Yeezy's New Clothes

So a funny thing happened on the way to Glastonbury this fine weekend:



It would be a little too fish-in-a-barrel to simply pronounce Kanye West as a talentless twat who needs to stop trying to punch above his meager weight. He has no business being at Glastonbury, any more than he had being at Bonnaroo. And he sure as hell has no business trying to perform Bohemian Rhapsody, a difficult song even for people who can actually sing.

(And I'll even give him credit for the sample from 21st Century Schizoid Man in his song Power. There is no upside for him to do that for money or popularity; I'd wager my salary for the next five years that very few of West's fans have even heard of King Crimson. I think he did it because he thought it was cool. I can respect that, whether or not I like the song.)

But this....Jesus Christ, is he completely deaf? Bad enough that he's simply swaying on an empty stage to a recording of the song, bathed in lights, letting the audience do most of the work. But when he does finally start vocalizing, it's the sort of karaoke croaking you generally hear from random drunks at the airport lounge, despondently hoping some wayward stewardess or bored milf will spot them and impulsively blow them right after their master performance.

I have to wonder what West's fans and followers think about this, no doubt they'll have their excuses and demurrals. He's a genius because he attempted to perform an iconic rock song in front of a couple hundred thousand people, without apparently learning or rehearsing it at all beforehand. Something like that. If anything, it should make them wonder the obvious -- if this is really what he sounds like "live", then just how much sugarcoating and backing tracks are they paying for when they see him?

It's a truism these days that since music is for the most part free, musicians have to perform and sell swag to cover their nut. This applies less to established people (I hesitate to refer to him as an "artist") like West, but it still applies to some degree. He's not some indie group cobbling together their demo with Pro Tools on the drummer's laptop; he probably dumps money into his magna opera, from licensing samples to paying producers to hobbit wax.

Going to a concert as a fan, especially a large stadium or festival, is obviously about more than just the music, it's about the event. But there has historically been at least the implicit agreement that there would be some spontaneity to the music, that you would get something special in return for paying through the nose for tickets and swag and refreshments, and battling traffic and a gigantic mob for a glimpse at your musical wampeter.

But for musicians to provide that truly live experience, they actually have to be able to do something musical, to sing or play an instrument with at least some competence, to improvise, to be spontaneous.

[Side note:  That last link is a terrific example of what I'm talking about, in a good way. I first heard Suit Fugue at least fifteen years ago, have listened to it countless times since, and it still makes the hair on my neck rise. In barely two minutes of running time, Kevin Gilbert took Bach's canon principles of composition and counterpoint, and used them to accurately eviscerate the shithead music industry. It's an outstanding piece of music, and qualitatively superior by itself to West's entire catalog put together. If you've got an hour to spare, check out Gilbert's live performance of Genesis' Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. It's fucking amazing, and captures the magic of what live music used to be about, those fleeting moments that will never happen quite the same way again, but happen anyway because of work, skill, and genuine passion. It's a refreshing contrast to today's canned, pre-recorded, choreographed pseudo-performances, each the same as the last and the next.]

One of the worst things about West is his utter dependence on AutoTune. Here is an instance where you quickly find yourself wishing he'd used it.

Mitt Happens 2: The Mittening

Despite the breathless tone of this article, I seriously doubt Mitt "Mitt" Rmoney would consider lowering himself to the indignity of running for Lord of the Peons again. There's far more precious pelf to be made as a kingmaker, hence the "ideas summit," where the occupants of the next Gooper clown car converge to ponder newer and better ways in which to separate morons from their personal belongings.

With the recent passing of Eric Cantor to K Street nirvana, the Republicans have themselves in a dilly of a pickle. The teabagger hyena they thought they had on a leash has gotten loose, and is rabid, and once enough of the public has been alienated from their nonsensical "uh wants muh country back" jabber, is going to ruin their brand, at least until the Democrats find a way to fuck up their end of it all, which they inevitably do. (Depending, of course, whether one chooses to believe that these things are mistakes or designs.)

To the extent that "conservatives," regardless of their wealth or social standing, tend to see poor people as another species, Rmoney's defining characteristic is that he underscores such a sentiment. The Mittster is indeed the apotheosis of the clueless swell, born on third base and bragging that he hit a triple, and seeing the less fortunate as some vile combination of stupid and lazy.

If there is ever a time where enough people get sick and tired of being treated like shit by a tiny elite that literally thinks they're better and superior in every way, it will be because of that sentiment, that assumption of stupid-lazy on the part of teh poorz. For now, there are enough of the downtrodden who prefer to remain merely envious of the idle rich, because they still hold out hope that they might join them, than to simply see what's been right in front of them all along, and get royally pissed.

In the meantime, here are the people you get to pretend to choose from in a couple of years. How do you like them apples, America?

The Lyin' King

It's rare that I'll link to (or even read) MoDo, but she is absolutely on the money (Boo Boo) with this:

Even some of Romney’s own campaign advisers confess they don’t really know who he is. Is he the pragmatist who would curb Grover Norquist, John Bolton and Dan Senor, or the severe conservative who would let them run wild? It’s sad when you are hoping someone is an opportunist and a liar.

Exactly. With Obama, the disappointment has a far different quality, because Obama seemed in 2008 to have the talent and desire to be a genuinely transformative figure. (Although he did say, over and over again, that "we are the change we've been waiting for"; implicit in that statement/slogan is that he couldn't and wouldn't do it himself, that an engaged (and given the circumstances, enraged) electorate would do some share of the heavy lifting, instead of losing interest and waddling off to watch the 200th season of Survivor.)

But Rmoney is, in many respects, a WYSIWYG candidate; if he appears to be a political lycanthrope, a smarmy shape-shifter ready and willing to be everything to everyone, it's because that's exactly what he is. The only rule in effect for him and his team, to determine how he would govern, is simply to follow the money, look at what Sheldon Adelson and the Koch Bros. want and plan accordingly.

To the extent that, per the N8r b8rs' masturbatory fantasies, there is actually a statistically significant number of third-party defectors throwing it to Rmoney (highly unlikely that he'll win, or that there's enough third-partiers to make a difference), those folks certainly need to keep in mind that, whatever their misgivings about Obama, Rmoney would be an order of magnitude worse on every single one of them.

But where this is really decided at, as we'll see in a couple of days, is if the horse-race coverage is true, if there really are a sufficient number of low-info women voters anxious to vote so directly against their own rational self-interest. Every time I hear or read a woman complaining about the oppression of the male hierarchy, I instantly respond that we can't do it without your help, ladies. I assume they'll keep that in mind when Preznit Money Boo Boo finds another Combover Tony or Strip-Search Sammy or Long Dong Thomas to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg to get a SCOTUS that will not only overturn Roe v. Wade and Obamacare, but find new and creative ways to damage families and children.

Mock the Vote

So, uh, it seems that Ozzy Osbourne/Brenda Vaccaro impersonator and noted thespian Scott Stapp is disappointed in Barry O, so, you know, let that sway you however it will. No word yet on who Chad Kroeger's endorsing, but then, he's Canadian isn't he?

It's hard not to enjoy the dynamic in play here -- did Faux News have to flip a coin to decide between Stapp and, I dunno, Janine Turner? What sliver of Faux' Maalox-chugging demo will even have any idea who Stapp is in the first place? Just weird -- or indicative of Mittens' level of pull among H-list has-beens and never-weres.

Crass Warfare

I don't usually do the "read it all" or "what they said" thing, but uh, what Angry Black Lady said.

You know, we've all got that conservative loudmouth brother-in-law type, whether it's a co-worker or cousin or whatever, who basically internalizes and regurgitates on demand whatever lie they heard most recently from their "news" source, whether it's Fixed Noise or Rash Limpballs or just their own friends and acquaintances.

And you realize pretty quickly on when they try to engage you with the latest nonsense some joker chain-emailed them, it's unfortunately a waste of time to try to counter their arguments with rational debating points. They are not looking for a debate, they're looking for affirmation of their preconceived prejudices, nothing more, nothing less. Any response or point that takes any longer (or even as long) as a typical teevee sound bite (say, six seconds) is going to go in one ear and out the other. They last about ten seconds at a stretch before they shake their wittle heads and mutter, "Whatever."

Okay, then. So what do you counter these passionate bozos with, that they might actually listen and pay attention? That Rmoney thinks half of all Americans are freeloading losers because of their voting preference -- at least, according to the comments he made at a fundraiser thrown by a orgy-throwing vulture capitalist scumbag? That he quite literally made his fortune gutting American companies and sending American jobs to Chinese labor camps? That not just Rmoney himself, but the people he quite explicitly represents, are in fact the only people who are significantly better off than they were four years ago, and they still fucking complain, still seethe with contempt at the the peons who don't know their place? That this modern aristocracy persists in referring to themselves as "job creators", yet after twelve years of the tax cuts they insisted on, have somehow managed not to create any jobs, but have hoarded over a trillion dollars in aggregate private-sector cash reserves? At what point do these schmucks actually pay attention to what's right in front of them, and believe their lyin' eyes once and for all?

You can give it your best shot, and at least make it somewhat interesting. One obvious problem is the high degree of built-in hypocrisy, the mindset of people who deeply resent what they perceive as a class of freeloading untermenschen, always with their hands out, but who have for the most part never themselves said "no" to any free gubmint money coming their way. On the one hand, you don't want to argue too much with a moron, because people might not be able to tell the difference, but on the other hand, that's precisely why their toxic stupidity manages to hang in there every damned time.