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Juliana Hatfield Might Be In Love: Moguls (The Snow Kind, Not The Human Kind)

julianalogoBy the time Juliana Hatfield had reached her mid-20s, she’d become the poster girl for ’90s indie rock. She was looked upon as the thinking person’s alternative to the riot-grrrl phenomenon, and the future seemed rosy. Hatfield had formed revered combo the Blake Babies, launched a red-hot solo career, played bass on the breakthrough Lemonheads album and gained national attention when she told Interview magazine she was still a virgin and wasn’t too worried about it. The backlash from those without much of an attention span was inevitable. In the ensuing years, Hatfield has honed her art and produced a wealth of stirring, self-confident albums. Peace & Love, out next week on her Ye Olde label, is an utterly sincere revelation that proves well worth the wait. Hatfield will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read our exclusive excerpt from her 2008 memoir and our brand new Q&A with her.

snowMogulsHatfield: When I’m skiing and I see a bump coming up in my path, I get all excited like when an alcoholic sees a bottle of booze. When I hit the first bump, it’s like the alcoholic taking his first drink of the day; it feels that good, that necessary to my well-being. I am addicted to mogul skiing: to pointing my skis down the hill at the top of a trail and visualizing a path through the bumps and following that invisible line, my mind creating it every step of the way, all the way down, like a visual directive I must obey. When I am above the slope in a chairlift looking down and I see a mogul run beneath me—a beautiful white field of closely packed little snow hills, all laid out like a delectable infinity of scoops of coconut ice cream—it triggers something in my brain; my dopamine receptors are activated. I want to jump off the chairlift so I can get to those bumps. I yearn to be amongst them, with them. I like a nice, flat, groomed run at the end of the day as much as the next guy, but more than a little of that bores me very quickly. What I am saying is that I crave moguls. I want them and I need them, even though they make my knees hurt afterward. Skiing makes me happy. Video after the jump.