I’m sorry; your Rollins test has come back positive. (Or: I’ve got diamonds in my eyes!)

I’m not one to belittle anyone’s rage or otherwise make light of the awful things that one might have gone through when he/she was a kid ……

Oh, who am I kidding? I’m usually at the head of the line when it comes to poking fun at people and their “unresolved issues from their youth.” Don’t get me wrong. There are damaging things that happen to kids, both today and in the past. But just the same, there is a line that is often blurred, somewhere between “my dad/priest/neighbor/uncle/teacher beat/molested me” and “my parents didn’t do anything to boost my self-esteem.” The former group has my utmost sympathy as long as they don’t perpetuate their pain by damaging other kids; it’s the latter "self-esteem" group who are fair – and easy – targets.

Anyway.

My not-iPod kicked up a series of songs that included a Dwight Yoakam song, two Mudhoney tunes, a Neko Case song … and the apocalyptic closer* from Rollins Band’s landmark early ‘90s album The End of Silence. This very intense song is called “Just Like You,” and while it fits in with the overall theme and timbre of the album … as a standalone song, in the midst of Yoakam-Mudhoney-Mudhoney-Case, it’s hilarious.

Rollins is pretty full of rage on the whole album - I often joke that The End of Silence was the first album to be sung in all caps - and he's got some really great songs on it. "Low Self Opinion," for instance, is still as strong today as it was 13 years ago, and I still occasionally use it to kickstart my day.

"Just Like You" clocks in at around 11 minutes, a train-wreck of a song that serves as the perfect closer to the album. It's as cathartic for the listener as it was for Rollins, a song that detailed his trials and tribulations with his father, who may or may not have done unspeakable things to him. The chorus, if you can call it that, features Rollins howling "RAGE!" repeatedly.

However, not unlike the infamous "sex mixtape" I made some years ago that included Zeppelin's "When The Levee Breaks," it ... didn't necessarily fit in that sequence of songs. So "Just Like You" became, at that time, the funniest song ever. Not funny because of what happened to Rollins, but funny because there is a man in my stereo screaming "RAGE!" over and over.

* - "... the hell? Apocalyptic closer?" you might ask. This was a phrase used in several of the heavy-metal magazines that I read at the dawn of the '90s, used to describe a last song on an album that is particularly intense and terrifying and awesome. First used, I believe, to describe the album-ender on Megadeth's epic Rust in Peace album. Occasionally modified to "epileptic closer," when the last song on an album is so bad that it gives you the twitches.