You Belong

“When you belong to a song, Salty Eyes, you belong.” —The Matches, Salty Eyes

“When I’ve got the music, I’ve got a place to go.” —Rancid, Radio

“You let me know like no one else that it’s okay to be myself.” —Simple Plan, This Song Saved My Life

The sheer number of songs out there that are written as “I love you”s to the rock scene and the music itself (how meta) illustrates perfectly just how important this scene has been to so many people. You’d be hard-pressed to find someone on the barricade or in the pit (or god forbid crowdsurfing) at a show who doesn’t identify with lines like those. Besides, of course, the friends dragged against their will. I once brought a friend to see Rise Against and after losing her in the pit during the first song, I immediately got a text saying she’d been punched in the boob and left.

But for most of us, (including you, dear reader, unless you’ve stumbled here by accident) the pit is where we go to both lose ourselves and find ourselves.

I consider myself part of the “Fuse generation.” I doubt there’s truly such a thing, but my high school years were filled with the F List, 100%, Daily Download, and my favorite show and where this magazine got its name, Steven’s Untitled Rock Show. Fuse was the underground music counterpart to MTV—it was “where the music went.” It was where I discovered new music daily and it was what bonded me to people with similar interests as I was never allowed to go to shows growing up. The perks of being a sheltered firstborn, right?

I struggled to find new music for years after Fuse started to change—which I personally consider to be 2009 after the cancellation of Steven’s Untitled Rock Show (RIP SURS). But eventually I started going to shows (upon leaving my parents’ house, of course) and discovered a place I belong in the world again.

Why is this scene so important? Why do certain shows feel like family reunions? (The enjoyable family reunion, where you hug everyone you see and gush about how much you missed them. Not the family reunion where some Great Aunt you don’t remember pinches your cheek and asks why you’re not married yet.)

How can you step foot in a venue for the first time and know “this is home”?

I can’t definitively answer those questions, but if you know the feeling, you’re certainly in the right place. You belong.

Whether you’ve chosen to dedicate your life to music or you use the music as a way to escape your everyday life, we all know there’s a certain magic to it that we can’t escape even if we wanted to—which we DO NOT.

And that’s what this magazine is for: to celebrate the magic, and the fans, and the fan experience. But also to give you what Fuse once gave me: music you might not have heard otherwise, news about your favorite bands, and glimpses into the music industry, be it the musicians themselves or their invisible counterparts.

Oh, and my name’s Lindsay.