New Sincerity and You: Counter-Counter-Countercultural Warfare

In today's culture of needy oversharing, cultural voyeurism, and [post-]post-modern irony it can seem as if nobody is willing to simply be their own self. It's possible that being a human being will no longer be as attractive an option as it used to be in the so-called 'simpler times' but most likely it is the old struggle in which mass culture tries to either force itself to be interesting or lays down a smokescreen of excuses about why it isn't. A reasonably recent phenomena, born out of cultural desperation and distaste, is New Sincerity. And, goddamn, the term is hot right now, and getting hotter by the moment – so come inside, place your bets, and learn a little something about nothing!

I'm no expert. New Sincerity, as a term, doesn't sit well with me, just like so many other facets of contemporary cultural shorthand. In many ways New Sincerity can be simplified as the diametrical opposite of that vague modern boogeyman 'the Hipster'. And yet, research I have done on the matter seems to suggest that mainstream 'hipster scions' are in fact loosely associated with New Sincerity. I don't really know what Zach Braff would say about the matter. Was Garden State actually a determined piece of New Sincerity propaganda? Did it manage to cash in on the credible? Worse yet, have the bewildering, out-of-favor films of Wes Anderson been appropriated by the movement? By the other movement?

My intention in this article has changed from simply making fun of New Sincerity to undertaking somewhat of a census about it. Mostly this will be the type of armchair cultural criticism I am known for, worldwide. For the most part New Sincerity is often used as a prescriptive term. In music this situation changes: many bands, hearkening back to the simpler, more heartfelt times of Bruce Springsteen, term themselves part of the New Sincerity movement, performing lyrics based less on conceptualism and cleverness and more on love, loss, sorrow, joy, and excitement. These are the earnest topics for music, but what keeps them from becoming pop music is a blend of aesthetics, identity, and intent. The prime axiom is to be authentic at all costs by not making attempts at authenticity, and never to ask 'what is authenticity?'

Unsurprisingly, New Sincerity stems from classic rock superstars such as Bruce Springsteen, Ted Nugent, John Mellencamp, and Bob Seeger, among others. Hair metal and psych are too ironic, or too insincere, or illegal, so lots of 'dad-rock' played to death on classic rock radio is actually questionable. Or perhaps they are valid inspiration, it's quite foggy to me and researching these kinds of things is slower than decisive critical strikes. What have these (and other) roots inspired?

Modern popular/indie acts such as The Hold Steady, Japandroids, Passion Pit, and evidently even Animal Collective are considered New Sincerity. These are just loose examples. To my mind the absolute pinnacle of new sincerity is probably Japandroids - they're not as bland as The Hold Steady and they're not politically or philosophically newly sincere. They just rock out and sing and holler and scream about partying, kissing girls, how life is and what they feel about it.

It's not slavish imitations of Springsteen topics about living in a shit down and running out of hope, or shooting up a bank in the back-roads of Nebraska. One has to admire the mixed positivity in songs about change, nostalgia/heartbreak, or raw excitement. The sense is that it's all youthful enthusiasm and angst, sometimes regret, and the energy cannot be denied. Their lack of pretense, deliberate simplicity and raw force all stand in contrast to established hype bands like The Hold Steady (with Springsteen and hearts worn on the sleeves). However, Japandroids' sophomore album is either too earnest or actually ironic in the ennui mode (or simply underwhelming after their debut), which may or may not say anything about New Sincerity.

Myself, I think the best part is that New Sincerity is often hailed as the redemptive force of contemporary hipster culture. It's a pretty great lie, but it makes everything seem much more epic and heroic, as if there really is a struggle against insincerity in culture. I stress, again, that the modern hipster has roots in Victorian England and earlier German youth movements. We see again and again the sorrows of young Werther in the trappings of a modern-day dandy. However it was inevitable, after the crushing nihilism of the 80's and the strung-out apathy of the 90's, that some kind of cultural force would rise in opposition. The only questionable thing is whether terming it 'new' is not a smidgeon untrue.

The Fate of the Book

So much very subtle and quiet hype about the end of the bound stack of paper sheets known as 'the book'. There have been many books over the years, and I think everyone can agree that they were not always perfect, nor ever had an overwhelming reputation for improving the world. But there's a certain something to books and even if they are dying, take heart: our generation will be able to come by books cheaply for the duration of our existence, unless they begin burning bales of books.

If the global stock of books is significantly destroyed in the next twenty years, or publishing is severely repressed by economic or colluded forces, then at the very least books will have predicted that. Basic reading and communication skills will not likely be replaced, so language will continue, and the flow of ideas will merely take on another, potentially better form. Or our eyes will atrophy from an unmitigated hegemony of digital screens, flashing lights, and confused information.

Maybe there will be a tidal-wave of information in the future which will overwhelm us. Maybe it will get the better of us. We could be changed forever.

Or the book could go on well into the future, as some type of elitist symbol that nobody understands. Probably this view of the book's future is already some cliche that has been analyzed and exploited in hundreds of books. Maybe the book will suffer a renaissance in a few years, or maybe all the news sensationalism and existential dawdling will come to naught, and the book will be as ubiquitous and burdensome as ever – perhaps forever.

In the end, if it goes, the memory of the book will either be exterminated, merely forgotten, or enshrined by some freakish bibliophilia committee as the centerpoint of some futurist, knowledge-based cargo cult. And however it goes, the book will remain as at least a symbol.

But in the meantime there is all kinds of mawkishness about books and print media in general. It seems that the publication industry gets more fatalistic while the technology industry fills with empty hype. There is no real confrontation between the two industries. Largely, the recent history of the matter is that the print industry has had to accept and learn to work with tech, gadget, and electronics industries. It's not really the same as the music industry and the internet, though there are similarities.

So these publishers and maybe even some bibliophiles are very worried and the internet is very unconcerned. That's basically the gist of the story. In my mind television, the postal service, and radio are the real danger zones, and they're still around more than ten years after the internet. Writing killed or perverted most oral tradition anyway, so whatever happens at this point is fair and not unprecedented.

Notes on the Not-so-Recent Fad of 1980's Revivalism and Nostalgia

The 1980's are roundly praised for absolutely no reason. Everywhere you looked six months ago people were going on about the 80's without actually knowing much about the 80's. This 'retro-movement' is by all means a strange thing. People who haven't seen Gremlins in theaters walk around citing Ghostbusters and E.T. as if they've never seen a fluorescent windbreaker. The 70's had better everything and the 60's were strange enough to win any contest for oddball decade. So what does the 1980's have left that its sound, its appearance, and its (utter lack of) soul are praised by clueless jags?

The first point is that the people who grew up in the 80's are becoming adults, and by extension tastemakers. Some of these people are making music and film, or TV and literature, or whatever, and consumerism needs its 'movements' even if such things don't have meaning. The generations that were born in the 80's are clueless and willing to attach themselves to any movement to gain friendship and acceptance, because they are not quite yet adults. Folks born in the 90's are sort of alienated but since they don't have even faint memories of the 80's it is far easier for them to look upon the time with rose-tinted glasses.

Finally, a crowd of people as far removed from popular tastemakers as anything, American Republicans, praise the 80's for Reagan and Bush. Anyone who has followed American politics from Nixon to Obama knows that there has been little reason for public trust and acceptance. Anyone who is willfully ignorant of this will praise Reagan for gutting the economy and being a tool of special interests. This set a pattern that is more or less still followed today, and more knowledgeable places than PUBLICATO can tell you all about it. So even people who are not hip, and who consider hip people to be a crowd of fornicating, godless sinners praise the 80's.

Operation Just Cause, the Iran/Iraq thing, Contras, Noriega and lasers in Panama... the list of strange and shadowy 80's events goes on. That's not even including domestic issues, global music, fashion trends, computer games, and the incredible spread of corporatism and globalism during that time. You'd have to be insane to look to the 80's and enjoy anything about the aesthetic (except for Robo-Cop, Blade Runner, John Carpenter's The Thing [NOTE THE RECENT REMAKE], Prefab Sprout, American Psycho, Michael Jackson, but I digress and contradict myself). If you're still willing to try, and think the list of 80's saviors is indestructible, I have a stinging rebuff for you to swallow.

Everyone worth a damn knows about Leonard Cohen and his minimal songs with masterful lyrics... most people know that he released a decent album in '88 called "I'm Your Man" which, despite being made in the 80's, was pretty decent and almost managed to overcome its production, which is synthy and generally aged a lot worse than The Cohen himself. Then there's this which is probably the one and only time Cohen is unable to overcome production. When you think of the 80's, set this song to the bombing of Panama, the crack epidemic, or anyone wearing a bright pink jacket in an acid rainstorm and cry, because the world ended in the 80's and all that misguided nostalgia is people burying their heads instead of dealing with the present.

It's easy to look back with rose-tinted glasses if you were too fucked up to realize what was happening, or too young to understand it, or you were simply born in a later time and it is a mythical place for you, but the 80's aesthetic was roundly panned as soulless and shitty for a lot of reasons. M83's newest release is probably the final bit of sub-popular 80's worship before the inevitable backlash and death of this rather unbelievable fad. M83 is years past its prime itself, so this final affectation is rather ironic and fitting. By 2013 only clueless people will "OMG I loooove the 80's baby!" mindlessly. Goodbye, 1980's, until the 2030s. You will not be missed and you have not been missed and your best achievements will still be safeguarded and the fact they took place in the 80's will be a footnote.


I can't exactly trace when 80's revivalism began, but judging by the attitudes of some of the hip girls I know I'd say it began, in the underground, between three and six years ago and hit sub-mainstream maybe a year and a half ago, and maybe a few months ago it became a thing that even the most culturally retarded person could indulge. People are going to be tired of it in a few months, because true hipsters are already making fun of the 80's again and have moved into the 90's where they will literally starve to death or the 70's where the drugs will kill them.