Ominous Foreboding

I was listing to the monthly mix at catbirdseat and thinking that something was missing. And then it dawned on me--conviction. Singers. Pipes.

The guts have been massively contrived these days. I'd say "in music" but I'm sure it's happening in almost every cultural product. But music is what I know best, so it's what I can talk about. Why why why do the people who seem to be able to burst the bubble fall victim to an attidute treadmill? Tough country artists, rockers, rappers--they are all complicit in a personality, and that's what they sell more than anything. You have to look tough rather than be tough. It's as common in normal life and even in politics.

But do we really need to react to it by acting smart? By breathlessly whispering? Is uncertainty really the best we can do? Or vanity and nihilism?

Are people afraid of grooves because they will be mislabeled?

Citizens of the world, please do not fall into that crap way of thinking. Face it--how cool can you possibly be?

I doubt very much that I'm going to like anything I write about here for a little while. I'm tired of the renovation of baby geniuses into heroes. They are neither geniuses nor heroic.

Or maybe I'm getting sensitive because dude got all puffy about my employment today.