Pathological Modesty

Part One

I have a gold record and a platinum record. Well, they are not my records. Not ‘Juliana Hatfield’ records per se. They were records that I was involved in and for my part I received two of those framed rectangular commemorations that you see on the walls of recording studios and in rock stars’ homes on “Cribs”.

The gold one (“gold” means half a million copies sold) does double duty for two separate albums that both have official gold status: the Lemonheads’ “Come on Feel The Lemonheads, on which I sang some backing vocals, and “It’s a Shame About Ray” (bg vox as well as bass guitar). The platinum one (a million sold) is the “Reality Bites” movie soundtrack to which I contributed my (Juliana Hatfield Three) song “Spin The Bottle”. (I realized just now when I went to look at it that the soundtrack is actually double-, or multi- plat.—2 mil. !)

I don’t claim credit for the commercial success of that album. I think it was largely due to Lisa Loeb’s “Stay” which was a massive long-running chart-topper. And there were several big, already-established names and songs on the compilation, too: The Knack (“My Sharona”), Squeeze (“Tempted”), U2, Lenny Kravitz…

But I was part of the album package and my song was heard in the movie and so when I found out the album had gone platinum and I did not automatically receive my own copy of the wall-ready memento, I said to my manager, half-jokingly but half-not, “Where’s my platinum record? Don’t I get one? Can you get me one?” I figured that as an artist on the compilation I was entitled to one of the a plaque-y things and yes, I was, but my manager enlightened me as to the fact that we would need to request one because it would not show up at my doorstep automatically. I thought it seemed a little sad for him/us to have to chase down my participation trophy but I also thought that that was what managers are for and I was just glad that he was able and willing to do it, because I certainly would never have done it myself. (“Um, hello, is this RCA Records? This is Juliana Hatfield. I was on your ‘Reality Bites’ soundtrack? Yes…H-A-T-F-I-E-L-D…Juliana has one “n”, yes. And I was just wondering if I could get a copy of the platinum album to hang on my wall, please? I can pay for the postage.”)

I thought it would be such a cool novelty for me to have one, as a toast to my ultra-DYI college rock beginnings with my first band the Blake Babies, and all our struggling to be heard, and noticed, and all the lugging and schlepping of our equipment (and scrawny bodies) into and out of our rickety old van and up and down from grimy stages where we’d played to practically no one. But a part of me was proud, for real, that my odd little bouncy tune had made it into something that had made an impact, had brought good feelings to lots of people, and mattered, in some way, culturally and musically, at least in that moment; that I was included made me feel good.

So my manager made the call(s) and I got my two framed commercial success awards. Neither contained an actual LP, though, like they used to put into the frame; this was the CD era and both plaques had CDs (and cassettes!) instead of LPs stuck into them—one gold-colored (the Lemonheads) and the other silver (platinum)-colored, each personalized with my name, and each album’s cover art and track listing.

Once I had my gold and platinum records in hand (I’ll just keep calling them records because “gold CD” doesn’t sound as good or as historical or legitimate as “gold record”) they went into a closet. For years. It felt wrong—boastful-- to display them in my home, where anybody could see them, and might ask about them or comment on them, probably leading me to blush and stammer as I tried to explain the situation, downplay it. (“It wasn’t my doing, really; it was Lisa Loeb who really sent it into the stratosphere; there could’ve been anyone in my slot and I was just happy to be there.”)

When I was a kid, being called ‘conceited’ was the worst insult. Once I aced an elementary school test and a classmate sneered at me, without provocation, “You think you’re so smart” and it felt like I’d been punched in the face. When the school wanted me to skip fourth grade, I declined and stayed with my immediate peers, going from third to fourth grade (and then fifth, etc.) as I always assumed I would. Even mentioning these things now makes me feel like I am bragging. About my brainpower. But no; I think I am an idiot. And public school success is not necessarily a predictor of any other kind of future success.

Humility was always my set point, my starting point and my end goal too. Sometimes it felt like it even veered into (self-) humiliation, almost beyond my control; that’s how ingrained my low self-opinion was. Pretentiousness was verboten –in life and work and career—and even though sometimes my songwriting subject matter could unfortunately veer into over-earnestness and moralizing and emo melodrama, the delivery wasn’t haughty or self-important.

When I was attending the Berklee School of Music, I could never bring myself to refer to myself as a “vocalist” as most of the rest of the staff and student body in the voice department did; I was a singer. I sang. Even that was hard to declare, sometimes, as I was surrounded by people with real technical mastery of their instruments—and such apparent confidence!-- who made me feel like a bumpkin.

Why show off the gold and platinum records? Wasn’t it crass to call attention to one’s good luck (right place, right time) prizes when there are so many other talented artists out there who can’t get arrested, can’t get a break? Why is a system—a business, a world—which above all else values money and high numbers (sales, clicks, views, followers, etc.) something that I should celebrate? My own accomplishments were considered in the business to be disappointing; I had never had a JH record go gold on its own and with these gold and platinum records that I was involved in, I had been pulled along in the wake of something bigger and more powerful (and more entitled and deserving?) than I was. I was happy to be there, but as usual I was conflicted and overthinking it all.

When I bought my first house, a tiny old former fisherman’s bungalow in Quincy, MA, a little south of Boston, in 2020, I unpacked the gold and platinum records and aired them out, and finally hung them, in the back utility room (more like a closet, where I’d hung a curtain where there was no door). This nook housed the water heater and gas burner and there were a few shelves holding paint cans and some loose nails and a fly swatter, etc. My house had no basement and no attic and this back area served as my shack’s version of a makeshift, abbreviated basement/attic combo. It was a space that no one except the homeowner and handymen would ever go into.

Next to the gold and platinum records I also hung up my framed one-cent royalty check (made out to me). This would be my Wall –my utility nook--of Humility. Or was it my personal private humble-braggerie? I exited and closed the curtain behind me.

I fixed the house up some (it needed some fixing-up) but it still wasn’t right, and I didn’t like living in it, so I sold it seven months after buying it. I flipped it, unintentionally (I hadn’t planned on selling it so soon) and made a nice profit (this was the Covid era and interest rates were under 3% and everyone wanted to buy). I briefly considered starting a new career in house-flipping but tossed that aside (too much work/stress/money stuff) and moved a couple of hours away from the city with the aim of focusing everything on making a new album there. Once unpacked in the new place, I hung my gold and platinum records upstairs behind all my clothes hanging in the bedroom loft’s closet.

I see them sometimes, my gold and platinum records, if I notice them, if I remember to look at them, and they give me a little jolt of pride and joy. I was part of that! I made a mark, a little mark. It’s not a huge deal from the vantage point of the bigger picture of the history of popular music, or of the world and the universe, but it’s not nothing. I made music and people listened to