Economic Uncertainty Spawns Creative Fecundity

By: Tim Freeman

If the Recession Blues are getting you down – or if you’re just dreading the countdown to 2012 when the ancient Mayan calendar predicts the world will end – have no fear. Even though you may not have a job, or you have a job but no money, you can take solace in the fact that things aren’t as bad as they appear on the surface.

As we approach the end of the first decade of the 21^st Century and realize what an anticlimactic disappointment it all was, we can take comfort in knowing that the world isn’t going to implode anytime soon (sorry Mayans). There is a vast future waiting to be conquered, and history is already unfolding before our eyes. Many of us might not see it, but all it takes is some sifting through the murky haze of blah-ness to uncover the possibilities.

You probably already recognize some of the trends brewing these days without even being aware of it. If not, let me call your attention to some of them:

Not since Bruce Springsteen has an artist tapped the American working class backbone with so much originality and intellectual honesty as this 24 year old virtuoso from Oregon. Itkin’s website describes his music as, “A little country, a little rock n’ roll,” but this man’s sound truly defies genre labeling. In “Like a Bruise” off of 2005’s Oregon, Jon laments, “Working ‘till [he’s] sixty then dying of a heart attack.” Not the most uplifting lyrics, but this coffee drinking hick has a way of turning pain into something beautiful. “Bismarck,” from 2007’s Big Gold Guitar in the Sky, is a more upbeat ditty which rants about fathers who are “land-locked sailors” and running away with “a beautiful woman.” Probably the most promising thing about Jon Itkin’s music besides his prematurely-aged wisdom and talent, however, is that it attempts to redefine a certain way of life within a 21^st Century context. Itkin proves that cowboys can still be cool and have relevance for all time, if they only adjust their sensibilities every once in a while.

Believe it or not, ennui is marketable. Chances are you and everybody you know (and their dog) has a blog. But did you know that your blogging might pave the way to a career? Yes, what you had for breakfast and your insights about last night’s episode of Big Love can actually land you a job. Emily Gould, former Gawker editor turned blogger, is a perfect example of someone who utilized this bedroom launch pad to make a career for herself in the limelight. Considered a leading authority on the whole blogging phenomenon, Emily is currently authoring a book based on her 2008 NY Times Magazine article about her personal obsession with blogging and being what she calls an “over-sharer.” The blogging maven has even been a guest on Larry King Live and FOX’s Redeye.

Carmichael native and Del Campo alumnus Brenna Hamilton, a self-described “freelance writer and former advertising wondergirl” began studying mass communications after her advertising job was downsized. “There is a huge rift in the mass media between traditional forms of broadcast, cable, radio, magazines, newsprint, books and sound recordings (music) versus the 21^st Century digital Internet and mobile/cell revolution,” she says. “What we are experiencing is the end of the line for the traditional media as they struggle to adapt or die in the new age of all things Internet/digital.”

As old school media struggles to keep pace with newer technologies, conditions are ripe for bloggers to move in and fill the gap. What does this mean for us lay people? Let’s say, for instance, you have season tickets to the King’s games. Perhaps you could provide firsthand reporting of all the Arco action on your blog titled Cow Bells. Sports Illustrated would no doubt be jealous, and who knows – they may even try to recruit you. With so much foreseeable potential in the future of blogging, you need to start asking yourself before you sit down at the computer: Who is going to be reading this and how will it impact me later on down the road?

Another foreign music invasion wouldn’t be something to feel optimistic about if it were anything as dismal as the last invasion which brought us such depressing acts as Coldplay, The Vines and the new politically-charged U2. No, the latest invasion of musical genius is actually being generated from within our own borders in a little place called New York City. These new bands share more in common with their older British siblings, bands like Radiohead and Blur who illuminated the alternative rock scene during the middle and late nineties. Acts like the Brooklyn-based MGMT, The Kills and Georgia born Cat Power are spearheading an American musical Renaissance. Add to this domestic juggernaut the Canadian rockers Arcade Fire and a Danish duo called the Raveonettes, and it seems as if the world is musically on the verge of something very powerful and transcendent. If you are someone who thought there was no future to music after Radiohead, think again.

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On the surface, blogging and a musical Renaissance may seem like meager sea changes in these gloomy times. But we should all take solace in the fact that the economic pall cast by the failures of the shadow banking system could not and cannot kill or dampen human expression and creativity. We will always have these great freedoms and commodities to enjoy, trade and sell.

And when times are toughest, sometimes this wellspring of freedom is all we have.