So you say Bill Callahan’s dropping the Smog moniker and beginning to use his real name? Strange. Yeah, I guess it is kind of a big deal. Oh. What do I think? Well, I don’t think much of it at all. I come from a land, one decade past, utterly awash in Red Apples, and I refuse to leave home.

Why would I? It’s unfathomable to imagine abandoning the heartbreaking sincerity of a man crooning:

Most of my fantasies are to be of use
To be of use
To be of some hard
Simple
Undeniable use

And while it’s the same man, biologically, urging that I climb aboard the new/real-name bandwagon, the similarities between his past and present self stop there. Smog’s “To Be Of Use” is a simple, steady melody in an uncontrollably hectic world; there’s nothing the song’s singer fears so much as being a flashlight at night in the middle of downtown Tokyo, and I don’t have it in me to leave him behind now, relegated to obscurity and occasional namedropping from arrogant hipsters thirty years hence.

How often does a musician assault an unsuspecting listener by sonically placing a double-sided mirror less than one foot away? Smog’s words conjure my reflection as well as they exhibit his own. I’m as naked as he is, and I hate him for this indecent exposure (mine, not his). I gag on the bittersweet realization of our mutual eagerness. I am perplexed by my sudden nudity. I am drugged and wondering how I got here.

How dare this man say so much by saying so little and drag me to alive? More importantly, however, how can I thank him?

I want to capture this moment, this rare opportunity to pinpoint an instance in an artist’s repertoire and say, “This is why I love his music.” Most cameras would be useless since lenses tend to blush and blur at such proximity (I haven’t any macro lenses or extension tubes at my disposal). And so, as the song slides into the coming day, I’m refusing to call Woke on a Whaleheart the upcoming Bill Callahan album. I’m sticking to a name.

Smog.

It’s the best way I can think to be of use.

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