States of Whatever

Before fire, before the wheel, before anything resembling civilization, we were already doing our favorite thing: deciding that America was irredeemable. The argument practically writes itself—oversized everything, inexplicable electoral choices, the habit of marching into small nations that were only just experimenting with authoritarianism. Classic.

And then: Hot Dogs. Halloween. Clint Eastwood. The entire pop machinery of it, which I keep feeding myself even while complaining about the factory. The country is a schizophrenic mess with a genius-level PR operation and I cannot stop watching.

Marina Diamandis put it better than I can on "Hollywood"—American ambition as a hunger that consumes the self, delivered with enough self-awareness to know that ambivalence doesn’t make the wanting go away. It doesn’t resolve, which is precisely why it’s great. Name the Pet’s "American Boys" is something stranger and sweeter: Filippa Smeds in a gymnasium, the whole thing affectionately surreal in the way that only comes from looking at something from the outside and finding it genuinely wonderful despite yourself. And then there’s Liam Lynch’s United States of Whatever, which is not a new song but will never stop being accurate—American cultural confidence captured with such perfect economy that three chords and a shrug feel like a complete thesis.

Three acts, none of them American, all of them obsessed. As am I. The place is maddening and magnetic and I’ll probably never stop.