[Glice]

It's only surprising because it's depressing - for me, the true mark of the insidious nature of vulgar capitalism is the way in which those who decry it simultaneously perpetuate it - remember the pictures of the Seattle riots, the guy wearing Nike trainers [/pumps/ sneakers] on top of the Nike building? I'm not proposing an escape trajectory from capitalism. I'd also agree that there is room for modifications, and shades of capitalism, and preferential models (in the same way that I believe in democracy, but not necessarily the British form of democracy). All I'd like to make clear is that the Jonas Brothers are hardly worth criticising when they are clearly a flash in the pan. Give it ten minutes and the pop industry will throw up some more fluff that won't inhibit my life any, and will make a lot of children happy. I don't want children listening to gore beyond necropsy, I'm quite happy for them to listen to something innocuous and enjoyable like JB.

Having said that, when I saw them live, I did think they were awful, in much the same way my 9-year-old neice isn't a huge fan of Bernard Parmegiani ("It's pooey" were her exact words).

"subjugates artistic integrity to demographic aesthetics and commercial presence" The problem is that I'm unwilling to draw that line. It's interesting you say 'demographic aesthetics', because the usual thing is to assume that demographics and aesthetics are very distinct. Artistic integrity, I'll repeat, is bunkum. The integrity of the art is its existence. It's more complicated than that, but in this instance, I can't defend John Cage's artistic integrity without also defending Jonas Brothes, which is a curious state to be in.

What JB have that a lot of people don't have is masses of consideration to them. You know, some composers spend years on their compositions, and the fact it takes great teams of people to make a proper pop album (regardless of whether I like it) suggests that there's masses of craft goes into it. I suppose what I'm saying is that JB are like architecture, and Cage is like painting.

I'm not entirely sure why I'm writing this, I don't think you're actually proposing the positions you're suggesting.