On George Michael, David Foster Wallace, and making great art

Michael's greatest song shows the path to the universal is through the specific and personal.

There’s a neat chronology to how the Beatles defined the sixties, bursting onto the scene in ’63 and riding their bigger-than-Jesus wave until Let it Be came out in 1970. From shaggy mop-tops to long-haired hippies, they wind up serving as the perfect prism for viewing that decade.

In a way, George Michael did that for the 80’s. Wham hit in ’83 and became massive (as seen in a new doc on Netflix). Then, he went solo and achieved even greater success with Faith in ’87. And he closed out the decade with a song that burnt it all down and set him on a different path.

His trajectory is like a time capsule of that era: He started as a pop cheerleader during the trickle-down, coked out Thatcher/Reagan years and garnered massive success as Wall Street told us “greed is good.” Eventually, he looked in the mirror, realized he hated what he had become, and vowed to start anew in a more authentic way. George Michael in the 80’s was all of us.

And the song he wrote that put it all to bed was “Freedom ‘90.”

Like a prisoner who has his own key

The reason there’s a ‘90 in the title is Michael wrote another (different) song called “Freedom” back when he was in Wham. (Note: Technically, it’s “Wham!” but I refuse to use the “!” at the end because I’m allergic to faux enthusiasm.)

The lyrics to that “Freedom”…

Like a prisoner who has his own key
But I can't escape until you love me
…
I don't want your freedom
Girl, all I want right now is you.

… set the table for the ‘90 version.

The earlier song’s narrator has imprisoned himself yet sings about someone else’s freedom – and how much he doesn’t want it. And then we hear a closeted gay man sing, “Girl, all I want right now is you.” Girl? Look, sometimes you gotta give the teenyboppers (and the Chinese) what they want:

Sometimes you “go go” along to get along.

The two “Freedom” songs feed into each other via their titles and a shared theme: Your identity can be a trap. Wesley Morris’ review of the Wham doc:

Michael recounts coming out to [Andrew] Ridgeley early on but to almost no one else. Success becomes his identity…Michael chose to let ambition define him. But there is a kind of desperation in the average Wham! song, a crisis about either being trapped in lovelessness or excluded from love — a crisis audible, even to my young ears, as a wail from the closet.

Around 1984, Michael went on kids’ TV and said his favorite record was Joy Division’s Closer. Imagine dressing up like this…

…while feeling like this:

Turns out George Michael (born Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou) was not the man he seemed to be.

Wham, ‘Whisper, and Wallace

The doc is a fun, breezy watch and makes you realize how many Wham tracks were just refried Motown ditties. You can easily imagine Diana Ross or the Temptations singing half their hits.

And oof, those outfits. Somehow, the group constantly looked like they were ready to play an arena and/or teach aerobics.

“All That She Wants” is a banger, no doubt. And you can’t deny the pep rally catchiness of “‘Go Go” and “I’m Your Man.” But Wham’s clear masterpiece was “Careless Whisper” (which was the start of Michael veering off into solo territory). That sax riff is one of the most iconic in history. (I’ve still gotta give the all-timer 🎷 intro trophy to Gerry Rafferty's “Baker Street.”)

“‘Whisper” is a gorgeous track and we’ve all heard it tons of times. Sometimes, the best way to get at the the nuance of a song is to listen to an instrumental version. Check out the Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio doing a cover of it that absolutely cooks…

Love when a cover illuminates the original this way. Minus the big production and vocal shine, you can really tune in to the song’s intricate arrangement and lush melodies.

Sidebar: Want another example of an instrumental version that makes you rethink what you know about the original? Check out the Wrecking Crew bringing it on “I Get Around.” The vocals dominate in the regular Beach Boys version because, well, it’s the Beach Boys. But underneath the vocal heavy mix is a handclappin’ surf orchestra letting it rip like they just stole all the amphetamines from a pharmacy.

Back to George Michael: He eventually dumped Andrew Ridgely, who seems to have taken it all in stride – and pretty much saw it coming because how long can you expect a guy who looks like a Greek god and writes platinum-selling singles to stay musically monogamous?

Speaking of, professional jealousy is a meaty topic that rarely gets addressed in an honest way. Often, people pretend to be happy for their more successful peers in public while talking 💩 about them behind their backs. Confused notions of respect, envy, and status bubble underneath but rarely surface.

The best exploration of it I’ve seen is in End of the Tour, a movie about author David Foster Wallace and David Lipsky, a journalist profiling him. They talk all about life, career, and art with both knowing one of them is the greatest writer alive and the other wishing it was him.

At the end of the flick, the David Foster Wallace character admits the image and the reality are misaligned.

It may be what in the old days was called a spiritual crisis or whatever. It's just the feeling as though the entire, every axiom of your life turned out to be false, and there was actually nothing, and you were nothing, and it was all a delusion. And that you were better than everyone else because you saw that it was a delusion, and yet you were worse because you couldn't function.

In a way, that sums up Michael’s crisis too.

Ya gotta have Faith

Faith, Michael’s first solo album, made him a massive star but left him feeling hollow. It was a vehicle for him to deliver Top Gun meets Elvis shtick on “Faith,” Prince schmoozing with Marvin on “I Want Your Sex,” and Phil Collins going full Freudian on “Father Figure.” And yet, behind the scenes, Michael couldn’t function.

The album dominated the culture so much it led to Dana Carvey doing a bit on SNL, as Michael, commanding Dennis Miller to look at his butt: “It’s a total circle…Accept it before it destroys you.”

SNL note: If you ask me when SNL was the best, it was probably this era. You know why? Because I was in middle/high school back then. And that’s the era when everyone thinks SNL was at its best – whenever they were a teenager. And that’s a noteworthy takeaway: SNL is made for teenagers. Lorne has spent decades trying to appeal to middle American youth. So when grown adults prattle on about SNL (see: media elites on social media) as if it’s an ongoing “state of the union” for comedy, I always want to shake them, tell them they’re judging a restaurant based on the kiddie menu, and bring them to an actual comedy club.

Michael couldn’t handle the combo of massive success and mockery. He did everything he could to make us love him, yet we still didn’t respect him. He wanted us to admire his mind, but we just wanted to stare at his butt. And that set the table for his cri de coeur: “Freedom ’90.”

Burn the past

It starts with the groove, a marvelous, percussive amalgam of “Sympathy for the Devil,” mixed with the Manchester sound of Primal Scream and Happy Mondays, funky James Jamerson-ish bass, Shaft wah wah rhythm guitar, a beat from the oft-sampled James Brown song "Funky Drummer," and an Aretha-esque church choir. It’s an irresistible combo that makes it a bulletproof go-to for any DJ who wants to get the dance floor moving.  

Where it gets really interesting is with the lyrics. Tracks like that are typcally paired with throwaway June-moon-spoon rhymes. But here, we get Michael going introspective and creating an ode to changing your mind. It’s a love song about loving yourself, regardless of the consequences. And it redefines freedom as evolution.

And then there’s the video, directed by David Fincher, starring all those supermodels. Michael’s subtext: “You want pretty? Fine, here’s pretty. It just won’t be coming from me anymore.”

In 1990, Michael explained:

I would like to never step in front of a camera again…At some point in your career, the situation between yourself and the camera reverses. For a certain number of years, you court it and you need it, but ultimately, it needs you more and it's a bit like a relationship. The minute that happens, it turns you off ... and it does feel like it is taking something from you…

I can’t lose because I know what the alternative is. I’m not stupid enough to think that I can deal with another 10 or 15 years of major exposure. I think that is the ultimate tragedy of fame. . . . People who are simply out of control, who are lost. I’ve seen so many of them, and I don’t want to be another cliche.

In the video, Michael’s Faith accessories (a leather jacket, a Wurlitzer jukebox, and a guitar) explode in a ball of flame as the word "freedom" hits during the chorus.

In the track, Michael manages to accomplish something incredible: He takes a song about perhaps the most unrelatable topic you can imagine (being one of the world’s biggest pop stars while also being closeted) and turns it into a universal anthem that speaks to anyone who yearns to break free from their past.

It’s a lesson in making art: The path to the universal is through the specific and personal. That narrative may be completely foreign to 99.99999% of the world, yet we can all relate to its emotional core.

Plus, it makes you wanna get up and move. Mind and body, unite.

Today the way I play the game is not the same

Let’s break it down…

Heaven knows I was just a young boy
Didn't know what I wanted to be
I was every little hungry schoolgirl's pride and joy
And I guess it was enough for me

When you’re young, you don’t really know what you want. You take the attention however it comes. You pretend and create an image. You wear what they tell you to wear and you sing what they want you to sing. At first, it’s enough. But then…well, here’s Michael in that ‘90 interview:

I’m sure that most people find it hard to believe that stardom can make you miserable. After all, everybody wants to be a star. I certainly did, and I worked hard to get it. But I was miserable, and I don’t want to feel that way again.

To win the race, a prettier face
Brand new clothes and a big fat place
On your rock and roll TV
But today the way I play the game is not the same, no way
Think I'm gonna get me some happy

TV was everything back then. So you do what the execs want, they put you on the air, and you reap the rewards. But what happens when getting everything fails to make you happy? The only way you can be truly depressed is after you have it all. Because then, it’s up to you. More stuff/power/fame didn’t solve it, so you have to solve it. In the end, you realize you must manufacture your own happiness.

I think there's something you should know
I think it's time I told you so
There's something deep inside of me
There's someone else I've got to be

Eventually, you need to come clean. You need to tell them the truth. If the person they know is not who you are, it’s unsustainable. You must deny your past to embrace your future. The only way out (of the closet) is through.

All we have to do now
Is take these lies and make them true somehow
All we have to see
Is that I don't belong to you
And you don't belong to me (yeah, yeah!)
Freedom!

The chorus arrives with a shift from first person to third. It’s not just you or me, it’s all of us. We must take our lies and make them true. We must be like the trees, breathing in the carbon dioxide and turning it into oxygen. I am not your property, nor are you mine. Freedom. Cue the choir. Let’s sing it all together: Freedom!

We had every big-shot good-time band on the run, boy
We were living in a fantasy
We won the race, got out of the place
Went back home, got a brand new face for the boys on MTV
But today the way I play the game has got to change oh yeah
Now I'm gonna get myself happy

That’s the thing about success: You’ve got to define it for yourself. Because otherwise you just winding up programming your life according to someone else’s functional spec. You can spend decades grinding nonstop just to get to a place they wanted to go. The only way to win is to stop playing another person’s game. Instead, go inside yourself and keep asking, “What makes me satisfied?”

Well it looks like the road to heaven
But it feels like the road to hell
When I knew which side my bread was buttered
I took the knife as well
Posing for another picture
Everybody's got to sell
But when you shake your ass
They notice fast
And some mistakes were built to last

Now the bridge. We go from major to minor and the vocals go spoken word. What looks like heaven can feel like hell. Every time you pose for a photo, you “take the knife.” In modern terms: Ask all those influencers what life is like when the camera goes away. You shake your ass to get over but it sticks to you. How will all these OnlyFans twerkers react in the future when they go to meet their boyfriend’s parents and feel the wrath? Some mistakes are built to last.

That's what you get
I say that's what you get
That's what you get for changing your mind

The world punishes you for evolving. Becoming someone new is viewed as faking it. Changing your mind is a betrayal. Flip flopper! You’ve broken a promise you never made. That’s what you get. Yet you must anyway.

May not be what you want from me
Just the way it's got to be
Lose the face now
I've got to live

During the slow fade out, we learn there is no choice here. Like that t-shirt Michael once famously wore, you must choose life. It’s not what they want, but it’s “the way it’s got to be.” Mic drop, meet mask drop.

The flip side of freedom: It can be terrifying. It’s like another brilliant songwriter, Kris Kristofferson, once wrote: Freedom’s just another word for nothin’ left to lose.

In Infinite Jest, Wallace writes:

The true opponent, the enfolding boundary, is the player himself…You compete with your own limits to transcend the self in imagination and execution. Disappear inside the game: break through limits: transcend: improve: win…You seek to vanquish and transcend the limited self whose limits make the game possible in the first place. It is tragic and sad and chaotic and lovely. All life is the same, as citizens of the human State: the animating limits are within, to be killed and mourned, over and over again.

“It is tragic and sad and chaotic and lovely.” That’s also how freedom feels. It is nothing left to lose, yet somehow it’s also everything. Welcome to what you wanted…also, sorry it’s terrifying…plus, you’re welcome.

Sound contradictory? Well, all that’s left to do is take these lies and make them true.

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Quickies

🎯 That this generation’s Jerry Garcia is John Mayer kinda says it all. It’s like trading in a wildfire for one of those battery powered candles.

🎯 Ron Desantis is just like that Clubhouse app: Got good traction during pandemic but now everyone just ignores it.

🎯 The richest man in the world tryna crowdsource a free logo within 24 hours is everything you need to know about the current state of graphic design.

🎯 So many Barbie bashes last weekend. Need someone to throw an Oppenheimer party. Just angry men in fedoras wondering what they’ve done.

🎯 Gerwig missed it: The Barbie movie shoulda been called Little Women 2.

🎯 Barbenheimer just proves how much we go with the flow if it’s a golden portmanteau. (I call that a gomanteau.)

🎯 Re: religious freaks in USA vs. the ones in Israel, at least the ones in America have the decency to serve in the military. These Israeli ones wanna have their rugelach and eat it too.

🎯 Odd how the more a woman hates men, the more likely she is to dress like one. It’s as if BLM protesters decided to dress up in police uniforms.

🎯 I have had many discussions with my therapist about gender stuff and would like to share what she taught me: When you make wide-ranging assumptions ("men/women are like this...") about the other gender, you're usually really revealing more about you and how you see the world than anything about them.

🎯 I will never understand watching a DJ. They barely move. It’s like crowding around to watch a cashier ring someone up.

🎯 Ladies, good line for when a creep hits on you: "Actually, I have a nut allergy. I don't want you to nut anywhere near me."

🎯 We've lost sight of the phrase "on average." Too many convos like this: "Women tend to prefer men who are taller than them." "Not all women! My friend dates a man shorter than her!" "Sure, I'm just saying that on average–" "No, I proved you wrong." Sigh.

🎯 The big issue with dating now is we think people should behave like apps. But people don't come with a Preferences screen. You can't just tick off the checkboxes you like and customize your perfect mate. The truth: Human beings arrive with their default settings intact and rarely, if ever, "upgrade."

🎯 Ugh. This is how it begins...

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Comedy

🃏 I post clips of my standup (and more) at Instagram, TikTok, Threads, and YouTube.

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Podcast

🃏 Last three eps of my KOAL podcast have featured deep dives on some classic Rubyisms…the most recent one:

• We’ll have so many photos of so much nothing and no one will look at them.

• Let your weight be absorbed by the ground. (Lesson from yoga.)

• An embarrassing success is worse than a proud failure.

Here’s a clip from ep22:

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5-spotted

I dig the Italian term passeggiata:

Passeggiata refers to the act of leisurely strolling up and down the town’s main street with family or friends. It’s a veritable social ritual that involves walking with no particular purpose other than socializing and staying together.

The secret to social media fame: The dumber, the better.

One finds fame on platforms like Twitter by being the lamest, the angriest, the least amenable to thoughtful pushback or open debate or introspection. And Zeus forbid that someone reject tribal orthodoxy. The biggest stars of the Twitter age . . . well, let’s just say that rarely have so many people who knew so little been imbued with so much confidence in their intellect.

Bob Lefsetz praising David Sedaris:

Today everything is a litmus test, the gotcha police are out in force, but somehow Sedaris goes unscathed. I think this is because he's not eager to be part of THEIR world. He's not dying to be more, to have more, he's satisfied where he is. You know the musicians, they're afraid of offending someone, hurting their career, after all you don't want to eliminate half of your audience. They're so busy protecting their "brand" that there's not much brand there.

Washington Post’s Helaine Olen making the case against QR codes:

Baby boomers in particular revile the use of QR code menus, with 4 out of 5 preferring a physical one. That might be because, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, 40 percent of people over the age of 65 still lack a smartphone. So do fully one-quarter of those earning less than $30,000 annually. A QR code menu is tantamount to telling the elderly and poor their business isn’t wanted.

You are not that unique, according to Benjamin Godsill.

There’s this feeling that we are all somehow terminally unique and more important than any other beings, and we’re broadcasting that uniqueness by what we like and eat and listen to and look like and wear. I think that will be super embarrassing. I’m super guilty of it. I know all about food and wine and esoteric music and bands from the 1970s or what have you. And it’s, like, come on, you’re just a middle-aged bro!

Not me, I’m a special snowflake! ❄️

OK, think I'm gonna get me some happy.

Best,
Matt