The song's okay. I can more or less see what the various specific criticisms in the post are pointing to (although I'm not sure what you consider the first abrupt shift), but I don't buy the overall argument at all.
Something along the lines of "this song is fractured and disjointed, to an exceptional and noteworthy degree."
I thought the song was truly terrible, and I have a very forgiving ear for pop music production. It's like they didn't even try to make good-sounding things. What gives, Janelle?
The idea that there's an argument here is almost as surprising as the idea that the song is not terrible.
The first shift is at :41, when it slows down, the drums drop out, and we just have piano accompaniment. The next shift is a mere seven seconds later.
If there is an overall claim it's just that the feeling of abrupt shifts here is, for whatever reason, greater even than the feeling of abrupt shifts in songs that were specifically intended to have abrupt shifts, as in Zorn's work, but I will (this is not meant to reflect poorly on you at all, mind) be surprised if you are very familiar with Zorn.
The Janelle cameo was admittedly pretty odd, in that they didn't really capitalize on her talent at all.
The first shift is at :41, when it slows down, the drums drop out, and we just have piano accompaniment. The next shift is a mere seven seconds later.
I guess I just thought of that as a single shift, with the first part as a brief segue.
3: Oh, sure. That's my argument in the sense of "high argument", I guess.
For comparison, here's Naked City's "Snagglepuss". It's a total mishmash of styles, but I don't think it's nearly as whiplash-inducing as the song in the post, perhaps (in part) because it sounds like it was actually all recorded at once rather than being a total Frankenstein's monster.
If there is an overall claim it's just that the feeling of abrupt shifts here is, for whatever reason, greater even than the feeling of abrupt shifts in songs that were specifically intended to have abrupt shifts, as in Zorn's work, but I will (this is not meant to reflect poorly on you at all, mind) be surprised if you are very familiar with Zorn.
I am of course not, and no offense taken.
I'm not saying it's a good song, just not exceptionally bad in the way you describe. But Stanley seems to more or less agree with you, so it's probably just my lack of musical knowledge talking.
Eh, it sounds like a song from the St. Elmo's Fire soundtrack, except in an alternate universe where the Occupy movement started in 1982.
And yeah, what's up with wasting Janelle Monae's precious time to have her sing a few bars of the chorus that you can barely hear because the lead singer is still droning on? She could be making up more stuff about androids!
There's also the bizarre Attack Attack! song linked in this post, but there weird hybrid nature is at least somewhat hinted at early on.
I guess I have no grounds for saying that this is actually exceptionally bad, other than that it caught my attention in a way that most of what I am exposed to on the (shudder) commercial radio doesn't. But that doesn't mean there isn't a whole lot that's as bad or worse out there too.
And yeah, what's up with wasting Janelle Monae's precious time to have her sing a few bars of the chorus that you can barely hear because the lead singer is still droning on? She could be making up more stuff about androids!
My theory is that they offered her a bunch of money and she was like "yeah, okay, whatever."
12: That theory has merit! Yet and still, those doofuses are not fit to take Janelle Monae's tuxedo to the drycleaners.
I had to listen to a bunch of versions of "Bandiera Rossa" to get the taste out of my mouth.
I actually bought their previous album a year or so ago because one of the band member is also in Steel Train, whose self-titled record I really love, but was disappointed by it (fun.'s, that is). Now I'm thinking maybe I should give it another listen!
I mean, I didn't love it. But I thought the transitions made it somewhat interesting, and I liked the ... somewhat overwrought, I suppose... production.
Okay, I'll be the one to jump on the carefully-indicated grenade: which "one Höyry-Kone song" and who is that?
Or maybe I didn't buy Fun's previous album after all! I can only seem to find in my library the auspiciously titled track "At Least I'm Not as Sad as I Used to Be," which also sort of switches up tempos, but which I don't find as pleasing as the OP's tune. I may be confusing Fun's album with that of The Format, a band which, like Steel Train, also shared a member with Fun, and which I downloaded for transitivity reasons.
... no, wait, I do have it; it was just mislabeled, sort of.
... listening to their last album now, it seems that almost every song does that same switching-around-thingie. Interesting. But not very danceable!
It does kind of crack me up how all these idiots are tearing shit up while Janelle Monáe stands there, calm, in her suit. She doesn't even deign to be shaking her head at them, but her bearing says, "You fools."
Has anyone linked to the catchy and cute Estelle-Janelle Monae song yet? No video for it, last I checked.
Also, autotune. Or possibly he just has an annoying voice.
Do people ever actually exhort themselves on by saying they're young?
Truly young people keep not being able to believe how old they've gotten.
Indeed, I've heard this song a dozen times and never noticed any female singer. The presence of Janelle Monae seems to be purely for branding purposes. It could also be called "Janelle Monae presents: Fun;"
This song is terrrrible. And painfully inescapable!
Oh, I know this song. I like it.
Eh, it sounds like a song from the St. Elmo's Fire soundtrack
This is exactly right.
The other totally inescapable song is that para-para-para-para-paradise song.
The beginning lyrcis worked me into such a froth that I almost posted them. It's something like
When she was just a giiiiiiiiiirl
She expected the wooooooooorld
But it flew away from her reeeeeeach
So she buried herself in a dreeeeeeeam
It was going to be a post where I mocked Anthony Kiedis and then admitted I liked the para-para-para-para-paradise part. Then it turned out to be Coldplay, and so I let it go.
The comparison to Naked City makes me like the song a little more. Just listening causally, I didn't notice how aggressively the song is making aesthetic mistakes. I like it when art fails big. The chorus is also catchy.
Living with a 9 year old girl, I can assure you that there are worse songs in the world.
Well, Lord Castock, I'm glad you asked that.
Höyry-Kone ("Steam Engine") was an interesting/strange/vaguely proggy Finnish band whose first album was pretty stylistically diverse (some tracks: one, two). Their second album, Huono Parturi ("Bad Barber") is significantly more uniform; here is a track from it. However, part of the way through the album, as you start feeling as if you know what to expect, there's a track of played-straight oompah-band blasmusik, on which none of the members of the actual band played at all. Disorienting!
Höyry-Kone is also notable because after they broke up two of the members went on to start Alamaailman Vasarat.
Someday I hope we're terribly embarrassed by the 21st-century enthusiasm for operatically dramatic songs about going out to a bar with your friends and hoping to have a good time.
This was the video through which I first encountered the song, via a grad schoool colleague's FB stream, which I've since hidden. Creeptastic! If you can watch it all the way through you'll be rewarded with some groaning.
I get that there is a huge audience for psych-up music, because people are shy and don't necessarily feel like going out to the bar with friends who may or may not be fun to talk to, and most of the people at that bar are douchebags anyway, or whatever, but when it's this dramatic, how could anything less than your friends choosing to immolate you on the karaoke stage possibly satisfy your need for world-changing EVENTS to occur?
33: But it's such a timeless topic for songs.
36: Yes, but that doesn't promise more than that we'll have a drink or two and maybe make eyes, not that we'll become immortals.
32:I love this album, will check out Horry-Cow.
34: I started groaning about 20 seconds in, when the girl in the video does the lip-bitey thing.
Ok, yuck, I feel gross for having watched that; thanks, Pongo.
Also, (a) that chick sucks at peeling apples, and I'm not referring to the fact that she cut herself; you aren't actually supposed to end up with a dodecahedron; (b) I thought it was at least hinted that she cut herself somewhat early on (there's a kind of jerky movement with the knife around 1:20 followed by a gaspy expression on her face and, I thought, by red (coulda been a reflection from the apple, though) on her thumb.
Also also, (c), now I reveal myself as a creep, because the "painting one's lips with one's bloody finger" move seemed kinda hot. I also think that about the blood-sucking scene in Ran!
Just since it's the weekend, an amazing Silvio Rodriguez performance*, it's worth watching all the way to the end, the way he relates to the crowd is amazing. It takes him a moment to switch from a very internal performance mood to sharing the moment, but I think that it ends up being very touching, and at the end he seems moved by it.
* I don't speak Spanish, but looking up the lyrics it's a song to a lost love and, reading a bit about it there's debate about whether it's to a person or whether it's a song about Cuba. What's interesting is that without needing to look very hard there are people from Cuba who come down definitively on both sides of that question -- some people saying, "everybody in Cuba knows that it's a political song" and other saying, "everybody knows that it's about a woman that he loved." The first translation that I found (which was described as imprecise) has the first verse as follows, which gives some sense of the mood.
If only the leaves stopped brushing your body while falling / So you didn't turn them into crystals. / If only the rain stopped being a miracle falling on your body / If only the moon could rise without you / If only the Earth didn't kiss your steps" which gives some sense of the mood.
40: No problem! I figured, a) someone else had to have the same horrible associations that I do for the song, and b) if folks were wondering if the lady getting hit in the head/face with the bar glass bit from the OP video could be much more fucked up, the answer is yes! Of course!
that chick sucks at peeling apples
I think it's because she's not looking at what she's doing. Knife safety first, kids.
It's like she doesn't even want to eat that apple.
42.last: Kids these days. We started peeling apples with machetes when were three, both ways uphill. Our parents lived in another state, and only visited on holidays. We'd sneak down to the service plaza and give the truckers blowjobs for the loose change we could steal out of their pockets. We'd spend everything we'd get on sharp sticks to play with. Then over Christmas break we'd ride the rails down to Guatemala and work as United Fruit mercenaries.
Tell us again about the time you stabbed a hobo, Grandpa. Pleeeease!
It was on the Santa Fe, just outside of Gallup. He wouldn't give my brother a reach around so I gutted him after he'd finished. We throw his body down the embankment and took the 50¢ he had on him and used it to go see Sleeping Beauty when we got Albuquerque.
Well, having finally listened to the song: it doesn't really seem fractured or disjointed, but it's certainly ridiculous. And yes, a total waste of Janelle Monae.
Thanks for those links to the Höyry-Kone action in 32, neb. They're interesting; not sure if I like them or not but certainly far more interesting to listen to than those jokers in the OP. I'll have to check out more.
Speaking of H-K I just noticed that the track I said was from Huono parturi isn't; messed up the copy-pasting. This one actually is, though I don't think it's the one I meant to link before. Oh well!
Here is an Alamaailman Vasarat performance.
Hmm, iPad won't load it. Guess it will have to wait until the kids wander away from the never-ending Jumpstart world on the computer.
Perhaps it is not available via HTML5 video, and only via Flash, which the iPad is powerless before.
Did the video in 34 disappear?
If only.
46: Thanks, that's my favorite.
The Sleeping Beauty detail is a bit funny for me, as I was just reading the frist chapter of Darnton's The Great Cat Massacre, which makes reference to the rape-ier 18th century French version of Sleeping Beauty, "Sun, Moon, and Talia."
Someday I hope we're terribly embarrassed by the 21st-century enthusiasm for operatically dramatic songs about going out to a bar with your friends and hoping to have a good time.
I love "Closing Time" so much. I had this reaction to it at first, then I stopped worrying and learned to love the bomb.
To be fair, it's an operatically dramatic songs about going out to a bar and having sex with someone you meet here, which is a little more specific than the chaste descendants you're pointing out. "Gonna set the world on fire" is no "you don't have to go home but you can't stay here."
I hate "Closing Time" so, so much.
It takes him a moment to switch from a very internal performance mood to sharing the moment, but I think that it ends up being very touching, and at the end he seems moved by it.
He starts by telling the crowd to sing along, so I'm not sure this is exactly what's going on.
I love "Closing Time" so much.
I hate "Closing Time" so, so much.
I realized, after a moment of confusion, that the song I was thinking of, when I read that comment, was Old '55.
But, really, what's to hate about "Closing Time"? I think it's one of the better songs from The Future.
He starts by telling the crowd to sing along, so I'm not sure this is exactly what's going on.
Fair enough, that's what I get for linking a performance in a language that I don't understand. But there is a very nice moment at 1:10 where he's really listening to what the crowd is doing, and it seems like he changes his performance at that point.
Listening to it again, he's got a beautiful voice.
36: But it's such a timeless topic for songs.
40: the "painting one's lips with one's bloody finger" move seemed kinda hot
Wow, yeah, 34 is creepy, but 40(c) is also kinda true.
What's also interesting, but has been shamefully neglected in this discussion, is that the lyrics of the song are much more ambiguous than just "YEAH WE'RE GONNA HAVE A GREAT TIME WOOO!" The first stanza, most notably, has the narrator confessing to having given his lover the scar s/he's being quizzed about, which fact he knows s/he's been trying to forget. That the narrator thinks that buying drinks is a way he can try to "take it back" is a measure of the dysfunction at work here: the narrator wants to connect through shared degradation, through being so wasted one needs to be carried home. The narrator simultaneously wants to be savior and saved, the one carried home and the one carrying, and it is precisely to achieve this end that the exhortation to "raise a cup" is delivered. This is grim stuff, not festive. In fact, seen in this light, I think the otherwise puzzling Monae cameo makes more sense: what is she doing there just standing there, with that tiny part? Why are her talents so wasted? Well, because she's not really there at all; she's one of "the angels [that] never arrived," and represents a particularly desperate sort of fantasy--not merely for the narrator's lover or friends to "find new ways to fall apart," together, but for some stranger to take him away, someone who therefore doesn't know anything about his ugliness ("the world is on my side / I have no reason to run," on this reading, is clearly false bravado, or perhaps a sort of "confession" of privileged position). And so it makes perfect sense to cast Monae, as a widely-acknowledged-to-be-ridiculously-talented African-American performer, to play that role of Exotic Other for the narrator, who, as presumably either a sort of post-fratboy or hipster, one imagines also to have issues about authenticity.
I think this acoustic version fails miserably, incidentally--despite actually having Monae do more singing--because the contrast between, as AWB puts it, the operatically dramatic production, and the sad when not creepy lyrics, is what gives the song whatever interest it has.
On the off chance that 60.last is not a bit of NickS deadpan self-parody, Closing Time.
What's also interesting, but has been shamefully neglected in this discussion, is that the lyrics of the song are much more ambiguous than just "YEAH WE'RE GONNA HAVE A GREAT TIME WOOO!"
Yeah, the first time I heard the song, I hadn't really registered the lines leading up to "I gave it to you months ago", in consequence whereof I interpreted that line as a strange way of saying that it was months ago that the lyrical I and the lyrical addressee had, well, uh, you know, done it.
Then after realizing what was really going on there I was confused afresh on contemplating how one takes back the giving of a scar to someone else.
Actually I think the acoustic version is way better, and I don't think that's entirely due to the fact that in the video Monáe is totally adorbs.
I don't think that's entirely due to the fact that in the video Monáe is totally adorbs.
Even more adorable is the way the lead singer keeps glancing over at her.
Totes Adorbs: The Janelle Monáe Story.
"Adorbs" but not "totes"?
My word choice is very carefully considered.
Everyone might already know this, but I just learned today that the Betty Davis's "Davis" is from her short marriage to Miles Davis (she was born Betty Mabry). Also that she introduced him to Jimi Hendrix and his music (page 290 here).
I did not know that! For some reason, I always confuse Bette Davis, Bette Midler, and Bettie Page.
I bet it's because the first names are similar.
73: ! Bette Davis was married to Miles Davis?! No way.
Also, "adorbs" is silly.
If you all don't entertain me, I'll carry on about the teeth-gritting nature of a small community.
I have a bunch of grading to get done, so if you're entertaining Parsi, then I'd also appreciate it.
Plus, seriously, Trapnel, Bette Davis and Bette Midler and Bettie Page are completely different. Haven't you ever seen a Bette Davis movie? And Bette Midler -- seriously?
On preview, 80: Oh. You might have put it in all caps or something.
Speaking of broads, my wife just reported that she has an awful rack (we're playing Scrabble®). We tend to have tight BOARDS.
Haven't you ever seen a Bette Davis movie?
No, actually. I saw "Beaches" when I was young, though!
You did not put it in all caps in its original instantiation. Also, it was stupid of me to say that you should put it in all caps, since that might be appropriate for an anagram, but this was not an anagram. Really, I have no idea what you were thinking.
87: I liked her in "Golden Girls" myself, after she married Barry White.
Really, I have no idea what you were thinking.
Mostly that Janelle Monáe is adorbs!
88 to 85, of course.
Trapnel, you really should see Jezebel and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane. You will never confuse Davis with Midler again. I believe there are other Davis films one should see -- The Little Foxes, All About Eve -- but I haven't seen them.
I still have that name-cloud problem with John Updike, Upton Sinclair, and Sinclair Lewis. I do know the difference but I have to actually think about it. (I used to have a Sllas Marner/Ethan Frome problem like that, I think, but that's just inexcusable.
Anyway, since no one answered my question, no video and just sound of Janelle Monae guesting like she ought to with Estelle.
Well, it only comes up when I hear that song "Bette Davis Eyes"; otherwise, it's not a big problem in my life.
88: since that might be appropriate for an anagram, but this was not an anagram
Christ. I misspoke. That would be appropriate for an acronym .. etc. We regret the error.
And even then, it's only a problem insofar as I have the nagging feeling that I'd enjoy the song even more if I'd ever seen a Bette Davis movie. Boy, that's quite a music video, though.
82: Mommie Dearest is her best, though.
Hmm, we have 4 people in 3 rooms collectively playing 5 games of Words with Friends and one of Scrabble. There may or may not be something wrong with this picture.
97: I'm not sure I've seen it. I have a terrible problem with remembering the names of films I've seen -- I tend to remember the lead actor and/or the director, but I frequently have to ask: what's the plot, now? Is that the one with a lot of fog?* Oh, right, right, I've seen that one; or, no, I don't think I've seen that one. It's a strange lacuna.
* This came up today with a friend who'd just seen Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris. I said, Is that the one with a lot of fog? My friend peered at me and said, um, I dunno, there's some fog, I guess. Anyway, turns out Midnight in Paris is totes silly, judging from the recounting, and is not the one with a lot of fog.
Granagram is an anagram of anagram.
Oops on the close italics tag there.
how one takes back the giving of a scar to someone else
Amputation.
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane
Oh my god, such a great movie.
Butcha are, Blanche! Ya aaare in that chair!
I admit that I am not completely clear on the distinction between Dennis Potter and Harold Pinter (or is it Dennis Pinter and Harry Potter?)
For some reason, I thought Bette Davis was in Gaslight, but Wikipedia doesn't show that. Probably just confusion on my part. I can look this up.
Other great movies: Long Day's Journey into Night. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf.
A pattern may be emerging here.
107: Sweetheart, who is Dennis Potter? I will look this up.
Wait, are we talking about Bette Davis or Betty Davis (who, I think, apo deserves credit for talking up).
Wikipedia mentioned that Betty Davis was married to Miles, but he isn't mentioned in the Bette Davis entry.
We may even be talking about both. But current discussion started at 73.
110: Right, I was unsure about the whole married-to-Miles thing, but I have been talking about Bette, even though JP said "Betty" at 73.
I bet it's because their first and last names are similar.
Are you just trying to cause trouble, or what?
I did not notice that! For some reason, I always confuse Sammy Davis Jr., Morton Downey Jr., and Harry Connick Jr.
I can't really tell, but I think Apo may have linked to Betty Davis or something.
I bet it's because they're all male crooners who look alike.
Wait, I meant Robert Downey Jr.!
I always confuse Karl Marx, Alan Moore and Rick Rubin. I used to think it was the similarity of their names, but perhaps there's something deeper and more mysterious at work.
120-> 118.
119: One of them's Jewish, though.
122: Who are three people who have never been in my kitchen?
And if you thought 117 was funny, just wait 'til you see 122. Thanks, all.
Dennis Potter and Harold Pinter
Ha! It wasn't until I re-read parsimon's question that I realized my brain had read this as Dennis Hopper and Harold Pinter. They seemed such a strange pair to confuse.
JP doesn't let Jewish people in his kitchen!
128: Take my wife's cooking. ... Please.
On the off chance that 60.last is not a bit of NickS deadpan self-parody, Closing Time
Just for the record: (1) I hadn't heard the Semisonic song before today. (2) When I saw the title I did think of "Old '55" (off the album Closing Time), (3) I then went to youtube and looked up "closing time" and saw both the Leonard Cohen song and the Semisonic song and decided to deliberately misunderstand.
131: Jewish music all sounds the same.
130: Apo for the recent stupid off-color comment thread-merging win!
Not that it was apo's comment that was stupid, or racist, or repetitive.
128: Alan Moore is a wizard though.
And 131.1 leaves me as gobsmacked as when neb claimed to have never heard CSN&Y's version of "Woodstock".
I used to confuse Flippanter and Frowner.
I guess neither of them have a head for following Physics discussions.
I want more people to join with nosflow and respond to my over-earnest analysis in 63. 105 was great, though.
Too great. You asked, got a winner and the world moved on.
I hated Closing Time back when it was on the radio all the time. Now I just don't particularly like it.
I basically only look at the first letter of anyone's pseud.
I think I've seen only relatively obscure Bette Davis movies: The Dark Horse, Cabin in the Cotton, Marked Woman, some film set in SF, I think maybe Fog over Frisco. If only the internet had a database of movies where I could look this up.
Apparently Stanley (the Jewish one not, the Polish one) is a composite of NickS and fake accent.
Also, Hells House and I think Watch on the Rhine. Her eyes are really kind of out of control in The Dark Horse, which was pretty early in her career.
145's procedure would make for some interesting commenting, anyway. The person called 'annealed simulator' or some such? pretty much = apo. Etc.
Wouldn't a watch sink if you put it on the Rhine? I guess maybe if it was the middle of winter, but still, even if it was a really crap watch, that would still be littering.
147: Huh, I guess The Office is still on the air.
151: Not to worry, I think everything takes place in DC.
Maybe we should have Unfoggediggedydogcon in Cincy, then I can check out Over-the-Rhine. It looks pretty neat.
ADORBS is an anagram of SAD BRO!!!
For me, Closing Time runs together with Semi-Charmed Life and Counting Blue Cars and about three dozen other songs from 1998-1999 that sounded like it. And sadbro (rhymes with emo) is the perfect name for the genre.
Dateline Greensboro: Bad boards and orb duds make sad bros sob.
But Semi-Charmed Life is one of the most upbeat songs ever. (ignoring lyrics)
A lurker who communicates only in acronymic Brit newspaper-headlinese has asked me to pass on this pitch, apparently for an Apatow-style movie in which the various members of an indie band find love:
BROADS ADSORB SO DRAB SADBRO BARDS! O, ADORBS! RAD SOB!
Don't the bards adsorb the broads, typically?
The thread has been won. Well played.
In the old days, someone hippie would've worked in bardo.
Jezebel is great.
But Semi-Charmed Life is one of the most upbeat songs ever.
A sad bro still rocks,
like the river still rolls.
You know we can't help it
It's inside our souls
'Cause we're young and on fire
And the bar's 'bout to close,
And the jukebox is bleeding
For all us sad bros.
But nobody's ready
To cease and desist
Sing along with the chorus
Closed eyes and clenched fists
By morning we'll prob'ly
Forget all of this.
It's last call so let's all
Get totally pissed.
[guitar solo]
Typically, yes. But in this case they're so-drab bards, probably unsuccessful. And I gather the broads are way out of their league.
Apparently Stanley (the Jewish one not, the Polish one
As part of my genealogy research (inspired by Stormcrow), I learned about my maternal relatives who came over from Norway. Last name: Berg.
My grandmother told me that her grandma told her they were Jewish but that no one talked about it, and they switched to Catholicism. I still have living relatives who get pretty defensive about definitely not being Jewish, nope nope nope.
Me? I'm happy for ToS, vindicated after all this time, albeit in his absence. I'm a Jew, Pauly!
I am very surprised that "the jukebox is bleeding" hasn't been used in some sadbro anthem already.
I'm totally not joking when I say that the caesura in
And the jukebox is bleeding// for all us sad bros
is poignant. Poignant, I tell you!
This bro is more regretful than sad.
Daptually Transmitted Diseases are a serious problem. Some might even call it a prepidemic.
They've turned off the music
And turned on the lights.
Exit sign's directing
All the bromance and fights
Out onto the sidewalk
But something's not right.
Sad bros, rev your engines,
Drive into the night.
We'll howl at the moon,
Leave the car in a ditch,
Wearing t-shirts that say
Abercrombie & Fitch.
I know, dude, your girlfriend
Can be such a bitch
But a sad bro still rocks so
We'll roll right through this.
[repeat chorus]
Bloodshot eyes at sunrise
My phone's disappeared
And sad bros are awkward
'Cause last night got weird.
And the details are hazy
After so many beers;
I don't think we made out
But there's stuff in my beard.
Bro, do me a solid
And call Triple A
To send out a wrecker
Get us on our way.
Let's not talk about it
I'm totally not gay
You know sad bros still rock
When they're rollin' that way.
[repeat chorus and fade]
Can't top Apo (and the voice is a bit different), but here's an alternative ending:
Saddle up! my sad brothers,
And we'll ride away,
To the place where they're open
All night and all day;
Which smells of stale brewskis
And men's unwashed socks,
Where sad bros tell stories
Completely btocked.
We'll moon at the moon
(What gives you the right
To pass your lame judgement,
You sad satellite?)
But dudes, keep on rocking;
Bro, isn't this rad?
(We're strangers, though brothers;
No wiser, still sad.)
Hey, that comic in 169-171 is awesome.
166: As part of our genealogy research (inspired by CCarp), my daughter has been tracing cousins forward from a numbe rof generations back. She came across this fine fellow (Abram Poole, socialite and painter, 2nd cousin 3 times removed). But his notable achievement was marrying Mercedes de Acosta who was best known for having affairs with (and later writing about) a bevy of Hollywood and Broadway women (Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich and Isadora Duncan among others). The marriage was almost certainly a sham on her part--and maybe on his as well--but it "lasted" 15 years.
75:
Russian Countess: Ah, there is something about Mozart!
Boris: Well, I think you're probably responding to his music.
I think the band is cute and I like that someone plays a live round of fruit ninja in the middle but I don't otherwise have strong feelings about this song.
Also you people do not have nearly the right attitude toward Bette Davis, except for fake accent.
Actually, now that I look, I've seen fewer than I would have thought. But I've seen All About Eve at least fifty times so that counts for something.
All About Eve really is one of the best movies ever.
It had never occurred to me before how relatively early the "seat belts" reference was in that movie (1950). It would have been really only on airplanes (and very few had flown) where they were common at the time (since the '30s)--but "bumpy night", of course.
My dad, raised in the 30's, regarded seat belts as a pointless nuisance right up until about 1982 or so.
Hey, that comic in 169-171 is awesome.
Isn't it? It's one of my current favorites.
I'd never seen it before, but I like it. It reminds me a lot of a different comic, though I can't recall just which. Maybe that one where the creator stopped after awhile, even though it was really popular, though he put out a book collecting the ones he'd done--shit, now I can't remember what it was called. God, this is a useless comment now.
It's a lot like Hark! A Vagrant (aside from the subject matter). Both the humor and the art show a lot of influence from Kate Beaton.
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Novel writer asserts that we need to pay off the debt like now, and that we can't wait until the economy recovers because it's going to be sluggish for the foreseeable future. He doesn't have much of an opinion on how it's done, just that it urgently needs to be done.
At one point he says that Social Security is our giant problem, and I take issue with that, and argue that it's really quite solvent and only needs tweaking to stay healthy for the next fifty years.
He says that's not what he's referring to. The problem with SS, in his opinion, is that all the other government programs loot it, and so it relies on an intricate inter-departmental IOU system to pay for itself. On paper, yes, it needs minor tweaking, but in order for actual checks to get sent out, a major set of gymnastics occurs.
The problem, he says, is that the shit will hit the fan, debt-wise, in the next three years or so, and then SS will be the impetus for society chaos, because the first thing to happen is checks will stop going out. (I doubt this, because I remember the calm forecasts if we failed to raise the debt ceiling, and none of it involved senior citizens eating cat food.)
Nevertheless: does the government have a liquidity problem? He says it does. That doesn't make any sense to me that government would have a liquidity problem, but what the hell do I know?
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Does the fine bro-art of Icing hold its own as an artifact of gaming?
Nevertheless: does the government have a liquidity problem? He says it does. That doesn't make any sense to me that government would have a liquidity problem, but what the hell do I know?
No. Novel-writer doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.
It's a lot like Hark! A Vagrant (aside from the subject matter). Both the humor and the art show a lot of influence from Kate Beaton.
I would never have hit on that. I'm not even sure I agree! I will have to think on this.
No. Novel-writer doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.
It had something to do with how people used to buy 20 year bonds, but now they buy 2-5 year bonds instead.
Since the government can print money, the only barrier to liquidity would be fears of inflation, right? Since we are a long way from inflation being a problem, we shouldn't be close to having a liquidity problem.
Also, if liquidity is just the ability to free up assets for unexpected expenditures, then shouldn't 2-5 year bonds be just fine?
Since the government can print money, the only barrier to liquidity would be fears of inflation, right?
Right. The fact that novel-writer doesn't appear to have even considered this shows that he doesn't know what he's talking about.
194: That does make it harder to dick with lenders in the long term but that's not liquidity.
189: The answer is that it's complicated.
Treated in isolation the Social Security shortfall is quite minor.
It's going to draw down its "assets" (gov't bonds) as boomers retire. This is exactly what a pension fund should be doing when it has more retirees than it expects to have in the future. A minor increase in payroll taxes or decrease in benefits would fix Social Security's budget, taken alone.
The problem, such as it is, is the long-term effects on the government's finances, of a major "lender" winding down its bond holdings. This would have the same effect as the Federal Reserve selling its bond holdings; it reduces the ability of government to borrow, and raises interest rates. In the short term we should not be worried about this, since any non-destructive reason for government to suck up more money and spit it back out would help us get out of the recession, lower unemployment, etc.
But IF in the medium term (5-10 years) we return to normal financial conditions, then this is a problem we'll have to deal with. Relative to the legal baseline, the government will have to do one of these three things:
1) Borrow more, without seignorage
This will raise interest rates and at best lead to "crowding out", where high borrowing costs make it harder to expand businesses, make long-term capital investments, etc.' The worst case scenario is that bond buyers lose confidence in the government's ability to pay off its debts, though if there is a genuine crisis we are more likely to resort to:
2) Borrow more, and print money to keep borrowing costs low. When the economy is already at capacity, this leads to inflation without growth.
3) Reduce the fiscal deficit by cutting spending or raising taxes. This has the benefit of neither "crowding out" private investments, nor subjecting people to high and uncontrolled inflation. This involves either higher taxes or service cuts.
The other, simpler, and also correct way to think of it is that the economic meaning of social security is just a payroll tax plus a plan to pay out money. The tax revenue is projected to decline, and the payments are projected to increase.
When you think of it this way, it becomes obvious that:
1) There is a problem
2) This problem is fairly small when you look at the whole budget.
I do think that as a matter of basic fairness, if we are going to adjust social security benefits, we should do so as early as possible, so people have time to plan. But that's unlikely to happen.
I used to be upset that I was part of relatively small generation who, by being born at the wrong time, would wind up paying SS taxes for the retirement of the largest generation. Then I realized that I could have been born in much worse times and resolved to be a bit of an asshole to the younger portion of the elderly and get over it.
Since the government can print money, the only barrier to liquidity would be fears of inflation, right? Since we are a long way from inflation being a problem, we shouldn't be close to having a liquidity problem.
His argument was that this would hit poor people so hard, say at the gas tank, that this would be too unpopular, or equally bad as the rest of calamity, or something.
Bearing in mind that I am in no way, shape or form an economist or a demographer:
When is the population imbalance represented by the Baby Boom generation projected to restabilize (if ever)?
If I had to take a wild and uneducated, purely anecdotal guess, Americans are having smaller and smaller families on an ongoing basis; some of this problem might be addressed by a more sensible immigration policy. More taxes into the pot.
But IF in the medium term (5-10 years) we return to normal financial conditions, then this is a problem we'll have to deal with. Relative to the legal baseline, the government will have to do one of these three things:
Novel Writer would say that we won't return to normal financial conditions in this timeframe.
I'm not actually concerned about you all knowing who I am. I just don't want all this easily recovered in the archives, because I feel like I'm being a jerk.
Novel writer seems really, really scared.
He is. On the other hand, he accurately described the last meltdown years in advance. On the other hand, he seems to think that we're always on the edge of destruction.
Technically, he's right probably right about that one. Nuclear-armed world and all.
he accurately described the last meltdown years in advance
What's the saying? The Austrian school has predicted 20 of the last 1 meltdowns.
Don't worry, be happy! I visited Pat Lang's place today, and the consensus is 80% chance of war with Iran before the election. All previous calculations abandoned then.
Novel writer can be taken seriously. Willem Buiter, whom I always respected, predicted American catastrophe years ago.
The problem is that Krugmanian statements like "We should just QE, spend like crazy, and worry about the deficit later." are not fucking serious statements within the American political system. Such statements, along with "tax the rich" or "Grand Bargains" or "Texas should succeed" are simply insane, because the system and polity are insane and unpredictable, non-ergodic and nothing but craziness is possible.
Any serious honest analysis of America and its economics must appear insane and irrational.
DeLong is actually better, with his "Republican delenda est" and Cthulhu rhetoric. But I don't think he is sincere.
206: I don't know which "last meltdown" that is.
What does novel writer think we should do in order to pay off the debt? ... Oh, per 189 I see you said he doesn't have a plan. Well, what happens if we draw down the war in Afghanistan and return tax rates to their former, Clinton-era level? I don't know how long that would take to be helpful.
I suppose I'd try to gently explain to novel writer that he's panicking, and must try to think more planfully.
Next two days at work are going to suck. I have to move a half million bucks out the door, outwit a crotchety admiral to do it, gather 25 people of wildly differing importance into the same room (and conference in folks in three other divergent timezones on at least a couple of continents), figure out what I'm presenting to them (when at least some of them will own the product I'm going to be dissecting [which is not to say: reaming]), and probably a bunch of other shit to boot.
I don't wanna.
On reflection, there is an intense paradox in 209 that has me all confused. If Krugman's sane and serious analysis is insane because the system is insane than it does appear insane so it is actually sane and all Cretans are liars.
I'll just act naturally.
202: The baby "boomlet" peaked in the early '90s at less than 5% below the late 50s peak (total births not rate, which remain below about 60%). But the trough following was very shallow--#of births has been pretty much between 3.9M and 4.2M since the late '80s. The difference with the mid-70s period of low births is more significant; it bottomed out just above 3M births (which was a combo of an echo from the big dip during the depression and WWII and later family-starting by early boomers).
209: "Texas should succeed"
Insane!
Hey, the only living boy in NY. Depending, I'd say the first task is the hardest. I had to get the Dep/Sec/Def to sign off on an expenditure of under 20K. I think the smaller the numbers involved, the more scrutiny. (Actually, I didn't get Carter to sign off. Folks in our USD's office said it was too much of a pain for them. We found another way to fund what we needed to fund.)
Oh, and 212er, my sympathies on all of it.
215: Thank you, JP, but I'm having a little trouble parsing that. Do you have a link to a chart or graph?
I'm getting that it wasn't the baby boom(let) that was the problem as much as the mid-70s period of low births. If it's too much of a pain to answer my requests for information, I can look it up myself, with apologies for being lame.
202, 215: Here's an animation of the population pyramid from 1950 -2005, then projected on to 2050. Not as much of a python swallowing a pig as sometimes reported. And link for the year-by-year birth data from previous comment.
Look. The key to understanding real Keynesianism is understand Keynes' times. If somebody ask in 1937 what a good safe long-term investment would be Keynes would ask:"One that would do well after a world war that killed 50 million people and most of the global economy?" That question is what the GT is about in two ways 1) non-ergodic humanity; 2) dealing with that fact, mostly by controlling everything else while retaining some freedom.
Was it just the Age of Keynes that made him crazy?
Well, in 1999 ask a similar question. Well, ok, but we are going to elect a nut who will slash taxes and then go to war. Then the Fed will go to zero and we will have a massive housing bubble like never before etc etc."
Then ask a economist to protect the economy and welfare state over the next thirty years.
It can be done. Hyman Minsky was a product of the 50s-70s and said "Keynes was right, It's fucking gonzo crazy out there. General equilibrium my hurting ass."
The goal is to lock as much as politically possible in sky-high taxes, permanent social spending and regulation that looks like socialism.
Don't waste my time on numerical analysis.
Md20/400: that is preposterous. Fortunately I have approval but the mechanics are stupidly complicated, and where's the time going to come from? Ugh. Fortunately D/S/D is the ultimate audience for this work so at least it won't be for nothing. Bwahahah
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Gah. Kendall Marshall, broken wrist. Goodbye, hopes for a national title.
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223: dangit! Between that and Belmont not going on an epochal run I am never getting that ten dollars back.
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Hey if you took those face recognition tests a few months ago you might be interested in the piece 60 Minutes did about face recognition. It's quite well done, and specifically interesting is footage of a superrecognizer, who is way better at face recognition than anybody here except possibly AWB.
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1 last:
Keynes understood the crazy and the hell. Minsky understood Keynes. (Maybe Lerner and Kalecki) Keynes invented the science to prevent war and depression. Fucking everybody failed.
If you ask DeLong and Krugman in 1985, 1995, 2005, today:"What is your economic plan to keep the Republicans from starting a war or causing a depression?" and they say:"That's politics, not my job."
Walk away
Because they don't know the First Thing about macroeconomics.
203: Novel Writer would say that we won't return to normal financial conditions in this timeframe.
Is there an accepted definition of 'normal financial conditions'? I mean, since Reconstruction, we've had a major panic or depression pretty regularly, every 10-20 years or so. The long boom of the '50s and '60s was clearly due to the fact that we'd helped bomb the rest of the industrial nations into rubble just prior. We had boomlets in each of the last three decades, each of which was tied to a bubble economy. Capitalism is chaos.
222. To be fair it was a result of that stupid muffin-controversy that came out of Justice's IG. Also, it was at the direction of OMB. To make it more fun, D/S/D had just come on board.
"Until such time as the Deputy Secretary (or equivalent) can certify that the appropriate policies and controls are in place to mitigate the risk of inappropriate spending practices with regard to conferences, approval of conference-related activities and expenses shall be cleared through the Deputy Secretary (or equivalent)."
OMB Memorandum M11-35.
Stupid brain-dead political ass-covering moves.
231: oh right muffin-gate!
Don't ever use Thomas Jefferson. It isn't anonymous enough.
225 was really interesting, and I definitely have the same problems the super-recognizer they interviewed has, in that I freak people out by remembering them when they try to introduce themselves to me. I don't think I'm a dick about it, but it's really awkward at conferences. Of course I remember everyone I've seen give a paper, and I remember most of the people who have been at my papers. So I say hi. Apparently this is freaky.
234: Are you lighter than a duck?
So I guess the OWS demonstrators in got messed up last night -- lots of reports of broken bones etc. Apparently, some of the liberals are starting to realize that the "black bloc anarchists" were right all along.
Novel Writer would say that we won't return to normal financial conditions in this timeframe.
I feel like I'm reading something by David Markson.
My last several comments brought by the need for anonymization and whichever commented it was who said they only looked at the first letter of anyone's name. I think it was one a them non-capitalizers.
Maybe looking at just the first letter of anyone's name is the online equivalent of being face-blind. It's uncanny how the rest of us can instantly determine the person's identity.
241: Not without a signed and recognizable pseudonym we can't. Or have you forgotten?
I just watched the piece in 225, and it's quite interesting, though perhaps not as interesting as the apparent fact that Stanley isn't the only one here who watches 60 Minutes.
230: What I meant by normal conditions were conditions under which inflation is possible - i.e. once we're out of the liquidity trap, and interest rates are at a market-clearing level.
I don't actually know whether economists are justified in considering the liquidity trap "abnormal."
243: Tweety tweeted about it, and I had meant to watch it (and thought of mentioning it here given the prior discussion).
