Kia Sorento Two
Our traveler steps onto the staircase and starts descending. He reflects upon what he has just witnessed. Perhaps he should not be quick to judge people for being passionate about things they like, especially considering that he has never been passionate about anything in his life, ever. On the other hand, is Harry Potter actually worth it? The traveler’s thoughts are interrupted by a change in the matter beneath his bleeding feet. The stairs have given way to a dune of yellow sand. Next to him, Paul sits, blade down in the sand, mumbling. The traveler picks his knife guide up and rotates him before putting him back in the sand, this time with the handle down. Paul sighs in relief.
“Thanks. Anyways, this is our next circle of Annoying Pop Culture Opinion Hell. This is where they keep people that call mainstream things ‘underground’.”
“I know what those words mean individually.”
“It’s those guys that are, like, ‘Oh, I’m a fan of this really underground band, they’re called the Beatles.’ People who say stuff like that.”
“But the Beatles aren’t underground.”
“That’s the point.”
“Oh.”
The traveler starts to sweat, finally noticing how hot the room is. He looks around them, but cannot see any other people. Looking down, however, he sees what the issue is: everyone around him is buried up to their heads in the sand.
“Ohh,” he says, turning back to Paul. “I get it. They threw around the word ‘underground’ too much, so now they’re underground. That’s kinda funny.”
“Shh!” Paul yells. “Don’t spoil it! The audience is supposed to figure that out on their own.”
The traveler shrugs and begins to walk away from the staircase. He glances at the heads he passes, watching as they twitch and writhe. He is confused until he looks down at his feet. His yellow foam flip-flops have melted off.
“Aw man,” he says, despondently. “I paid $1.50 for those.”
Realizing that the flip-flops must have melted off for a reason, our traveler panics.
“Hey Paul?” he yells, worried. “Is the sand gonna burn my feet?”
“Nah,” Paul says from next to the traveler’s feet. “You’re not dead.”
“Then why did it melt my flip-flops?” the traveler asks as he continues watching.
“I’ve got some bad news for you, buddy.”
The traveler stops dead in his tracks as he sees a group of heads ahead of them. Four men are in a line, obviously grouped together. The traveler gapes as it clicks where he recognizes them from. He runs up to the men.
“Weezer?”
For those who do not know, Weezer is an alternative rock band formed in the early 90s, known for many hit songs such as “Island in the Sun'' and “Beverly Hills”. The band is named after a childhood nickname given to the frontman of the band, Rivers Cuomo, making fun of his asthma. One of the trademarks of the band is their self-titled albums, of which there are currently 6, each distinguished by the prominent color on the cover. To date, their most popular release is their debut album Weezer, better known as the Blue Album. The Blue Album was produced by Ric Ocasek, the frontman and head writer for the Cars, and had three lead singles, including “Buddy Holly”, a rock homage to the popular bubblegum pop tunes of the 50s that Buddy Holly himself became popular from. The Blue Album cover is simple and easily recognizable: a simple blue background with the four (at the time) current members standing in a line. In order, it is Patrick Wilson (drummer), Rivers Cuomo (lead vocals and guitar), Matt Sharp (bass), and Brian Bell (guitar). Bell appears on the cover and is listed in the credits, but actually did not play on the album. All of the rhythm guitar parts on the album were initially recorded by the original guitarist, Jason Cropper. However, Cropper was kicked out of the band and replaced by Bell during the recording of the Blue album, while Cuomo re-recorded all of his parts. In recent years, the Blue Album has seen a post-ironic resurgence, being both hated and revered. Because all of these details are relevant to the plot of this circle, the author opted to give a quick summary of events, lest the joke fly over the heads of the uneducated. We now take you back to our regularly scheduled Hell tour.
The 1994 lineup of Weezer, who were in the middle of an argument about whether or not they should tune their guitars to a different key, turn as much as they can to face our traveler.
“Yeah?” says the man who is 2nd in line. He is Rivers Cuomo.
“I love your song, the one that goes like, ‘ooh wee ooh I look just like Buddy Holly.’”
Rivers Cuomo shifts in the sand, slightly turning to the left. He shifts back to the right before shifting back to the left, this time turning farther than he had before. The traveler stares as Rivers repeats this sequence, finally stopping when he has successfully turned 180 degrees from our traveler. The traveler is slightly offended at this. He doesn’t actually love the song. He only said it to be polite, as one does when one meets the former lineup of a fairly famous band.
“Hey, I’ll talk to you.” The fourth man in the line says. He is Brian Bell. The traveler does not know who he is. He looks to the other two men, the first being Patrick Wilson and the third being Matt Sharp. The two are already in another conversation about car batteries. The traveler really doesn’t want to talk to Brian. Brian really wants to talk to him. Brian seems lonely. The traveler sighs and squats down next to Brian.
“Hi, who are you?” the traveler asks, not even pretending to be interested.
“What do you mean?” Brian laughs awkwardly. “I’m Brian Bell.”
“Never heard of you.”
“I’ve been the guitarist for Weezer since 1994?”
“Doesn’t ring a bell.” the traveler shakes his head. “Anyways, Brandon-”
“Brian.”
“Right, Brain. So, why are you guys here?”
Brian sighed before beginning.
“Well, Weezer used to not be popular. We were playin’ local gigs, dive bars and clubs and whatnot. We used to be, well, underground. And then Ric Ocasek comes in and helps us make this incredible album that we didn’t even know was good. And it got to a point where we’d be out, talkin’ to chicks and such, and I’d say somethin’ about bein’ in a band, and she’d be like ‘What’re you guys called?’ and I’d go ‘You probably haven’t heard of us, we’re not that big’, and she’d go “Come on, what’s your band name?” and I’d go “Well, we call ourselves Weezer’, and then she’d gawk and get mad because the bar we’re in is literally playin’ one of our songs on the radio and I have the audacity to say we’re not big? But yeah, and now we’re here.”
The traveler paused to process everything Brian said before he began.
“‘We’?” he asked. Brian furrowed his brow.
“We, us,” he pointed at his bandmates with his head. “Weezer? I know you know.”
“No, yeah, I know about Weezer,” the traveler says tactfully. “I just don’t know why you’re saying ‘we’.”
Brian laughs uncomfortably.
“What do you mean? ‘We”, like me and the rest of the band.”
“Yeah, but you weren’t always in the band, right Bruce?”
“It’s Brian, and I don’t see what that has to do with anything.”
“You weren’t there when they were playing dive bars and clubs, huh? You didn’t even meet Ric Ocasek.”
The traveler stands up in disgust
“You weren’t a part of Weezer when they were underground.”
The traveler spits, hitting Brian in the forehead, and walks away. Rivers has turned once again and is now facing the same way as the rest of the band. The traveler stops between Rivers and Matt.
“Why are you down here too, though, Matt?” the traveler asks, happy to talk to someone interesting. “Didn’t you quit in, like, 2001 or something?”
“Well, I’m gonna be honest with you,” Matt says, lowering his voice to a whisper.
“The rest of us aren’t actually getting punished down here. Sure, we accidentally called ourselves ‘alternative’ and ‘underground’ and such, but we really didn’t know better.”
“The people in charge bring us down here to play every Thursday for office parties,” Rivers chimes in. “They just keep us in here for storage.”
“Brian actually is getting punished, though. The authors just got a bone to pick with him specifically, I guess.”
“But still,” the traveler questions. “Why is it you down here and not Scott Shriner, the current bassist?”
“Oh, yeah. I don’t think the authors know that I quit the band, they just only know the lineup on the Blue Album.”
The traveler nods in shock.
“Wow, the people who created this Annoying Pop Culture Opinions Hell are fake Weezer fans? That’s sad.”
“Shh!” Patrick pipes up. “Don’t say that too loud, you might get shipped out to one of the other circles.
Our traveler takes this bit of foreshadowing as advice and shuts up. He looks around for Paul and finds him a few feet away, partially buried in the sand.
“Hey, how do we get out of here?” he asks.
Paul doesn’t reply, just sinks deeper into the sand. The traveler shrugs and sits next to Paul, criss-cross-applesauce style. He too begins to sink, and is soon entirely engulfed in sand. Thankfully, as soon as his head is under, his feet fall out, and the traveler is eased through the sand barrier into the next circle.