Friday's Music Moment - Gasoline by Enter the Haggis

A friend of mine who I’ll call Jonathan, because that’s his name, once taught me an excellent party game called “Poor Man.” When you’re bored or at a gathering where you don’t know anyone, scan the crowd for those people who, if you squint or look at only from the side or are thirty yards away from, sort of resembles a famous person. Then tell your companion, “There’s the Poor Man’s [fill in the name].” 

Poor Man is addictive, and I find myself playing it solo when I am running errands. Poor Man's Christian Bale goes to my church, Poor Man’s Melina Kanakaredes is a mom at my school, and I have a friend who is Poor Man’s Patrick Dempsey. In certain neighborhoods of Oakland favored by the cute young butch lesbians, you can’t swing a cat without hitting Poor Man’s Justin Bieber – though since his haircut looks better on a girl, I might just call the Biebs “Poor Man’s Cute Lesbian.”

While I was on vacation with my brother in August I taught him the game, the result of which is that we referred to the boyfriend of one of the other vacationers as Poor Man’s Jake Gyllenhaal for the entire week. As in, “Who was up at the archery range when you were there?” “Oh, a bunch of people: Mom, Josh, Shannon, David, and Poor Man’s Jake Gyllenhaal.”

I mentioned in an earlier post that my brother’s new favorite band is Enter the Haggis; this week Larry told me that upon further listening he’s realized they are the Poor Man’s Dropkick Murphys. Being of English Protestant descent, I will not say a negative thing about the Boston Irish Dropkick Murphys for fear that they would beat my absentee landlord ass. In fact, I will give them a compliment: they make Shane McGowan of the Pogues look tuneful. And I'll add that I like this song, Gasoline, by ETH, and admire five guys who can rip it up in skirts. Exit the norm, enter the Poor Man, friends -