Walmart as Utopia. Obviously there are lots of songs about conspicuous consumption, but most of them are about a fantasy level of consumption which is unattainable (probably, for the artist; certainly, for most of their audience). I think Jay-Z has actually produced the Adornian nec plus ultra of this genre with “Picasso Baby.” How do you top a song that says, “I’m so rich I can buy art, the value of which is defined precisely by its purported exclusion from the sphere of exchange-value”? But what I’m thinking of for this theme are those songs where the utopianism of consumption is placed somewhere rather more everyday: Diamond’s “Living in the Mall” is probably my favourite example, though Shampoo’s “Take a Break” kind of works too. Read more↴