How the neon flash of Jem and The Holograms helped validate Tim’s current life choices.
At eleven years old I wanted to be Jem. To be clear, I didn’t want to date her (my pre-puberty emissions were already a-washed over the Prime-adjacent chassis of Elita-1), rather, this idolization stemmed from the animated lifestyle this drawing of a person lived.
Sort of how THE REPLACEMENTS defined Tim’s 90s dissent.
Prior to college, “DON’T TELL A SOUL” was my favorite Replacements album. From it came the song I thought most defined me in that mid-teens moment: “I’ll Be You” (which is odd , given its a song about swapping personas). And, while their career had spanned the near entirety of the ‘1980s, it was also the only Replacements album I knew.