I'm Back

January was a pretty busy and interesting month. On New Year’s Eve, at about four o’clock, Jami and I had no plans. She mentioned that My Morning Jacket was playing Madison Square Garden and that some of her co-workers were going. I figured it was a long shot but looked into tickets just in case. There was an ad on craigslist.com for two tickets so I called the guy. He claimed to have several tickets in several price ranges. I settled on the $40 ones and hoped for the best. It seemed sketchy but Jami made a good point, it was like playing a $40 hand of black jack. Worst case scenario we buy fake tickets, are out $40, and end up celebrating the New Year at her apartment like we planned.

The tickets were real and the show was incredible. Our seats were in the lower part of the second level. My Morning Jacket was awesome. They played new stuff, old stuff, and covers. The only negative came right before midnight. The band showed some sort of film while they took a break just before midnight. It was in black and white and initially flashed commercials like you would see in a movie theater in the 1950’s. About ten minutes before midnight, the Star Spangled Banner started playing with several pictures of soldiers and then a picture of Barack Obama looking up at the sky with a waving American flag in the background. Just after Premier Obama’s likeness, an actor came on the screen dressed in a military uniform with a Hitler haircut and moustache. In rousing Hitler style, the speaker went on about the end of consumerism, a new day in which the workers of the world will unite and overthrow the evil corporations. I was offended but not surprised. The kind of music I listen to is not patronized or performed by libertarians. These shows are almost always communist love fests that I endure because the music is really good. And, that is the beauty of music; it is what you want it to be. Plus I tend to overreact to anything that even smells of socialism. Jami on the other hand, does not get bent out of shape about politics and generally thinks of it as something about which she is ill-informed. It was her reaction to the film that made clear its blatant communist/fascist nature. She was outraged by the ignorance and gall of the band and its followers. The roof came off the place when this Hitleresque figure gave his rousing speech denouncing the individual and praising the collective effort. I mentioned this to my father who pointed out that we are witnessing a cultural sea change. Americans no longer want individual freedom or responsibility, they want the paternal government to make decisions for them, to take care of them. I hope we are able to survive this zeitgeist.