Someone asked me where I got the idea for A HERO IS ALWAYS ALONE SOMETIMES. And, yeah, it’s kinda weird…

We recently bought a vintage audio console. You know, the kind with a record player and radio and tube amp built in? One of those big ol’ suckers you might’ve seen in your grandparent’s house? It looks like this:

So I went out and bought a few records, some new ones, some old ones that took me back. One of the oldies was this piece of post-punk Brit-pop:

 

I put it on and danced around the living room like some outcast from the Breakfast Club. After trying to explain the 80’s to our four-year-old (who responded by throwing a plastic dinosaur at my head) I flipped it over to the B-side and lowered the needle onto “My Time”…

You can have anything you can hold in your hand
And a hero is always alone

…and I thought, but what if someone wanted to be that hero’s sidekick? Then, naturally, but what if that hero didn’t want a sidekick? Followed by, what if that sidekick didn’t care?

Add a renegade wife, a dysfunctional support group, and a flatulent dog, and there you have it: A HERO IS ALWAYS ALONE SOMETIMES.

PS: for proof that the 80s were both awesome and terrifying, witness the big hair and sunglasses known as The Psychedelic Furs!