Mono Sun-AU (361k)

By the time I arrived, there were already about 100 people lined up. I got in line anyway, just 'cause I might have a chance. This rent-a-cop came out. He looked like he was about 16 years old, barely old enough to shave, nervous, and he asked us to reverse the direction of the line by swinging around 180 degrees! At that point, the whole thing broke down and everybody just turned into a tight little knot. Some people got pissed off and irritated, and started shoving. It was getting ugly. Finally the guy came out with this huge bundle of tickets. Everybody converged on him, and he got this look of sheer terror in his eyes. People were clawing at his hands and he ended up throwing this bundle of tickets up in the air everyone kind of surged forward. I look down and I'm 30, 31 years old, a parent, wearing shorts and a pair of Teva sandals, and everyone standing around me is 21 or younger. They're all wearing Doc Martens. It became really obvious to me who was going to lose if I tried to get into a shoving match with these people. So I backed away because I value my toes. It was too late for me. The whole Seattle thing had happened during exactly the four year period I happened not to be living in town. I was over the hill.

ATN: Obviously if you were listening to that music when you were writing, you're still a pretty big music fan.

Stephenson: I find it hard to work unless I've got music going on my headphones.

ATN: So what was playing when you were writing The Diamond Age?

Stephenson: Screaming Trees and Alice in Chains were a couple of my favorite bands, and still are. I was listening to the entire Seattle gang. It sounds incredibly unimaginative of me. Soundgarden, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Screaming Trees, Alice in Chains, a little bit of Tad, the usual suspects. Some Sugar, too, I guess.

ATN: Is that allegiance to Seattle music or did it just turn out to be your taste?

Stephenson: It's some sort of weird synchronicity. I kind of like pop culture. Although I'm qualified to call myself kind of an intellectual, I've always admired various kinds of pop culture for the same reason intellectuals are not supposed to. I like comic books. When I go to a movie, I almost always see some kind of action film. Like the last film I saw was The Hunted. And I like books with a lot of action in them. I like music that has power to it, that has a lot of drive and gets your adrenaline going. So I've always had this dark, hidden admiration for kick-ass rock-n-roll bands like AC/DC and that kind of thing. I always wondered why someone couldn't make music with a powerful drive that was fun to listen to, got your adrenaline going, and kicked ass but wasn't stupid. All through the '80s we had to put up with these hair bands who kicked ass but were incredibly moronic in their choice of subject matter. There's only so many times you can listen to "Oh baby, I wanna do it to you all night long, I wanna do it to you right until the morning light." When Soundgarden came along, I was tremendously excited because they did kick ass and they were exciting and fun to listen to, but they were obviously intelligent people. All the subsequent Seattle bands that came along had that same quality.

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