“Dreams” (The Allman Brothers Band)

Could The Allman Brothers Band be the harbingers of the fertile ground that postmodernism gives to anti-utopian thinking (Moylan, Scraps of the Untainted Sky 140)? Keep in mind that one year after “Dreams” (1969), they release “Revival” (a track now performed in churches, it seems). Unlike the latter’s politically debilitating profession of collective love and its uses, the trax in question finds us at the precipice of social collapse. Dystopias, according to Jameson, require a character/subject, and singer’s “blues” (which he “had to wake up with”) are founded on the “dreams I’ll never see” (The Seeds of Time 56). But unlike an anti-utopia’s attempt to proclaim imperfection in the name of greater (achievable) perfection, the singer can only turn to the lover who will witness the singer’s “end of me.” Dystopian praxis: the sharing of a plural “hunger”/impulse and an “us” out of join(t).

“That’s The Story of My Life” (The Velvet Underground)

Lou Reed has only a pair of observations to make, and then repeats. First: “the story of my life” has been a moral one through and through, and its guiding thread is “the difference between wrong and right.” On the other hand, Billy Name (a key participant in La Monte Young’s Theatre of Eternal Music and Andy Warhol’s Factory scene) has clearly told Lou: “both those words are dead.” The world is now beyond right and wrong, or good and evil, as Nietzsche might say, and Billy and Lou are exploring superabundant life and the will to power in New York’s gay bars and with the help of methedrine. And that, too: “that’s the story of my life.” In short, the singer finds himself between two worlds, in two distinct historical contexts, and each acts as both a break with and an ongoing dialectical critique of the other. Relaxedly gliding between these moments in the ongoing history of nihilism, Reed’s vector points two ways and suggests that metaphysics has been weakened (but still has a part to play).

“Master Race Rock” (The Dictators)

American version of “All the Young Dudes,” strafed with irony, in which 60s rock activism is replaced by anal-obsessive cleanliness, sports, sleep (“gasoline shortages” make no difference if you’re napping), and a generalized affirmation of childishness (“we’re scared of growing old!”). This is, then, the sound of the Nixon’s “silent majority” achieving youthquake. The “master race” retains its position by mere rocking back and forth, without movement, so that the final call to arms (“let’s go!”) is represented by a quick, anticlimactic guitar fade-out. The smug violence of inaction.

“Time (Clock of the Heart)” (Culture Club)

And the lover says: time together risks both fear of loss and the coldness of prolonged proximity. Temporal span is useless—pesky, even—for lovers. Traditional calculated time “shows” nothing, cannot be possessed (“time won’t give me time”), and generates no value for community.

“Are You Gonna Be There (At the Love-In)” (The Chocolate Watchband)

The link between the maintenance of the nation and flower power is, to all parties, “broken heart(s)” which lead to one’s “head in the air.” Sneering vocals are in invitation to “design” the future of law, which would be “too late” to account for anybody “belong[ing]” anywhere, especially at love-ins (which only allow for attenuated sympathy).

“No Nose Job” (Digital Underground)

The sell-out, be it the “black girl” who wants slimming down or the white one’s desire for excess, supposedly can’t claim those “responsibilities” necessary for “race and community.” Apart from these “carnival exhibit[s],” Humpty Hump can only become brown through tanning (despite the wish to “change it”). Doctor skit pulls at the argument, demonstrating how the nature/science relationship is one of collusion, a “sedative” and a “scalpel.” Race politics, like corporate musics, still stuck in exhibit mode.

“Love of the Common Man” (Todd Rundgren)

What could “turn your head [or ‘world’] around”? It might consist in a professor jumping from their “ivory tower” and joining the masses. (Don’t bet on it.) Our narrator has faith, serves as an intermediary, and knows the mutual imbrication of theory/praxis. Even though the rabble will “catch you” when you descend, they’re purely receptive even when they express their “love”—a requirement for our future constitution. As long as it’s “easy,” everyone can reorient their vision(s). But be advised: just don’t talk “through your hat,” even if you’ve been “living in your pockets.” (Why the latter is seen solely as poverty and linked up with ill-advised attempts at intellectualism is curious, unless you’re a Gramscian.) Pie in the eye. No more living for you today, common man; there’s leadership to (endlessly?) listen to.

“Earth People” (Dr. Octagon)

“Overriding” all communicative/sharing technologies, the interstellar pirate surgeon delivers “cosmophonic[ally],” submerged in the “same data same system” and translatable across all contexts. More of a trax dealing with movement, articulation, and strategy; talking trash and mocking localization, specialization, and knowledge production. Afronaut move to excise brain cancer, focusing on the “earth planet” where “nothing’s aware.” System indebted to its outside. Less of an embrace of one’s nemesis, more of a diagnosis of potentiality awkwardly trained inward. Race technology overload.

“La Bamba” (Ritchie Valens)

Some say the song itself can be traced back to the conquest, and, further, to Africa, and that there are 500 or so verses which can be sung to it. Cornucopia. In this distillation, the “captain” says to his dance partner: for you, I will act as a “sailor,” and divest myself of power. After all, in order to dance “la bamba” (which references a certain swinging, swaying, wobbling), there can be no leader and follower, as in formal dance. The master/slave dialectic, therefore, does not apply. Instead, one needs a certain grace (“de gracia”) and a little something else (“y otra cosita”). Excessiveness, below or before sovereignty/subjecthood.

“007 (Shanty Town)” (Desmond Dekker)

As David Katz’ work often reminds, Jamaican music is born in relationality: to U.S. boogie and R and B in particular. For ground-zero ska, it’s simply a matter of a different accent on the 2 and 4. The figures which populate ska and rock steady songs, therefore, should be no surprise. The lyrics here specify the appearance of Jamaican James Bonds (he already had visited the island in Dr. No, and would do so again and again) and Frank Sinatras. On one level, it’s a typically moral rude boys track: in the end, the police rise with a vengeance and the cheap imitation outlaws “a weep an’ a wail.” On other level, Dekker implies that 007 represents a license to kill in a specialized sense: the right to produce and determine the third world. Truly, the anxiety of influence.