ACCOZZAGLIA

Len’s “(If You) Steal My Sunshine”, a sample of pop genius from Toronto that was rare enough to break the charts in 1999, is a time capsule. pure and simple.

never minding the Andrea True Connection’s sample of “More More More” in there, this song encapsulates a climate and mood so completely in opposition to right the fuck N-O-W.

i wasn’t privileged enough to be a part of the dot-communist bandwagon. i was in the wrong city and i was the wrong demographic.

but even so, i couldn’t escape the electrified buzz coming from myriad directions all at once. concurrently, my then-girlfriend, maatnofret, and i bumped into Prozzäk’s “Sucks To Be You”, another encapsulated Toronto pop gem in its own right — a song then already nine months old, give or take, but still new to the slow American circulation of ClearChannel-choked airplay, where it never took off.

Len’s one-hit wonder leaves me with this emotional snapshot of an apprehensive hope that i was feeling then, despite being over two years away from witnessing a bad saga come to an end and just a couple of months after the radio in my car was stolen.

GW43 wasn’t in office, and a small, disgruntled minority of people were still hawing and smarting over the fact that WJ42 was less than forthcoming about his personal time off the clock, even though he was long since off the legal hook by then. buildings hadn’t fallen, vanity wars hadn’t been fought, electoral processes hadn’t been hijacked by sore losers and sore winners, the bottom hadn’t fallen, senators hadn’t been killed in aerial accidents, entifadas were not to be seen and attention was being doted on Serbia while a blind eye was turned to the Ivory Coast and Congo.

all sorts of wack shit was popping up online everywhere — online purchasing of your groceries and delivery to your door, tasty iMac colours, Wallpaper* at its finest, industrial design was at an apex in its own right and there was no shortage of IT-related work to go around for people i knew in that line of profession.

unemployment nationally was at just under four percent. in many thriving cities, it was even lower.

however, this posting isn’t to wax nostalgic, because there was plenty in my own life in 1999 that was not cause for any kind of celebration. i was poor (like that’s changed), i was outcasted, i was on a trial of sorts and i was still getting to know faces and names in what would ultimately become my accidental home — love it or hate it.

rather, this posting is to ask the question, “just what the fuck happened to us in only four short years?”