Ah the Grammys - the one major award no one actually cares about besides me and Kanye West. And I feel like the only reason Kanye cares is because somehow he missed the memo that the Grammys aren’t a valid award and that white people could care less about them. Nevertheless I love (repeat: LOVE) to see someone like Kayne who cares so openly and abashedly about winning awards. So I wouldn’t dare miss my chance to root Kanye to victory and hopefully see some good performances along the way. And even though you didn’t watch the telecast and could care less about the whole thing, I’ve decided to share with you my thoughts I had while I watched it. Enjoy.
* If I had to use band name to describe the conditions in my apartment right now, I would definitely go with Hot Hot Heat.
* I wouldn’t so much call the Madonna/Gorillaz “collaboration” a collaboration, as much as I would call it The Gorillaz performing and then once they were finished performing, Madonna performing.
* Remember the band called Live? What would you say if you saw them live? “I saw Live live”? And wouldn’t “Live Live” be a great name for their live album? And if someone held a benefit concert to help raise money for them would it be called “Live Aid”? Just some things to think about.
* Good to see Tom Hanks out doing some early PR for his upcoming movie. The Da Vinci Code I believe it's called. With a weird title like that I think its gonna need all the publicity it can get.
* If I was black I think my dream girl would be Alicia Keys.
* If I was 12 I think my dream girl would be Kelly Clarkson. Then again when I was actually 12 my dream girl was Christina Ricci in Casper so who knows.
* Kelly Clarkson is singing a song other than “Since U Been Gone”? She HAS other songs besides “Since U Been Gone”? I don’t know how I feel about this. I do know how I would feel however if I was an American Idol winner who beat Paul McCartney for Best Pop Album. I wouldn’t accept it. I wouldn’t even consider accepting it. Also when I was thanking my competition I wouldn’t mention Sheryl Crow and Bonnie Raitt and yet NOT mention Paul McCartney who I should feel unworthy to even be in the same room as. But then again I’m not the voice behind “Since U Been Gone” so what do I know?
* No more comments about Kelly Clarkson I swear.
* Kelly Clarkson.
* Sorry, I couldn’t resist.
* Coldplay always seems a little off and awkward live. Kind of like Chris Martin’s new fro’.
* I get the impression that Ciara might be a woman of loose moral principles. Plus is the phrase “a poor man’s Beyonce” ever a good description to be able to use about someone?
* Has there ever been a less shocking revelation than Fantasia admitting she’s illiterate? That’s on par with Liberace admitting he’s gay.
* I really don’t think enough people were involved in the Sly Stone tribute. I was waiting for the kitchen sink to come out and do a song.
* I hate to rush to judgments on people, but I get the impression from his appearance and demeanor that Sly Stone might have engaged in a little recreational drug use in his youth. And by “his youth” I also mean “5 minutes before coming on stage”.
* While watching the Grammys it’s interesting to think about the fact that 50 Cent is sitting there listening to Bruce Springsteen. Or that Billie Joe Armstrong is sitting there listening to Faith Hill. Or that I’m sitting there listening to Sugarland.
* How was Kayne not nominated for Producer of the Year? He WAS the producer of the year. And yet somehow he wasn’t even NOMINATED? How is there not more outrage about this? Oh yeah, that’s right, no one else cares about the Grammys.
* Herbie Hancock and Christina Aguilerra together at last! Finally, the collaboration America has been clamoring for has happened! Speaking of late 90’s pop stars, I think its time for my annual ridiculous early Grammy prediction for next year. And it is this – Justin Timberlake’s new album will be nominated for Album of the Year. And keep in mind this prediction is coming from the same person who predicted Speakerboxx/The Love Below would WIN Album of the Year a full six months before it even came out. So you best recognize.
* 3 & 1/2 Comments About Mariah Carey:
1.) It seems that record execs are angry that Mariah hasn’t been shown more love by the Grammys over the years. I know how they feel. I’m still upset that she was robbed out of a Best Actress in a Comedy Series Emmy for her performance in MTV Cribs.
2.) I feel certain that if Abe Lincoln were alive today he would go back and revise the Emancipation Proclamation to state, “I emancipate everyone except for Mimi. She shall forever remain unemancipated.”
3.) “We Belong Together” should have been played at my high school dance. Actually, I feel like it was.
3 & 1/2.) Everyone talks about how this is Mariah Carey’s comeback album, but is it really a comeback when what you’re coming back from is the revelation of the fact that you’re insane?
(And why does it seem that as a nation we have chosen to overlook the fact that Mariah Carey is insane? Whatever the reason is, is it the same reason we have chosen to overlook the fact that R. Kelly is a pedophile?)
* People who have now officially overstayed their welcome: The Black Eyed Peas, Teri Hatcher, Jamie Foxx.
* I think Kayne, Common and John Legend have formed the best hip hop posse of all time. I mean I’d love to hang out with any of those guys. Now if only they can find some way to ditch Jamie Foxx. Maybe they can pawn him off on Colin Farrell full time.
(Speaking of Jamie Foxx and Colin Farrell, is the Miami Vice set like the Mecca of groupidom? Are groupies from all over the world taking holy pilgrimages there as we speak? And is there any conceivable way that the record for most groupies slept with in one film shoot has not already been obliterated by this point? I bet what’s going on in Miami right now makes the Oceans Twelve shoot look like the Steel Magnolias shoot by comparison.)
* Hey Keith Urban, Jon Bon Jovi called and he wants his persona back.
* How was “Numb/Encore” a hit and yet “The Grey Album” wasn’t even allowed to be released legally? How is this fair to humanity? Speaking of “The Grey Album”…hey look, its Jay-Z and Paul McCartney! Their live collaboration (if you can call it that) was cool because it was so shocking to see Paul McCartney appear in the middle of the song and because it was thrilling to see them together, but ultimately it didn’t work. Still though, cool to see Jay-Z wearing a John Lennon T-shirt
(Speaking of Jay-Z, how has "Dirt Off Your Shoulder" not been used in a Head and Shoulders commercial yet?)
* When you hear “Helter Skelter” unexpectedly and out of context of “The White Album”, it’s really shocking to consider the fact that it’s a Beatles song. And I also gotta give Paul props: “Fine Line” is a pretty darn good song. (Also not to be morbid, but it must be said: please God let Ringo die before Paul. Paul deserves to be the last one left.)
* If you combined Bono’s hat with Kanye’s glasses would the resulting coolness factor cause a new ice age? Would the person who could pull that look off make even Johnny Depp jealous? Do I occasionally engage in hyperbole?
* What would have happened if Kanye had lost Best Rap Album? Would he have immediately walked out of the building? Would he have run up on stage and snatched the Grammy out of the winners hand? Hell, none of the other nominees even bothered to show up, but still, part of me wishes he would have lost just so we could have found out what he would have done.
(While we’re on the subject of Kayne its worth noting that he never removed his sunglasses the entire night. That’s amazingly cool in my book. Somewhere Corey Hart is smiling. And by “somewhere” I mean the I-95 Exit 28 underpass.)
* With “Late Registration” winning Best Rap album that means Paul Wall has like 1/44th of a Grammy, which I guess makes him the most successful person to ever (allegedly) graduate from my high school.
(Just to get it out there before the inevitable Houston rap backlash of ’06 begins I'd like to go on record that I’ve not liked Houston hip hop much longer than everyone else has not liked Houston hip hop. In fact its kind of unfathomable to me that Houston hip hop has blown up nationally because I never knew anyone in Houston who ever thought the local hip hop scene was any good. In fact only two good things have ever come out of the Houston rap scene: “Tops Drop” by Fat Pat and “Wanna Be A Balla” by Lil’ Troy. Try to recall the biggest, most popular, most omnipresent song of your lifetime. (“Hey Ya” for example.) Well for two years in Houston “Wanna Be A Baller” was at least five times more popular than that song. I seriously think that 97.9 The Box was under strict orders to play it at least once every 10 minutes. And bare in mind that it’s a six minute long song. I think the best part of the whole thing is that no one had any idea what any of the lyrics were. Lil’ Troy makes Ma$e sound like Laurence Olivier when it comes to diction. I still have no idea what exactly the last part of the chorus is even though I’ve heard the song at least 250 times, easily. I’m pretty sure its “swisha roll tight, got sprayed in my eye”, but then again that doesn’t really make any sense. But what does really? And you have no idea what I’m talking about do you? But then again do you ever?)
(And while we are on the universally fascinating topic of the hip-hop scene from the city I grew up in, I had absolutely no idea until I came to college that doing cough syrup and the using the phrase “chunk the duce” were not national phenomenons but were instead “Houston things”. I can’t tell you how shocking this was to find out. This would be like coming to college and finding out that smoking cigarettes and saying the phrase “that’s cool” had been things that were only popular in your hometown. And just for the record “chunk the duce” is ridiculous dated slang. In high school it had already morphed with my friends and I into “chunkage” or just simply “duce”. And this was way back in 1998. And we were white. At least I think we were…)
* Back to Kanye for a minute…Even though it was off his last album, I’d like to take this opportunity to say that I feel that “Last Call” is definitely the most underrated 12 minute long autobiographical rap song of the past few years. In fact, you could make the case that, in its own way, it’s the best thing Kanye has ever done.
* If one were to ever meet The Game how would one refer to him? I mean “Hey there The Game” sounds awkward but what else could you say instead? Mr. Game? “Guy Who Is Feuding and/or not Feuding with 50 Cent”? Simply “Game”? And if you were asking The Game if he was down to do some particular activity what would say? “Yo Game, you game?” I feel like Abbott and Costello would have a field day with this.
* Announcer: Please welcome Gwen Stefani.
Me: No.
* Mary J. Blige and U2 is a match made in heaven. Although their duet wasn’t quite her "No More Drama" performance from 2001, it was still the performance of the night by far. Speaking of which…
Best 3 & 1/2 Performances of the Night:
1.) U2 & Mary J. Blige
2.) Bruce Springsteen
3.) Kanye West
3 & 1/2.) Paul McCartney
* On to the awards…
Best New Artist goes to…John Legend. It would not be humanly possible for me to care less.
Song the Year goes to…U2! Wow the best nominee actually won. Shocking!
Record of the Year goes to…Green Day! Man, these Grammy are going great so far. The Grammy people have gotten the three major categories right so far. Has that ever happened before? Ever?
Album of the Year goes to…U2? Gotta say I’m conflicted about that one. I’m one of the biggest U2 fans in the world, but Kayne was robbed. He not only had the best album nominated but he actually had the best album of the year and one of the best albums so far this millennium. U2’s album was AT BEST only their 4th best album and you could make a case for it being ranked as low as 7th. If you can argue that an album is a band’s 7th best album then there’s no way it should be beating one of the best albums of the millennium. Still, Bono handled the whole thing amazingly. That is why he is God. And if Kanye had to lose to someone at least it was U2.
(Still I worry about Bono’s proclamation that Kanye will be next. It sure seems that way, but you never know when the magic will run out. A few years ago it seemed like an inevitability that Eminem would win Album of the Year some day. But after his unexpected recent artistic implosion of epic proportions it now seems very unlikely he ever will. So it’s with cautious optimism I say to Kanye, “you’ll get ‘em next time”. )
Thought of the Week: How would the world be different if rats looked like bunny rabbits?
Showing posts with label high school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label high school. Show all posts
Sunday, February 12, 2006
Sunday, May 08, 2005
Facebook.com and the Nature of the Universe
Before you begin to read I have prepared a brief quiz to help you determine whether or not you should spend your valuable time reading this entry. Because it’s long. Very long. In fact I considered titling it “Das Kapital II: The Facebook Manifesto”. So the point is, answer honestly…
1.) When I wake up in the morning the first thing I do is:
A. Turn off my alarm clock
B. Open my eyes
C. Get onto my computer and check facebook
2.) When I meet someone new my first thought is:
A. What an interesting person, I would really like to get to know them.
B. They are so cool, I could see myself having a long-lasting emotionally fulfilling relationship with them.
C. Alright! A new facebook friend!
3.) I would like to have a boyfriend/girlfriend because:
A. Of the emotional comfort and happiness it would bring me.
B. “The greatest joy in life is to love and to be loved in return”.
C. Then I could update my facebook profile to read “in a relationship”!
If you answered C to any of the above give yourself a point. If you scored 1 point or higher then you are qualified to read this entry. If you did not score any points then you should probably not waste your time with this article because clearly you do not own a computer or otherwise you would know about facebook and therefore be obsessed with facebook. Because to know facebook, is to need clinical help regarding facebook. And if you do not know facebook then might I ask, what the hell is wrong with you? Might I also suggest that you get yourself to a computer and join facebook post haste. Because your life is incomplete.
(Now granted I know the facebook obsession is dying down and writing about facebook is like, so February, but hey it was either this or my article about Ricky Martin and the Latin pop explosion so just be grateful...)
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Thinking back on the 1910’s, as I often do, it’s hard to imagine how our great-grandparents ever were able to interact with each other. If they wanted to talk to one another they had to actually physically travel to where the other person was, even if they only wanted to ask a simple question. Or if distance was prohibitive, they had to write long well crafted letters to one another that would often take days or weeks to reach their destination. If you think communication is crucial to a good relationship now, I can only imagine how vital is must have been back then. And of course all of this is if you were already securely “in a relationship”. The whole process of meeting someone and dating must have been even more difficult. You couldn’t wait three days before calling someone whose number you had gotten and were clearly interested in simply in order to make it seem like you were less interested in them than you actually were. No, if you were interested in someone you had to tell them face to face when you first met them because otherwise you didn’t know when you would see them again and there were no such things as phones to call them on to set up a date later. And since there were no phones, at the end of each date if you wanted another date you had to say so and set one up right then, face to face! That means you had to make your intentions known by telling someone face to face that you were indeed interested in them and wanted to see them again! In fact you had to do EVERYTHING in person!! All of your fights had to take place in person. You had to break up with someone in person. You had to express all of your thoughts and feelings in person because the postal service took too long and was unreliable and the technology did not yet exist to make a mix tape.
(Actually I guess poetry, with its careful selection and ordering of words to send a message to someone on an almost subliminal level, was the mix tape of its day but still…)
The whole thing sounds excruciating.
Thankfully, with the help of current technology, we have progressed as a society. All the important communication in a relationship can now be done solely on the phone or over the internet, allowing you to spend your actual time together for more important business, like sex, or watching TV. And that’s pretty much it. And technology hasn’t just helped romantic relationships, but relationship of all kinds. Now it is possible to maintain relationships for years with people you never cared about in the first place by simply IMing their away message every few weeks. Now all your BFFs from High School really can K.I.T. And best of all, we now have facebook, the website that has made it possible to reduce all human interaction into its essence: a measurement of your popularity. Now making friends with someone in real life is almost secondary to making friends with them on facebook. Now we will tolerate people we hate just to claim them as a friend. In fact now not only can we be friends with people we don’t care about, but we will use them to draw our sense of self worth from how many of them will claim us as their friend. At last, we think, tangible proof that I am indeed popular! And it’s on the Internet, the province of the innately unpopular and the insecure - the very people who worry about such things!!!
Ain’t technology fun.
Now if you’re not a member of facebook, I understand. I used to be intelligent like you. I swore I would never join one of those stupid online community things like friendster or myspace or underagecumguzzlers.com. But then one day I caved. And now look at me. I’m obsessed. Although I’m starting to think that some of the cumguzzlers aren’t actually underage. But that’s neither here nor there. What IS here, one Alt-Tab click away from this very document, is facebook. And it has changed my life, in so much as I am no longer a productive human being. Because facebook, unlike friendster or any of those other services, isnt a way to meet new people, but is instead a way to meet people you already know. And whats more exciting than that!? Plus its the most addicting thing to happen to the world of computers since solitaire. So come join the revolution. Get with the times. Become a part of the website that puts the “super” back in “information superhighway”. But before you do, there are a few rules to being a facebook member you should know.
Top 3 & 1/2 Rules a new facebook member should know:
1.) The first rule of facebook: Above all else, have standards. Unless thou art a Marymount dancer, thou does not have sex with every single person who requests to sleep with you. So why should thou accept every friend request thou recieves? Thou should not. Reject some people and be selective with who you send out friend requests to as well. Thou should have standards regarding other people. For example, thou should never request to be friends with someone who you would not feel comfortable acknowledging in real life. Also, there should be a waiting period between meeting someone and requesting to be their friend. Much like buying a gun, a friend request is a very serious matter.
2.) If thou art poked once by a friend, thou art allowed to return the poke. If thou art poked a second time by that same friend then quickly delete that person from your friends list because they are clearly insane. Somewhat like poking is.
3.) When such time comes that His Divine Majesty Greg Lynch requests to be your friend (which if you are just now joining facebook should be sometime in the next few seconds) bow down and give thanks to him and his almighty friend gathering powers. He is your master. By accepting his friend invite you are now a valid member of the facebook community. Congratulations.
(Editors note: This is not in any way to denegrate Mr. Lynch or to imply that he is in any way pathetic. It is simply to imply that he is much cooler than you. Now drop to your knees and offer your blessings up to him.)
3 & 1/2.) Thou shalt not edit thine’s own wall as that is pathetic. Even moreso than being on facebook in the first place.
So now that you know the rules, go join and let the good times roll, as the kids say these days. Seriously, go do it. Ill still be here when you get back.
You back?
Great!
Now will you be my friend?
No but seriously, by joining facebook you’ve just embarked on a journey that has to do with much more than just obtaining friends.
There are also clubs.
But be warned: the facebook journey is long and tough and it often veers about wildly. Almost as much as the tone of this entry. But spend enough time on the journey that is facebook and you’ll learn a lot about the world you live in and the nature of the universe. Which of course brings us back to the title of this entry. And although facebook can tell us many things about our lives, to me there seem to be, conveniently, 3 & 1/2 main things that we can learn about our world from facebook. And to explain these 3 & 1/2 things I have surprisingly created a handy list:
Top 3 & 1/2 things Facebook can teach us about the nature of our universe:
1.) Our taste defines us.
What’s most interesting about facebook is that through being able to view the profiles of people we may not already be friends with it allows to “meet” people and get to know something about them. Now that facebook has become a verb, whenever someone tells you a story or an antidote about someone you don’t know you can immediately go “facebook them” to find out more about them. And what is this “more” about them that you can find out? What is this information that often is the sole basis for your judgment of them as a person? Well, besides their picture, who they are friends with, and what it says about them on their wall, it’s basically their taste in movies, music, books, and quotes. Unless of course they wrote a lot under their “About Me” section in which case they are a loser. (Unless of course YOU did that, in which case you are very cool and I judge you only in a very positive way.) But basically the main thing you can learn about someone through facebook is their taste in quotes and entertainment. And using that information, you make some sort of opinion about them (don’t deny it). But the thing is that that’s a pretty valid opinion. Now its pleasant to think human beings weren’t born shallow and judgmental, and that way back in the 1910’s our grandparents would have found it absurd that we would judge people based on their taste in entertainment rather than their personal moral beliefs and convictions. But what today is “Biggie or Tupac” was surely back then “Jane Austin or Emily Bronte”. And there’s nothing wrong with taste based judgment; it’s human nature. Common interests have always been a key part of any interpersonal relationship. People have from time to time tried to go against that fundamental truth and almost always been proven wrong. Paula Abdul for one once said that opposites attract and, well, look how her life has turned out. I, on the other hand, say alike people attract and human nature backs me up. It makes perfect sense - you love yourself so of course you would love a version of yourself that you can hang out with or maybe even have sex with. I know that sounds awful, but the truth often is, and much like John Leguizamo in Moulin Rouge, Fred the Online Journal only speaks the truth. How facebook plays into all this though is that it reduces what was once a broad spectrum of potential common interests discovered only through discourse and discussion into a simple list of movie and book titles. There is no explanation or reasoning behind any of the information, it’s just simply listed there. We now measure compatibility not through discussion but by checking things off a list. “Likes Monty Python. Good.” “Likes Whitney Houston. Bad.” And so on. This person knows nothing about this other person other than the elaborately constructed presentation this person has made of themselves and what movies, music, books, and other such things they like. They know most likely nothing about this person’s values, their religious views, their outlook on life, their background, or any other similar matters. They don’t even know why or to what degree they like the things they do. But in the end, a list is all that facebook gives us. A list of their taste in entertainment, or at least they way they choose to present their taste in entertainment. Taste in music, movies, books and TV shows - are these really the qualities on which we want to base our opinion of someone? Well. Maybe they are. As a wise man once said, “Its what you like, not who you are that’s important.”
2.) Life is high school; high school is life.
You thought you were done with high school when you graduated didn’t you? Well you thought wrong. It never ends because life is just like high school, only on a much bigger scale. As a wise man once said “high school is life in concentrated form” And if you need proof, look no further than facebook:
On facebook some people join every club under the sun and even start some of their own and other people only show up once every few weeks just to check out what’s going on. Some people have gone to elaborate lengths to create a cool persona for themselves and other people just don’t give a shit. Some people have a new picture every week and others have had the same one since the first day. There are cliques, elaborate and specific social networks, and even groupies. There are rivalries, competitions, and far too many people who like Harry Potter. There are guys who want you to know how “straight” they are, people who want you to know that they really like beer, and apparently still a group of girls who like totally love their boyfriends SOOO much!!! Hell there’s even a way to leave each other yearbook style messages like “keep it real” “you rock” and “I didn’t want you to break up with me so I got pregnant with your kid”. But just like high school, ultimately none of it really matters. Because in the end, it’s all only really about one thing:
Popularity.
3.) As society grows more impersonal, we grow more “personal”
As a wise man once said, “The Internet is like beer, it lowers your inhibitions. Also, its how I met my wife”. And of course what is "the Internet" other than email, “sources” for your research paper, and facebook? And if you don’t think people express things on facebook that they never would in real life then how do you explain the “Best Deep Throats at MMC Club”? Or all the half naked pictures of people? Or the Bea Arthur Club having almost 40 members? Or the surprising number of girls apparently in lesbian relationships with their roommates? Or all the people who have tracked people down who they haven’t talked to since junior high or even elementary school? Or the people who confess to having a crush on their professor? Or just to having a “secret crush” in general? Okay so maybe facebook isn’t like beer. Maybe it’s just like a junior high sleepover. Or a game of truth or dare. Only without the dare. Or the soul crushing fear that you might get picked. But whatever the case, since facebook seems so impersonal it allows the personal revelations to flow out much more freely. What were once diaries kept under lock and key are now blogs linked to in our profiles. Now our phone number and address are there in the open. Our personal messages from others posted on a wall for all to see. Now that there’s a safe haven for us all on the Internet, there’s nothing left to hide.
Except the homemade sex tape of course.
3 & 1/2.) We are very self-involved.
As a wise man once said, “Damn, I’m a sexy bitch!” Now as a person surrounded by theater majors, the fact that people are self-involved is not a news flash, but the extent to which we are in love with ourselves is definitely highlighted by facebook. And surely you’ve realized this if you have ever tried to convince someone they should join facebook. That conversation always goes something like this:
Person 1: You should like totally join facebook! It’s like totally awesome!
Person 2: Why?
Person 1: Well, you get a chance to be friends with people who you’re already friends with or with people you don’t care about in the first place, but now you get to do it in a forum where you get to tell them information about yourself without having to put up with them doing annoying things like talking or changing the topic of conversation away from yourself. It’s so addictive!
Person 2: Why is that?
Person 1: Well because...because…because...hey look! Shiny things!
(Person 1 runs away )
And much like shiny things, it’s hard to not stare at yourself as you walk by a mirror because you’re just so damn fascinating. That’s why its lucky facebook came along so you could share the fascinating fabulousness that is YOU with the world. And you don’t even have to feel bad about it because everyone is doing it. And hey, at least its not as bad as having one of those damn online journals…
Now of course the lessons of facebook extend far beyond these 3 & 1/2 things. What more lessons can we glean from facebook? Many more. Like, maybe we shouldn’t let the Internet supersede face-to-face contact. Maybe we should all improve our communication skills. Maybe the intERpersonal is more important than the intRApersonal. Maybe we shouldn’t be so desperate for distraction. Maybe we should spend more time listening to the voices in our heads and in each other’s mouths than the words on the monitor (and in “The Monitor” for that matter). Maybe society is going to hell. But then again maybe it always has been. And maybe in the end all we have is each other. So I guess what I’m trying to say is:
Will you be my friend?
Top 3 & 1/2 of the Week:
1.) Ben Folds - “Songs for Silverman” (album)
2.) Ben Folds - “Gracie” and “Still Fighting It”
3.) Ben Folds - “Landed”
3 & 1/2.) Ben Folds - “There’s Always Someone Cooler Than You” (Live)
(New feature alert!) Thought of the Week:
I think I figured out why I respond to Ben Folds so much. Hes a writer. Now of course all song writers are techincally writers, but Ben, at heart, is a "writer" writer and he just chose songs over novels, shorts stories, or online journals. To help illustrate my point I think I should first outline a fact about songwriting. And that is this- There are several basic styles of song writing:
Poetic- Bob Dylan, Michael Stipe, etc.
Confessional- Joni Mitchell, solo John Lennon, etc.
Random- Beck, Anthony Kiedis, etc.
Straight forward- Marvin Gaye, James Taylor, etc.
Ambigous- Bernie Taupin, Mick Jagger, David Bowie, etc.
Universal- Bono, Kurt Cobain, Robert Plant, etc.
Of course there are many more styles and these styles all overlap, but I think for the point of this discussion thats a good list. Now what leads to believe Ben is a writer at heart is the fact he falls, most consistantly, into another unmentioned category: Storyteller.
His songs are most often stories about specifc people or incidents, thus one of many reasons for the constant Billy Joel comparisons. But unlike much Billy Joel, or Fountains of Wayne, or most anyone else for that matter, his stories are specific yet ambigous enough to reflect universal themes while at the same time expressing the feelings of the author, or in this case the songwriter. Sounds like a description of alot of the best writing, both fiction and non out there today. Which is why I believe Ben is a writer at heart and just chose to write songs rather than say, magazine articles. Which is why I respond to him so much. And why you do too.
1.) When I wake up in the morning the first thing I do is:
A. Turn off my alarm clock
B. Open my eyes
C. Get onto my computer and check facebook
2.) When I meet someone new my first thought is:
A. What an interesting person, I would really like to get to know them.
B. They are so cool, I could see myself having a long-lasting emotionally fulfilling relationship with them.
C. Alright! A new facebook friend!
3.) I would like to have a boyfriend/girlfriend because:
A. Of the emotional comfort and happiness it would bring me.
B. “The greatest joy in life is to love and to be loved in return”.
C. Then I could update my facebook profile to read “in a relationship”!
If you answered C to any of the above give yourself a point. If you scored 1 point or higher then you are qualified to read this entry. If you did not score any points then you should probably not waste your time with this article because clearly you do not own a computer or otherwise you would know about facebook and therefore be obsessed with facebook. Because to know facebook, is to need clinical help regarding facebook. And if you do not know facebook then might I ask, what the hell is wrong with you? Might I also suggest that you get yourself to a computer and join facebook post haste. Because your life is incomplete.
(Now granted I know the facebook obsession is dying down and writing about facebook is like, so February, but hey it was either this or my article about Ricky Martin and the Latin pop explosion so just be grateful...)
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Thinking back on the 1910’s, as I often do, it’s hard to imagine how our great-grandparents ever were able to interact with each other. If they wanted to talk to one another they had to actually physically travel to where the other person was, even if they only wanted to ask a simple question. Or if distance was prohibitive, they had to write long well crafted letters to one another that would often take days or weeks to reach their destination. If you think communication is crucial to a good relationship now, I can only imagine how vital is must have been back then. And of course all of this is if you were already securely “in a relationship”. The whole process of meeting someone and dating must have been even more difficult. You couldn’t wait three days before calling someone whose number you had gotten and were clearly interested in simply in order to make it seem like you were less interested in them than you actually were. No, if you were interested in someone you had to tell them face to face when you first met them because otherwise you didn’t know when you would see them again and there were no such things as phones to call them on to set up a date later. And since there were no phones, at the end of each date if you wanted another date you had to say so and set one up right then, face to face! That means you had to make your intentions known by telling someone face to face that you were indeed interested in them and wanted to see them again! In fact you had to do EVERYTHING in person!! All of your fights had to take place in person. You had to break up with someone in person. You had to express all of your thoughts and feelings in person because the postal service took too long and was unreliable and the technology did not yet exist to make a mix tape.
(Actually I guess poetry, with its careful selection and ordering of words to send a message to someone on an almost subliminal level, was the mix tape of its day but still…)
The whole thing sounds excruciating.
Thankfully, with the help of current technology, we have progressed as a society. All the important communication in a relationship can now be done solely on the phone or over the internet, allowing you to spend your actual time together for more important business, like sex, or watching TV. And that’s pretty much it. And technology hasn’t just helped romantic relationships, but relationship of all kinds. Now it is possible to maintain relationships for years with people you never cared about in the first place by simply IMing their away message every few weeks. Now all your BFFs from High School really can K.I.T. And best of all, we now have facebook, the website that has made it possible to reduce all human interaction into its essence: a measurement of your popularity. Now making friends with someone in real life is almost secondary to making friends with them on facebook. Now we will tolerate people we hate just to claim them as a friend. In fact now not only can we be friends with people we don’t care about, but we will use them to draw our sense of self worth from how many of them will claim us as their friend. At last, we think, tangible proof that I am indeed popular! And it’s on the Internet, the province of the innately unpopular and the insecure - the very people who worry about such things!!!
Ain’t technology fun.
Now if you’re not a member of facebook, I understand. I used to be intelligent like you. I swore I would never join one of those stupid online community things like friendster or myspace or underagecumguzzlers.com. But then one day I caved. And now look at me. I’m obsessed. Although I’m starting to think that some of the cumguzzlers aren’t actually underage. But that’s neither here nor there. What IS here, one Alt-Tab click away from this very document, is facebook. And it has changed my life, in so much as I am no longer a productive human being. Because facebook, unlike friendster or any of those other services, isnt a way to meet new people, but is instead a way to meet people you already know. And whats more exciting than that!? Plus its the most addicting thing to happen to the world of computers since solitaire. So come join the revolution. Get with the times. Become a part of the website that puts the “super” back in “information superhighway”. But before you do, there are a few rules to being a facebook member you should know.
Top 3 & 1/2 Rules a new facebook member should know:
1.) The first rule of facebook: Above all else, have standards. Unless thou art a Marymount dancer, thou does not have sex with every single person who requests to sleep with you. So why should thou accept every friend request thou recieves? Thou should not. Reject some people and be selective with who you send out friend requests to as well. Thou should have standards regarding other people. For example, thou should never request to be friends with someone who you would not feel comfortable acknowledging in real life. Also, there should be a waiting period between meeting someone and requesting to be their friend. Much like buying a gun, a friend request is a very serious matter.
2.) If thou art poked once by a friend, thou art allowed to return the poke. If thou art poked a second time by that same friend then quickly delete that person from your friends list because they are clearly insane. Somewhat like poking is.
3.) When such time comes that His Divine Majesty Greg Lynch requests to be your friend (which if you are just now joining facebook should be sometime in the next few seconds) bow down and give thanks to him and his almighty friend gathering powers. He is your master. By accepting his friend invite you are now a valid member of the facebook community. Congratulations.
(Editors note: This is not in any way to denegrate Mr. Lynch or to imply that he is in any way pathetic. It is simply to imply that he is much cooler than you. Now drop to your knees and offer your blessings up to him.)
3 & 1/2.) Thou shalt not edit thine’s own wall as that is pathetic. Even moreso than being on facebook in the first place.
So now that you know the rules, go join and let the good times roll, as the kids say these days. Seriously, go do it. Ill still be here when you get back.
You back?
Great!
Now will you be my friend?
No but seriously, by joining facebook you’ve just embarked on a journey that has to do with much more than just obtaining friends.
There are also clubs.
But be warned: the facebook journey is long and tough and it often veers about wildly. Almost as much as the tone of this entry. But spend enough time on the journey that is facebook and you’ll learn a lot about the world you live in and the nature of the universe. Which of course brings us back to the title of this entry. And although facebook can tell us many things about our lives, to me there seem to be, conveniently, 3 & 1/2 main things that we can learn about our world from facebook. And to explain these 3 & 1/2 things I have surprisingly created a handy list:
Top 3 & 1/2 things Facebook can teach us about the nature of our universe:
1.) Our taste defines us.
What’s most interesting about facebook is that through being able to view the profiles of people we may not already be friends with it allows to “meet” people and get to know something about them. Now that facebook has become a verb, whenever someone tells you a story or an antidote about someone you don’t know you can immediately go “facebook them” to find out more about them. And what is this “more” about them that you can find out? What is this information that often is the sole basis for your judgment of them as a person? Well, besides their picture, who they are friends with, and what it says about them on their wall, it’s basically their taste in movies, music, books, and quotes. Unless of course they wrote a lot under their “About Me” section in which case they are a loser. (Unless of course YOU did that, in which case you are very cool and I judge you only in a very positive way.) But basically the main thing you can learn about someone through facebook is their taste in quotes and entertainment. And using that information, you make some sort of opinion about them (don’t deny it). But the thing is that that’s a pretty valid opinion. Now its pleasant to think human beings weren’t born shallow and judgmental, and that way back in the 1910’s our grandparents would have found it absurd that we would judge people based on their taste in entertainment rather than their personal moral beliefs and convictions. But what today is “Biggie or Tupac” was surely back then “Jane Austin or Emily Bronte”. And there’s nothing wrong with taste based judgment; it’s human nature. Common interests have always been a key part of any interpersonal relationship. People have from time to time tried to go against that fundamental truth and almost always been proven wrong. Paula Abdul for one once said that opposites attract and, well, look how her life has turned out. I, on the other hand, say alike people attract and human nature backs me up. It makes perfect sense - you love yourself so of course you would love a version of yourself that you can hang out with or maybe even have sex with. I know that sounds awful, but the truth often is, and much like John Leguizamo in Moulin Rouge, Fred the Online Journal only speaks the truth. How facebook plays into all this though is that it reduces what was once a broad spectrum of potential common interests discovered only through discourse and discussion into a simple list of movie and book titles. There is no explanation or reasoning behind any of the information, it’s just simply listed there. We now measure compatibility not through discussion but by checking things off a list. “Likes Monty Python. Good.” “Likes Whitney Houston. Bad.” And so on. This person knows nothing about this other person other than the elaborately constructed presentation this person has made of themselves and what movies, music, books, and other such things they like. They know most likely nothing about this person’s values, their religious views, their outlook on life, their background, or any other similar matters. They don’t even know why or to what degree they like the things they do. But in the end, a list is all that facebook gives us. A list of their taste in entertainment, or at least they way they choose to present their taste in entertainment. Taste in music, movies, books and TV shows - are these really the qualities on which we want to base our opinion of someone? Well. Maybe they are. As a wise man once said, “Its what you like, not who you are that’s important.”
2.) Life is high school; high school is life.
You thought you were done with high school when you graduated didn’t you? Well you thought wrong. It never ends because life is just like high school, only on a much bigger scale. As a wise man once said “high school is life in concentrated form” And if you need proof, look no further than facebook:
On facebook some people join every club under the sun and even start some of their own and other people only show up once every few weeks just to check out what’s going on. Some people have gone to elaborate lengths to create a cool persona for themselves and other people just don’t give a shit. Some people have a new picture every week and others have had the same one since the first day. There are cliques, elaborate and specific social networks, and even groupies. There are rivalries, competitions, and far too many people who like Harry Potter. There are guys who want you to know how “straight” they are, people who want you to know that they really like beer, and apparently still a group of girls who like totally love their boyfriends SOOO much!!! Hell there’s even a way to leave each other yearbook style messages like “keep it real” “you rock” and “I didn’t want you to break up with me so I got pregnant with your kid”. But just like high school, ultimately none of it really matters. Because in the end, it’s all only really about one thing:
Popularity.
3.) As society grows more impersonal, we grow more “personal”
As a wise man once said, “The Internet is like beer, it lowers your inhibitions. Also, its how I met my wife”. And of course what is "the Internet" other than email, “sources” for your research paper, and facebook? And if you don’t think people express things on facebook that they never would in real life then how do you explain the “Best Deep Throats at MMC Club”? Or all the half naked pictures of people? Or the Bea Arthur Club having almost 40 members? Or the surprising number of girls apparently in lesbian relationships with their roommates? Or all the people who have tracked people down who they haven’t talked to since junior high or even elementary school? Or the people who confess to having a crush on their professor? Or just to having a “secret crush” in general? Okay so maybe facebook isn’t like beer. Maybe it’s just like a junior high sleepover. Or a game of truth or dare. Only without the dare. Or the soul crushing fear that you might get picked. But whatever the case, since facebook seems so impersonal it allows the personal revelations to flow out much more freely. What were once diaries kept under lock and key are now blogs linked to in our profiles. Now our phone number and address are there in the open. Our personal messages from others posted on a wall for all to see. Now that there’s a safe haven for us all on the Internet, there’s nothing left to hide.
Except the homemade sex tape of course.
3 & 1/2.) We are very self-involved.
As a wise man once said, “Damn, I’m a sexy bitch!” Now as a person surrounded by theater majors, the fact that people are self-involved is not a news flash, but the extent to which we are in love with ourselves is definitely highlighted by facebook. And surely you’ve realized this if you have ever tried to convince someone they should join facebook. That conversation always goes something like this:
Person 1: You should like totally join facebook! It’s like totally awesome!
Person 2: Why?
Person 1: Well, you get a chance to be friends with people who you’re already friends with or with people you don’t care about in the first place, but now you get to do it in a forum where you get to tell them information about yourself without having to put up with them doing annoying things like talking or changing the topic of conversation away from yourself. It’s so addictive!
Person 2: Why is that?
Person 1: Well because...because…because...hey look! Shiny things!
(Person 1 runs away )
And much like shiny things, it’s hard to not stare at yourself as you walk by a mirror because you’re just so damn fascinating. That’s why its lucky facebook came along so you could share the fascinating fabulousness that is YOU with the world. And you don’t even have to feel bad about it because everyone is doing it. And hey, at least its not as bad as having one of those damn online journals…
Now of course the lessons of facebook extend far beyond these 3 & 1/2 things. What more lessons can we glean from facebook? Many more. Like, maybe we shouldn’t let the Internet supersede face-to-face contact. Maybe we should all improve our communication skills. Maybe the intERpersonal is more important than the intRApersonal. Maybe we shouldn’t be so desperate for distraction. Maybe we should spend more time listening to the voices in our heads and in each other’s mouths than the words on the monitor (and in “The Monitor” for that matter). Maybe society is going to hell. But then again maybe it always has been. And maybe in the end all we have is each other. So I guess what I’m trying to say is:
Will you be my friend?
Top 3 & 1/2 of the Week:
1.) Ben Folds - “Songs for Silverman” (album)
2.) Ben Folds - “Gracie” and “Still Fighting It”
3.) Ben Folds - “Landed”
3 & 1/2.) Ben Folds - “There’s Always Someone Cooler Than You” (Live)
(New feature alert!) Thought of the Week:
I think I figured out why I respond to Ben Folds so much. Hes a writer. Now of course all song writers are techincally writers, but Ben, at heart, is a "writer" writer and he just chose songs over novels, shorts stories, or online journals. To help illustrate my point I think I should first outline a fact about songwriting. And that is this- There are several basic styles of song writing:
Poetic- Bob Dylan, Michael Stipe, etc.
Confessional- Joni Mitchell, solo John Lennon, etc.
Random- Beck, Anthony Kiedis, etc.
Straight forward- Marvin Gaye, James Taylor, etc.
Ambigous- Bernie Taupin, Mick Jagger, David Bowie, etc.
Universal- Bono, Kurt Cobain, Robert Plant, etc.
Of course there are many more styles and these styles all overlap, but I think for the point of this discussion thats a good list. Now what leads to believe Ben is a writer at heart is the fact he falls, most consistantly, into another unmentioned category: Storyteller.
His songs are most often stories about specifc people or incidents, thus one of many reasons for the constant Billy Joel comparisons. But unlike much Billy Joel, or Fountains of Wayne, or most anyone else for that matter, his stories are specific yet ambigous enough to reflect universal themes while at the same time expressing the feelings of the author, or in this case the songwriter. Sounds like a description of alot of the best writing, both fiction and non out there today. Which is why I believe Ben is a writer at heart and just chose to write songs rather than say, magazine articles. Which is why I respond to him so much. And why you do too.
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