Thursday, January 15, 1987
Page 6
Daily Nebraskan
j.g.'s mm& mm
r3 tn c3 m m a c-a cj a
1
o
r-i n en n ri
PITCHER COUPON
PITCHER COUPON
D
U.95
J1.9S
D
iW.C's Downtown -exp. 51587 f W.C's Downtown -exP. 51587
acJCJcautjncaarjacJLiLJCjntaac
j PITCHER COUPON U PITCHER COUPON I
D '198 D W 0
0 W.C's Downtown - exp. 51587 R W.C's Downtown exP. 61587 fl
By Charles Lieurance
,-.--jSm
Become involved in an organization
designed to promote interaction
between students, faculty, and alumni.
Student Alumni Association application
for new members will be available
JANUARY 19TH at the Wick Center.
Student Alumni Association
rn
itollif (clsrellec
When work and classes
conflict . . .
. . . UNL independent study can help. Examine
course syllabi in room 269, Nebraska Center for Con
tinuing Education, 33rd and Holdrege. Take the shuttle
bus from city campus.
Call 472-1926 for
UNL it a nondiscriminatory
i t
3 I
Q5j
ui 6 -f
APP
LY
NOW
information.
institution
Campus M
- P I II
They're the bands of the "new
sincerity." They wear leather fringe
jackets, they're growing their hair
out, they stretch their guitar straps
all the way out so their axes hang to
their knees. They say they're new,
but they look like Aerosmith or
Crazy Horse or Buffalo Springfield.
Their music, for the most part,
would be perfect for any of those
American college commercials for
soda pop, Chevrolets and beer
you know, old folks playing horse
shoes, family reunions, watermelon
feeds, farmers slapping their trac
tors the way Roy Rogers used to give
Trigger an affectionate slap on the
flank. Things made the American,?1
way, things like they used to be, old
meets new with a small-town howdy
doo.
Aside from the fact that this
America shriveled up into a few
condemned old barns and some bot
tomland the small farmer uses as a
buffer zone from the hydra cf the
corporate farm more than two
decades ago, the mu?.:ic makes a
wonderful bargaining chip for the
atavistic public-relations corps of
our government Grab a few scenes
from Steinbeck, Muir and Thomas
Wolfe, find a w hite picket fence that
no one has scrawled anarchy's big
black "A" on yet, and stage a
healthy America.
Despite the fact that the bands of
the "new sincerity," for the most
part, are either critical of these
images of Americana or ignore them
completely in their lyrics, it is the
"sound" that attracts Washington,
the sound "of America singing." The
PR kings are willing to even incor
porate the sort of Americana that
"long-haired hippies goin' back to
the land" represent, rather than
buckle under to punks...,-... those
short-haired, unpredictable politi
cal vacillatrons, pogo-ing from left
to right like out-of-control novelty
dentures.
Take the bands chosen to repres
ent Miller and Budweiser beer X
(punks with a beatnik sensibility),
the Blasters, the Long Ryders, the
Del Feugos bands with "integ
rity." None of this trendy bull for
Miller and Bud, no siree. No Swans
or Sonic Youth hawking for Milwau
kee. This is America, and we can
spot a scam when we see one. No
one's pulling the aluminum over our
eyes you ciui bet that on a horse.
So who are these pretenders to
Woody Guthrie's throne, these
would be Leadbellys? When you
grapple the music out of the. hands
of those demented twits who some
how managed to construe Bruce
Springsteen's "Born in the U.S.A" as
a statement of America's blossom
ing health, as a message of Reagan
era positivism, what's left? (or should
I say, what's right?
Of course the view from the sky is
Springsteen's, who fleshed out the
ambiguous monicker "American
Music" and also emanated vats of
"sincerity." Springsteen's sketches
of American life, from the rural
angst of the "Nebraska" LP to the
urban charcoal panoramas of "The
Wild, the Innocent and the E Street
Shuffle," go beyond rock'n'roll
whether one appreciates the man's
style or not. It's like reading "Spoon
River Anthology" by Edgar Lee Mas-
X
1
-,....',15
f. 5'.; "" . .- -ifr'..
Brian MaryDaily Nebraskan
ters, a collection of voices so diverse
that it is difficult to believe one
man is responsible for them. Spring
steen took on the voices of the dead,
the wounded, the downtrodden, the
criminal and the junkie. Like Woody
Guthrie, Springsteen pretty much
ignored the lives of the upper and
even the middle class, except as an
easy target for parody. Springsteen's
characters all tried to substitute
the high the rich managed to get
from money with the high of sex, the
high of drugs, the high of driving
fast and the high of living on your
toes. The problems with being not
only a musician, but an important
v- : i,
C'$k y- "SZ r-,,..
voice of the times to boot, are
multitudinous. For one, you can't
contradict yourself. For another,
people start following you around,
blindly believing everything you say.
For yet another, you might start
believing everything you say.
And you spawn would-be voices of
the times who want to hang onto
your Levi beltloops on the ride to
stardom. Springsteenism gave a
directionless hack from Indiana who
had been marketed as everything
from the "new David Bowie" to the
"new Meat Loaf," a new lease on
life, as the Springsteen of the farm
belt, champion of the confinement
feeder-pig operator and the trac-tored-out
farmer. The man was John
Cougar. He was born to make
American music. And as a move to
sincerity, he dropped the feline
Bowie-ism of "Cougar" and became
"John Mellencamp," the shaggy,
diminutive hometown boy who made
good on some ancient promise to his
pappy to be tha Robin Hood of
music. ' 1 .
You can almost hear Copclind's
"Fanfare for the Common Man"
blaring up out of the cornfields.
Then someone told everyone it
WS easy to write songs about Amer
ican, that America is made up of a
fairly finite number of icons. Not
only that, but these icons have
names that rhyme with almost any
thing. Bar. Car. Chevy. Levy. Road.
Know'd. Sign. County line. Long way
to go. Mexico. Mortgage. 12 gauge.
Once the word was out, you could
hear all America singing. John Caf
ferty sang. The Long Ryders sang.
Sort of made you want shitkickers
like Lynnyrd Skynnyrd and Molly
Hatchet back. Bands who empa
thized with people too stupid even
to farm.
But the mainstream wasn't the
only stream affected by the "new
sincerity," "the new Americana."
Nope. Someone discovered that
Michel Stipe was "America Sing
ing" too, und REM became the voice
cf the American haircut. The stam
pede that followed made the run
into Oklahoma lock like a line at
the Kresge's snack bar. Jj
Rainmakers. Winter Hours. Con
nells. Feelies. Meat Puppets. Come
hear American mumbling. Although
most of these bands can claim some
glory of their own, it is ludicrous to
think REM didn't pave the way for
their success.
And sincere? What could be more
sincere than an alternative band? If
it's not money they're after, or a
place on American Bandstand or
SoulTrain, or Rolling Stone cover, it
must be a sincere need to com
municate. -
At least you don't see Reagan
quoting REM songs (although some
times he sounds like he is). Or the
Feelies on national TV, popping a
cold Bud while they lean up against
a pool table, saying something like,
"Our music isn't commercial, it's
real."
