Taylor Swift: The Bland leading the Bland

this is from my Substack account richardcongress@substack.com Listning to Taylor Swift Mood music for the comatose RICHARD CONGRESS AUG 14, 2023 Listening to Taylor Swift: American Blandstand. A Taylor Swift concert is similar to eating tapioca pudding with whipped cream and vanilla jello. She exhibits a singing range of about 1/8 of an octave and lyrics that would be rejected from a Hallmark greeting card as too bland. What is it with this singer? The only distinguishing characteristic of her performances is a slight country twang to the backup music. Blues, Jazz, Politics and Irony is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribed Maybe she is such a sensational hit because of the anesthetic quality of her music. People don’t want to be worried about anything, given the state of the world and the country. But…then, why gather in huge concert venues and wildly applaud? Why not just relax at home and stream her on Spotify? It looks like getting up and actually going to a Taylor Swift concert requires an investment of physical exertion. It’s like getting physically worked up and then drinking 3 vanilla milkshakes. How about seeing it as a retreat from a disturbing reality of gun violence run amok, deteriorating pseudo-health care, income stagnation (if you are lucky and not seeing decline), constant war, etc? That could be the answer. Perhaps she has been created by the entertainment industry (I won’t say music business) as a purgative to get rid of and bury the effect of female vocalists who had feeling and ideas: Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, Billie Holliday, or more contemporary, active performers like Shamka Copeland, Bonnie Raitt, or Lucinda Williams? Taylor Swift could be the designated soundtrack for a coming nuclear war caused by the lunatic neo-cons who populated the war-criminal Bush/Cheney regime and who have now migrated to the Biden camp (Hillary was already a Democrat and a war-lover). And as if it wasn’t bad enough, now the Biden Administration has raised from the dead Regan administration hack Elliot Abrams, the used car salesman of indiscriminate murder of civilians by contra mercenaries in Nicaragua, who also was convicted of lying under oath before a Congressional committee. Maybe Taylor Swift could do joint performances with Elliot Abrams, and Kamala Harris could sing backup.