"In the Cold" by Acceptance, Friday, September 30, 2022 (Partial Repost)

We’re at the end of another month, now solidly into fall in the northern hemisphere. This month’s playlist has been the most repeats of any other month with 17 reposts and 13 new songs. And yet I don’t regret the choices because almost every song fits a certain autumny nostalgia. So today, despite the weather being a record high, I chose one of my favorite fall songs from an album I’ve talked about to death. But repeated listening is not the same as repeated reading. So, if you've read enough about Acceptance, skip today's post and just go listen to Phantoms or "In the Cold."

THE WORDS, THEY TAKE THEIR MEANING. While "In the Cold" is a mid-album track that had very little potential to become a single, I feel that this song best encapsulates the "cooling" of interest Columbia Records had with Acceptance. I've talked about the anti-piracy CD recall that took the band's record from the shelves. But there were more problems. Columbia Records signed Acceptance based on their incredible live energy. For rock bands, though, the label made most of its money through ballads. Hence, Phantoms starts out as a pop-rock album that eventually becomes a rock record. The podcasters on Finding Emo give many examples of rock bands needing a rock radio song before their pop ballad. Even the band Hoobastank's "The Reason," whom Columbia was trying to capitalize on, didn't release that song first. The Fray didn't lead with "How to Save a Life" or "Look After You." Yellowcard didn't lead with "Only One." Releasing a rock radio single first would establish the core fans of the band. The pop ballad would bring their girlfriends on board. And yes, the song "Different" might have been the biggest money-maker--like "Only One" or "Boulevard of Broken Dreams," the shortcut of skipping straight to the ballad made longterm, local band fans think that the band had completely sold out. On its release, Phantoms would seem like a pop album and would be lost in the anti-piracy/spyware shuffle. Maybe a song like "This Conversation Is Over" or "Permanent" on alternative radio would have helped the band survive. If it were super successful, "In the Cold" could have been a fourth single? Of course that didn't happen, and Phantoms remains a cult classic. 

I REMEMBER THE CHILL THAT CAME OVER. "In the Cold" is about looking back on a relationship that didn't work out, but it gives me these autumn memories. I think about the frosty mornings, camping in the mountains over the weekend with my Pathfinder club. Pathfinders is the Seventh-day Adventist alternative to Boy and Girl Scouts. I think about friendships that I had that were everything before we all grew apart. The boys in the tent determined that sleeping in your underwear in the sleeping bag to use your body heat to stay warm through the night and one boy said that he was actually sleeping commando. There was the early morning scramble to put on layer upon layer of clothes and a smokey fleece zip-down sweater. You either were on breakfast duty, which meant getting the water or trying not to burn the pancakes, or mess duty, which meant washing the syrupy plates in the warm-to-lukewarm water. Then there was always a fear among the boys about the showering situation. You never knew what the showering situation was at the campground, and the wrong shower situation might make you gay. To avoid this, you had to go at different times of the day, ask a friend to stand guard while you shower at the end, or just not shower. After a clean up of the campsite or a shower, we were ready to start learning orienteering in the woods and other skills that would help us survive the end of times. Mostly, the camping trips were a time of ungodly conversations--making fun of weirder, more conservative kids, rebelling against one particularly tyrannical leader, sex and puberty, and music and movies--all while learning how to tie knots (I failed so many times). Wasn't our Pathfinder group the worst?

 

Read “In the Cold” by Acceptance on Genius.