a book...

Klosterman's Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs has been on my reading list for quite some time now. Yesterday, with time on my hands, I picked it up... and fell in love. This dude is funny, insightful, and can take anything and make it interesting. There's a chapter about Country Music that I finished with my fists in the air screaming "Preach on, Brother Chuck!" Here's a quote...

"...The reason Garth Brooks and Shania Twain have sold roughly 120 million more albums than Bob Dylan and Liz Phair is not because record buyers are all a bunch of blithering idiots; it's because Garth and Shania are simply better at expressing the human condition. They're less talented, but they understand more people.

The paradox, of course, is that I'm writing this essay while staring at my CD rack, which currently holds seventeen Dylan and Phair records and exactly three country records released after 1974. And in a weird way, that makes me happy. I have at least one thing in common with Bob Dylan: Neither of us understands how the world works. When push comes to shove, we're both Reba's bitch."