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Michael Jackson is dead tonight.

Nobody born after 1984 can appreciate how big a star he was.  No pop culture figure can ever match the Beatles and Elvis for sheer overwhelming fame.  But if you lived during the early 1980s, Michael Jackson was the star.  When I was little, every kid had Thriller, and listened to it over and over again.  A new Michael Jackson video on MTV generated tremendous interest.  Kids at my school wore leather jackets with tons of zippers and tried to moon walk.  He was ultra-famous.

But, of course, he could never duplicate the success of Thriller.  Even if he continued to sell well through the rest of the 1980s, everyone compared his later work to Thriller or Off the Wall, and the comparisons were never favorable.  Combine that with his increasingly erratic behavior and freakish appearance, and before long Michael Jackson seemed like a sad carnival act.  While he had once been the one everyone wanted to emulate, he wound up being tabloid fodder.  A lot of it he brought on himself.  Some of it may have been unfair.  But, by the mid-1990s you could have queried a hundred Americans and not found anyone who’d claim to be a Michael Jackson fan.  “Thriller was good”, they’d say, “but that guy’s messed up”.

We live in a different age.  Everything is incredibly segmented now.  There isn’t just one MTV anymore to claim the attention of the young.  The 1980s saw the rise of some remarkable superstars, but the conditions that created those stars don’t exist any more.  Set aside the sham marriages, plastic surgery, baby-dangling, accusations of molestation, and all the other bizarre and disturbing behavior and rumors, and think back to the years 1983-1985.  There was nobody bigger than Michael Jackson.  And no athlete, movie star or singer will probably ever be that famous again.

My attitude toward most popular music created since 1988 can be best described as disdain.  I haven’t heard every record released, of course, and I don’t doubt that many fine songs and performers have missed getting my attention.  But so much of what excites others leaves me ambivalent.  I seldom hear anything special. Perhaps this is because that music lacks context for me.  I am, after all, entirely disinterested in “the scene”.  Any music associated with a distinct social group will, when stripped of that context, strike me as irrelevant or even pointless.  Thus, dance, emo, punk, shoegaze, and other genres inextricably linked to a “scene” leave me cold.

But, last month I made a rare nighttime outing, and braved the scene to see a band that shows astonishing promise, and whose songs have been echoing in my head since: Bombadil, from North Carolina.

Miriam saw them last summer at a music festival in Gainesville, and she spoke very well of them.  I heard a few songs on their MySpace page, and they seemed good enough that I was interested in seeing them myself.  But in a disaster which I’d rather not think about ever again, we missed seeing them on their next Gainesville visit, when they played at the Orange and Brew, a small, but clean, smoke-free venue at the Reitz Union.  It was distressing, to say the least.

Months passed, and I waited for word that Bombadil would again venture south.  Finally, in March or so, I noticed some Florida dates scheduled on their webpage.  Orlando, Tampa, etc., but no Gainesville.  I wrote to the band to ask if they might consider adding a Gainesville show.  James, the drummer, soon wrote me back to say that, indeed, they were adding a stop at 1982 (a bar in the same building once occupied by Common Grounds, which has moved to SW 2nd Avenue).  I was glad to hear it.

I always worry a bit that the band I’m present to see will play last, requiring me to stay past midnight.  But, upon arrival, I was delighted to see that 1982 had a sign right inside the door showing what times the bands would play.  Bombadil was listed second, and would start at a reasonable 9:45 or so.  I chatted with the members of the band before hand, as they were unloading their van.  James remembered that I had written to them.

Sara, Mark and Laura had come with us, and since we had a little time before Bombadil would start, we went down to Mother’s Pub and got some food.  The place is a dive, but I kind of liked it.

Once we got back to 1982, and the show began, I was transfixed.  Bombadil is a whimsical, captivating band.  Their songs were instantly catchy and memorable, and their arrangements were inventive, with the guitarist frequently switching between acoustic and electric instruments, and the bass player repeatedly moving to electric piano.  The drummer played a large recorder.  When the set ended a mere twenty minutes later, I was sad.

Afterward, when I spoke again to members of the band, James gave me a copy of their new CD, due to be released in July.  A couple days later I got a chance to listen to it.  It is the best album I’ve heard in a decade.  A review is forthcoming.

I can, at last, declare unlibelously that Phil Spector has murdered both music and people.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame opens their new Bruce Springsteen exhibit today.  “From Asbury Park to the Promised Land” showcases an array of significant Springsteen artifacts, including the hand-written lyrics to “Born to Run”, the Teac 4-track used to record Nebraska and the saxophone Clarence Clemons used to play the solo heard on “Jungleland”.  But for me, and probably many other fans, the most significant object in the exhibit is what the true fans call “THE Guitar”, the legendary 1950s Fender Esquire Bruce bought for $185 – the guitar pictured on the cover of Born to Run.  I’ve seen him play THE Guitar live, but it would be a dream to see it up close.

Here’s a video about the exhibit.

Meanwhile, the new E Street Band tour starts tonight.  Those attending the rehearsals in Asbury Park spotted a new song on the setlist that the band has never played before: “Hard Times Come Again No More”.  It had to happen sooner or later!

I picked up Working on a Dream right when it came out, and I’ve listened to it all the way through exactly once.  Since that first hearing I have avoided a few tracks, and grown very fond of many others. What don’t I like?  “Outlaw Pete” is just too long and rambling. “Lucky Day” is weak.  “Good Eye” isn’t bad, but it’s a really bluesy number, and, in general, I don’t like songs with lots of harmonic sevenths.  “Queen of the Supermarket” is an unfortunate case.  The music is lovely, and in the same aesthetic vein as most of the other songs on the album, but it is a waste lyrically.  The singer’s effusive praise for the wonders found in the aisles of the grocery store seems ridiculous.  And, by the end, the addition of cash register sound effects sends the whole affair over the top, like a bad imitation of Meatloaf, but without the ironic wink.  It’s unfortunate that Bruce didn’t scrap every line in his notebook and come up with a whole other concept for the otherwise worthy tune.

What do I like?  Most of the rest of the record, really. The big arrangements that characterized Magic are even bolder here, and, in many instances, they are coupled to song structures that are more obviously inspired by 1960s pop.  Take “This Life”, for example.  It begins with sounds which would have fit well on a Beach Boys album:

But it’s not just what’s on the surface that reminds me of 1960s pop; it’s the harmonies and chord progressions themselves.  I cannot, off the top of my head, think of many occasions where Bruce has turned to a diminished chord, but very briefly in the second verse of “This Life” you find one (and only one: the other verses don’t do this):

I am aware that what I like on any Springsteen album is often the opposite of what many Boss fans like.  I have read reviews of this album that praise the harder rocking numbers like “Good Eye” while disparaging the tracks that appeal to me.  These reviews come from people that preferred Magic tracks (like “Gypsy Biker”) which don’t appeal to me aesthetically.  To each his own.  It is no wonder, then, that a my favorite song on Working on a Dream would be one that that I suspect is the least favorite of many: “Surprise, Surprise”.  It’s a straight-up pop song that would have surely made the top-10 in 1965.  The vocal timbre is much more natural, and has little of the affected twang that Bruce has used for years now:

The chord progression is a total throwback to classic pop:

And for me, the climax of the song comes when we hear other members of the E Street Band get to sing a little.  It’s the perfect touch:

When I listen to this song, I am always temped to follow it with its musical twin from Magic, “I’ll Work for Your Love”.  In fact, quite a few of the tunes on Working on a Dream have analogs on other Springsteen albums from this decade, including Magic and We Shall Overcome.

Where “Queen of the Supermarket” fails lyrically, “Life Itself” succeeds.  The banal imagery of the former isn’t nearly as subtle or imaginative.  That is to say, I think “the wind in the black elms” is a much more meaningful metaphor for life than the aisles of a store.

If it isn’t my favorite song on the album, I must acknowledge that “The Wrestler” is Working on a Dream’s best song.  It is the sort of portrait that he painted so well in the old days, as good as anything he’s written in years, and it’s remarkably touching:

My ultimate analysis is that, while there are many tunes on Working on a Dream that I like, if I had my way, there would have been a couple that never made it.  I recognize that the three E Street Band albums of this decade each explore a particular theme (September 11th with The Rising; America in the Bush era with Magic; a new optimism with Working on a Dream), and that is a pretty amazing feat, even if none of these records will ever rival masterpieces like Born to Run and Darkness on the Edge of Town.  It’s an impossible standard to live up to.