I’m all mixed up today, out of sorts with things, feeling like I don’t belong here, but unable to say where I should go.

At jam on Monday we played quietly and it was OK. At the end I was excited to tell one of the other jammers about the new Godflesh track and after we’d all stopped playing, I played it for everyone. Sounded sick. Tickets already acquired for Oct 19th.

One member of the jam band started playing guitar over the top of it. I was already frustrated with him because I think he plays too much, seems to always need to be heard, and he doesn’t listen enough. Suddenly I said: “Hey, you’re kind of ruining the song.” And he stopped playing. He texted me later saying he was deeply offended at being spoken to like that. I said I could have said it differently and apologized. And now he’s acting like a whiny little bitch about it. Truth be told: he was ruining the song. I care far less about this fallout than I once might have. I don’t know if it’s because I’m feeling less about people these days, or just him, or just fed up with most things.

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In the past and over time I have given people a hard time about top-10 type music. When I hear popular tracks everywhere, I get seriously agitated. The sound of commercial music makes me want to be explosive and violent. Why is that? It’s because there’s nothing there, in that sound. The industry is so fucked. All those songs are written by one or two people, and for the sole purpose of appealing to teenagers. It’s formulaic, like Hollywood. There’s no art in there, and it’s just beyond me how anyone can listen to it, knowing what it is, knowing that the performer who wears the face of the song had literally nothing to do with the song, and is merely a pretty object.

Is that too extreme? What if I could prove it to you, would it change anything?

Ever heard of Max Martin? No? Well that’s strange. You’ve heard lots and lots of his “music”. Would it surprise you if I told you that the songs “Quit Playing Games (With My Heart)“, “Everybody (Backstreet’s Back)“, “I Want It That Way“, “…Baby One More Time“, “Oops!… I Did It Again“, and “It’s My Life” are all written by the same person/business? More? OK, the same single entity also wrote:  “F**kin’ Perfect“,”So What” and “Raise Your Glass” by Pink; “I Kissed a Girl“, “Hot n Cold“, “The One That Got Away“, “California Gurls“, “Teenage Dream“, “E.T.“, “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)“, “Part of Me“, “Wide Awake” and “Roar” by Katy Perry; “My Life Would Suck Without You” by Kelly Clarkson, “…Baby One More Time“, “3“, “Hold It Against Me“, “Till the World Ends“, and “I Wanna Go” by Britney Spears, “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” by Taylor Swift,  “One More Night” by Maroon 5, “Dynamite” by Taio Cruz, “DJ Got Us Fallin’ in Love” by Usher, “Whataya Want From Me” by Adam Lambert, “Beauty and a Beat” by Justin Bieber, “I Knew You Were Trouble” by Taylor Swift, and many, many more.  All were all written and produced by the same single entity, and then shopped around and sold to the entities who market and sell the performers we’re all familiar with.  Nearly all of “popular” music comes from the same place, a place with a formula that knows what teenagers will buy, and there’s not much more to it than that. Especially nothing more musical to it.

It’s not art, there’s nothing artistic about it. It’s like if Monet sold draw-by-numbers versions of his painting, and the person who connected the dots was made into a celebrity for having done so. Why? Because it makes someone else, the person who corporatized the art, lots and lots of money. But what does it do for the art itself, or for human expression, or for anything else at all? It does nothing at all.  It’s so fucked. It’s just beyond me how anyone could listen to any of it while knowing what it is and what it was made for.

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Class tonight and then home for writing. It’s nice and crisp outside and perfect for training hard, long runs where you don’t have to worry about getting too dehydrated.

I’m in a bad way lately. I feel healthy and strong and it’s best for people to stay away from me. I’m dangerous for everyone right now.