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Under the shadow of preopositions
By Cassie Hood
hoodc@mscd.edu

I want to be like everyone else.

Every day I think about cutting my hair like Pat Benatar’s, or maybe just going crazy with the scissors and having chunks missing here and there. Maybe then I would be cool. Perhaps I’ll start wearing all the ’80s trends and go to shows of bands I have never heard of, like After the Fall or Of Hearts and Shadows, or any of those carbon-copied musical groups insisting on throwing creativity out the window and leaning on the good ol’ preposition.

Sometimes I think these bands are just too emo to pick stimulating names. They must be too busy putting on makeup and practicing their melancholy, grief-stricken faces in the mirror. Maybe their abundant use of hair dye and nail polish has washed away too many brain cells, and they can’t think creatively anymore.

Either way, all I want to know is: What is happening to music these days?

In the indie scene, originality has become a rarity. Whether hardcore, post-hardcore, metal core, emo-core, screamo, emo, melodic hardcore or any other genre, the bands all manage to sound the same. Granted, they all have their little nuances, but for the most part, the freshness of indie has turned rotten.

Recently, I have been annoyed to find that there are a couple hundred bands that use the 30 most common prepositions in their names. Names such as After Silence, From Behind, Behind the Door, Against the Wall, Beyond the Shadow, Before I Go or Along Came Man show these bands lack the talent to pick suitable monikers.

I have a hard time being enchanted by any of these bands. Do they think they’re clever? Because, frankly, After the Fall, After the Tragedy, After the Fight, After the Sirens and After the Crash do little more than make me despise the word after. One band even thought of the short and sweet name After. I hope they didn’t hurt themselves coming up with that one.

I don’t know how many groups thought being behind something was catchy. This one follows a simple formula: Behind + (insert angsty word here) = crappy emo band that thinks they are hardcore.

Stop fooling yourselves. Wearing tight pants and black eye makeup doesn’t make you hardcore. I just keep finding bands like Behind Closed Doors, Behind the Wall, Behind the Walls, Behind the Lies, Behind White Lies, Behind Bars, Behind Eyes, Behind Crimson Eyes, Behind Bleeding Eyes, Behind Closed Eyes, Behind Me Lies Another … must I go on? What’s brilliant about any of these names?

And I’m sure Along Way Home thought they were being cute by making along grammatically incorrect. Instead, it just made them look dumb as rocks. Band names like this perturb me because the group thought they were being truly original but failed miserably.

The names could at least be complete thoughts. Take the band Of Broken, for instance. Of broken what? Dreams? Hopes? Windows? Teeth? My only hope is before they could think of a complete phrase, they were attacked by a flock of angry birds (and since they are from Maryland, let’s say these birds were orioles). If this were the case, then the name would make more sense.

From is another trite choice. From Autumn to Ashes doesn’t make much sense because autumn can’t really turn to ashes, unless Autumn is a girl, and we are burning her. Perhaps what they were trying to do was conjure up images of fall’s reds and oranges turning to winter’s grays and whites. They get a gold star for effort, but unfortunately, From First to Last had to come in and ruin the prepositional fun. Not only does From First to Last sound like an imitation of From Autumn to Ashes, but they copied their name too. Where’s the originality in that?

At least 10 bands thought Beneath the Ashes would be new and exciting. Sad to say, being beneath anything and in a band doesn’t seem very smart, unless you happen to be beneath a piano, in which case we can hope it drops on you, resulting in one less band called Beneath the Ashes.

Another popular preposition is outside. Many bands wanted to be Outside In; one even decided to be innovative and call themselves Outside Inn. Let’s not forget On the Outside Looking In, who listed their main influences as From First to Last and Fear Before the March of Flames. Hmm … more carbon copies?

If all these so-called artists can’t even show us imaginative titles, how on earth will they be able to entertain us with their supposedly avant-garde music? These bands undoubtedly have to rely solely on the hordes of mindless indie clones who go to shows to be seen and look like photocopies of each other. I guess it’s a match made in heaven: banal, clichéd bands and vapid, jejune scene kids.