Brandon Scott Gorrell, the Electrowars and the New Sincerity (Part III of III)

I.

You might wonder what any of this has to with Brandon Scott Gorrell. Some who have followed Tao Lin's postulations on the book reviewing process will also question why I am even writing this review. After all, Tao's take on book reviews as of 2006 basically says that he considers a lot of the process to be bullshit. In 2006, Tao blogged, "'when a book is reviewed the universe is almost always reduced to 'earth,' 'the blogosphere,' or something like, 'the americas,' or 'the human race,' or else 'the human race plus all animals' or 'the human race plus all animals that look cute.'"

As you can see, Tao is aware that there is an element of the review process that is self-serving. Writing is not unshaped by politicking; pro- or anti-house blogs exist for a reason. However, Tao later contradicts himself in this post and hypothesizes that book reviewing, as with all occupations, is one way of justifying one's existence.

He goes on to say:


I must hasten to add that Tao also says, "when a book is reviewed the reviewer shows that the reviewer is delusional, has delusions, thinks in contexts that exclude a lot of information, and has many preconceptions." Certainly, I am not beyond projecting my understanding of reality upon this extended metaphor of a body of literature. I feel it necessary to attempt to address these considerations before talking about Brandon's book in an effort to give as honest a review as possible. So please keep in mind that I am aware that I am:

A) a finite being existing within space and time that does have to cope with the eventual end of this linear phase (yes, book reviewing is one activity to keep you from thinking about existential despair, but I am aware it is there)

B) a person constricted by my own belief system, including the fact that while I am typing this and attempting to portray this perspective as somehow neutral, this voice is but an internalization of the critical theories I have ingested in an academy

and

C) aware that house style does not speak for the collective entity or personal opinions of all its members. Nonetheless, it is possible to refer to common styles between the writers, the impact of mentoring (as in the case of, say, Jordan Castro and Tao Lin) and how the constraints of a physical medium impact the production of said house distribution. For the sake of simplicity, I am going to refer to a collective house style, even though I know there are vastly different influences and techniques employed by all of a house's contributors.

Reviewers should pay attention to questions that engage in an evaluation of the meaning of the text, not merely the stylistic trappings that get hits or sell product. It is too easy to get caught up in the meanings of style than to ask, as they would say in news speak, 'hard-hitting' questions. Questions such as, if this group rejects fiction in favor of fictive realism, can you please talk about what you think that signifies? If this style attracts such a sea of imitation and disdain, why do you think this happens? Why is this popular in this specific milieu? In other words, as Tao Lin would posit, what makes this text relevant?

Not asking these questions and instead writing about your dislike of scare quotes obscures the potential of a work to be discussed in terms other than style. Recognize that you are perpetuating a cyclical shallowness on the internet. If, after that, you turn around and moan, why aren't people reading books anymore? It's the internet's fault. The death of print was inevitable. We didn't stand a chance... remember it has nothing to do with the internet. It has more to do with the fact that since you are selling a product or a service, you sell the content. When this happens, you lack a consideration of depth and if people read books to feel, then they are going to reject your copy and not buy your books. The reason why I try to include a personal narrative in a review is because I am attempt to reflect what it made me feel in defiance of the traditional reviewing process.

II.

With that aside I want to examine the relevance of During My Nervous Breakdown I Want to Have a Biographer Present (2009) starting with its presentation. The jacket has the words 'anxiety,' 'low self-confidence' and 'alienation' juxtaposed over happy, lime green starbursts. The back jacket is also accompanied by a photo of Gorrell from Nylon in the bottom left-hand corner. He's looking haggardly stylish and, like most hipsters, he looks like someone who's homeless in a dapper way. There are quotes from Matthew Rohrer, Chris Killen and Noah Cicero on the jacket. You can tell just by glancing at the book that it's probably the perfect thing to read when you decide to stay in and end up just feeling lonely.

During My Nervous Breakdown I Want to Have a Biographer Present (2009) arrived in the mail last week, as I mentioned, on the day that I decided I was having a crappy St. Patrick's day. These circumstances are going to, in fact, influence my read of the text. When I opened the package, the chapbook was wrapped in an envelope that had been used previously. Gorrell had taken an envelope that came addressed to someone at his address, folded it inside out and sent it my way. The original envelope was from Washington State University. It was addressed to someone else who also lived at the same apartment, a girl, a girl who had presumably attended WSU. I think, there must be a story there.

Part of what interests me about Gorrell, and to be honest, Muumuu House in general, is the willingness of these writers to put their personal life online. I read a reply to a comment by Bebe Zeva that someone posted on Hipster Runoff, a site that I feel like I've outgrown as a twenty-two year-old. I still RSS to it and click when a headline in Google Reader interests me, but I've realize there is only so much you need from the internet.

Anyway, she (and here we're saying for the sake of argument that this commenter is the 'real' Bebe Zeva) asked why the person who got their first 'first' on Hipster Runoff didn't take a print screen of the shot.

The tradition of 'firsting' on Hipster Runoff is a practice of fanboy-ism that is supposed to indicate one's dedication to a blog. By 'firsting,' the participant is basically tagging the text, as with how graffitos tag walls or buildings. They are entwining their personal brand with a time stamp and this practice is supposed to indicate their loyalty. As in this person is so dedicated to said blog that they will go to elaborate lengths with the 'refresh' function of a website or even implement codes that track a site and inform them of the updates.

But, while this person happened to chance upon the blog being updated, thus demonstrating a certain level of technological awareness, they failed to use the common technique of 'print screening.' If the internet is the new printing press, then chancing upon your favorite site being updated is the same as walking by your favorite bookstore, seeing a copy of something you like and purchasing it immediately. You 'need' to 'own' a 'physical' 'copy.'

So, this person reading and tagging his first is like if someone likes the book so much that they're buying it from the store (upping the page views) and telling their friends (abstractly, through social media). It's the digital version of going into a book store, buying the book, running into a friend on the street and telling them about the book.


The reference to Bebe Zeva, who I presume to be the 'Dakota Fanning' character in Tao Lin's Richard Yates, reveals a considerable amount of the ambivalence this generation has about these changes. We grew up learning, don't talk to strangers, yet I don't know anyone who didn't hit up a chat room out of curiosity as a teen and start a/s/ling. As people living through the era of when communication is being translated to the digital realm, we are learning what this migration means, even if no one yet knows how to describe it.

Thus, Bebe Zeva, or a sort of modern vision of the female muse, is both reviled and worshiped for consenting to having her image displayed in this fashion. As you can see in the ensuing commentary, the power dynamics behind this representation have the potential to be inherently problematic in the sense that it's only one person's perspective. But, that kind of thing is for the critical theory police. The idea, Your entire life is linked is more relevant than whatever subjective interpretations of a text can be made depending on one's own perspective. Sounds kind of ominous, no?

But, at the same time, none of these individuals would be known if they hadn't, to some degree, 'papped' out their lives or disseminated their online identities to the masses regardless of whatever consequences this observation will entail. They are the first people to be famous for being famous people online.

III.

During My Nervous Breakdown I Want to Have a Biographer Present (2009) picks up on the theme of the collocation of self (the authentic self) and the perceived self (artist, persona, representation of self) that is present in Lin's work. The first thing I noticed about Gorrell's work was, yes, that he had an affinity to Muumuu House style. Namely, Gorrell treats the same conditions (modernity, metaphysical constraint, the internet) and engages with them in a developed, methodical fashion. Some of the ideas may seem recycled after reading Lin, but Gorrell's chapbook is worth parting with some PayPal pennies if these concerns at all intrigue you.

Gorrell's language is lackadaisical in a way that is eloquent and enhances the reading of the text, particularly the passages about computational materialism that would otherwise seem 'cold.' For instance in, "giant destructive moth," Gorrell infuses the theme of an LDR and electronica together in an unparalleled grasp of contemporaneous times. He writes,

"i said i want to move into the internet/ you said let's do that/ i said where do you go in/ i said does it have sun chips"

"giant destructive moth" is fascinating because instead of seeing how technology is a cold entity that is somehow responsible for the social alienation of modern society, we start to see how it is instrumental in maintaining human relations, particularly in times when one feels socially alienated. One can see a similar thread in the poem, "you are a goldfish and i am alienated," a title that will undoubtedly earn Gorrell a bit of rancor among critics.

The lines,

"you/ were living inside of a spherical/ semi-permeable membrane that you wanted to escape completely/ i continued avoiding eye contact/ because when i looked at your eyes, i couldn't resist smiling/ i would have rather flown into outer space with you/ stared into a telescope with you next to me/ or committed suicide together/ or something"

are even more compelling for their simplicity.

V.

Gorrell's other prowess as a poet is demonstrated in the poem "face annihilation," which addresses the theme of monotony. Now, you might wonder, why would someone trying to sell books write about being bored? I would say that instead of mocking this element of fictive realism, this is pivotal to recording the experiences of twenty-somethings in The Great Recession, a term first coined by the writers of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia." From what I've noticed, the recession doesn't seem to be documented in the artistic experience in materials produced for commercial copy.

When political events are documented in mainstream media, it is disguised through symbolism for the sake of avoiding the hostility of the working public consumer, i.e. the masses. For example, the highest grossing movie of 2008, when the housing bubble crashed, was The Dark Knight. Allegory for the criminal embezzlement of mortgages (predatory lending) by an unidentifiable control freak loose in Manhattan (the unregulated banking industry), anyone?

The culture industry knows that to sell a product or ideology, the terror, depression and hostility of the public can only be represented symbolically. 'Heaven forbid' the public victimized by the propaganda of American materialism be educated about how and why this is happening. But, for people actually concerned with this phenomena (re: 'a certain kind of person'), producing art that conveys meaning while being marketable has always been a challenge. One of the strengths of Gorrell's writing is his ability to convey malaise in a humanizing and humorous manner.

Where Lin excels in what people would call the 'absurdist' style of the group with his reference to, for instance, dolphins and hamsters with personality, Gorrell places emphasis more upon the 'absurdist emo' element of the human condition. Gorrell is able to take that nagging, careening sense of anxiety/ concern for one's times and personal dilemmas and, much like a Larry David, manages to neutralize perilous emotion into humorous, if not anecdotal, observations.

I think the best example of this is in "face annihilation," where Gorrell writes,

"today i will go to work/ i'll hardly ever move my body.../ sometime tonight i'll try not to get drunk/ sometime tonight i'll walk to the store, buy alcohol, and/ think 'what about the homeless people'/ sometime tonight i'll get drunk/ in the middle east, people are getting blown apart by bombs"

Gorrell articulates the stunning disconnect that is happening to people who are politically aware of current times but lack an ability to change them. The passage continues with Gorrell listing the kind of problems any politically aware individual who plugs into a podcast or independently produced newscast would follow:

"monsanto patents organisms/ the military-industrial complex/ every high-level american politician is a rich, corrupt/ piece of shit... a very small number of white men control what billions of/ people see and hear, which indirectly means that they/ control what billions of people think and feel... protesting, writing letters to representatives, signing/ petitions, grassroots movements, and general public/ outcry are built-in to the overall plan; they are not/ effective means of change"

In essence, like anyone who has had contact with these resources through exposure, you still must maintain their sanity, despite knowing about all these shitty problems beyond your control. That's why my favorite part of "face annihilation" is when it closes with "popcorn butter is toxic/ i can feel the economy crashing."

VI.

The challenge of modern movements in art and culture, like the New Sincerity or even 'emo absurdism' is the conflict of how to document an economic depression without depressing the hell out of everyone. For all the criticism Muumuu House generates for being comprised of something like 'spoiled brats eating away trust funds,' I would say that Gorrell's writing is a compelling counterexample.

If Lin attracts an audience and social capital with his 'gimmickry,' then it Gorrell who extends the theories and postulations about these issues that Lin first articulated. Gorrell's Thought Catalog post, "A Guide To Dealing With Japanese Earthquake Guilt," for instance, is an amazing example of his astounding ability to document the alienation of modern times in the style of biting sarcasm that made Gawker so popular.

Something about Muumuu House hits a nerve and resonates with the modern audience; otherwise, these writers would not have become a phenomenon within their own lifetime. People want to believe that a group of young internet jockeys can harness this new media to something beneficial rather than us having to face, as singer/songwriter Dan Bejar says on Kaputt in the song "Suicide Demo For Kara Walker," "four hundred more years of this shit (fuck it)."

How successful these artists will be in instituting change (and here's hoping that change is something they are indeed going for rather than fame, influence or critical approval [this is me projecting]) is going to depend upon how easily influenced they are by the hype-machine and readily available internet praise/disdain. If the cycle of consumption is indeed accelerated, as thinkers like Rob Horning over on Pop Matters suggests, then the critical evaluation will all occur at an alarmingly accelerated rate, hence, the snowball affect seen with shitstorm alberto. But, I hope that they stick with it.

I mean, four hundred more years of this? Eff it.