Somebody asked the question of why, if Neil Diamond is so great a songwriter, does he not have any contemporary hits even as his skills increase over time. And it was actually a serious conversation.
I think the answer lies in the fact that popular music is all about capturing the moment, and there is nothing transcendent about the moments we celebrate in popular culture. Neil Diamond was put on this earth for ordinary men and women who don't know how to declare their love for each other without the aid of radio broadcasts. That's about as deep as it gets.
Given that, the only real genius in popular culture are those gentle debunkers of stardom. There is but one gentle parodist in our America whose soul is not full of cynical, snarky anarchy. His name is Al. In fact if you have the patience to watch them, you can see how he rips two of those symbols (Michael Stipe, Eminem) apart in these mock interviews. In so doing, he transcends the self-important with ludicrous self-deprecation.
Weird Al is the answer to Borat, except Weird Al is more talented and predates the question. Unlike Neil Diamond, Yankovich gets better with time.
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