Only the Lonely

helena fitzgerald on ellen willis. 

Ellen Willis, ca. 1968.

Helena Fitzgerald’s “Heroine: Ellen Willis on Rock Music” in The New Inquiry is the best criticism about criticism I’ve read in a long time because it gets at the core aspect of rock music (and the writing about it). At first, rock music seems to be about achieving power, but in the end it turns out to be about asserting vulnerability, which is, ultimately, quite powerful.

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