Yes, a lot of their music is sophomoric silly suburban frat boy crap. Yes, it's disposable pop.But...I WAS a silly sophomoric suburban frat boy (well, OK, minus the actual frat, mind you...) once. And there are moments, just moments, when their dreamy lyrics float in...
"There's a shopping cart in the ravine...reach deep into the darkest recesses of the silly suburban frat boy heart, pull out the confusion and dissonance that are tucked carefully away from everyone's sight, and hold it out with a sly smile; "Is this yours..?"
Foam on the creek is like pop and ice cream
A field full of tires that is always on fire
To light my way home
There are luxuries we can't afford
But in our house we never get bored
Cause we can dance to the radio station
That plays in our teeth."
And then there's nothing to do but smile warily back and sing along.
3 comments:
Few can make it through the dissonance; few dare even call it that, I'm afraid.
One of the most pernicious things about our society is the confusion of material wealth with emotional and spiritual happiness; David Brooks is a sort of high priest of the religion that says if you have a Lexus and a hot tub you are a happy, happy person.
I think this may have a lot to do with the way we tend to equate simplicity and poverty with personal failing and brute force with strength. Dunno; maybe it's just an excuse for suburban kids to wear their pants down around their ass and get arrested for tagging.
"we tend to equate simplicity and poverty with personal failing"
--yes, and we are so confused! The bored wealthy try to co-opt the perceived romance via their "simplicity" movement (i.e., "Real Simple" magazine, vs. poverty simple, I guess.)
It's not that wealth (or financial security) couldn't help with emotional and spiritual happiness, it's just that we don't know how to rout out the dissonance you mention. We only know how to accrete, and that is a path to obfuscation, which seems to be the way we like it.
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