Punk Goes NaNo

I've made the realization that my punk band backstory has to move up to the mid-90s, because I really want to call them Winter on Venus (now promoting their debut album, Retrograde). See, that's in reference to it "snowing" metal on Venus. Because how kick ass is that? But it also wasn't really postulated until 1995, after the Magellan spacecraft took a trip out there. And I just have to be right about everything.

I think it's probably for the best, since I'm familiar with punk bands who started in the 90s, while the 80s, not so much. A bit before my time.

On the other hand, I could call them that anyway and just offer no explanation. How many bands have weird names with no discernible meaning? (I'm looking at you, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus.) Damn it, now I don't know what I'm doing.

The ridiculous thing is that this is all for backstory. It has very little bearing on whatever the main plot is. All it really determines is how long he's been wandering around as a vampire. So at this point it doesn’t really matter.

So, most of the bands I'm big on, punk and otherwise, are from the late 90s onward. That's when I really expanded my musical horizons. Now, as I've mentioned before, I like to make playlists for my stories. So does that mean I'm stuck exclusively with music of the 80s or 90s, that I'm personally not so much a fan of? Not necessarily. See, I've thought about this, probably too much, and the way I see it, punk was this whole "fuck the establishment, I'm an outsider, and no one understands me" thing. People who might have listened to that back in the day might have grown up and moved on (or might not have, this isn’t representative of the while population). But what if you never grew up? What if you were a perpetual twenty-something outcast, pissed off at the world, and no one could ever understand you? Then you might stick to that same genre of music, even as it changed over time. So a mix of old and new punk would make sense, is what I'm saying.

Like I have to justify any of this to you.

Sorry, that's my "fuck the establishment, I'm an outsider, and no one understands me" attitude coming out. Write what you know, they say.

On another note, this will be the first time I think I've had a character who’s a musician. And that's pretty damn exciting. Does this mean I get to write angsty vampire punk lyrics? Maybe. Hey, that would be more words. And you know how much I love more words.

So why a punk band, you might be asking? Why did it have to be that genre? Well, I've got a picture of this dude in my head, and he looked the part for a emo/punk band. Also, he's a fan of Sisters of Mercy, apparently. I saw the name in passing, and a voice popped up in my head, listing his favorite bands, and getting frustrated that kids these days don't know who they are.

This guy still doesn't have a name, by the way. I'll know the right one when I see it. I'm pretty sure his (now) dead girlfriend's name is Jenny. Not sure why. It just is. That's what he called her. In my… head.

Maybe I'll have some of these questions answered by Tuesday. I wouldn't bet on it.