2020 Hindsight Commentary: Prophet 15, Christine Sixteen

I’m revisiting Timely Persuasion 12 years after releasing it / 17 years after writing it / 6000+ days since I jokingly told Jon Mack “maybe I’ll write a book” with a new round of fresh eyed commentary. Today’s look at yesterday’s chapters is brought to you by Supergrass and Kiss.

Prophet 15

“Revelations of her revolution” is still a great line—and still a Googlewhack. (Or it used to be before Google stopped crawling the online version because I didn’t have time to make it mobile friendly.)

“Won One” is a real song my friend Chris Evjy wrote in college. I haven’t heard it in over twenty years, but in my memory it’s still one of my favorite songs of all time. (Yes, I know that’s a little extreme.) A handful of old mixtapes exist somewhere with a live version recorded on my radio show, but after countless hours trying to track one down in the attic of my childhood home I gave up. Mainly at this point I want to hear it again to see if it’s really as great as I remember.

Why is the Local Boy open mike debut on Halloween? My past self could have at least had a throwaway joke about a costume.

The list of Local Boy songs contain an easter egg very few people have discovered. The first letter of each song points you to a website. (In hindsight, putting Dash 7 by Wilco in the middle of the list might have helped.)

I wish there was a little more agonizing over the song stealing implications between the 2 set lists. I mean, 1 paragraph? Really?

“Debonair” & “Start Choppin'” are awesome, but not exactly “a barrage of hits…”

“One more chord to play” is a reference to a different Chris Evjy song.

“Use the gifts you gave yourself” is my favorite nugget of writing advice. Re-reading the original commentary for this chapter reminded me the whole Local Boy subplot is a classic example of that.

Christine Sixteen

The narrator could have shown more concern around the fact that his grandparents house that he knew in the future was gone before its time. (And by “more concern” I mean “any concern at all.”)

Another batch of still, still, still.

I wish the Local Boy name was foreshadowed at the coffee house open mike show or elsewhere before popping up out of nowhere here.

“Author of the hit singles” makes no sense. “See Local Boy perform his hit singles…”

On the other hand, a musician performing “in his own backyard!” might have been my current COVID-era self sending a message to my past self.

Quite a lot of smoke in the trailer after being inside for “less than a minute.”

The “Let me clear my throat” reference is pretty bad.

I had to double check the popularity of double albums in 1970 when writing this commentary, which means I probably should have done so directly in the text too.

The last paragraph of this chapter reminds me of the song Bill & Annie by Chuck Brodsky, but I didn’t discover that song until several years later. (It would even tie back to the tomato on the plane!)

Check out the original 2008 commentary for these chapters:

Prophet 15  |  Christine Sixteen

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