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Decline and Fall of Alternative Civilization
June McClunaghan, a luckless waitress and ex-flight attendant, ends up in Seattle in the early 1990s after a life of post-Joycean, Cubs-style defeat, and learns to play bass guitar at the height of that good ol’ coffee-swilling “Grunge Mania.” She loves coffee, hates grunge, so she and her friend Dedra Fatiuchka try to start a trashy garage band instead. No dice. But....
...Dedra, a talented singer and computer geek who is disillusioned with the digital revolution, pranks together an impressively bogus press kit for the band and, in conspiracy with a studio-geek friend, her voice is overdubbed onto the dead tracks of a defunct band (that couldn’t pay their studio bill) and presto! A demo tape! No one the wiser, the whole shebang is sent to the offices of South By SouthWest in Austin, TX as a joke. SXSW, however, respond by offering the band - which doesn’t exist - a high profile showcase at the 1994 edition of the great, ballyhooed music conference. With the help of two guy friends, a guitarist and a drummer, they manage to slap together a functional combo and then embark to the big event only to lose their showcase by running afoul of one of the head festival honchos who pointedly yanks the rug from under them. But....
...another disappointment in June’s doggedly optimistic life, they begin the long trek back to Seattle. When inclement weather forces them off the road, June gets caught in a flash flood incident that leaves her stranded and injured in the middle of nowhere. Rescued by a mysterious hot-rodder, she is thrust into yet another post-Joycean world with even more surreal elements. Here she begins to sense that this strange but benevolent character may actually be the fabled “Seattle Capper” himself - the unseen phantom responsible for a history of distributor cap thefts - and the same one who stole their cap in Arizona while the band was enroute to Austin.
Decline and Fall of Alternative Civilization is literary fiction that may appeal to misguided men, unsettled women, disgruntled music enthusiasts, and anyone fond of examining the strings from which physicists' yoyos spin.
...Dedra, a talented singer and computer geek who is disillusioned with the digital revolution, pranks together an impressively bogus press kit for the band and, in conspiracy with a studio-geek friend, her voice is overdubbed onto the dead tracks of a defunct band (that couldn’t pay their studio bill) and presto! A demo tape! No one the wiser, the whole shebang is sent to the offices of South By SouthWest in Austin, TX as a joke. SXSW, however, respond by offering the band - which doesn’t exist - a high profile showcase at the 1994 edition of the great, ballyhooed music conference. With the help of two guy friends, a guitarist and a drummer, they manage to slap together a functional combo and then embark to the big event only to lose their showcase by running afoul of one of the head festival honchos who pointedly yanks the rug from under them. But....
...another disappointment in June’s doggedly optimistic life, they begin the long trek back to Seattle. When inclement weather forces them off the road, June gets caught in a flash flood incident that leaves her stranded and injured in the middle of nowhere. Rescued by a mysterious hot-rodder, she is thrust into yet another post-Joycean world with even more surreal elements. Here she begins to sense that this strange but benevolent character may actually be the fabled “Seattle Capper” himself - the unseen phantom responsible for a history of distributor cap thefts - and the same one who stole their cap in Arizona while the band was enroute to Austin.
Decline and Fall of Alternative Civilization is literary fiction that may appeal to misguided men, unsettled women, disgruntled music enthusiasts, and anyone fond of examining the strings from which physicists' yoyos spin.
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Published April 3, 2019
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About the author
G.S. Oldman
2 books1 followerG. S. Oldman is a cranky Midwest reclusive who tries to forget that he once published poems and essays in zines that barely existed, then remembers that he also wrote for newspapers and contributed to journals like Thrasher, No Mag, Forced Exposure, Flipside and Option. He also won’t divulge the number of Midwest motorcycles or skateboards he’s destroyed, nor will he mention having filled spaces in X-rated prose and film scripts without having to take his clothes off. In the 1990s, he did time in the backrooms of arts and music promotion in Austin, TX because someone needed to write those blurbs, bios and phony reviews. After Hurricane Katrina, he escaped back to the heartland where all hell did not break loose, and no one could hang the wreck of the Deepwater Horizon on him. He now lives somewhere in Michigan searching for secret U-boat bases.
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