Best of 2021

How does a pandemic affect behavior? What behaviors are we locked into because of their convenience or resulting pleasure? What behaviors do we avoid because they’re difficult or discouraged by external forces? A multi-year pandemic should bring these questions into focus and time should be spent coming up with answers.

I can’t say this worked for me. My drinking increased, my diet declined, and I spent a lot of time watching tv I’ve seen before, for comfort. I spent a lot of time telling people that this was the year to expect good underground music because the underground is protection against the cancers of society, or at least it attempts to be. I spent the year waiting and waiting, and yeah, there were good albums, but not quite the sterling standouts I was expecting. Among the disasters of the past year, I didn’t really notice any big change, no more or less nihilism, no more or less charity. Status quo with a slight decline.

My perception is if people, including myself, are even marginally comfortable, no matter what they see on the news or no matter what they’re not allowed to do, stick with the status quo with a little decline as they inch closer to demise. Pandemics will become more frequent, droughts more widespread, fires and storms more destructive. You’ll see your neighbor impacted and say, “Damn, I can’t believe it, that could’ve been me.” But, it wasn’t yet, and that’ll be the collective narrative because the collective is constructed of those who survived.

I rely on the music to give me a picture of the zeitgeist, to tell me if people are panicking, comfortable, or thriving. The zeitgeist is comfortable now, but he is dying, not quickly enough to do anything about it. I would advise you to use these words to do something today and maybe tomorrow too. Write something, use less plastics, eat more rice, put down the damn bottle no matter how good your fancy cocktails are, talk more with friends and family no matter how much they annoy you. Make sure it's something you didn't do yesterday. I speak to myself more than anyone else reading this.