I have a confession to make about an omission from my past that I've only recently corrected. I did this without time travel, believe it or not: I had never seen "The Usual Suspects" until recently.
So... was I just watching a liar the whole time? And looking beyond that, was I, Sy Waxer, being lied to the entire time because I believed Kevin Spacey's story?
My mind isn't exactly blown, but it's been severely shook. Not by the story, or by all of the quotes I have finally heard in the proper context (so many conversations from college make sense now!), but by the idea of being lied to for an extended period of time.
It hurts me. Me, Sy Waxer. I don't like it, so I'm sure that you, Sy Waxer's friends, don't like to be lied to either.
Which brings me to my next admission: I change the "Posted Date" on these posts to make it look more "time travely." I just want you to like me and think I'm impressive.
While I'm getting things off my chest: -This is not my natural hair color -I have never been in a fist fight -I don't understand poetry no matter how much you explain it to me.
I've been gone for a while, trying to set a few things right for good. And now I have to admit defeat: I cannot save Guns N' Roses.
I've been dashing all around the years, and it's like a puzzle I can't figure out. A puzzle that drinks and has serious problems with women.
First, I went back to 1991 and tried to convince Izzy from quitting... but then Slash disappeared. For weeks. I'd just lost him. Turns out he was just sleeping--for WEEKS.
So then I went back to 1989 and tried to get the idea of putting out 2 double LP's ("Use Your Illusion I and II"). I thought that maybe if I got them to do something less ambitious... anyway, it didn't work. They just kept recording and re-recording cover albums and piano solos. It was a mess.
I tried to simply help that 2002 MTV Music Awards "re-emergence," but I just made everyone get in a fight. Literally, everyone. Jimmy Fallon can take a punch, and Kurt Loder has not been the same since getting chop-blocked by Buckethead's guitar. At one point I actually tried to prevent James Hetfield from catching fire onstage (thereby allowing Metallica to continue playing that show in Montreal, 1992, and thereby staving off a riot)... but it can't be done! No matter what I try, he can't help but burst into flames.
In a last ditch effort, I even tried to simply help Axl and Stephanie Seymour maintain their relationship--at least I could save the "Illusion Video Trilogy," right? But while I was doing that, Duff went hang gliding and accidentally destroyed a civil rights demonstration. This did not help their image, so I went back to 1985 to nip it all in the bud and just mellow them out... thereby ruining "Appetite For Destruction." You haven't heard sucking until you've heard a laid-back version of "Night Train."
So, I'm sorry music fans. I can't do it. They're beyond my help. It's like herding cats trying to get these guys focused. Tattooed, angry, maladjusted cats.
Anyway... maybe I'll just go back and make sure I stop buying G'n'R albums after "Lies." That might be the simplest way.
We have a kind of insider's motto here in the Time-Travel correcting game (different from the Time Travel Corrections game you see in "Time Cop"), and that motto is "wait... we can fix it." And most of the time, we can fix it using time travel. It's a valuable tool that I wish humanity had thought of earlier... and then they did... I suppose.
Anyway, the motto is not exactly 100% true. MOST things can be fixed with time travel, but there are certain tricky elements of humanity that are create loop-holes that even time travel cannot navigate.
I personally experienced one of these lapses in humanity a short while ago. I cannot explain why this dawned on me now and not earlier, but the I regret it that I couldn't realize this realization earlier: the Rolling Stones' song "Hot Stuff"--while barely listenable on the album "Black and Blue"--is actually pretty good when played live, particularly on "Love You Live."
What's more--this isn't the first time that a live version of a Rolling Stones song has redeemed the album versions. It also works for "Shattered," which is just kinda goofnuts on "Some Girls," but when it's played live, it loosens the tights a bit and it jangles me the right way.
I don't think I could ever convince 25-year-old me, 21-year-old me or even 13-year-old me that these things would be true. All those past versions of myself firmly believed that "Hot Stuff" and "Shattered" were annoying bits of album skipage. The foolishness of youth, right?
I'm still not convinced on "She's So Cold," or the entire "Steel Wheels" experience though. Maybe an older version of myself has found a way to love them, but currently... I'm not seeing it.
betrayed
excited
amused