Freedom

It happened that Molly’s mother was a longtime Arts editor at the New York Times, a fact that may explain why the Traumatics, despite record sales in the low four digits and audiences in the high two digits, had received several full write-ups in the Times (“Consistently Original, Perennially Unheard Of,” “Undaunted by Indifference, the Traumatics Soldier On”) plus brief reviews of each of their records after In Case You Hadn’t Noticed. Coincidentally or not, Insanely Happy—their first record without Molly and, as it turned out, their last—was ignored not only by the Times but even by the free weekly city papers that had long been a bastion of Traumatic support. What had happened, as Richard theorized over an early supper with Walter and Patty when the band dragged itself through the Twin Cities yet again, was that he’d been buying press attention on credit all along, without realizing it, and that the press had finally concluded that familiarity with the Traumatics was never going to be necessary to anyone’s cultural literacy or street credibility, and so there was no reason to extend him further credit.

Patty, carrying earplugs, went along with Walter to the show that night. The Sick Chelseas, a foursome of assonant local girls barely older than Jessica, opened for the Traumatics, and Patty found herself trying to guess which of the four Richard had been hitting on backstage. She wasn’t feeling jealous of the girls, she was feeling sad for Richard. It was finally sinking in, with both her and Walter, that in spite of being a good musician and a good writer Richard was not having the best life: had not actually been kidding with all his self-deprecation and avowals of admiration and envy of her and Walter. After the Sick Chelseas finished playing, their late-adolescent friends seeped out of the club and left behind no more than thirty die-hard Traumatics fans—white, male, scruffy, and even less young than they used to be—to hear Richard’s deadpan banter (“We want to thank you guys for coming to this 400 Bar and not the other, more popular 400 Bar . . . We seem to have made the same mistake ourselves”) and then a rollicking rendition of their new record’s title song—

 

What tiny little heads up in those big fat SUVs!

My friends, you look insanely happy at the wheel!

And the Circuit City smiling of a hundred Kathy Lees!

A wall of Regis Philbins! I tell you I’m starting to feel

INSANELY HAPPY! INSANELY HAPPY!

and, later, an interminable and more typically repellent song, “TCBY,” consisting mostly of guitar noise reminiscent of razor blades and broken glass, over which Richard chanted poetry—

 

They can buy you

They can butcher you

 

Tritely, cutely branded yogurt

The cat barfed yesterday

 

Techno cream, beige yellow

Treat created by yes-men

 

They can bully you

They can bury you

 

Trampled choked benighted youth

Taught consumerism by yahoos

 

This can’t be the country’s best

This can’t be the country’s best

and finally his slow, country-sounding song, “Dark Side of the Bar,” which dampened Patty’s eyes with sadness for him—

 

There’s an unmarked door to nowhere

On the dark side of the bar

And all I ever wanted was

To be lost in space with you

The reports of our demise

Pursue us through the vacuum

We took a wrong turn at the pay phones

We were never seen again

 

The band was good—Richard and Herrera had been playing together for almost twenty years—but it was hard to imagine any band being good enough to overcome the desolation of the too-small house. After a single encore, “I Hate Sunshine,” Richard didn’t exit to the side of the stage but simply parked his guitar on a stand, lit a cigarette, and hopped down to the floor.

“You guys were nice to stay,” he said to the Berglunds. “I know you’ve got to get up early.”

“It was great! You were great!” Patty said.

“Seriously, I think this is your best record yet,” Walter said. “These are terrific songs. It’s another big step forward.”