Bostonist Talks With Chuck Klosterman... Sort Of

"...I was driving through the scenic backwoods of Idaho to uncover the black metal scene in Boise for Spin, and I was flipping through the dead air of the Wild West's hazy frequency when I came upon a startling event on the radio. No, it wasn't anything like when Orson Welles broadcast War of the Worlds and the entire state of New Jersey thought it was real, and why wouldn't they, I mean, they live in Jersey, what do they know. But, this sound was startling nonetheless. It was a classic rock station and they were playing Chinese Democracy. I wasn't alarmed by the fact that they were playing Guns 'N' Roses on the radio - it's a bone-fide rule of law that all commercial radio stations play at least 7 'Roses songs, 4 Nirvana tracks, and 5 Zeppelin ballads every two hours. What was shocking was that this record, the Holy Grail of rock gems, the album that took the span all of my teenage years and hopes to create was being played on a classic rock station. And I thought, 'this station must have owned Chinese Democracy for decades in order for it to pass the unspoken-but-still-followed-bylaws of classic rock radio. Why did they not tell the rest of the world?!'..."

"...and I said of course Twilight was a hit among teenagers! The plight of the vampire is so reminiscent of the pangs of being a young adult in our developed society. Many teens are covered in blotch marks and scars from breakouts of zits and eczema, and their skin is so pale from either sitting in school or in basements smoking pot and playing video games, that, in essence, these creatures are only comfortable going outside in the nighttime, when their hideous deformities are safe from the intense focus of sunlight. Just like vampires! And the romantic, forbidden sexual chic of vampires. Well, that's got teen angst all over it: most teenagers are awkward, gangly, and yet their bodies contain hormones so enraged they could be manufactured into bombs to destroy entire continents. The thrill of sexual lust, the passion of merely touching another individual when it's forbidden and highly unlikely, is merely a reflection of every loser teen that failed to get a prom date. Also, the movie has pretty people in it..."

"...Tampa Bay has destroyed baseball. They've injected an idea of the love of the game back into the sport with their poorly-paid players. But ultimately, this is just a conceit, a mark of the decline of baseball. Sports, just like every other form of entertainment, relies on some stasis of celebrity, and baseball may be one of the biggest star-gazing galleries in this nation. And when a small child cannot idolize, nor name, a single player on a World Series contending team, well then everyone's lost. But mostly, the Rays. I've got my fingers crossed they'll be shipped off to an expansion franchise in Fargo..."

"...and did anyone see The Wrestler? Mickey Rourke totally deserved the Oscar, but only because of that scene in the bar where he rags on Kurt Cobain and preaches to the pedestal of hair metal. I believed in that scene more than I've believed in any other movie before or since..."

"...And that's when I began to watch Lost. And I mean, I really watched it; I was engrossed in the television show like I could only be engrossed in the arms of a woman. See, I'd just been involved in a torrid love affair with a writer at Vanity Fair, and our relationship reflected a lot of the themes and recurring images on Lost. Now, I won't name names, but I was head over heels for this lady of the high-end glossy magazines; thighs that went to her eyes, eyes that were larger than an anime character, and a body so shapely you'd mistake it for a finely-crafted, glass-blown vase from Florence. And she threw me for a loop after another, and after a week of our romantic misadventures, I was thrown to the curve. That Wednesday night, I found myself planted on a couch in front of one of ABC's most popular broadcasts. And I realized, what I find so repelling and oddly attractive about Lost I find in the women with which I become romantically entangled. They're both confusing, frustrating, illogical, repetitive, perform for me once a week, and have the ability to time travel..."

"...I'm sure I should talk about Twitter, but I find it hard to condense any one thought into 140 characters and make it appear brilliant..."

"...Barack Obama. Sorry, I just had to squeeze his name in there, even he doesn't even seem to have anything to do with the resurgence in vinyl sales. But, that's where you'd be wrong..."