The Cold War Kids: "Something Is Not Right With Me"

First, and I’m pretty sure I already know the answer to this one, but: who’s excited for Oliver Stone’s newest mind-blowing biographical expos-hey? Yep, that’s what I thought. Every-motherfucking-body’s excited for W. We’re excited because self-congratulatory, single-sided, whiny liberal finger pointing is maybe the only thing more obnoxious than the self-satisfied, grinning, ignorance-as-principle conservatism of the Bush Whitehouse. So we’re all gonna get drunk and/or high and go watch Oliver Stone ejaculate fanatical culture war “insights” onto celluloid. Fuckin’ killer.

But that’s not the best part. The best part is, no matter what happens in the upcoming election, W is certain to be only the tip of a masturbatory iceberg of such gargantuan dimensions that Arianna Huffington herself will shake her head in disgust. Because Iraq is the new Vietnam, but not in any political or social way that matters. It’s just the new generational conflict that Hollywood can, and will, exploit the shit out of for a quarter century. And when that happens—when every single week features the rollout of another “statement” movie about the atrocities in Iraq—the Cold War Kids will be national treasures. You know how every Vietnam movie ever made has “Fortunate Son” didactically slammed into it somewhere? Yeah, that’s the Cold War Kids’ “Something Is Not Right With Me” in the upcoming spate of quivering hindsight protest material.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that the Kids make bad protest music, or bad music at all for that matter. In fact, a lot of the perennial Vietnam movie songs are epochal and badass. It just means that they make music that’s generally and aimlessly rousing and ominous. The booming electric guitar and snare march of “Something Is Not Right With Me,” off Loyalty to Loyalty, will sound great as soldiers deplane in Afghanistan, giving each other knowing looks and walk in slow motion across the sweltering air strip to their criminally unjust fate. And people will be all, “Yeah, something wasn’t right alright!” And then their cell phone will ring in the theater. And then they’ll answer it. And then, because I’ll be drunk, I’ll throw up on them.