The artist formerly known as John Cougar recently posted on The Huffington Post, and he sure is pissy. Nonetheless, he provided a decent history of the record business and how it went horribly wrong. It is hard to take the man seriously, especially since all I can ever think about is how GM drilled “Our Country” into my gawdamned skull the NFL season before last. Also, a coworker of mine used to say that he disliked any artist that claimed to be a “savior of the working class”, The Boss included. That idea sort of stuck with me, especially when it comes to Springsteen. When a musician of that type gets successful and relatively (or very) wealthy, do they remain a channel for working-class struggles or turn into just another Hollywood actor? That thought briefly troubles me until I stumble across “Small Town” or “Thunder Road” on my Zune, and then all is well again.

Anywhoo, Mellencamp makes some good points, one of which is regarding how country music rules the flyover states. I thought it was some kind of misguided inborn obsession with steel guitars, but alas not at first. I didn’tknow that new methods for measuring a record’s success drove music companies into the major cities and away from the flyover states. That left the the door open for a relatively “niche” music category that appealed to hick sensibilities. Too bad it got too big for its britches and desperately sprawled into the big cities – what other excuse do we have for this country-pop-crossover garbage? Shania may be scorching hot, but I blame her.

Furthermore, Cougar’s view of CD technology is interesting, and mirrors what is going on with Blu-Ray DVDs today. The Powers that Be are trying to cram this new technology down our throats although most of us will get very little intrinsic improvements. You have to have a kickass television, dvd player, and expensive cables. Also, the picture is often unrealistic to the point of surreality. Watch a sporting event on High-Def – the colors are often glaring and cartoonish. Sure, I can see their sweat but why? Plus the yellows and reds just fry my corneas.

Too bad Johnny’s call for “compassion must replace name-calling, fairness must replace greed and we need to come together as a musical community and try to understand each other’s problems” is a pipe dream. Maybe if we download and share enough MP3s to completely break the system, but I’m not holding my breath. The most recent indicator was the obscene $100million contract for the washed-up version of Madonna. That is a sure sign of commercialism over quality. Also, if the Live Nation/Ticketmaster merger goes through, every band not at U2-levels or bigger will be boned.