MARK SMITH MORE COLUMNS Advertisement

I'll be the first to admit I'm not wild about bull-riding or calf-roping, and I'm not all that crazy about motorcyle runs and misplaced Pony Express rides. (In Pahrump? The Pony Express never came within miles of this place, even assuming there were some hopelessly lost riders. It's like celebrating the great Confederate victory of Bull Run ... in unionist Philadelphia.) But I try to recognize what's important and reflects an area's lifestyle, even if it's not shared by everyone and her brother.

So when I hear rumors roundabout that rodeos may have a limited life span here, or that some powers behind the throne want to turn Pahrump into a "new Henderson," or that there is an effort on the part of some to eliminate livestock from the city, I tend to perk up and listen.

This is the sort of thing that stretches back decades and decades. Think sheepherders vs. ranchers and you'll get the idea. Anyone from Juneau in the mid-'70s would understand in a minute. Half the town wanted condos and a tramway up the mountain, the other half wanted to relive the days of gold and gunslinging.

And then there is the effort on the part of still others to "brand" Pahrump, preferably as something other than the Home of Legal Brothels, though even some local chamber boosters have been known to admit that is the first thing that comes to mind on the part of many outsiders and not a few "insiders."

Whether they are trying to rid the town of prostitutes or cows, there is always going to be someone who wants to get rid of what he perceives as an unfortunate stink and a blot upon the landscape.

It would be OK to celebrate with floozies at, say, the Fall Festival as long as we didn't have the real thing right down at the end of Homestead. Ewwwwww!

When in fact, most people simply ignore such things so long as they don't force themselves on their homes and families. But there are people who just have to look upon others and demand that they align themselves with, in their view, a proper lifestyle.

In a minor key, much the same nonsense is going on where keeping wild cats as pets is concerned.

The proponents of such restrictions ignore the fact that, unless you are incredibly stupid (or you've hired on as Siegfried's partner), the odds of your ever running afoul of a wild cat -- tiger, lion, mountain lion, you name it -- are virtually nil. Really, you have a much better chance of winning Mega Millions or catching a bolt of lightning than becoming a snack for your neighbor's pet bobcat.

But alas, what some people want is a town that is pasteurized and homogenized out of any real character, to the extent it actually becomes a real-life Stepford town, where even those grubby gunslingers at the Wild West Extravaganza should be expected to smell of Right Guard and Irish Spring, and they all have 2.5 kids and a golden retriever named Dylan and a late-model Volvo sedan named Madison. And their fingernails are clean.

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Some time ago a 19-year-old college kid I knew got tired of listening to those of us in our forties and fifties (OK, I said this was some time ago) rave about classic rock on the radio. When I asked her, very seriously, what was wrong with it -- she had her own rock show at her college radio station and I figured probably had something interesting to say -- her face screwed up and she blurted, "It's boring."

My first response was to explain why you really need to listen to the Kingsmen, man, to understand why the drumming on "Louie, Louie" is so good. My second was to take her answer seriously and think about it.

She was right. Classic rock is boring. Frightfully so.

Why? Because in the mindlessness that is radio, "classic" means "made tons of money" and nothing else. God knows it doesn't have anything to do with quality, not when you have to listen to such dreck as "Stayin' Alive," "Downtown" and "Layla" played repeatedly.

As an example, one regional station seems to have a playlist of about 100 songs, and one happens to be Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are a-Changin'." I have had to listen to it a half-dozen times in the past four months.

Now I love Bob Dylan and his work. I even love that song. But for cryin' out loud, out of his hundreds of great songs, could someone not manage to throw in "Obviously 5 Believers" or "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues" just once in a while?

This is where classic rock loses it. It never understands that what made songs classics in the sixties and since was not the great single that grabbed attention but the sheer mass of music that opened up so many new avenues of understanding.

If you have ever heard of albums like "We're Only In It for the Money" or "Palomine" or "Electric Music for the Mind and Body" or "Liquored Up and Lacquered Down," you might have an idea what I'm getting at. And no, they're not all sixties albums,

Just to start with, the following pieces ought to be locked away except for rare special occasions, like the repayment of the French war debt or the triumphant reappearance of Amelia Earhart: "Layla," "Stairway to Heaven," "Hotel California," "Start Me Up," "Who's Next?" and anything from Sgt. Pepper.

Then require that one song from the following artists has to be played at least once every hour: Country Joe and the Fish, Bettie Serveert, Love, the Mothers of Invention, the Blues Project, Lou Reed and Southern Culture on the Skids.

At least some listeners might manage to listen instead of just hear.