Klosterman Fandom

So I just read the new Chuck Klosterman book, Killing Yourself to Live. Clever title, for a book about the legacy of dead rock stars, no? Also one of my all-time favorite Sabbath songs. Mad props to Chuck for that one. He must’ve had me in mind when he titled it. On a side note, does anyone else hear the similarity between that song and Chicago’s “25 or 6 to 4”? I’m not sure if they’re in the same key; I’ve never listened to them back to back. There is, however, definitely a similarity in the chord progression of the chorus in “Killing Yourself to Live” and the verse in “25 or 6 to 4.” Didn’t notice? Go check it out and get back to me. Yes, I’m asking you to listen to a Chicago song. It’s okay, you’ll live. It’s really not a bad song.

About the book: do not read this if you expect to gain knowledge about the deaths of Duane Allman, Ritchie Valens, or even Kurt Cobain. This book is not actually about rock stars and how they died. I repeat: THIS BOOK HAS ONLY A TANGENTIAL RELATIONSHIP TO EXAMINING THE DEATHS OF MUSICIANS. Despite what you may have heard, Chuck Klosterman is not actually a music journalist. However, he IS a journalist who has an enviable number of CDs, works for a prominent music magazine, and enjoys using music in as many metaphors as he can fit into a 235 page book.

This is why I like him. Similar to Elizabeth Wurtzel, I don’t much care what he’s writing about. I like the author, regardless of their subject, because I can understand them. I can see what motivates them. In fact, I relate to it so strongly that upon discovering Klosterman’s first book, Fargo Rock City, I sat and read the first chapter in the aisle of the bookstore, teary-eyed in the realization that I had found someone who sees the world through the same Motley Crue-colored lens that I do- and he did such a perfect job of articulating that perspective.

Interestingly enough, Wurtzel was mentioned twice in the book, once when Klosterman recounts having met her in the offices of Spin and complemented her on a particular passage from Prozac Nation, and once when a co-worker muses on him becoming the male equivalent of Wurtzel. I understand this comparison completely; both have cultivated a lifestyle based in rock and roll, and both are compelled to- as Klosterman puts it- to write about what others are content to merely experience.

What this book is actually about is Klosterman’s quest to sort out and come to terms with his relationships- past, present, and future. Their examination and subsequent euthanization is set to a backdrop of a cross-country drive, ostensibly to pay his respects to dead musical icons by way of visiting their death sites. Each stop, however, is punctuated by stories of women he’s known; women who somehow relate to the dead guitarist at hand. He rehashes conversations in his mind; theorizes about the dynamics of each relationship and how music somehow contributed to them.

For instance, he relates every woman he’s had a significant relationship with to different members of KISS, living, dead, or otherwise (the otherwise is, of course, Frehley). He judges a female acquaintance on her familiarity with the Allman Brothers. He remembers girls not by their names, but by their opinion of Pearl Jam’s Ten. And all of this is interspersed with insightful but sometimes neurotic observations about human interactions. I can appreciate his outlook, though he often comes across as isolated and lonely. Perhaps its merely an artifact of his writing style, but he never fails to leave me with the sense that he doesn’t really have a place to call home in terms of either location or social connections. For a intentionally disconnected person, this might actually be preferable, but Klosterman seems to be the type who desires a quiet home and family and just can’t quite get there. That always leaves me feeling a little empty when I’ve finished reading his work.

Aside from this in-depth analysis of his love life, there are a few digressions which lead to matters directly related to the supposed meat of the book. He expounds on how Kurt Cobain posthumously created an entire culture: after he died, suddenly everyone rewrote their personal history to include having had an emotional bond with Nirvana’s music. He muses on how every teenage boy experiences Led Zeppelin in the same manner. And in what I thought was the most significant passage, he visits the remains of the Station in West Warwick, RI, where a Great White show claimed the lives of 100 people. The people he meets there illustrate how their town’s tragedy brought them all closer; how this band that is so often dismissed as a shitty has-been meant a great deal to this working class community. They honestly enjoyed the music, but whether they were in attendance that night or not, they were all undeniably changed by the fire.

So in regard to being a wealth of information on untimely demises, this book falls short. However, in regard to being a collection of well-formed thoughts about life and relationships in the eyes of a rock enthusiast, I think it’s a worthwhile read- albeit somewhat narcissistic and self-serving. If you can get past the fact that it’s essentially just detailed analyses about another person’s romantic trysts, then it’s possible to say that Klosterman succeeded in writing an entertaining and intelligent book.