Some Nights

By Josh Corman

Stealing titles is so much easier than inventing them!

Follow me on Twitter @JoshACorman

What I know:

I brought a bitter, windy cold with me to Grantham, Pennsylvania. As Ben, my friend of fifteen years, and I sat huddled on freezing metal chairs outside the Messiah College Student Union, I was reminded of Lewis Black’s rant about how much he hates the cold. You can’t even hold a thought in your head, he says (or shouts, really). Of course, the reminiscence, true to Black’s word, didn’t stick around for long.

Eventually, the powers that be opened the Union doors at about a quarter after seven. The six hundred of us who waited in line were ushered into the warmth, where we were handed rubber bracelets and directed towards the open area in front of a small stage, packed to its edges with guitars, horns, keyboards, and a drum kit. Ben and I planted ourselves in a space just a few feet from the stage’s right side (much, I’m sure, to the chagrin of anyone on that side of the room under six feet tall). Arms folded, backs straight, toes still numb, we endured an underwhelming opener (sample lyrics: Her name is Kendall/She’s an ordinary girl) as enterprising - and mostly female - college students jockeyed for position nearer the front. Then again, I’m not six-four and 230 pounds for nothing. We weathered the siege, the openers left the stage, and the massive clock hanging on a wall left of the stage ticked on. Its second hand may as well have been a barometer, spinning like Clark Griswold’s electric meter on Christmas Eve. With each one of its short jumps, the room grew warmer, nervier, more volatile.

The lights dimmed. Eyes turned to the closed off balcony behind us where four men and a red-headed whisper walked in a single file, all smiling as they took a staircase down to ground level, behind a lengthy divider, and strolled onstage.

Over tinkling piano, Fun.’s (for legal reasons, always spelled with that period at the end) lead singer, Nate Ruess, sang to the hushed throng: “Some nights, I hold to every note I ever wrote/Some nights, I say, ‘fuck it all,’ stare at the calendar/Waiting for catastrophes, imagining they’d scare me into changing whatever it is I’m changing into.” He raised his eyes then and almost hissed, “You have every right to be scared.”

And just like that, Nate Ruess held six hundred people in his sweating palm. About an hour later, he had every voice singing with his the chorus to Fun.’s wildly popular (top of both Amazon’s and iTunes’ mp3 downloads) song, “We Are Young.” From what I could tell, nearly everyone in the room knew every word. The album had been out for four days.

At some point near the show’s end, Nate thanked the crowd. It was the first show of the tour, he told us, and “...this is just-” but he didn’t seem able to find the words.

What I think:

I think that in less than twelve months time, Fun. will have played Saturday Night Live.

I think that “We are Young” will win the award for best song at next year’s Grammys.

I think that the work that Fun. is doing (and that Ruess’ old band, The Format, did before them) is as good as any music I’ve heard in the last decade.

I think that I saw a band on the brink of stardom.

I think that when Nate Ruess stopped short as he addressed the crowd at Messiah College, it was because in that moment, but not before, he thought all of this too.

The new record, Some Nights, is largely a record about duality. Its opening lines (the same which opened the show) hint at as much. Some nights we want to be held, some nights we can imagine only being alone. Some nights every choice works out, some nights we can make only mistakes. Some nights we know what we’re doing, some nights we haven’t a clue.

None of this is groundbreaking territory, as far as rock musicians go. But the duality which Fun. examines most closely is a rarer bird. Go back and look at those opening lyrics. Some nights I believe in my vocation, my art, and essentially myself, some nights I look for any excuse I can find to rid myself of the burden that being an artist has put on me. How much longer, he asks, can I reasonably do this before I hang it up? Will there come a time when six hundred people in a college Student Union will mean defeat rather than success. Has that time already come?

The songs on Some Nights ask these questions again and again. Ruess sounds, for all the world, like a man giving professional musicianship one last run, to see if it’ll finally stick.

I think that he got his answer last Saturday night.

What I Believe:

I believe I’ve got some talent as a writer. I also believe that talent is only a small part of success in any given field (just think about how often we see it easily squandered). After Ben and I left the show, I wondered about those very same dualities Ruess wrestles with in his lyrics. Any writer will tell you that on some days when you stop working you feel so good about what you’ve created that you’d challenge Hemingway to a duel, fifteen paces at dawn. Other days, you feel like you’re a shame to Stephanie Meyer’s profession (cheap shot, I know, but I’m working out some demons here). It’s just the nature of the artistic beast.

I read somewhere the other day that writing is awful, but having written is wonderful. That is perfectly true. For about five days. Then the dreaded "other side" of a writer’s life rears its head. Query letters, rejections, agents (or worse, the lack thereof), publishers (see last parenthetical), and the prospect of each day waking up to write words that no audience might ever read are so much more daunting than deciding whether or not the third paragraph on page thirty-eight really needs that last sentence.

There’s a great line in High Fidelity where Rob (John Cusack’s character) says in voiceover, “Only people of a certain disposition are frightened of being alone for the rest of their lives at the age of twenty-six. We were of that disposition.” I feel like, if modified slightly, those lines would describe me only too well. Only writers of a certain disposition are frightened of remaining unnoticed for the rest of their lives at the age of twenty-six. I am of that disposition.

This is, admittedly, not a good sign. Tons of great writers don’t have any notable publishing success until they’re in their forties. Twelve houses passed on Harry Potter. A half-dozen record labels passed on The Beatles. So what happens when (the word “if” would be absurdly naive) months or perhaps years have passed and I’m essentially right where I am now. Am I prepared to stay committed? To trust that as long as I put in the work on my end that some form of validation will arrive? Will I have the guts to keep pushing myself like Nate Ruess has done?

Some nights I believe I can do it, but some nights I just don’t know.

By Josh Corman

Follow me on Twitter @JoshACorman

P.S. - Do yourself a favor and give Fun. a listen here.