Ageing Self-Control with Bad Religion

There’s nothing more softly jarring than being struck with the quiet thought “Huh, this is okay”.

Losing that sense of youthful contrarian cynicism and finding yourself in the position of being generally satisfied can trigger a whole terrifying orchestra of fears concerning your own mortality, your innate morality and your sudden mild indifference towards paying taxes.

You’ve been walking around, mentally listing the positives and negatives of spending your entire month’s grocery budget on Wizz Fizz and cocaine, mixing them all together in a mini snow mountain and spending three days making quick and sticky snow angels, and all of a sudden you find yourself, on the whole, vaguely satisfied with you who you are and where you are. Which essentially means you’re going to have to spend the rest of your life avoiding mirrors lest you look into one and suddenly melt into a pool of irrelevance, grossly insufficient pension funds, Viagra and a nursing home’s worth of all-purpose lube.

But it’s important not to overreact. Youth is a universally horrifying experience in which your hormones force you to have opinions about things. Now that your hormones are not so much screaming at you to rage against the machine as they are settling down to a lovely eternal evening of UK’s Taskmaster, you can finally relax and start taking things with bitter aplomb.

If you’re unfamiliar with exactly how this process works, take a lesson from Bad Religion.

Formed in 1979 in Los Angeles, California, Bad Religion is an American punk rock/progressive rock band. They are most known for their lyrics that often relate to social and political commentary. They will be engaging in a live, interactive discussion concerning their latest book release. From their beginnings as teenagers experimenting in a San Fernando Valley garage dubbed “The Hell Hole” to headlining major music festivals around the world, ‘Do What You Want’ tells the whole story of Bad Religion’s 40-year career in irreverent style.

See? It’s not as though ageing means you’re not able to fight against the system at all.

You may not have the piss and vinegar it takes to shave half your hair off, stick a safety pin in your nose and not wear deodorant for a month, but you have the capacity to release a paperback book during an age dominated by streaming services and an anti-intellectual wave spanning western society.

And that takes a lot of wrinkly old balls.

 

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