15 July 2009

Satirization of Anti-Intellectualism in Public Discourse... Shorty.

It's an inspired melody that makes you walk around, absentmindedly singing, "Cancers! Heart disease! Respiratory disease!" I have been bobbing my head to the ubiquitous Autotune the News songs ever since I officially became the last person on earth to learn about them.

It finally occurred to me what is so satisfying about them: their recontextualization of talking heads' inanities, malapropisms, and conceits is actually more fitting than their original settings. Public discourse - from actual congressional hearings to shows like The View that are relatively open about their entertainment slant - has become so inconsequential and ridiculous that it fits seamlessly into the R&B universe of shawties, crunk'd out partiez, and pimpin'.

"I'm an angry gorilla. I heard you needed me." LMAO! These guys have skewered the whole entertainment-news industry with this character.

The character "Junkie Einstein" has to be one of the greatest satirizations ever. He is a man with great faculties of reason, but he has crippled his own mind with amusements. It's as biting as it is hilarious: "My brain says no, but my body says yes."

Kudos to the Gregory brothers (and sister-in-law) for putting politics in its proper place: that of engaging, first rate, inconsequential, mindless entertainment. BTW one of the brothers is named Michael Gregory. There are lots of other Michael Gregorys - a session musician in Nashville, a smarmy fashion[/softcore porn] photographer in Australia, at least two working musicians in NYC, etc...

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