Every Era Has Its Music...

and our rough time of financial collapse, militarism, terrorism, war, and ecological degradation has finally gotten its troubadours.

Listening to Atlanta's finest indie radio station--WRAS 88.5 out of Georgia State University--while driving through rain-slogged streets this afternoon. One of the wonders of listening to a good radio station like Album 88 is that in doing so you leave yourself open to any interesting new music that might come across your car stereo. That is, you're liable to hear something that might come out of nowhere and truly surprise and enchant you; no need to wait for the thumbs up from Pitchfork Media.

Anyway, heard this song.


Discovered that the artist is a Minneapolis rapper called POS, and that the song comes from a brand new album titled Never Better.

A million times better than most things coming from the white-bread indie scene, I think. More spacious and imaginative musically, better lyrics, and amazingly it's music that actually takes notice of the world and not just solipsistic personal issues.

The lyrics in this song are actually honest-to-God incredible. "Arrow after arrow after bullet after sunflower," which reminds me of William Blake.

But best of all is the female rapper's verse. "Flight of the salesman/ Death of the bumblebee" isn't just a clever inversion; it's also a plain description of our current condition. This era might be remembered more for the death of the bumblebee than anything else. Seriously.

It seems like weve fallen out of favor/ the era ended on us/
Now the moneys just paper/ the houses all haunted/
We had a hell of a run before it caught up/
For all the corners cut/ we got an avalanche of sawdust/
Life of the party/ were the death of the novel/
The glass is half empty/ so pass the next bottle/
Its the flight of the salesman/ death of the bumblebee/
Nothing left for the/ attorneys and the tumbleweeds