Two songs occurring upfront of my playlist are sort of teen suicide jams, but also shakes at the (this new, almost here) Great Revival.
First, B.o.B.'s "I'll Be in the Sky." Second, Lil' Wayne's "Drop the World" (featuring Eminem). Both, not so coincidentally, were featured in last week's episode of The Hills, gusts of Goth confetti (humid, I know) from this genius swan song season, which is so much about the crisis before and around religious conversions, the angst of the faith-seeker, the tin of the faithless OMG!

B.o.B. (Atlanta rapper Bobby Ray) is new (to me to me). His current singles are yes and no ("Nothin' On You" was on heavy rotation for a minute and then I got bored), but this one, presumably the next single, is so fresh--discoursing The Lord in Pop and also air travel. En general, I dig how he's doing this 90s (there it go) nerd-boy, vaguely jazzed Yankee hip hop, but with Southern accents and stories, ways of telling stories. And isn't that why God is in the lyric? The Eastern Seaboard is such a den of clever doubt and cynicism. Up here, men consumed with trying to be hard almost never take it to CHURCH*. En Sur, Tradition holds for everybody; "roots" matter as much as (and often more than) the self-reliant quest (though this track incorporates doses of both). You know? Anyhow, the chorus:

I was a man with no name,
Now I'm attributing mo' fame,
But all of this ain't gonna matter when I die and say goodbye,
So long, sianara, I'll have to catch you tomorra' baby
Cause baby-- I'll be in the sky

I'll be there
Ooh all right
I'll be in the sky
I'll be there
Ooh all right
I'll be in the sky

As ever, I've listened to it dozens of times, and still it emits this funny, addictive emotional smoke (vapor? The Vapors?) about success and airplanes and artists leaving and living alone and my fears and non-fears, the wicked powerful non-fear of dying (teen suicide mania), my grandmother, belief in G-d, but hubris too...

...I've been skeptical of this Wayne record with it's electric guitar noises and electric guitar face, but "Drop the World" is soo smart. It's full of that masculine angst that I'm non-thrilled by, "fuck all y'all!!!!!!" and stuff. But it comes off more like the glam-crazies than the punk-angries. My first thought about Wayne's chorus---

So I pick the World up
And I’ma drop it on your fuckin’ head.
Bitch, I’ma pick the World up
And I’ma drop it on your fuckin’ head
And I could die now--Rebirth motherfucker!
Hop up in my spaceship and leave Earth, motherfucker
I’m gone
Motherfucker, I’m gone.

---was a flashing memory of that scene in The BBC I, Claudius when Claudius realizes that Caligula is mad, running about calling himself Apollo (or somebody) and being as debauched and daring and violent and costumed as a god, or an imagined god. In song, Wayne has long described/inhabited this brand of madness, an imagined me-godhead to great effect. This passage also touches on Wayne's newness; he's a "Baby" and a disciple (symbolic son) of Baby. He is not wise; he is ALIVE, vibrant, burning, fast, engaged, ALL BODY, no victim of CYCLES, a victor of CYCLES ("Rebirth motherfucker!"), and foolish, brave. I don't know; the song makes me smile. And Em (who I love more when he's being less furious, but sobeit) has one fantastic line of Jesus-hubris (or something), "This world is my Easter egg/Yeah, prepare to die."


*I'm kind of wrong here, or duh there are exceptions---"You're Nobody Till Somebody Kills You" and I guess Nas pretended to be Jesus, but I've never really paid attention to him and now that he won't pony up child support for Kelis I think he's SUCH a chump and never will. Also, I don't know what to say about California. I know L.A. is considered a piece of the Bible Belt (it's mega-churches and COGIC congregations are astounding). And I'm so down with their New Age ideas (like those incorporated into Christian Evangelism by The Hills' Spencer and Heidi Pratt!).....