day I’ve had.  Man I miss that.  Does anyone remember those days?

 

”Moshing is a dance in which participants push and/or slam into each other. They also flail their limbs to breakdowns of hardcore punk and its sub-genres. It is most associated with aggressive music, such as hardcore punk and heavy metal.”

So says Wikipedia. Back in the day, we called it slam dancing.  And it was a beautiful, careless, violent spectacle.  Outstanding!

It never received positive publicity; whenever you saw anything in the media it was always unnecessarily negative.  In fact, you never heard about it at all until somebody got hurt or worse.  That was the best part though: it was our thing!  Violence certainly happened, but that’s not what slamming was all about.  Usually the guys who didn’t get it were the problem.   

In every pit, just like in life, 99% of the people are there for the right reason.  It’s the 1% that screws it up for everybody.  In my experience, these blokes usually fell into (1) of (2) categories – meathead, ‘roid-rage jocks or the military (no offense to those who serve(d).  This is most likely colored by the geography I found myself in at the time.  Let’s be honest, North Mississippi is not exactly a hotbed of progressive thought and/or tolerance.  When I graduated high school I weighed about 150 pounds and had hair down to my ass – I should have just painted a freaking target on my back!

Apparently, it still exists…but I’m damn near (40) and guessing that window has closed.  I have often thought of starting a Slam Club. Think Fight Club but with a bunch of dudes like me.  Of course this could never happen but I still like to think about it.  It’s one of those deals you can’t recreate though.  You were either there or you were not.  If you were there, you surely know how I feel.  (If you were not, you are probably further convinced I’ve lost my mind.)  Either way, I remember that magical camaraderie with perfect strangers – literally bouncing off the walls and each other.  Bloodied, bruised, ecstatic. 

In 2005, The Voodoo Music Experience happened in Memphis.  It was just after Katrina and New Orleans obviously couldn’t support it.  I spent that weekend with some dear old friends in Memphis and saw some great bands – New York Dolls, The Secret Machines, Cowboy Mouth.  Nine Inch Nails closed the 2^nd night.  Not exactly a slamming crowd but I pushed and shoved as best I could.   I didn’t mention, but you are probably aware, that stage diving is an integral aspect of the mosh.

I was certainly old enough to know better at the time but when remembered teenage adrenaline takes over what do you do?  I fought my way to the front, timed my move perfectly and was on stage with Trent Reznor before even I knew what I was doing.  This is a (5) second occurrence!  The first (2) seconds are evading the cops and climbing onto the stage, the third second is looking at Reznor and trying to decipher the perplexed look on his face / realizing you have to get off the stage before security intervenes and the last (2) seconds are the dive.   

Pure bliss.   

The last (2) seconds are my lifeless body in mid-air, sadly enslaved by gravity – falling backwards into the crowd. Seeing the whole of my life in stop-frame artistic black and white vignettes.  The past and the present colliding and exploding in perfect unspoken harmony. That brief free-fall was as pure and as peaceful a moment as I have known in the last (10) years of my life.  Total silence.  It was just me and the stillness that I felt.  Absolute perfection.  The crowd passed me around, sat my feet back down on the ground and went back to the show and forgot about it.

I walked away victorious.

That’s as close to a slam as I will probably ever be again.  And that’s probably a good thing.  At some point you have to put away the past.  That sucks.  But I’m hopeful that I will once again find myself Caught in a Mosh at some point in my future. 

And that won’t suck!