Tiny Dancer Is Not OK! Example 3: Honda Pacific Coast 800

[Continued from earlier post]

I’m calling bullshit on music on motorcycles that breaks the spell woven by the motorcycle itself. I’ve put up some “sprit matching music” to go with each of my three very different motorcycles. This is my last motorcycle and the hardest to pin down.

I can only hope the Harley-geezer who forced us to endure Tiny Dancer has reformed himself and and will NEVER PLAY TINY DANCER AGAIN.

Example 3: Honda Pacific Coast 800

Description: 30 years ago Honda sought to expand the motorcycle market beyond people who enjoy engines and mechanicals. They built the perfect bike to get somewhere without drama. It turns out people love drama. They missed it when it was gone.

Honda’s utterly competent no-bullshit transport was a flop. People who can’t quite define “overhead cam” still want to see the engine anyway. Also they want to see chrome. It’s hard to can’t roll into town to the mental sound of electric guitars and screeching eagles if your bike is mechanically flawless and adequately powered without being ridiculous. The market didn’t want “adequate”, it wanted “overkill”!

Long suffering bastards, the poor Honda’s engineers did a great job of mixing form and function only to realize nobody cares. They soon turned back to the Goldwing which is scaled more like an Imperial Starcruiser than a two wheeled vehicle (and is so successful it’s practically a license to print money).

The PC800 is proof that you can build something awesome and perfect for its intended use, only to get kicked in the balls by the market. It’s the Betamax of a world that has long forgotten VHS.

On the other hand, I get to have one and it was cheap. The universe made a motorcycle just for me! How cool is that?

The Pacific-Coast is quiet, clad in plastic, and looks more modern than most bikes on the road (despite being 34 year old technology). If you know what you’re looking at, it’s slightly unnerving. It makes you question your core beliefs about machinery and the true definition of “motorcycle”. If you don’t know what you’re looking at, you assume it’s a small Goldwing and wonder why I don’t have a stuffed animal strapped to it.

Appropriate Soundtrack: If you’re going to ride a Tupperware clad antique you’ve already proven you don’t give a shit what the crowd thinks. You’re a nerd because you didn’t freak out about the missing chrome. You’re so deeply unconcerned with societal norms it’s amazing that you remembered to wear pants. Are you wearing pants? You’d better check!

The PC800 is massively uncool. Anyone weird enough to buy one probably won’t know what cool would look like even if instructed by the TV (which he doesn’t watch). The soundtrack for an oddity like this should be technological, dated, and odd.

The interesting thing about this bike is that it can pass through the uncanny valley of oddness and emerge into coolness from a different dimension of time and space; but only if you’ve got an open mind. It’s like when you listen to a bitchin guitar riff and then realize it was played by Prince. “The little purple dude played this? Huh!” The Pacific Coast was made when “Silicon Valley” was a new idea, for people who don’t want the cruiser look and have more practical uses than sportbikes. The Pacific Coast 800 won’t get you laid but you knew that the instant you looked at it.

The Pacific Coast is a motorcycle for people who read too many books. Here’s my selections for the PC800:

Whip It, Devo:

Now whip it
Into shape
Shape it up
Get straight
Go forward
Move ahead
Try to detect it
It’s not too late
To whip it
Whip it good!

She Blinded Me With Science, Thomas Dolby:

Ha! It’s poetry in motion
Now she’s making love to me
The spheres are in commotion
The elements in harmony
She blinded me with science
(She blinded me with science!)
And hit me with technology

(Good heavens, Miss Sakamoto – you’re beautiful!)

Bike, Pink Flyod:

I know a mouse, and he hasn’t got a house
I don’t know why I call him Gerald
He’s getting rather old, but he’s a good mouse

Space Oddity, David Bowie:

This is Major Tom to Ground Control
I’m stepping through the door
And I’m floating in a most peculiar way
And the stars look very different today

For here am I sitting in a tin can
Far above the world
Planet Earth is blue
And there’s nothing I can do

Bonus Classical Track, Dance of the Sugar Plum Faeries, Tchaikovsky. (Don’t worry about what to play while riding with a “club”, you’re a club of one.)