3 Ways to Tell Your Boyfriend the Hold Steady Is Boring
So, you’ve landed yourself a perfectly fine, plaid-wearing, corn-eating white boy from the midwest. I bet he does improv or some shit. Chances are, he’s forced you to listen to the Hold Steady on your ride to his parents’ place in Oconomowoc, singing the whole goddamn four and half hours away. You’d honestly rather participate in a full-throated argument about how he cheated on you with your boss, but he’s actually pretty sweet and probably wouldn’t do that. Which explains why his music taste is SO BORING. The question now is: how do we break this to him? Well the worst thing you can do is sit there in silence staring at cows, so let’s walk through this! There are 3 sure-fire ways to tell your baldy beard-boy with just the cutest pot-belly he needs to branch out a bit.
1. Be direct
Your relationship should be built on good communication and honestly. That’s why your first approach for gifting him this epiphany is by simply telling him the truth. Just say “Craig Finn sounds as if Bruce Springsteen had his throat replaced with aluminum siding that went straight to his nose then forgot how to play guitar and was like really really tired.” It might also help to remind him of his guest verse on that one POS song where he complains about the movie Predator. This will help him remember how old he is – men are obsessed with their age!
2. Offer him alternatives
Men from the midwest really seem attached to artists they can even remotely tie to their state. You gave up a long time ago on telling him that sure, Craig may have grown up here, but he was born in Boston and has spent most of his life in New York. Doesn’t matter: he still thinks Ric “I’m Definitely from Charlotte NC, WOO!” Flair’s from Minnesota. Anyway, remind him other states exist. Like the state of unconsciousness! Fall asleep while his favorite band plays at volume 20 in his 2006 Nissan Altima. Nothing says “I’m bored” more than catching some Z’s. He should get the hint by then. But if all else fails-
3. Be mean
Sometimes, you gotta manhandle a cat before it can love you. Men are the same way, at least the ones you like. Tell him The Hold Steady really sucks and that you can’t believe that anyone let alone a whole fucking state was duped into liking this yawn of a bar band whose success can only be explained as their label’s tax write-off. Then spit in his face. Scream. Start singing a completely different song over the one playing – it might even make that song better. The nuclear option here is to take his CD (you know this dude still has CDs), flick it out the window frisbee style, look him in his big, beautiful, and deeply hurt eyes and say “You did that.”
Trust me: this is going to be a boon to your relationship.