The "Fake Empire" of Joshua Ferris' Then We Came to the End and The National's Boxer

"We're half-awake, in a fake empire."

So declares singer Matt Berninger of The National in "Fake Empire," the song that kicks off their latest album Boxer. The entire album continues in this vein, suggesting that American life has become a life "half-awake," one of suburban efficiency and catchy marketing.

And that's essentially where the members of The National are coming from, having endured the life (career, rather) of catchy marketing; most of the members gave up the high life of a career in marketing to form a band that tackles the issues facing our "fake empire." There's something wrong with us, and it's kind of ironic that those who once helped with marketing the things that supposedly will make us feel better are now the ones trying to warn us that we are about to collide into a brick wall.

Boxer is an album that digs deep into the upper middle class life of corporate America, the guy who is stuck, but has a numbing acceptance of it all ("I can tie my tie all by myself / I’m getting tied, I’m forgetting why"). The National have tapped into a sentiment that simmers on the surface, but rarely gets discussed directly: that conformity becomes numbing, and none of the quick fixes we give ourselves will work. It's an essential question that goes to the heart of what it means to be American: to conform -- chasing the elusive "American Dream" -- or not to conform, and transcend societal expectations.

Equally, Joshua Ferris' latest novel Then We Came to the End speaks to the essential questions of conformity and what it means to be American. In the epigraph, Ferris quotes Ralph Waldo Emerson, who urges against being "reckoned in the gross, in the hundred, or the thousand, of the party, the section, to which we belong." This quote shows what we face within our society: we celebrate independence, but expect conformity. It's both the essential elements of human nature and what makes corporate America tick, yet we put up with it all, accepting it as reality and popping pills along the way.

Since this lifestyle is so deeply embedded in the American consciousness, it was only a matter of time before a novel would attempt to tap into the reasons why we've let ourselves become obsessed with work. Ferris' Then We Came to the End is such a novel. Chronicling the office lives of a marketing agency in Chicago, Then We Came to the End is both a hilarious and heartwarming account of how and why we endure such work-focused lives.

Ferris' novel follows the copywriters and art directors of the agency as they endure cutbacks in the wake of the dot-com crash, and as they watch their colleagues get the ax -- or, as they coin it, "walking Spanish" -- they huddle in the corners of offices speculating why, how, and who is next to go. In the midst of all these layoffs, the agency takes on a mysterious pro bono breast cancer awareness case at the same time they discover (through office rumor, of course) that their supervisor Lynn Mason has breast cancer. Their task is to create ad copy that will make a breast cancer patient laugh, but the group is experiencing an extreme case of writer's block.

The novel is written in first-person plural to reflect the collective "we" of modern corporate culture. As each character goes through his or her own personal conflicts, the group experiences these as a whole, or so it seems; Ferris' "we" is actually an ironic critique of the groupthink that pervades throughout corporate America. "We were corporate citizens," Ferris writes, "buttressed by advanced degrees and padded by corporate fat...What we didn't consider was that in a downturn, we were the mismanaged inventory, and were about to be dumped like a glut of imported circuit boards." So essentially, this "we" is nothing more than a commodity, the worker bees whose only goal is to keep the colony alive and fed.

Ferris uses two characters in particular to stress these distinctions between independence and conformity. Tom Mota, a disgruntled office worker who tries to shake things up through pranks, tries to find a level of transcendence but is eventually fired and doesn't handle it too well. Although those at the office have termed him the office Emerson scholar (he quotes him throughout the novel), Tom never actually transcends anything, and eventually falls back into conformity (albeit in a completely different way). Even though Tom can never bring himself to fully reject societal pressures, he does introduce his office friend Carl Garbedian to the words of Emerson. Carl suffers from depression, and the pills designed to level him out never work, so he takes matters into his own hands, resigning from the agency and starting a successful suburban landscaping company. He ends up transcending the politics of corporate groupthink by returning back to nature, so to speak. Essentially, these two characters represent something profound about America: that conformity is difficult to understand, but even more difficult to break away from.

The National's lyrics, like Ferris' novel, don't tell us how to live -- rather, they show the parts of society that are numbing and inconsequential. In their song "Apartment Story," Berninger sings about the apathy of a society that is "tired and wired" and "ruined to easy" where "we’ll stay inside 'til somebody finds us / do whatever the TV tells us / stay inside our rosy-minded fuzz for days." And fuzz is a good way of putting it; it's comfortable, but not entirely exciting. It's shopping at Target and golf at the country club, but not life to the fullest, or the elusive "pursuit of happiness" promised to us.

It seems relevant that in 2007 -- in the midst of a war with no end and the glut of a sub-prime mortgage meltdown -- two works of art come out and to the same concerns about society. And here we are in 2008, our politicians promise "change" and our artists recognize that this numbing groupthink is hurting America (Then We Came to the End was nominated for the National Book Award and The National's Boxer was voted album of the year by Paste magazine), and we still don't have any definitive answers. Just like Emerson didn't advocate changing society, but rather, removal from society, so to do artists in the 21st Century point out the absurdities and inconsistencies of our society and hope that someone out there is listening.

Don't buy EMI's upcoming Radiohead release, The Best Of

I wouldn't usually advocate not purchasing an album that has Radiohead on it, but this is too much.

Radiohead's former record label, Parlophone/EMI, plans to release a greatest hits compilation to coincide with Radiohead's upcoming world tour.

Now, this wouldn't be a problem, except that it reflects the ongoing rivalry between Radiohead and its former label. Radiohead left Parlophone/EMI after the two could not come to terms on renewing their contract (which have been controversial and mysterious). Radiohead subsequently released their latest album In Rainbows independently, first as a name your price download on their Web site, and later through TBD Records.

The rivalry has continued because EMI still owns the rights to Radiohead's back catalog, and continues to milk the Radiohead buzz for their own corporate gain. First, there was the Radiohead box set, which included their entire discography (minus In Rainbows).

Now comes this, a "best of" collection that exists only to profit from Radiohead's growing success as an independent act. True fans will see through EMI's attempt at profiteering from Radiohead's back catalog, and lets not forget that EMI isn't doing so well right now.

Frankly, I'm tired of the major labels trying to catch up to the success of independents, and Radiohead's success is just one more reason why going independent is better. The best musicians out there are already on independent labels anyway.

So don't buy this best of collection. EMI doesn't need your money, and Radiohead is doing fine without them anyway.

Denis Johnson's Tree of Smoke and the Endless War in Iraq

Out of all the major upsets, tragedies, and failures America has experienced in this new century, none will be as damaging to American morale as our current war in Iraq. We've just marked two major milestones in Iraq--five years of direct conflict and war, and four thousand troop deaths--and yet, the powers that be, those taking on the unenviable task of trying to fix this mess, have not improved conditions for the Iraqi people or for America's safety and standing in the world.

And yet, we knew it was inevitable. We knew that our relationship with the Middle East was contentious and multi-layered, and that a military occupation of a nation that did not provoke or attack us would stir up resentment and anger in that region. We may never recover from these fractured relationships, much less win militarily.

Those who warned against war in 2003 had their patriotism questioned and their voices silenced, and now that their fears of the worst have come true, they now seem to represent the mainstream opinion. Yet, the Bush administration and Republican Presidential nominee John McCain continue to support this war without an end, and their poll numbers continue to fall.

Of course, the War in Iraq is not the first war America has messed up. The obvious one was Vietnam, but there were plenty that came before that, and even the ones that we won had their problems and setbacks. These wars, and the effects they have on an entire population of people, seem to come and go throughout history. Yet nothing seems to change; every other generation or so, we start the pattern of fear, war, remorse, and peace over again and then promise that we'll never do it again.

Denis Johnson's 2007 novel Tree of Smoke speaks to a war-torn generation in the ways that previous war novels have spoken, and all the elements of a classic are built right in. First, Johnson writes of a different era (the Vietnam war), a grand but elusive objective controlled by the mythical powers that be (the CIA's secret operations), and a resolution that leaves our heroes as washed up failures. Like Joseph Heller's World War II novel Catch-22, Johnson's characters are left without a definitive purpose or objective except to stay alive and trust their commanders. The commanders, and those who assume the roles of authority, have their own things going on and no one knows exactly what might happen.

The novel follows several characters that are directly involved with the Vietnam war effort, but mainly focuses on CIA operative William "Skip" Sands and his uncle Colonel Sands ("the colonel") as they attempt to win the war. The colonel is essentially operating a proxy war through the psy-ops division of the CIA, attempting to attack the Vietcong through double agents and their own superstitions. But as the colonel operates in the shadows of the war, he becomes a larger-than-life myth himself. Those around the colonel see him as much more than a mere operations manager, and the colonel begins to lose focus of the war on the ground.

The colonel will eventually die, but his death will remain a mystery that Skip and the colonel's confidant, Sgt. Jimmy Storm, try to understand and figure out. After the war, both Skip and Storm will attempt to discover the truth behind the colonel's disappearance, and their lives will become muddied versions of the lives they led before the war. The end of the war brings with it disillusionment and sacrifice that is far removed from the idealistic beliefs of morality and justice they were taught.

Just as the title suggests, Johnson's characters operate under the false myths that America's might will ultimately win, and that in a war against an inferior nation, America automatically assumes the role of morality and righteousness. These myths, like the tree of smoke, are abstract; they are impressions of the thing itself, just like a tree of smoke isn't actually a tree, but rather, smoke plumes shaped like a tree. Equally, the title shows Johnson's grasp of the intricate complexities of war. "Tree of smoke" is biblical (“'There shall be blood and fire and palm trees of smoke' - from Joel, wasn’t it?” says a Catholic priest in the novel), but it also represents a philosophy of warfare that the colonel embodies, a "sincere goal for the function of intelligence--restoring intelligence-gathering as the main function of intelligence operations, rather than to provide rationalisations for policy." Essentially, the colonel's proxy war in Vietnam is a war of conflicting cultures and myths that fails, and leavs the characters that surround him confused about their purpose in Vietnam.

It's this idea that permeates throughout entire novel. Johnson's fluid prose style, mixed with the grander themes of war and morality, point to our current war in Iraq. They leave open the many questions we now have about the Bush administration's flawed logic that got us into this war in the first place. Just like the colonel's flawed philosophy regarding the "function of intelligence," the Bush administration's flawed philosophy of pre-emptive war has turned out to be a "tree of smoke" in its own right. The "smoke" just happens to be claims of weapons of mass destruction, Saddam Hussein's plans to attack America, and the exploited fears of American's living in a post-9/11 world.

Most Americans see the war in Iraq with much clearer eyes, and a strong majority of Americans believe it's time to withdraw. As the major characters in Tree of Smoke become confused about their role in the Vietnam War, Americans at home doubted the purpose of the war as well. Sound familiar?

Tree of Smoke may use a historical turning point in American history as a way to tell a fictional story, but its story feels more relevant now than ever before. Five years into it, the Iraq war has no major turning point or sense of resolution, leaving Americans uneasy about the future. Denis Johnson knows this, and so do his readers; the myths that shaped our policies in the past continue to shape our policies now, and America will continue the cycle throughout the rest of the century.

Best Song of 2007

Narrowing down the year's best songs into a fashionable list is a difficult task to take on. It's bad enough trying to figure out this year's best albums, and it's even more difficult to pick out individual songs, especially picking a single song that makes the whole year shine.

As we wrap up 2007, however, there's one song that sticks out to me more than any other. It's a song that's meant more to me than any other this year, and it's a song that I feel summarizes the reasons why I fell in love with music. For some reason, all of the pieces to this song just fit so well.

Appropriately enough, Radiohead's "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" is my choice for 2007's song of the year. It is, in my opinion, Radiohead's climactic peak artistically and musically, a song that ties in everything Radiohead has done and everything Radiohead has yet to do. It borrows from the past while reveling in the present, and suggests what is to come: a band that has recognized a new musical phase and is ready to reach new heights.

My first experience with Radiohead goes back to the summer of 2001. I was seventeen and, thanks to my Dad's job that took our family overseas, I was living in England. The escape from my mundane life in Central Illinois was a welcome change, but I was experiencing constant culture shock and felt particularly isolated and alone that summer. Luckily, I had my guitar and a four-track recording system I borrowed from a neighbor friend, and tons of time after school to write and record various songs I had written over the years. It was a time in my life where I finally started to take music seriously, enjoying bands like Pink Floyd and Pearl Jam (my favorite at the time) with more depth and understanding than ever before. I finally saw rock music as more than just a release from the mundane or a call to social rebellion, but as a true art form, and one that can entirely move the soul.

It was around that time that I borrowed a taped recording of Radiohead's sophomore release The Bends, and it completely changed my view of the band that, at the time, was making computer noises on Kid A and Amnesiac (I have since fallen in love with these two albums, but at the time I couldn't stand them). The Bends was different: its combination of loud guitars and atmospheric noise stuck with me, and I couldn't have enough of the album. I spent the rest of that summer writing bad ripoff songs that sounded too much like "My Iron Lung" and "Fake Plastic Trees," but it wasn't the music itself that got me through that melancholy summer, it was the act of discovery--finding something completely new, something I'd never heard before, that I could call my own.

Since then, Radiohead has become one of my favorite bands. With their incredible mix of visual art with atmospheric noises and orchestral compositions, Radiohead has become a band that goes beyond genre restrictions and fan expectations. They are a band willing to try new things, to forge new paths, and stay completely accessible to discerning music listeners.

Radiohead's In Rainbows has been all over the place recently. It took the number one spot for several prominent music year end lists, and for others, it stayed within the top ten. The best part about the album is that, despite the unconventional pay-what-you-want marketing, In Rainbows is better known for its incredible music, which of course is what all the hype is about. At the beginning of the album's opening track, singer Thom Yorke declares "how come I end up where I started," suggesting that the band has finally come full circle and is ready to step out to newer ground.

Buried towards the end of the album, In Rainbows reaches a climax with "Jigsaw Falling Into Place," and it's at this moment, when the acoustic guitars come in and drummer Phil Selway holds the strong rhythmic beat together, that Yorke's earlier declaration finally makes sense: the pieces all fit, the jigsaw has truly fallen into place.

The best part about "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" is its amazing syncopation. The acoustic guitars give way to a tight drum beat, which bring in Yorke's airy vocals and guitarist Johnny Greenwood's stratospheric electric guitar riffs. It's a style that brings us back to Radiohead's early days, when they were seen as just another '90's "grunge" band with their debut album Pablo Honey. Yet, at the same time, the band is tighter, more mature; age and the musical diversity of their collective works have brought the band to this moment when they can look back at it all and throw it at the wall to see what happens. Of course, it all just fits so well.

Lyrically, "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" seems to tell two stories at once: a narrative about lost love at a bar and the subjective feelings that the music brings. Like a poem by Frank O'Hara, the lyrics show desperation, happiness, and confusion surrounding an otherwise mundane moment in time, and it is this poetic "swirl" that makes the lyrics come alive fully. Yorke sings: "Before you run away from me / Before you're lost between the notes / The beat goes round and round" as if everything is "blurring into one." And, of course, the music seems to blur everything that Radiohead has done together into one place, one exceptional moment in time. At one point, everything becomes "lost between the notes," something that Radiohead has done for years with their minimalist musical compositions (think "How to Disappear Completely" from Kid A and you'll see what I mean).

The guitar work on "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" is also significant because it is the first song I've heard since OK Computer that makes full use of Radiohead's three guitarists. Back in the Pablo Honey days, having three guitarists was seen as an unnecessary excess, but on "Jigsaw Falling Into Place," three guitars are exactly what is needed. While the first acoustic guitar comes in with a complex, finger-picked riff, the second acoustic guitar comes in to carry the rhythm while the bass guitar fills in the gaps. It builds from there, and by the time Yorke is letting the beat go "round and round," the atmospheric electric guitars have taken over, flinging the song out into its own orbit. By the end of the song, Radiohead have created a song that has the same musical effect that Led Zeppelin's "Song Remains the Same" did to restore their musical bravado at the beginning of Houses of the Holy.

When the song finally comes to an end, you don't feel that it's been overdone, or that the band has struggled through it. Instead, the song feels like an organic work, and there's not a single moment that drags with boring interludes. It builds up to a climax, and leaves you wanting more. In Rainbows then fades into its own denouement with "Videotape," bringing you back down and resolving all that had built into a frenzy before it.

Even if this was all I had to say about "Jigsaw Falling Into Place," it would still be one of my favorite songs. But what makes it stand out as the best song of 2007 is the same feeling The Bends gave me during that lonely summer in 2001: it renews my sense of wonder for music. "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" truly moves my soul in ways that most music never can, and every time I listen to it, I never find a dull moment or a single way to criticize it. It will, for years to come, remind me of 2007 and all of the joy this year's new music gave me. For that reason alone, "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" is my pick for the best song of 2007.

Originally published at Blogcritics.org: http://blogcritics.org/archives/2008/01/01/211645.php

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