I just finished reading the Millennium Trilogy.

It wasn’t easy.  Richard Griffiths had to send me the "The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets’ Nest" from the U.K.  It was six hundred pages long.  But I savored every line.  As I was introduced to a new world that was eerily similar to my own.  Because, as Depeche Mode once sang, people are people.

Mikael Blomkvist is all about the work.  He may get laid in the midst of his passion, but romance will not get in the way of his pursuit.  For truth, justice and what we used to call the "American Way".  Something Tea Partiers have bastardized to the point where socialistic Sweden is closer to what we used to be than their vision for the future.  One in which we live in a society where everyone is included and the government makes sure no individual gets an unfair advantage.

Lisbeth Salander is an outcast, an outsider.  No different from the pierced, tattooed denizens making up the audience at a punk show.  Desirous of playing it their way, skeptical of anyone who wants them to conform, who wants them to play by their rules.

Well, this was before today’s punks went home after the show and wrote software to become rich and famous on their laptops.  Actually, Salander does become rich utilizing her computer skills. But fame?  No, she’s lurking behind the scenes, like a real artist.

A real artist doesn’t do it for public adulation.  If the unwashed masses love you, then what you’re doing can’t be too good, can’t be very edgy, can’t be testing too many limits.  Great art makes people uncomfortable, yet ultimately draws them in.  The Beatles were laughed at in America, they sounded nothing like Elvis or the Four Seasons.  Then, suddenly, seemingly overnight, people threw off their mental constructs and embraced the four lads from Liverpool.  They were born to follow…young men who were not restricted by convention.  John Lennon was chastised by oldsters for stating the obvious, that the band was bigger than Jesus.  Isn’t it interesting that we remember him and his work yet not his detractors…

Stieg Larsson, author of the Millennium Trilogy, died before its publication.  Do you get that?  He wrote three books alone at night, not wondering all the while why he didn’t have more Facebook friends or Twitter followers.  He wasn’t checking his bank account, he was following his passion. The passion of people who call themselves artists today is too often for riches and fame, not utmost personal expression.  An artist does it for the work, too many of today’s "stars" do it for the aftereffects of the work.

In today’s L.A. "Times" there’s a story about the infiltration of corporations in music.  If you think this is the future, you’re probably sucking at the tit.  You too, want to get paid.  That’s what’s wrong with too many agents, too many middlemen brokering corporate deals, they say they’re about the music, but really, they’re about the money.  Do you really want to trust these people?

Who do you want to trust?

Lennon said he could only believe in Yoko and himself.  That’s the essence of an artist.  You can’t believe in the label or the promoter.  They’re necessary evils.  But their interests are not aligned.  You are the creator, they are the exploiter.  So you end up with Clive Davis telling you how you should make your music to please him.  That’s like having Mickey Rourke over your shoulder telling you how to screw.

Maybe you don’t get that reference.  How Mr. Rourke supposedly had fourteen women in one night.  It was all over the Web last week.  Just like GaGa shopping in that ridiculous outfit.  And the exploits and meanderings of too many little-talented but ultra-famous.

And then we’ve got the OK Go Rube Goldberg video.  An incredible achievement sponsored by State Farm Insurance.  Is this a victory or a loss?

In the world of music, it’s a loss.  Because if the underlying song, whose name escapes me, was that good, we’d already know it, and certainly remember it after seeing the clip.  Unfortunately, the clip was more creative than the music.  Damian Kulash’s expertise seems to be as a performance artist more than a musician.  And that’s fine, but what about the music?

And there was some more hype about Phoenix in today’s "New York Times".  But at least the music led the way there.  SNL wanted the band because it heard the new record, not because Procter & Gamble threw its weight behind the foursome.

It’s hard to put an ad in a book.

No, let’s restate that.  It doesn’t work too well.  Or, most companies won’t pony up, unless the author is already ubiquitous, and then the company’s money isn’t needed.  The book stands alone.  What makes the Millennium Trilogy work is the work itself.  The writing.

Stieg Larsson sketched out a landscape of events, with assorted characters and motivations. Unlike "Avatar", the key wasn’t the surface, but what was underneath.  Today mainstream art is about the sheen.  But it used to be different.  Used to be art was edgy and oftentimes ugly.  And the conflagration surrounding it brought the mainstream to it.  And that’s quite a difference.  One is made for a market, the other creates a market.

Used to be it was almost impossible to get attention.  When Andy Warhol uttered the famous aphorism, the average punter could not get on TV, not even in the newspaper.  But now people put themselves and their wares up on MySpace and YouTube and expect endless attention and adulation.  When most of us shrug.  Because there’s no reason to pay attention.  Unless you’re Tila Tequila showing us your boobs and alternately claiming pregnancy and miscarriage

I kept hearing good things about "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo".  I saw it seeping into the public consciousness.  I checked it out.  Over a year after it was released in America.  Ever play last year’s pop hits?  They sound as dated as a Pinto.

And when I entered the world, I was alone.  Just like I was listening to great records in my bedroom.  There was no club I could go to to try and chase women while someone read from the book in the background.  I was drawn in, gave up my regular life to read, in thrall to the work.

"The Girl Who Played With Fire" wasn’t quite as good.  Because it ended abruptly.  Little did I know its loose ends would be picked up in the third edition…

It was like following a band.  You’re dedicated.  You wade through the morass, buy the not as great second album to get to the third.  Because the band is on a mission, of exploration. Reaching for the Holy Grail of expressing themselves, of their art.

Music will be relevant once again when it is purveyed by people like Stieg Larsson.  Doing it not for the fame, but the experience.

Do not confuse GaGa and Lucian Grainge and all the other tools trying to make a buck with music.  That’s commerce.  And no wonder big corporations want to play along.  That’s what they want, money.  No corporation wants to be involved with something unknown, edgy and dangerous.  It can’t risk its reputation.  Whereas all the artist has is his reputation.  So he won’t do one thing that compromises it either.  Even after he’s made it.  Because the audience knows.

All of America is a sham.  Because the media and the politicians make like the audience doesn’t know.  It does.  It knows that the Democrats are almost as bad as the Republicans and Obama can’t lead and you can’t trust Fox News.  And the story of the decade is how the Internet is undermining the establishment and the old institutions can’t cope.  That’s you, "New York Times". To think that a newspaper should be relevant in 2010 is to believe that we should all be driving Model T’s and using electric typewriters.  Times change.  And you need to change with them.

And like I said, the people have changed.  They know the music on the hit parade is vapid, evanescent and insignificant.  They know who’s selling out.  They know, like Frank Zappa claimed, most people are only in it for the money.  And they also know, just because you know how to use GarageBand and are hawking your music, that doesn’t mean it’s worth listening to.

Everybody wants to be famous.  Everybody wants to party with the Hiltons and the Kardashians. Everybody wants to be atop the pecking order.  As if we could truly live in Lake Wobegon, where all the children are above average.

But this is untrue.  There are winners and losers in the world.  And great artists speak of both. They don’t tell us about their exotic lifestyles, in song and on TV, they speak about honest emotions, heartbreak and financial ruin.  Because this is the fabric of America.

Sure, there are entertainments that provide escape.

But what we draw close to our bosom, and what truly lasts, is the unsullied honesty of the lifer, someone doing it because he has to, because he’s got to get his message across, who will continue even if no one is paying attention.  And believe you me, when most of today’s failed "artists" realize no one cares, they jump ship immediately, into marketing something else. Because it’s not about the music.  It’s never about the music.  And to be valid, to be interesting, to draw us away from our smartphones and PlayStations and flat screens, it’s got to solely be about the music.  No dancing, no playing to hard drive, just expression, warts and all.

That’s "Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives" to the uninitiated.

Food porn.  That’s what the Food Network is.  And it’s SO successful Scripps is dialing up another outlet, the Cooking Channel

Another Cable Helping for Food Lovers

You see the public just can’t get enough.

Yes, that used to be a famous Depeche Mode song, from an era when music was king on TV.  Now food rules.  It’s like we’ve closed the door on Woodstock, everyone’s laid down his guitar and picked up a frying pan and is innovating like crazy.

And you can see some amazing dishes on the other Food Network shows.  But I love the cuisine on Triple-D.  Not only because it’s basic and understandable, but because of the raw creativity of cooks who are doing it not to become famous, not to franchise into billionairedom, but to satisfy their coterie of customers, who are thrilled to the point where they contact Guy Fieri and tell him he’s got to visit their favorite joint.

Cheeseburger soup.  That was one of the specialties at the roadside establishment Mr. Fieri visited the other night.  Upon tasting it, Guy said…"Tastes just like cheeseburgers!"

Mmm…  Made me want to fire up my car and go.

Hell, screw going to see Bon Jovi one more time, I’d bet more people would sign up for a bus tour schlepping them from one of Triple-D’s haunts to another.  It wouldn’t be about social stratification, everybody would walk into the dive and partake just like everybody else. Oohing and ahhing…  What do they say, we all put our pants on the same way?  Well, we all eat the same way too, it’s a common denominator.

Not amongst the stars.  They don’t eat at all.  Their public does.  Which is one reason why no one can relate to today’s stars.  Who’s got the time to work out six hours a day and then walk around lightheaded on celery?  In other words, there’s more honesty on Triple-D than any show on MTV.  I’d rather own the Food Network than the outlet that dropped "Music Television" from its name any day.

But the reason I’m writing this is because the cooks, and they don’t need to be called chefs, and many aren’t trained whatsoever, are endless fountains of creativity.  The way local bands used to be.

Going to music school?  Shit, our favorites never walked the halls.  They listened to a ton of records, they practiced ad infinitum, at first copying legends and then making up their own sound.

And there were a zillion different sounds.  Everybody didn’t sound alike.  Hell, dial up today’s Top Forty radio, you’ve got no idea who the acts are, and it doesn’t even matter.  And it’s not much different in country radio either.  There are rules.  Ain’t that ridiculous, music was about BREAKING RULES!

These cooks are breaking rules left and right.  Experimenting.  You’re drawn to them and their food, you want to visit their establishments, the same way you used to be addicted to FM radio and needed to go see these bands live.

Yup, you now go to a concert once a year.  But you go out to eat on a regular basis.  It’s cheap theater.  Everyone partakes.  The way live music used to be.  Before music became about beats with inane, oftentimes misogynistic, lyrics dolloped on top.

People know what a great restaurant is.  They can’t stop talking about it, they bring their friends, tell acquaintances they need to go, the same way they used to testify about bands.  Sure, people still testify about music, but music no longer drives the culture, because most people see it as faux, evanescent entertainment that is ultimately meaningless.  And who’d go to a restaurant with only one good dish? Sure, an establishment like that could do some business, but in order to succeed EVERYTHING on the menu’s got to be good.  And at the Triple-D places, they are.

Used to be you percolated in your own backyard, established a sound that your neighborhood became addicted to, and then word spread. Now you go on "American Idol" to try to win the sweepstakes overnight.  And winning ain’t what it used to be.

You’ve got to be in it for the music.  You’ve got to love to explore.  You’ve got to be willing to take chances.  You’ve got to do it for the smiles on the faces of fans you know the names of, not for the unknown teeming masses.  It’s got to be personal.  Because we like nothing more than what speaks to us, what makes us feel human.

You know the feeling of eating something you’ve never thought of that knocks your socks off, that makes your taste buds roar in delight? That’s what hearing a great record should feel like.  Sure, it may be reminiscent of what came before, but ultimately it’s totally unique, you couldn’t even contemplate the sound before you experienced it.  Like hearing Marvin Gaye’s "Sexual Healing" or Gnarls Barkley’s "Crazy" the very first time.

It’s got to be more about the individual and less about the corporation.  Major players in music want it their way, when the renaissance will only come when the players do it THEIR WAY!

Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives

The closing ceremonies, hell, the entire coverage of the Olympics seemed to be made for a customer that doesn’t exist, who lived back in the pre-Internet days, when the fact that NBC broadcast in color was enough to satiate those stuck in front of screens without clickers, sentenced to watching endless commercials or forced to get up off the couch to switch to one of two other networks.

We were supposed to have sympathy for NBC, after all, they were losing millions bringing us the games.  Ain’t that America, where the public is beholden to corporations who pay no tax yet demand sympathy, as their lobbyists keep the government’s hands off of them and they wine and dine luxuriously in private while walking around in public with their pockets turned out.

Hell, the final hockey game was great theater.  Because unlike the lame "Marriage Ref" which preempted the remainder of Canada’s party, sports are not scripted.  We revel in the drama.

But it was hard to revel in the musical performances closing the games.  Reminded me of nothing so much as one of those variety shows back in the sixties, Perry Como or some such dreck appealing to an older generation that was one step from the grave mentally, if not physically.

And then it’s over.  The IOC bureaucrat declares the games history, and a gray-haired gentleman wearing a hat takes center ice and sings a thirty five year old song that’s more poignant than any of Bob Costas’ commentary, more insightful than any post competition press conference.  Yes, Neil Young sang "Long May You Run".

We’ve been through
Some things together

That’s the true Olympic spirit.  Not the thrill of victory so much as the mingling amongst peers.  That’s almost gone today, in an era where the home country keeps competitors off the course so they can gain an advantage.  But as years go by, and no one remembers your name, never mind that you won, your memories of the event will remain.  That’s what life is about, experiences.

With trunks of memories
Still to come

Believe me, Bode and Lindsey are going to be competing on the World Cup circuit momentarily.  And the rest of us…we’ve got to wait another four years for the Olympics, which seems too long.  But that’s what life is…  Events that come, then go.  You must keep on keepin’ on.

We found things to do
In stormy weather
Long may you run

Holding the Olympics in Vancouver is like AC/DC playing a closet.  Makes no sense.  Have you ever been to Whistler?  I’ve experienced every one of those conditions there.  Rain, fog, snow…  Never mind the snow-less Cypress.

Conventional wisdom is you can’t risk a fuck-up, you’ve got to sing to tape.  And last night some of the vocalists were so far from the track, they should immediately contact Ashlee Simpson to learn how to fake it.  They’re fooling nobody.  The whole thing is bogus.  The games have devolved into sheer commercialism, with cities looking for a longstanding tourism boost and the IOC as corrupt as the Major League. Sure, they say bribes are history, but do you really think drugs are gone from baseball?  We live in a world where you smile as you rape and pillage, and when you’re caught, your excuse is everybody else is doing it.

Our morals, our national character is all screwed up.  We’ve got Republicans stating that health care reform is taboo, all the while insisting to their constituents that Medicare is untouchable.  As for the Democrats?  They used to be the party of the people, now they’re ineffective corporate toys.  Our system is broken.  We need a way out.

That’s what artists used to provide.  A beacon, uncompromised by money and all that corrupts the average citizen.  Yes, a great artist is willing to starve, he sees no other option than to express himself, to seek truth.  What passes for artistry today is commercialism, playing by the rules in order to get a payoff at the end.  It’s like they moved the music business to Vegas, and everybody wants a chance to push the button on the slot machine.  And if they lose, they bitch.

We’ve got a country addicted to playing the lottery, too dumb to know that it’s a tax on the poor, that winning ruins your life anyway, since everybody wants a handout and no one ever treats you the same again.

And then we’ve got one lone man.  Who’s still making music long after David Geffen accused him of recording tripe.  A man who has always followed his instincts.  Hell, after recording "Long May You Run" Neil Young bolted from his scheduled tour with Stephen Stills…it just didn’t feel right.

That’s what an artist does, go with his feelings.

Last night Neil Young sang live.  He reached my heart like none of the smiling athletes parading by were able to.  A day later, he’s just about the only thing I remember.

Because real artists are unforgettable.  Whether they’ve got one hit or dozens.  They reach down deep and excavate feelings we know but cannot express.  Hell, the Left Banke’s "Walk Away Renee" captures teenage wistfulness better than any record today.  Hell, isn’t that the problem, kids are no longer wistful, they’re too busy writing iPhone apps!

Neil Young did it his way.  And what’s remarkable is when an artist gets it right, their way is our way.

Long may you run.

At the end of the first season of "The Osbournes", Kelly and Jack are riding in the back seat when they drive by McDonald’s and Jack suddenly implores Kelly to look, the McRib is back!  When his sister is unimpressed, Jack ends up telling Kelly it’s the little things in life, like Bode Miller winning the gold medal in the Super-Combined.

In today’s "New York Times", there’s a compendium of stories about people who’ve lost their jobs during the recession, who’ve faced financial difficulty and have had to make dramatic turns to survive, if that.  There’s also a piece by Thomas Friedman about a town that charges $300 for a 911 call.  Nothing’s free anymore.  We live in a world of diminished expectations.  We’re being nickel and dimed to death, just start filling the parking meter to get up to speed.

Then there are the trivialities.  The product that suddenly breaks with no warning, that is necessary to your everyday life.  The traffic jam that makes you late for an appointment.  But it’s the little things that ultimately put a smile on your face, that keep you going.

Because nothing is big enough to last.  No gold medal, no sexual encounter, no momentary event can keep you going forever, in order to remain optimistic you must experience a steady stream of uppers, that may not make you stand up and say hell yeah, but will certainly put a smile on your face.

That’s the human condition.  In the face of adversity, you focus on the good things.  You hop from one good thing to another, like crossing a river by jumping from stone to stone.

I’ve been following Bode Miller since the last century.  When he started producing good results on K2, which hadn’t made a decent racing ski since the 80’s.  Bode switched to Rossignol and won two medals in Salt Lake, unexpected by anybody but the devoted.  Hell, I’ll always remember him putting his ass to the snow and STILL winning.  Because victory isn’t always pretty.  Only in Hollywood do people believe that perfection is the way to riches.  It’s our imperfections that make us lovable.

But Bode was pretty perfect in a sport that denies this.  He won races in all five events, the World Cup, even skied an entire run at the World Championships on one ski after losing the other.  He was not a machine, but a human being.  Who could laugh.  Something that’s been absent from the U.S. Ski Team since the days of Bob Beattie, who believed only by overconditioning could his charges triumph.

Jimmy Heuga and Billy Kidd succeeded, but we never had a dominant racer until Bode.  Someone the Europeans feared in every discipline.

But the Ski Team was like America.  Conformity comes before success.  And Bode didn’t conform.

Eventually they parted ways, and Bode went on to further triumph, winning the World Cup again after the disaster in Torino.

There’s no use revisiting it.  We can comb through historical details, but all I can say is in Turin America was suddenly paying attention, and Bode didn’t deliver.  And America is all about winners.

But today Bode Miller delivered.

He came from behind, three quarters of a second out.

As Bode’s aged, he’s become a speed skier, he needed to win the downhill portion of the Super-Combined to stay competitive.  I couldn’t follow on the Web.  Although he triumphed in the tight-turning slalom earlier in his career, Bode was now famous for not even finishing.  He’d have to push and he’d probably ski out.

But that’s not what happened.  Bode pushed and won!  He put it all on the line and blew them all away!  I turned on my computer and there he was, smiling in triumph.

And I let out a yell,  I smiled, a day fraught with problems became sunny and bright, despite the rain pouring down.

Bode never let me down.

But now he proved to everybody else that he was a winner.  That you didn’t have to be the smiling idiot of Jackson Browne’s "Pretender" in order to succeed, going for the gold to placate everybody but yourself.

Ski racing is a very individual sport.  But Bode’s triumph today was not singular.  It was for all of us.  It showed us you can come back from adversity, not by denying yourself, by apologizing, by admitting your mistakes, but by doubling down, staying in the game and showing everybody what you’ve got.

Don’t operate with one hand behind your back.  Put it all out there.  Let your freak flag fly.  We want you.  Rough edges and all.