Failing to look away from this ridiculous exchange between two acolytes of Greil Marcus' "Pay-me-to-masturbate-at-length" school of rock criticism, concerning (in the most tenuous sense of that word) the rawk classic Led Zeppelin IV. A representative sample:
{Q:} . . . More generally, what are the connective threads, conceptually speaking, between, say, looking at a landscape painting, a Roger Dean record cover, the jackets of the old Lord of the Rings paperbacks, black light posters, M.C. Escher calendar art, a videogame like Myst, and virtual worlds, if any? What is it about the ape mind that wants to project itself into imaginary landscapes, and what memetic role did the '70s album cover, the music that was its soundtrack, and the imaginary geographies they constituted play in the construction of the "wraparound sensorium" (McLuhan) we now inhabit, as residents of the Matrix?I guess I only kept reading because I was waiting for one of them to just break down and wail a boozy "Why? Because Zeppelin FUCKIN' ROCKS, COCKBREATH!" and then storm out. Let me then spare you the same fate: it doesn't happen. You will, however, be treated to some light discussion of "Led Zep's gender politics" (eep) and the creeping sense that both critics would rather be talking about Yes (double eep). Posted by FLOG at June 12, 2005 2:36 PM{A:} "Head" to me has always been a more interesting cultural category to me than "hippie." One way into the headspace of the heads is by brushing off the hoary old term Imagination . . . {and so on}