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My name is Justin Moyer and I am a rock and roll musician from Washington, D.C. This weblog, which I call “Iceland,” details many wonderful and terrible adventures undertaken between Oct. 8 and Nov. 11, 2007, the dates of my band’s upcoming four-week European tour. Failing financial disaster or personal tragedy, I expect many noteworthy things to happen during this 33-day period, and am here recount these happenings for your entertainment.
Today, the United States of America observes Columbus Day. Christopher Columbus, a Genovese navigator, sailed west across the Atlantic in 1492 in search of a route to the East Indies. Unfortunately for many, an enormous continent prevented this would-be genius explorer from reaching his visionary goal. Still, Columbus’s “discovery” of a “New World” set the stage for many events—-some wonderful, some terrible. These include, but are not limited to, the mass murder of the American indigenous population, the invention of the cotton gin, World War I, the unrolling of the Eisenhower Interstate Highway System, the widespread availability of the “The Sopranos” on DVD, and the continuing urgency (or, at least, the continuing existence) of punk rock.
With a Columbian mind—-that is, with a determination to blaze trails across the psychogeographical landscape no matter what formidable physical, ethical, and financial obstacles may block the path—-I now return to the Old World in the name of punk rock, a.k.a. “my art.” The Old World has taught me much about geopolitics, new wave cinema, the Protestant ethic, and the spirit of capitalism. Quid pro quo, I will now educate the Old World about the glory of my uncompromising, American-made rock-and-roll aesthetics.