Latest / Whereabouts Tales | Stories of Belonging and Immigrant Experiences / Rockstar: Echoes – Why the NASA Author Ghosted Us | Book of Tales no.3

Transcript

Rockstar: Echoes – Why the NASA Author Ghosted Us | Book of Tales no.3 · Whereabouts Tales | Stories of Belonging and Immigrant Experiences

• 0:00
  They say writing a novel takes discipline Zach Taylors Rockstar
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  Echoes is a gritty single look at the music industry penned by
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  a man who has spent two decades at the NASA managing space
• 0:11
  flights hardware. You think that someone who
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  coordinates logistics for the International Space Station
• 0:16
  could successfully navigate a calendar invite, But after two
• 0:20
  consecutive no shows to this very podcast, it's clear that
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  while the vacuum of space is well managed, the vacuum of
• 0:26
  basic professional courtesy is an entirely different frontier.
• 0:30
  Welcome to a solo book of tales. Let's talk about the book the
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  author couldn't be bothered to. We had Zach Taylor scheduled
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  twice and twice the line was dead.
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  Now I spent 20 years navigating corporations In that world.
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  If a critical companies calls you twice, you cut the vendor
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  and streamline the system. You don't sit around waiting.
• 1:00
  You adapt and move the product. So that's exactly what we are
• 1:03
  doing today. We're moving the product.
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  It takes a remarkable level of irony to win a Silver's Nuclear
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  Award for Engineering excellence and simultaneously fail at
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  clicking a basic digital rendezvous link.
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  According to his bill, he lives in Hansville, has three kids and
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  a cat named Spare Kitty. A picture of ultimate real
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  ability. Perhaps he was pulled away on
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  non-emergency missions to Mars, or maybe he was just fishing.
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  Either way, we are proceeding with an autopsy of the text
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  itself. Let's dive into Rockstar Echoes.
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  The premise of Rockstar Echoes is fascinating largely because
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  of who wrote it. Our protagonist is Klein Thomas,
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  an engineer from Huntsville, AL, an identical mirror of Taylor
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  himself. Klein goes viral and gets yanked
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  out of obscurity to front Aberdeen, a legendary rock band
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  whose lead singer just died. Is the ultimate wish fulfilment
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  fantasy, the steady, reliable engineer thrust into the
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  chaotic, morally bankrupt world of rock'n'roll.
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  But Taylor actually does something interesting here.
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  He doesn't just let Klein be the hero.
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  He frames the narrative through Clara Cowley, an ageing music
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  journalist who acts as the Greek chorus, cynically tearing down
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  the industry. Clara insists the real stories
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  in The Lucky Engineer, it's Rain Harlow.
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  She's the fiercely talented, starving front woman of a punk
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  band called the Painted Queens. She's forced into sex work and
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  gambling just to survive an industry that treats her as a
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  disposable commodity. The executives in this book,
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  characters like Paul White and Greg Holden, are painted as as
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  calculating predators. It's sharp critic of how
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  corporate machines view human talent purely as return on
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  investment. It's dark, it's gritty.
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  And frankly, it's a surprisingly harsh look at exploitation
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  coming from an author whose day job is grounded in strict
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  government protocols and safety regulations.
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  Ultimately, Rockstar Echoes is an ambition look at the dark
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  underbelly of a glamorous industry.
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  It explores who gets to build a legacy and who gets ground into
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  dust trying to survive. It's worth the read if you want
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  a cynical take on the music business written by an outsider
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  looking in. As for Zach Taylor, if he ever
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  manages to triangulate the coordinates to Recording Studio,
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  the door remains open. Until then, the story speak for
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  itself. Keep reading, keep questioning,
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  and we'll see you on the next episode of Whereabouts Tales.