What kind of crazy, fucked-up world do we live in where the biggest rock star doesn’t even play an instrument?

I don’t know if you were online at 10 A.M. (1 P.M. on the east coast), but a roar was heard on the Internet louder than any audience explosion ever noted on a dB meter.  Steve Jobs hit the stage!

I’ll wait until later to decipher the announcements, right now, the biggest story seems to be Apple taking aim at the video game companies, the action being there as opposed to music, but what I find utterly amazing is I’m more interested in what Steve Jobs has to say than any musician.

And I’m not alone.

He’s autocratic.  Beholden to no one.  Says no to partners.  Does what he thinks is right.  Sound like John Lennon?  The rock stars of yore?

While today’s "artists" make music by committee, kissing the butts of everyone in the food chain of retail and publicity, this guy in Northern California, far from the streets, has amassed a following larger than any band.

Don’t do endorsements.

Don’t make deals with sponsors.

Don’t worry about offending.

And you might have a career that lasts a decade or two.

Pursue your dream.

Don’t focus on the hit.

Break the rules.

Tell those in your way to fuck off.

Don’t be afraid of alienating potential customers.

And you might just grow a fan base dedicated enough to give you all its money, and evangelize to others, getting them to part with their dough too.

The iPod begat the Apple revolution.  It was so good, worked so flawlessly, that users ditched their bedraggled PCs and paid a fortune for Macs.  At either an immaculate Website with no hidden gotchas or a retail establishment cleaner than any record store with much friendlier help.

Can you pass an Apple Store without going in?  You know all the product, but you want to breathe the air, feel the vibe.  They’re never empty and there’s always help available.  Shop conventional retail and you can’t find a clerk.  Enter an Apple Store and you wonder how they make a profit, paying all these people.

Free help?

If Apple can give away free help at the Genius Bar, something they charge prodigiously for on the phone, via AppleCare, do you really think giving away music is such a bad idea?  Apple knows you’ll buy a Mac, anything and everything they sell, because you’re gonna get support. Where’s the support in the music industry?  Where the act overcharges for one good song on an album and you can’t figure out the price for a ticket until you check out.  Convenience charge?  Print at home fee?  I’m still waiting for Ticketmaster to explain those to customers, just doesn’t make sense!

If you’ve got a desirable product, people will give you all their money.  Ever think that people just aren’t dying for music, not in the amounts they used to?

We need a complete realignment.  We need heroes.  For more than one day.

Jobs taking the stage today is bigger than any Rolling Stones tour, even bigger than McCartney.  That’s what we like in America, a comeback.  But usually, it’s a tribute concert, an endless round of hype with very little substance.  Secretive Steve Jobs, like a rock star of yore, has released almost no information, we didn’t even know he was going to do this show, and he stood on stage and performed, utilizing his classic aphorisms, his well-known style.

We like things that can last.  That we can own for decades, not fads.  But the music business just sells momentary crap.  Or endless repackagings of what came before, what meant something once.

Steve Jobs’ appearance today is the biggest story in the world.

When was a record even close to that?