My car stereo broke.

I was eating dinner at Lisa’s, and when I emerged from her abode I turned on the defroster and I got a readout, both Sirius and XM, but no sound.  As I drove home in the intermittent rain I ran through the possibilities, after stopping and turning both the Alpine and the Saab off and on endlessly, fruitlessly. This had to be the amplifier.  Rather than settle for an Alpine, I’d popped for the exotic Italian amp no one but car stereo geeks had even heard of, the manufacturer of which had probably gone out of business.

After driving home in silence, I pored the Web.  And found out my Audison’s warranty had expired.  I could barely sleep.  My schedule precluded me from showing up at the car stereo shop before early afternoon the following day, would my installer be there, if he removed the amp today would it come back before March?

I parked on the street, the lot being full of machines, and as Robert, my installer, fixed the Sirius in an old school Mercedes-Benz, I fingered the convertible Lamborghini gathering dust.  There may be a recession, but it’s not affecting this emporium, the last of its kind extant in Santa Monica.  With factory-installed stereos so much better than they were in the seventies, the aftermarket has shrunk, all the money for manufacturers is in being the authorized provider.

Turned out I’d blown a fuse.  Hearing this was like getting a birthday present.  Music in my car would continue.  My machine may be cheap, but it’s got a mellifluous sound permeating its tiny environs.  I drive in my cocoon and feel safe from the world.  As I navigate through the hundred plus satellite channels.

And it was only days before that I’d driven to Larry’s Shaver Shop to get new shaving lotion.  My father used an electric razor and he presented me with a Remington as soon as I started to sprout whiskers, I’ve still never used a straight edge.  But without lubrication my skin is strafed like the epidermis of a skateboarder who’s lost his balance and scraped the asphalt.  I used Lectric Shave until the guru at Larry’s told me it was shit and that I needed to use Parks Prep, which wouldn’t clog up my shaver.  He was right.

I’d gone to Larry’s because I needed new blades.  I’ll never do that again.  Only in Santa Monica can you find a retailer who charges more than list price.  I now purchase new cutters via Amazon.  But I still go back to Larry’s for this exotic lotion.  And I’ve learned to pay cash, it earns you a twenty percent discount.

And on this day it’s raining.  And even though I’ve got an umbrella, I want to park close to the shop, so I don’t soak my Nikes in the plethora of puddles which form so rapidly when it rains in SoCal.  And I didn’t find a meter, but around the corner from the Coffee Bean I saw a woman opening the passenger door of her mini-SUV.  Not seeing a driver inside, I decided to wait.  And I was lucky, this caffeinated citizen got behind the wheel and pulled away from the curb. And as I navigated my machine into the spot she’d vacated, I heard a lyric:

I’m not a princess
This ain’t a fairy tale
I’m not the one you’ll sweep off her feet
Lead her up the stairwell
This ain’t Hollywood
This is a small town
I was a dreamer before you went and let me down
Now it’s too late for you and your white horse
To come around

I liked Taylor Swift until her handlers convinced themselves that she was a superstar who was innately-talented and had earned her place atop the hit parade.  The ability of handlers to drink their own kool-aid knows no limits in this business.  You’d think they’d be happy knowing they’re raking in the bucks, but they’ve got to go further than that, they need to convince themselves and everybody they encounter that their charge is the new Beatles, the new Joni Mitchell.

I found Ms. Swift charming at first.  But when they crossed her over to Top Forty and didn’t stop flogging her album, I tuned out.  I didn’t even play her new album.  Her single slid by me, I often punched the button on my radio when it came on.  I didn’t want to encourage them, I didn’t want to help them justify their cause.  Believing their over the top TV productions, with dress changes and waterfalls all in the same song, were cute and acceptable because Taylor was under twenty.  Dignity, hubris, they’ve got no place in teen pop.

But is Taylor Swift really teen pop?  Teen pop is supposed to be laughable and evanescent, easily-dismissed by anybody whose balls have descended or tits have sprouted.  But "Teardrops On My Guitar" was only teenage in its subject matter.  It had the changes and the heart and emotion of a radio staple.  It was the best of both worlds, it was simultaneously catchy and touching.

But the rest of the album was not as listenable.  And usually the rushed out follow-up is substandard, all about paying the executives’ overhead as opposed to satiating the core.  And that’s what the core wants.  Satiation.  The core wants to feel the identification, fans want something that will make them feel included rather than excluded in a nation where no one is ever good-looking or rich enough.  Perez Hilton stands up for the outcasts and then suddenly he switches teams, he’s co-opted by those he’s commenting upon, working for Britney, believing he’s on a par with those he’s disparaging.  We lose our connection with him.  He’s just another tot in Tinseltown trying to make it.  Whereas most of those in the heartland, Hollywood too, are never going to make it.  This is not a dress rehearsal, there is no close-up, this is their life.  And they’re looking to make their lives easier, they’re looking to make sense of the morass.

I opened the door of my car, and then shut it, to prevent the rain from entering.  I had to hear this record, which was quite obviously Taylor Swift, but which I’d never heard before.  On one hand the lyric is cheesy, but we’re all from a small town, where too many people have categorized and classified us, where we’re stuck in a rut of someone else’s device.  And we’re all dreamers.  We believe if we just get our chance we can charm that cutie on the sitcom and our life will work.  And our fan letters never get through, thank god, because if we ever met our heroes we’d find out they’re just as fucked up as we are.

But the actors are empty vessels.

The musicians are their songs.  They’ve had these experiences.  We may not be able to have sex with them, but we feel if we could just talk to them, they’d UNDERSTAND us!

If you’re singing about banging this one and kicking that one to the curb, if you’re exhibiting your glitzy lifestyle and strutting your stuff, we can’t relate, we’re not that fortunate.  But if you tell us you’re confused, if you tell us something about ourselves, we’re enraptured.

I came home and fired up Spotify and listened to "White Horse".  Which, astoundingly, sounded just as good as it did in the car.  And the rest of "Fearless" was a cut above the debut album.  And rather than needing to shut it off, I played it over and over again, even dialing it up in Rhapsody so I could listen via my Sonos system in the kitchen.

And I’ve been chalking up Ms. Swift’s tenure at number one as the last gasp of teen stardom.  But now I’ve changed my opinion.  This is closer to Carole King than Kanye.  This is more like "Tapestry" than not only hip-hop, but "Working On A Dream".

The superstars, Bruce and U2, they’ve lost touch with themselves.  They’re playing to the last row.  And we can’t even get a seat in the building.  We want something we can play over and over on our iPods, we don’t care if it’s played on the radio, it’s only important that it touch our hearts.

How come Nashville can get it so right and the rest of the business so wrong?  I’m not sure exactly who composes Ms. Swift’s material, I hear she doesn’t write alone, but the result is songs, with melodies and changes that you can sing along with.  This is not rocket science.  While the household name purveyors are trying to create dazzling extravaganzas, while the alternative rockers are concocting screechy tracks with lame vocals that are barely more than demos, Taylor Swift concocts a very basic record that is burning up the chart, that has already sold 2,600,000 copies even though it’s only been in release for 14 weeks.

Cause I’m not your princess
This ain’t a fairy tale
I’m gonna find someone, someday
Who might actually treat me well
This is a big world
That was a small town
There in my rearview mirror
Disappearing now
And it’s too late for you and your white horse
Now its too late for you and your white horse
To catch me now

We’re dreamers.  Despite being bruised and battered, we do our best to rekindle hope.  We believe we can escape to a better life.  Not one where we drive a Bentley and party with Paris, but where we have a roof over our heads and have the mutual respect of a loved one, all the while able to pay our bills.

Now, more than ever in our lives, the underpinnings are shaky.  There might not be a job to work hard in, keeping what money you’ve got in the bank is a losing proposition, but putting it in the market is too big a risk.  Still, if someone with heart and desire can break through, we’re encouraged.  We want to hear that person’s story, unfiltered.  We want the unvarnished truth, we’ve been sold bullshit for too long, we want warmth, but not darkness.

I left the east coast and everything it stands for.  I’m living in a place where no one ever asks what college I went to, never mind my SAT scores.  I didn’t consciously want to reinvent myself, but I liked the opportunity to start over, sans the burden of the preconceptions of those I went to school with.  I haven’t struck it rich and famous.  And now I’m wavering, the economic chaos impacting my ability to have hope.  But when I’m driving in my car and the right record comes pouring out of the speakers, I feel confident, I believe I can make it.

And too often it’s an oldie, reminding me of what once was as opposed to what still can be.  But when I heard the production of this adolescent, I was touched the same way I was in my dorm room back in Middlebury, when those Wendy Waldman and Jackson Browne records gave me the strength to pack up and drive across this great country of ours to start over.

There is no princess, there is no white horse, fame doesn’t equate with riches and the mainstream media can get it just as wrong as the titans of Wall Street who wrecked our financial system.  There are no short cuts, only hard work and perseverance.  And what allows us to keep on keepin’ on, what soothes us and prepares us for battle, is almost always music.  Listening to Taylor Swift’s "White Horse" I’m reminded of this, I’ve got hope.