Random Thoughts On Pop Culture

How fucked up is American pop culture? For an example of this look no further than the family entertainment of the Disney corporation. Talk about Babylon burning. What happens to all these child stars who were once mouseketeers. It seems like you'd be an outsider if you came out of Disney as a child star into adult life and weren't fucked up (more on this in future blog).

Why have Mumford & Son been allowed so deeply into toady's pop culture? What the fuck is wrong with the kids? The re-release of Devo's Hardcore Volumes 1 & 2 put this in perspective for me. I thought why the fuck would you want to listen to this Mumford shit when you could buy those two LPs? Would it be a bad starting point for an anti Mumford manifesto? C'mon kids. Mr Agreeable is on board as well here.

Why didn't more records sound like Iggy Pop's The Idiot? You can hear the air on that record. Has there been a more singular sounding record ever? Speaking of Mr Pop surely his next step in his retro career replay project is to get the gang from The Idiot/Lust For Life era together and do some concerts then maybe a record and perhaps start using heroin again. Is anyone looking forward to when he gets around to Blah Blah Blah and American Caesar again? What happens when he gets round to The Weirdness again does he start the replay again? He might as well just keep the loop going till he dies. Imagine if he never dies? That got me thinking is there anyone whose career was so awesome you wouldn't mind it being replayed over and over again? It's just not a very good idea at all is it? Leave a comment if you can think of someone.

Is pop culture as we know it dead or dying? Catching an episode of Letterman a few months ago I was struck by how uninterested Dave was in his alleged pop icon guests. He's sometimes been like that in the past but he was having fun with it. He seems to get that talking to actors or whoever is a waste of time and why would anyone care? He lights up more when he gets to talk politics. The talk show format does seem to be moribund. Watching the Australian talk show Adam Hills Tonight or something like that I just thought it was tired and a completely pointless.  Everyone- Hills, the guests and the audience know this but they don't want to admit to it because then what? There's no new paradigm. Why did people ever think talking to actors or musicians was interesting? Name me a recent episode of a tonight show where you thought 'Gee that guest was great!'

Morcheeba & Woob are the latest couple of groups who are returning from the 90s in 2013. Who's next? Well I saw Omni Trio's Rob Haigh has a record out as well. To be quite honest I can't recall a single Morcheeba track. They were like trip-hop johnny come latelys as I recall and the genre was probably past its use by date by the time they arrived. 1194 the debut LP by Woob however was a 90s ambient classic, which I loved. Still do in fact.

Chillin' out..

Dull Smug Mum & Dad Mortgage/Renovation Rock

I'm on holidays at the moment so I decided for the first time in about a year and a half to put the radio on. The second song was by the Melbourne indie band (I think) The Twerps who I gave a go to once, couldn't see the point, kinda 80s Aussie/NZ indie vibe but I gotta say I quite liked it.

The Twerps: I don't hate them!

 Later on though I heard the worst fucking song ever. It was a boring schmindie tune. The lyrics were like some middle class turds explaining their 1st world problems to you. They were singing about paying the mortgage and not being able to go on a Bali holiday. Then I think there was a bit about ripping up the floorboards perhaps renovating. It was a bit like watching Getaway interspersed with a bank loan ad followed by one of those renovation shows. This was the pits. It wasn't funny. It wasn't angry. I couldn't detect any irony. They were just gonna write a song about their boring lives and sing and play it in a boring way. I don't think there was any art project pretention about it whatsoever. This is how rock has ended up right where it was supposed to take you away from ie.the domestic drudgery of ordinary daily life. Yeah I know MX80, Devo and Talking Heads sometimes sounded vocally bored but they were funny and the music was always fucking excellent, electrifying & exciting. Ordinary things have been subjects for rock many times before but never this badly and witless. I get the whole inverting of rock: Debbie Harry's awkward dancing, Elvis Costello lookin like a nerd, new wavers putting their knees together, cuties acting pure, virginal and innocent, the faux naivety of Beat Happening and Jonathan Richman. I still like glamour, weirdness, sex, gender issues, creatures from outer space, drugs, seedy stories, love, lust, creepiness, celebration, heartbreak, mentalness, the unthinkable, awkwardness, fantasy, the dodgy, being wrong, politics, cars, strange theories etc. This can all still be done in new and non-cliched ways. But fuck me if I ever wanna hear a song that sounds like a conversation at my friends house on a Saturday morning unless it's really bloody funny or is set to the the most incongruous music imaginable. I don't know what that band was called but I hate them and their dull smug mum and dad mortgage/renovation rock.

MX80 SOUND
At their funniest/most exciting when sounding bored.