It’s a moral issue.

I was brought up with the notion that people knew, if they were elected to top positions, if they ran the corporation, they were skilled with insight.

This has not turned out to be true.

This is what Washington has wrought. We’ve now learned that everybody is human, everybody screws up, and even the most educated and talented have blind spots and those with blind spots can often supersede those who know.

It’s inspiring and disillusioning. It’s inspiring because it demonstrates I can compete, the playing field is level, those in power, those with status positions, are truly no better than me. But it’s disillusioning because chaos reigns, there is truly no there there, what holds America together is a very thin thread. We’ve been living under the fallacy that we’re all connected through a moral fabric, we’re all in it for the common good, that truth and justice will out.

That’s no longer true.

Let’s start with Clinton. Hell, let’s start with Gary Hart. Rumor was he was having an affair. He said no, to follow him, and then they caught him in the act. What was Hart thinking, that he was truly immune? Clinton had a reputation as a playboy. A reasonable person would keep his penis in his pants for his term. But it turns out Clinton couldn’t, he was no different from the guy running the local machine shop or manufacturing plant, taking advantage of his position, not worrying about social mores. But was Clinton’s behavior so egregious that he should be kicked out of office? I won’t walk you through the details, but it’s clear the Republicans were out to get him, and if getting a blow job and lying about it means you lose your job…women would run the Fortune 500.

And Clinton’s election coincided with the rise of Newt Gingrich, who turned politics into a zero sum game. Either you win or I win. No different from Monopoly, or Careers. Compromise was out the window.

And then Roger Stone got Bush elected via the Brooks Brothers riot.

A black man became president.

And then it all imploded.

Now I get the Republican position, they’re playing a team sport. But this is not what everybody was taught about politics growing up. Politics was for the greater good. And if someone crossed the line, they were excised. Now you can break the law, brag about it, and keep on ruling, more powerful than ever, can you say “Ukraine”?

Don’t argue with me. That’s not the point. Don’t quote Fox talking points. Yesterday, they cut away from the impeachment process. Their talking heads were more important, after all, ratings are everything, and what someone is not exposed to they do not know. This would have never happened in the three network era. But that era is long gone.

Later I listened to Mark Levin spew his inanities on Sean Hannity’s show. The Democrats were stupid and laughable. There was no respect, no decency. And sure, those concepts went out the window eons ago, but my point is what impact does this have on Fox fans?

Oh, don’t quote the false equivalencies, Russian collusion, Benghazi… As for Russian collusion, turns out Bill Barr got out ahead of the Mueller Report and Robert Mueller himself punted.

But let’s not get caught up in the past.

Now we have video evidence. Of a Capitol riot. What we’re hearing from the right is no one is responsible but the rioters themselves, they operated in a vacuum and Trump is not culpable. So, you tell me my eyes are lying?

As for the legal defense of the ex-president… The founder of the Federalist Society said the impeachment was legal, and those who haven’t gone to law school don’t realize that everybody, every criminal, is entitled to a defense…but that does not make them innocent.

Come on, you see it in the news every day. Outrageous claims that should exculpate behavior.

But what stresses me out, has me wondering, is the future. Yes, if those at the top lie and get away with it, WHY SHOULD I TELL THE TRUTH!

This is the America we now live in. Only the poor get caught and get incarcerated because there are security cameras everywhere and they can’t afford good lawyers. As for white collar criminals? Hire good enough attorneys and you can delay to the point where the prosecutor at the government leaves his post, and maybe a friend of yours gets elected and can make it all go away.

It’s all about gangs and who you know. Is there any wonder we’ve got gangs in the inner cities? There’s no future for these people, no money for training, many join the gang just to survive. And if you’re a rapper, you may get shot. We don’t live in the wild west anymore, but maybe we do! Westerns used to be fantasies, now they’re realities.

So what do these senators who refuse to convict Trump say to their friends, their families, their heirs? Well, it’s not radically different from what a member of the Crips or the Bloods would say… I was forced into it, if I went against the gang I’d lose my job, maybe even worse. And without money and power you become a second-class citizen who is forgotten.

So what lesson are we teaching further generations?

You’re on your own baby. Do not trust institutions. Everybody is out to get you if you raise your head above the fray, and it’s important to build your team to fight them. Loyalty is everything, truth is out the window.

Lying in court? EVERYBODY DOES IT! Used to be taboo, now it’s de rigueur.

“Nearly 140 police officers were injured in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, according to the Capitol Police union. Officers suffered brain injuries, smashed spinal discs, and cracked ribs, and one is likely to lose his eye. Two officers have committed suicide.”

NBCNews.com via “The Week”

I thought the right was the party of the police. But what do you say to the injured, the dead and their families? That their efforts were in vain? That it was nobody’s fault and they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time on the wrong day and these are the risks you take?

When a building collapses we hold the contractors accountable. But when it comes to politicians, everything’s up for grabs, how good a team do you have, one as good as the Yankees, the Buccaneers?

Accountability itself is up for grabs.

And the truth is that Trump lied incessantly during his tenure, loyal news outlets refused to correct him and people are completely misinformed as to what went on. But ignorance is a badge of honor these days. You’re not from some highfalutin’ family, you didn’t go to college, no, you stay at home and drink beer and…how exactly do you pay the bills, wages are so damn low! Or else you’re a Christian conservative, an upper middle class nitwit protecting your right not to sacrifice, not to lose anything in this game we call life. But there are no guarantees, nothing is future-proof. They make no more Pontiacs, Oldsmobiles either. Kodak is a shell of itself. What, are we supposed to hold back progress so some people don’t get hurt? YES! You hear this argument again and again, in life, in business, give me protection from the future, hold the ingrates back, it’s not only white supremacists who rig the game. What do you think all those lobbyists are about?

And the establishment media tells us to lionize Sheryl Sandberg when she’s a fount of misinformation and misdirection. Facebook was an insignificant driver of the January 6th insurrection. OH YEAH? They expect us to buy all this crap. They know they’re lying when their lips move. But since they’re so rich and powerful they can get away with it. Hell, Zuckerberg himself is willing to throw our privacy under the bus to save small businesses, even though this in itself is a falsehood. Turns out small businesses are a very small part of Facebook’s advertising base. But Apple wants to protect people and this just can’t happen, Facebook must survive, operate unfettered.

And then there’s the case of Twitter. Wall Street is down on the company because it’s just not growing fast enough, as if that was the only criterion, the only measure of success. And then the naysayers say Twitter is not America…then why was Trump on it? During the window between the inauguration and the impeachment trial did you notice Trump was nearly completely out of the news? And you wonder why…he couldn’t spew his falsehoods on social media!

Today they shut down Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. for spewing vaccine falsehoods, debunked evidence, on Instagram. But we’re supposed to respect this idiot, because he’s a Kennedy! Like Bush got elected president because his father was president.

America is truly rotten at the core. No one is interested in doing the right thing, sacrificing their own self-interest, putting themselves at the end of the line. And when senators do this in plain sight, with the cameras on, the fabric of America frays. And rust never sleeps. We can’t teach evolution in schools, it’s like we’re pulling the hood over America, to keep it in darkness, as it isolates itself from the rest of the world believing it can go it alone when the truth today is NO country in the world can go it alone.

One could hope that Republican senators will wake up and do the right thing, but hope is now hopeless. The game is rigged before you start. Yes, the evidence the House managers are giving is irrelevant. The Republicans don’t want their faces shown on camera, a slew are not even paying attention, their minds were made up before the trial even began!

Expand upon that. You were arrested and when you get to court you realize it doesn’t matter what the evidence is, you’re gonna get convicted.

And then there are people like Springsteen, who gets drunk and drives. So let me get this straight, everybody in these United States is perfect and if you commit a faux pas you’re history forever? You can’t learn from your mistakes? As for Morgan Wallen…he’s in the penalty box, we’ve got to let him out at some point, otherwise it just demonstrates cancel culture knows no limits, no boundaries, never mind none of the focus on Wallen’s behavior was why the country star was out partying with his boys during Covid anyway! No, that’s not sexy, but that’s bad behavior!

But science is no longer facts. The virus leaked out of a lab in Wuhan. Masks and vaccines don’t work. Just go on about your business, you’re safe. And if it turns out you weren’t, well, too bad. Scientists say if everybody in America wore a mask the virus would be gone in two weeks. But no, we’d rather argue about freedom for two years.

But if your parents defended you against the principal…

If your daddy got you your job…

If your bros covered up your bad behavior…

WHY SHOULD THINGS CHANGE NOW!

Almost fifty years ago, John Dean claimed there was a cancer on the presidency. Nixon resigned? BECAUSE REPUBLICAN SENATORS TOLD HIM TO!

But now everything is topsy-turvy. And we’ve let things fester and slide for so long that the cancer has spread throughout our nation. But just like climate change, it cannot be addressed. Government is a team sport, there is no such thing as the common good.

Actions have consequences.

Don’t parrot legal mumbo-jumbo. If Trump gets off, our nation will be the worse for it. Truth and justice will be gone, the American Way completely eviscerated. BUT WE’VE GOT OUR FREEDOM!

PERSEVERANCE

It takes longer than ever to make it. If you are not in it for the long haul, don’t even start.

YOU CAN PLAY BUT THAT DOES NOT MEAN YOU CAN WIN

The barrier to entry has never been lower, but the odds of getting noticed and growing have also never been lower.

YOU WILL NOT BECOME A HOUSEHOLD NAME

No one is anymore. Unless maybe you’re president or a tech billionaire. You may want to increase the size of your audience, but there’s absolutely no way you can reach everybody.

HATE

Once you have some success, you will have people taking you down online. Be prepared.

STUNTS MAY NOT GET YOU NOTICED

Used to be you could make a flashy video, perform some outrageous stunt and you’d get publicity and you’d be on your way. Today, the internet is an ongoing flashy stunt machine, can you say TikTok? Best to focus on the underlying art as opposed to the marketing.

MARKETING

You can have a campaign with a lot of tear sheets that ultimately reaches no one, has no effect.

NEWSPAPERS

Are worthless unless you’re appealing to an older demo, the younger, more active audience just doesn’t read them. Local newspapers have never meant less. Subscription levels keep decreasing. So you can send the article to your mother but you won’t be any further down the road to success.

PRACTICE

In an era where everybody can do it, those who can do it well have a leg up. Furthermore, in an era where everything is easy, where the computer tools help you, being able to perform at a high level in the offline world is notable. You can fake it online, you can’t fake it off, at least not without tech. In an era dominated more and more by machines, it’s the human that translates. If you learn how to play an instrument, or paint, or do anything which is not easy, eventually people notice. They’re awed because there are so few skilled at your level.

INSPIRATION NOT SKILLS

Inspiration is the basis of great art. Period. Without it you have something inert that does not affect people. Inspiration usually happens in a flash. The key is to act on it immediately, and don’t let in your naysayer voice or outsider criticism. When you’re inspired, you capture the zeitgeist. It’s all about catching lightning in a bottle. You know it when you do it, but it happens very infrequently, usually when you’re not even working.

LIVE A LIFE

Otherwise you have nothing to build upon, nothing to say.

THERE ARE NO RULES IN ART

You can get up at noon, you can work five minutes a day… Artists channel the world so the rest of the public can understand it.

YOUR GOAL IS TO BE SELF-SUSTAINING

There are no longer any markers that definitively say you’ve made it. No record deal, no TV appearance. You have to learn to be happy with the success you have, not the success you dreamed about.

ART FIRST MONEY SECOND

People can tell. They know what you’re all about, what you’re in it for. There’s commerce and then there’s art. There can be money in commerce, but don’t confuse it with art. Art touches people, art lasts.

WHAT’S HATED TODAY IS LOVED TOMORROW AND VICE VERSA

You have to adhere to your own inner tuning fork. If you compromise and do it their way chances are your work will lose its essence. Sure, the Beatles were loved by critics in their era. But not Led Zeppelin. Which never changed its sound to satiate critics.

CRITICS

It used to be a small club based on access and free records and tickets. Today everybody has access and everybody’s a critic, so criticism means less than ever before. Furthermore, don’t pay attention to any criticism made by someone who doesn’t love your work or genre to begin with. Who cares what a critic of Renaissance art has to say about abstract expressionism.

YOU’RE THE ONLY ONE ON YOUR TEAM

Culture has changed. Nobody’s in it for the long haul, everybody’s in it for themselves, everybody wants money and they want it now. As a result, you’ll get a plethora of bad advice, mostly in the vein of do this now because everybody else is.

CONSTANT CREATION

You must be creating work on a regular basis, so that fans can keep up with you constantly, otherwise you’re forgotten. Don’t shoot the messenger, this is the reality. If you’re waiting years to debut your work you’re laboring under the fiction that people are eagerly waiting for its delivery. There are a few fans who feel this way, most people have moved on, because there are so many options/choices in the marketplace. You have to be really special for people to be waiting for your pearls of wisdom with bated breath. And if you believe mainstream publicity can bridge this gap you’re wrong. Tom Wolfe’s “Bonfire of the Vanities,” his first and most successful fiction work, was serialized in “Rolling Stone” before publication.

SOCIAL MEDIA IS A CHOICE

The goal is to deliver a large enough audience that their chatter sustains your career. If part of your art is social media, interacting with your fans, go for it. But if it is not, don’t. But, at the beginning, you’re going to have to play this game, you’re going to have to participate.

INVITE DON’T FORCE

No one wants anything jammed down their throat today, everybody is overscheduled, it’s a privilege to be able to gain someone’s attention and time. Don’t hammer, don’t chide, don’t say you’ve delivered the best thing since sliced bread, be warm and open, invite, so that tastemakers will be interested in checking you out and spreading the word.

GROWTH

If it’s not happening, you’re doing it wrong. Or you’ve been too afraid to play, to allow your work/career to grow. You’ve got to post your work online. It doesn’t matter if it’s imperfect, if it’s unfinished, just by participating you will improve and this will make more people stick to you.

VIRALITY

Happens very very slowly. Almost under the radar. Once or twice a year something blows up virally nearly instantly. And most of these have a short shelf life.

GENRE

There are no channels. Do whatever you want. Sure, some types of creative work have a larger built-in audience than others, but now, more than any time in history, the world is open to anything, you can grow an audience for anything. Don’t shave off the edges to grow your career, it’s the edges that hook people.

YESTERDAY’S HEROES

Can succeed on the nostalgia circuit, but barely have a leg up online. Your name gets you entry, but the work decides whether you get traction or not.

BITCHING AGAINST THE SYSTEM

Is positively fruitless. It’s a waste of energy. Furthermore, there’s this canard that there is an impenetrable system that is working against you. How can this be where anybody can post for free on YouTube or SoundCloud and for a de minimis price on streaming services like Spotify and Apple? You have a bigger chance than ever before. The system is working for you!

DON’T PAY ATTENTION TO THE SCUTTLEBUTT/NEWS

Successful people rarely bitch. It’s only the unsuccessful, used to be successful and wannabes who spend their time complaining endlessly, it’s easier than creating great work. Furthermore, most people writing in major news outlets have no real understanding of how the system truly functions, nor does the government. And the more people bitch, the more systems operators retreat from view, because there just can’t be a rational discussion based on facts. Mob mentality rules today, as well as misinformation, don’t be a victim of falsehood.

THE INTERNET IS THE MEANS

You create the end. Computers and the internet are your toolkit, mix and match and innovate. Some of the greatest products of all time were mistakes. And some of the greatest sounds in music history were created by people playing with equipment in the studio, oftentimes contrary to instructions by the manufacturers and the poohbahs.

YOU’VE GOT TO LOVE IT

It’s a long hard road and success might be long in coming, or it might not come at all. Anybody who’s a legend contemplated giving up at one point.

MEANS TO AN END

If your art is a way to get rich, to become a brand, sell clothing and tchotchkes…that paradigm does exist, but it’s very different from creating art. Creating art takes all your time. You’ve got to experience, you’ve got to distill, you’ve got to polish…it’s a full time job. Today money is paramount, most respected, but never confuse that with art. In a world where everybody can’t get rich, in a world where no one is as big as they think they are, in a world where the public is searching for soul fulfillment…art is king.

Tune in tomorrow, February 9th, to Volume 106, 7 PM East, 4 PM West.

Phone #: 844-6-VOLUME, 844-686-5863

Twitter: @lefsetz or @siriusxmvolume/#lefsetzlive

Hear the episode live on SiriusXM VOLUME: siriusxm.us/HearLefsetzLive

If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app: siriusxm.us/LefsetzLive

Never was so much spent on so little.

You rise to the occasion. Getting the gig is one thing, delivering is another. And it’s not as simple as performing, art is all about conception, and the Weeknd seems to have ceded his entire production to third parties and in the process lost control of his art. It was almost like we still live in the pre-internet era, when MTV ruled and if you didn’t spend money and dance you couldn’t make an impact, but those days are through. Contrary to mainstream disinformation this decade is about the niches, the triumphs away from the Spotify Top 50. Never has music been a bigger tent.

Name recognition. That’s why you play the Super Bowl. It’s not so much a notch in your belt as a step in growing your fan base. Usually tickets go on sale right after the performance, striking when the iron is hot, but there are no shows now and the Weeknd wasted his opportunity, in one flash he made the rest of the world outside the music industry bubble realize how big he is, but he didn’t come close to closing them, at best you could shrug. My inbox is filling up with those who were non-plussed and disappointed, how could this travesty be presented? Sure, football is a spectacle, and music can be too, but oftentimes the bigger you make it the smaller it becomes, whereas that which is tiny and precious triumphs. Like H.E.R.’s rendition of “America the Beautiful.”

Most people have no idea who she is. But she sang the song like she owned it, like she’d written it, and it wasn’t only her vocal, it was her guitar-playing that wowed and made you pay attention, her performance stuck with you as the game progressed, a game hobbled by penalties…thank god there are no penalties in music, music is about being pure, distilling it all to an uncompromised essence, like H.E.R. did tonight.

We’ve gotten too far from the garden. We’ve become focused on stars as opposed to music. Money rules and it cannot be contradicted. If someone is successful you can’t criticize them. I think it’s ridiculous that the Weeknd wasn’t nominated in the big Grammy categories, but I can’t say his music is memorable, that it moves the needle, never mind the football, especially when he started working with producers-du-jour who homogenized his sound, sawed off the edges in pursuit of consumption. Yes, the Weeknd is now safe.

We want to be wowed, we want to take notice, we want to be able to tell everybody about it, we want to FEEL SOMETHING!

That’s one thing that separates human beings from other species, we have feelings. And we live to be touched, otherwise it’s just drudgery. And sure, one can be moved by athletic performance, but not as much as music, which when done right comes from the soul and transfers the message, the feeling, into the listener. I can try to explain H.E.R.’s magic, but it can’t compete with what I felt, like I’d been remiss in not paying her much attention previously, that not only was she talented, she played like she owned the place. That’s how Prince owned the Super Bowl, he was bequeathing his music, his material, to everybody watching, both in the stands and on TV. Can you remember who competed, never mind who won? OF COURSE NOT! Can you remember the production? NOT REALLY! All you remember is Prince wailing on the guitar and reaching you in a  way no one else ever has in this setting, you had no choice but to take notice.

Funny that America’s game is hobbled by penalties. This is why soccer, the rest of the world’s football, is superior. It’s just like life, make too many rules and people become dispirited and innovation wanes. But if you set people free you’ll be amazed what they’ll do.

And H.E.R. was set free tonight.

So expect further travesties at halftime at the Super Bowl. Bigger and better. But intimate is what really triumphs these days. It’s the key to social media, the more money you put into it the fewer the rewards. We want to see YOU, not the trappings. Which is why you can spend a fortune on a music video and it still stiffs in the marketplace, because that paradigm hasn’t really mattered since PSY, and that was years ago.

And Lil Nas X triumphed on TikTok. And it was the song that generated the videos. The public embraced it and expanded upon it. People want to be engrossed and participate, in the twenty first century watching is oftentimes not enough.

So you can play the Super Bowl and everybody knows your name, but it may not drive up your business, it may even backfire on you, as it did with Maroon 5. Just showing up is not enough, Just giving a performance is not enough. We’re not looking for lights and lasers, we’re not looking for dancing and production, we’re looking to you…are you real or are you affected, do you have credibility or have you sold out, are you doing it their way or your way?

H.E.R. did it her way tonight. She sprinted far beyond the Weeknd. This one appearance will pay dividends. People have a good feeling about Gabriella Wilson, they’re tuned in and want more. Watching Abel Tesfaye tonight you winced, you wanted to change the channel, and if you continued to watch you wanted it to get better, but it only got worse, especially with all the dancing fools at the end.

When we strike the production and effects, when it’s just you on stage, it is quickly revealed whether you have it or not. In truth we’re rooting for you, because so few have it. H.E.R. obviously practiced, she paid her dues, she was confident, you could see all her experience, all her talent in a couple of minutes. Let her be a beacon, if you want to triumph in music, if you want to have a long career, follow H.E.R., not the Weeknd.