…but  there are, of course, many other – oblique – ways of approaching emotionality.

Emotional inner turmoils often have a corroding impact over our daily social life.  It’s in the way we park cars, deliver lectures, perform songs, and pour coffee. And it’s not always pleasant to the eye. We are getting burlesque when we least expect it. Burlesque,  grotesque, and, after all, recognizable to anyone.

Our neighbors know a lot more about our inappropriate gestures and grimaces than we ourselves do; they must have seen it in our early gloomy “good morning”‘s and in our late hazy “good night”s. We’re unconventional, disturbing or subversive in innumerable, uncontrollable ways, and we’ve been unintentionally putting up embarrassing, personal shows for everyone out there. Such shows are of course beyond the audience’s  immediate understanding and acceptance; but it’s what people secretly love most: monkey business!

Everything that doesn’t fit, all the stuff resembling nothing so much as a tribute to frailty and failure is here to get the troubled monkey out of us.

PS: Something in my post sends me back to a reading I thought I have completely left behind in my very early twenties: Henri Bergson’s theory of laughter; and now I wonder whether that book is still considered useful; or interesting; or fun. And do I still have it somewhere?…

PS2: Everyone’s favorite combo at the moment: Lovett & Hiatt! The era of credible, brilliant singer-songwriters is fading away for good. I thought that popular culture and fashion are ultimately reversible, but are they really? Look at Lady Gaga and her – let’s call them – postpop attempts.  She “deconstructed” some trivial cliches, rearranged them in a shocking manner and called herself a freak. Some even called her a genius. She’s just a moderately smart (yet very talented and ambitious) musician who succeeded in getting the fools, the half-witted snobs, the high school drama queens and other accidental music lovers to believe that she delivers a complex and charmingly decadent perspective on music, fashion and art in general. I could have maybe enjoyed Gaga’s brilliant videos, live performances, and perfectly pathetic pop hooks had people been more moderate in their praise for her. Oh well.

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