If you had told me, twenty years ago, that this last decade would be one of the most terrifying/interesting/instructive/growth inducing periods of my entire life to date, I’d have laughed uproariously, and then kicked you out of the room.
Continue readingELECTIONS! Whether we want them or not!
But first ….
FACEBOOK! If you’ve been following my Facebook antics – or lack thereof, as I have sat banished and abandoned in Facebook solitary for the better part of the last six months – I am happy to report that I have been allowed to return to the site. Well, for the moment, anyway. I’m already getting warnings for doing really horrible things like posting links to how to determine if you might be addicted to social media.
Continue readingTo be honest, I haven’t much enjoyed the last five years or so. I’m not just talking about politics, though, if there was ever a time in which it became apparent how much politics affects every aspect of our every day lives, this was that time.
Continue readingIn the 50s and 60s, most of the gendered role models for kids were caricatures, physical and psychological distortions of what a ‘real man’ or a ‘real woman’ should look like, and how they should behave.
Continue readingI’m happy to report that the rumours of my death were greatly exaggerated. I’ve only been dead to the social media world for the last 30 days.
Continue reading
Teenaged me wasn’t very smart. “Hope I die before I get old.” ‘Never trust anyone over 30.” I’d not yet heard of the 27 Club, but if I had, I might have aspired to joining it, thus avoiding becoming untrustworthy.
Continue reading
I have said it before, and I will say it again. The Mainstream Audience LOVES their public figures to be weird, quirky, odd, strange, possessed, mentally unstable, drug addled, alcoholic, Re-Hab invulnerable, mouthy, shallow, deep, oblivious, and/or strangely coiffed or have an artistic deformity. Why? Because everybody knows if you have green hair, dress like a Circus act, own a dolphin, go shopping driving a zamboni, or have a prehensile tail, you are a better singer, actor, or politician than all the others. If you can grow a third arm in the middle of your forehead …you will be destined to be the greatest whatever-you-are until the end of time.
Or until someone comes along whose genitals can recite the Declaration of Independence.
Continue reading
We all seem to have a penchant for “the good old days”…..those seemingly free and easy days of the 60s and 70s. Thing is, they really were…..free and easy. Oh, they weren’t perfect. People had their personal challenges but the music, oh the music.
There was a special kind of ambience, a unique kind of camaraderie among the artists. It was an exceptional time and it was happening everywhere. The music sonic boom of 60s was taking place on both sides of the ocean. There’s been a cavalcade of books and documentaries written and produced about the artists themselves and the influences they and their music have on us all today, and will continue to for generations to come. It was the perfect storm of change culminating in Woodstock in 1969, propelling us full speed ahead into the 70s.
Now that I have your attention, let’s talk about music in the time of COVID, shall we?
In the Before Times (March 2020 or sooner) the music industry was teetering on the brink of obsolescence as concert tickets had skyrocketed to the price of, well, a moon-landing, and venues were closing down at a rate equal to Nortel distributors. The music itself had been co-opted by the tech industry through streaming platforms, leaving artists wondering how they got robbed so badly (here’s a hint: you’re the cow, the music’s the milk…insert cliché about not buying the former if you can get the latter for free). On a scale of economics, you’re either a starving creator or a billionaire exploiter. There is no middle class in music. And given that most weasels in the music industry aren’t clever enough to become billionaires, they turn to low hanging fruit and pick the pockets of performers and songwriters for pennies on the dollar.
I blame social media and reality TV. I blame reality TV because the flood of singing, dancing, housewifing and endurance series that became ubiquitous during the early 2000s were the catalyst for too many narcissists to believe that their big fish in a small local pond anonymity was only an audition and a bunch of ‘likes and shares’ away from stardom. And that belief, that, in the past, would have been knocked out of them by cruel reality, has gone right to our collective heads.
Bullseye Records of Canada
