Earth to Me

It’s pretty commonplace for a band to release a single before their album comes out. Sometimes they make a music video too, and sometimes they don’t – but most of the time, a band doesn’t just drop an entire album without giving some sort of peek into it.

In 2011, Put’emup, Put’emup just sort of put out “Cooler Than Cool” with no warning or singles. They didn’t have any music videos for the album at first, and even though they gave us little thirty-second previews on Cooltube, there was no real way to judge how the album would sound. Most people in the scene thought they were weirdos for doing that, and…well, rightfully so. Soon after the album dropped, though, they caught on like hair catching fire, and the rest was history.

Almost immediately after announcing “Epitome of Hyperbole” at the end of their summer tour that year, they officially released “Keep Around” as an actual song. For the first time, we could hear it in the studio rather than in live videos that were filmed on potatoes, but they also announced that it would not be the leading single of the album.

A week into October, they released an even newer song, one that they hadn’t even played live yet – “Sell Me Out.”

And it seems to be common for a lighthearted band to put out a new song that sounds “dark” and “edgy” compared to the rest of their repertoire, but no matter how often it happens, there will still always be crusty losers out there who do nothing but complain about the change. As soon as they posted it on their Facenook page, there were hoards of people whining about how they had, ironically, “sold out.”

I was not one of those people. Neither was Tegan, and neither was Murray.

For that reason, we were beyond ecstatic when we heard the song for the first time, and all at once I had some sort of swelling pride in my chest. I didn’t know why; I had only first heard of Put’emup, Put’emup in 2009, so it wasn’t like I could be one of those people who stuck with them from the beginning.

The same day that “Sell Me Out” was released, the SkyTunes pre-order went up, and both their main single and “Keep Around” were available. I spent two dollars to get both songs and never looked back, not when I was walking to class with my earbuds in, not when I was studying and needed a soundtrack. They were solid tunes that made me crave more.

On top of all that, the Wednesday after the pre-orders began, they even announced a music video for “Sell Me Out.” Of course, this simultaneously scared the crap out of their fanbase and also drove us nuts in a good way, since it was something “normal” that they had never done before.

Anthony would message me and Tegan some nights and tease us by making us guess what was in the music video, and he’d be vague and say the band would be in it. He’d also be completely random and say that they recruited 200 platypuses for a very vital part of the video, and then at that point we knew he was just screwing with us.

The day of the music video finally came, and I can truthfully say that there wasn’t a single platypus in it. In fact, it would’ve been more normal for Put’emup, Put’emup to have a video littered with platypuses, but they were going along with the heavy edge of the song itself.

In a high-contrast black-and-white setting, the band ran through mazes of walls inside of what looked like an abandoned warehouse, lipsyncing the words to their soon-to-be hit. At the end of the first verse, Chance fell into a bottomless pit to his doom, and during the second chorus, Mick tried to escape through a window until the window fell and sliced him in half.

“How can I sleep when the whole world’s watching over me? How can I breathe when I don’t wanna die alone?” Andy sang into the camera, a face of panic like a natural-born over-actor.

“How can you sleep when what you did was wrong? How can you breathe when you knew this all along?” Anthony contrasted, his own demeanor cool and controlled and awfully majestic for someone stuck in an evil warehouse.

In the end, though, the two of them escaped only to get abducted by aliens, or at least we all assumed so from the beam that shined down from an unknown source in the video.

Overall, “Epitome of Hyperbole” was shaping up to be a huge success even though it hadn’t been released yet, and of course with any success, Put’emup, Put’emup had to celebrate by throwing a party and only inviting the guardian group. (And Shira, of course.) They didn’t give us the album in advance, and they didn’t even let us listen to the finished product, but it was still a great gesture.

So a few weekends into the semester, Tegan and I packed into my car and ventured through downtown Chicago to get to their apartment, eager to celebrate the way we always knew and cherished. This time, I wasn’t worried about a hypothetical distance from the band like I was a year beforehand. After spending a summer on tour with them, it was kind of hard to not feel a little closer to them, really.

It was a Friday after all of our classes had finished, so after a pit stop at our dorms to change into something a little more dressy (my definition of “dressy” was anything with a collar, so I just switched into a blue plaid button-up), we headed out. I told Murray we were hanging out with a few friends from Florida who were in town for the weekend, and, well, I wasn’t technically lying.

Murray just said, “Sweet, I can sleep naked tonight!”

“Whatever floats your boat, buddy,” I laughed.

Of course the band was the same as they always were whenever we met up with them after a few weeks of no contact, all hugs and handshakes and “how are you”s, and mere minutes after me and Tegan arrived, Chuck and Riley were right behind us with Shira in tow – she was the one to fly them up from Gainesville, after all. Everything had meshed together after that.

Way too many people were asking me how college was going, and so after a while I just responded with a shrug and an, “It’s going fine.” Mick had told me he read our interview on Alternative Sound, and when I said, “Oh God,” he snorted and said we did fine for our first times. He then reiterated that we were welcome to join them on tour again.

Anthony must’ve overheard that, because he jumped right into our little conversation with a can of beer in his hand. “Okay, don’t tell anybody – but we’re touring this fall. Like, right after we release the album.”

“That’s awesome!” I gushed. I loved the little snippets they would give us, even if they’d sometimes count us as outsiders with certain things. “You’re gonna do a show in Chicago, right?”

He gave me the most deathly-serious look and I almost crapped myself. “No, we’re skipping our hometown on our headlining tour.” He must’ve smelled my fear. “I’m being sarcastic, of course we’re doing a Chicago show. Jesus.”

“S-sorry,” I stuttered, setting my root beer down on the bar counter.

Mick slapped Anthony’s arm with the back of his hand. “Dude, don’t be an ass.”

“I’m not! I’m just sayin’, it’s kind of a given we’re doin’ a date here,” Anthony laughed, patting my shoulder and walking away. “Sorry, Osh. Didn’t mean to be a dick about it.”

“No problem,” I smirked. I was used to it at that point.

Whenever they talked to us about their band stuff, I always forgot about our universal ties, and for a moment it would always make me feel normal. I mean, I know it’s probably the least-normal thing on the planet to be able to casually talk to celebrities, but compared to the things I went through in 2011, I was an average Joe.

While Mick took little sips of his beer and we shot the breeze, the other conversations drifted past my head and I caught snippets of tour stories, complaints about professors and apartment complexes, TV shows, and everything else including the kitchen sink. We could’ve gone on forever. But he excused himself to go to the bathroom, and I stood alone by a barstool, watching everyone else interact as usual.

Someone clapped me on the shoulder, snapping me out of thought, and when I turned around to see who it was, I came face-to-face with Chance. He was swaying a bit, slowly blinking, and the bottle of alcohol in his hand definitely wasn’t his first. After a long burp, he finally said, “Dude, I can’t wait for you guys to hear the album.”

“I can’t wait to hear it either,” I smiled, speaking pure truth.

“Like, I’m not even shitting you,” he went on, his voice deep as if he just woke up. “Like, it’s the best thing we’ve ever done. Like, shit. Fuck, it’s so good.”

He was only a few inches taller than me, so it wasn’t hard to meet his eyes, but it was still a little weird. “That’s good to hear, man.”

He turned to face me straight-on and asked, “So how have you been doin’, Oshie? You doin’ alright?”

I nodded, used to the question. “School sucks, but that’s the same for everyone,” I said, forcing a laugh. Chance was still Chance, no matter how much he drank, and I was exactly as awkward around him no matter what his blood-alcohol level was. It was always sort of like that.

He draped his arm around my shoulder, just hanging it there, and from the corner of my eye I saw his bony hand that had shredded through countless guitar solos, hanging so nonchalantly. “That’s cool. You’re a smart kid, you’ll make it through, you know?”

“Yeah, I guess,” I mumbled. People having faith in me was a mixed bag. It felt nice, but the burden of living up to their expectations was horrible. It was one of the reasons why I hated talking about school to adults.

“You’re gonna make a bunch of art and get into galleries and shit, aren’t you? ‘Cause you can just holler at me when that happens and I’ll be there and I’ll be one of those dudes who takes a million pictures of your drawings and shit.”

He kept murmuring about being an artist in the city, and I just smiled and nodded along, not really sure what to say, and then he zoomed in back to the matters at hand that I didn’t even think he was thinking about.

“Are you still havin’ weird dreams and shit?” he said quietly, looking directly at me again. “Wakin’ up all static-y?”

I froze, dead in my thoughts, and after a few seconds of gaping, I just said, “Uh, sometimes.”

He pursed his lips and took another drink, squeezing my arm. His eyebrows pressed together right under his tousled half-fauxhawk, he asked, “Are you alright, dude?”

He sounded so sober that it caught me off-guard. “Yeah, I’m alright.”

I had a bad habit of forgetting the people I was surrounded with and how much they actually cared about me. Heck, I even put off telling my dad about the nightmares because I knew how he’d react – he’d freak out more than anybody else would. When Chance’s glazed-over eyes stared right into mine, it all came back to me in a nauseating reminder: a multitude of people actually gave a crap about me. I couldn’t fly under the radar anymore and assume that nobody was concerned for my safety. There were few things I could lie about.

And I understand that it’s far from being a bad thing. In fact, it’s one of the best things that ever happened to me – it was just so hard to get used to.

“Are you sure you’re okay? ‘Cause, like, if you ever need anybody to talk to, I’m here, man. That’s if you wanna talk, though. Shit, we’re all here. We’re right in Chicago, and we’re online if you ever wanna send us a message or something, dude,” he reassured me. “You’re one of us, buddy. Can’t let one of our teammates fall behind, ‘cause we work together and shit.”

I didn’t have to force the smile that broke out on my face, but I kept it as contained as I could. Even though I could definitely tell he’d have a hangover in the morning, he was never not genuine in his words, and that was no exception.

And for Chance of all people to say it really meant something to me. If he was the one telling me that the band would look out for me in addition to Tegan, there was no use being paranoid over whether or not I was alone in the universe in this weird chapter of my life.

When it was all over, when we said our goodbyes again at the end of the night, the hugs I got were just as powerful as they ever were, and the words about keeping in touch were even more poignant. I didn’t know if I could open up on a dime and spill all of my fears to everybody on the “team,” at least not immediately. It could be gradual. I mean, I told Murray about my mom, didn’t I?

Patience is a virtue. If someone is patient with you when you’re not ready to tell them everything, that’s when you know they’ll stick by you. The rest of the guardians were some of the most patient folks out there, and I knew it would take some time for me to get ready. Something would have to happen to jog me out of the daze.