OK, So MTV

Today is still Tuesday, 1 August 2006.

Blessings upon: “Bangles Fan”.

As you may have noticed, most of the time your author chooses to beat the world over the head with weighty issues, thus the column on slavery, earlier today.

But, “Bangles” raises an important issue, and OK, so I’m taking a heavy spin on the fact that, yes, today is MTV’s 25th Anniversary. So sue me. (‘Though I prefer indictments to suits. Line forms to the right – snark!) So go on VACATION and WALK LIKE AN EGYPTIAN. What else to do while LIVING WITH WAR. MASTERS OF WAR. WAR: WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR?

ABSOLUTELY NOTHIN’.

GOOD GOD Y’ALL.

Walter Benjamin, one of the stars by which I steer the ship, and a representative work: The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.

(And yes, we’re trying to replicate the quick-cut,-short-attention-span look of MTV, only in prose. Prose, dude: so Old School. Showin’ yr gray .)

OK, so I’m a Martha-Quinn-era primitive, MTV-wise: I liked it when they just played MUSIC, videos, and didn’t try to be a bad imitation of ABC back in the (bad ol’) day.

But I’m doing the same thing perhaps: I make a one-off piece of art/artifact (this column) and, thanks to mechanical wizardry; it’s duplicated “ACROSS THE UNIVERSE”.

A hundred years ago, before the invention of T.A. Edison (vastly inferior to Tesla, but that’s a horse of a different colour to beat another day), “ordinary people” made music for one another, that being the only way.

“Amateur” music. “Amateur” being a word derived from “a lover of”. And “professional” is so much better, right. The difference here is The Industrial System. The latter values that which it pays for, not necessarily that which is “better”.

“Bad” news: we’re running out of petrolmania, so we have to construct a “civilization” on another basis. Downside: hot summer, cold winters, lots of starvation.

Upside: The return of everybody-makes-music-and-art-in-general, which is to say, the bard Homer returns, only this time I hope he doesn’t spend all his time sucking up to “HEROES”.

FULL DISCLOSURE: Your author is not only a Bangles fan, but a fan of The Go-Go’s, E. Piaf, Bach, Mozart, Sousa, Stockhousen, The Weavers, N. Young, Leadbelly, Howlin’ Wolf, The Blind Boys of Alabama … hell, just come over to the house and check out the platters.

This would be the point to commend to youse one of the finest novels, A Canticle for Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller, Jr, for reasons you realize if you read/have read same.

Surely one of the Terminal Documents compiled by Kaldren (in The Voices of Time, by J.G. Ballard).

Following I just found, by The Anti-Idiot-President-Coalition Band. Don’t know whom they are, but right on.

Hey, Mr. President, Don't You Kill for Me!
(By Ron and Tom Piechota)

Hey, Mr. President, don't you kill for me!
(Don't use my taxes for your insanity)
I said, hey, Mr. President, don't you maim for me!
(This fixation needs psychiatry)
You've got the whole world hating us
From sea to shining sea

The economy's in the toilet so what do you do?
You make Ritchie Rich richer while we get the screw
And banging them war drums won't drown out that tune
Your legacy's soon to be pissed away too

I said, hey, Mr. President, don't you kill for me!
(Don't ruin my country and say you did it for me)
I said, hey, Mr. President, don't you maim for me!
(After Iraq what will we see?)
Cause in your New World Order
They hate us from sea to sea

You say you're "sick and tired" but who gives a damn?
Our boys will soon be dying, just like down in Vietnam
And collateral damage will be hard to ignore
When it's a monument of corpses bigger than Hoover dam!

I said, hey, Mr. President, don't you kill for me!
(They're not toy soldiers, they have family)
I said, hey, Mr. President, don't you maim for me!
(Cruise missiles are WMD)
You've got the whole world hating us
Burning more flags you'll see

100,000 dead was your dad's legacy
How many more Osamas will come from your lunacy?
Sharon's "a man of peace"? I'm in "shock and awe"
The stem cells are all safe but the humans want mercy

I said, hey, Mr. President, don't you kill for me!
(Kill Osama not civilians for me)
I said, hey, Mr. President, don't you maim for me!
(Little children aren't able to flee)
Cause in your New World Order
They hate us from sea to sea.