There\u2019s a scene early in the iconic mockumentary This Is Spinal Tap, where director Marti DiBergi presents the heavy metal band with a collection of criticisms about their previous albums.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe musical growth rate of this band cannot even be charted,\u201d reads DiBergi. \u201cThey are treading water in a sea of retarded sexuality and bad poetry.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s nitpicking, isn\u2019t it?\u201d guitarist Nigel Tufnel says, brushing it off.<\/p>\n
It goes on like that for a bit<\/a>, with Tufnel, lead singer David St. Hubbins, and bass player Derek Smalls offering hubristic retorts to any and all critique. But as the film follows the band during a make-or-break tour that nearly tears them apart, each member has moments when they come to terms with the price of their fading stardom, reflecting on whether the critics might have had a point.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s such a fine line between stupid, and uh\u2026 clever,\u201d St. Hubbins later muses.<\/p>\n Like Spinal Tap, Pat McAfee knows about his critics<\/a> and spends a lot of energy offering retorts<\/a> to explain why they\u2019re wrong<\/a>. He contorts and spins as needed, often hiding behind the notion that he is simply an athletic supporter<\/a> or that he is\u00a0standing for unity<\/a>. When that doesn\u2019t work, he plays the woe-is-me victim<\/a>.<\/p>\n And like Spinal Tap, McAfee has taken to channeling his emotions into song in hopes of expressing more clearly why he is this way. His debut single, Dookie, was the story of a man who had risen above his critics<\/a>, and not exactly a break with his usual persona. The hope, with the announcement that he was releasing an entire album<\/a>, was that McAfee would finally peel back the layers. Show people the wounded child who grew up to be so full of angst and frustration despite such immense success and conquest.<\/p>\n He even teased as much in the album announcement.<\/p>\n \u201cFor as long as I can remember, my mere existence has made people hate my guts,\u201d McAfee wrote. \u201cI\u2019ve been writing songs about it for 20yrs & it\u2019s time to let them aht.. A LOT of headlines & narratives.. if I was to die, I\u2019d like my kids to know exactly who their dad is.\u201d<\/p>\n The Diary Of A Polarizing Figure debuted on Friday, and it does indeed walk the fine line between stupid and clever. It\u2019s also unlikely to change many minds about the mercurial cultural figure.<\/p>\n McAfee\u2019s genre can be summed up as a kind of country-hip-hop amalgamation I would call Uncle Rock. A steady autotuned flow of generic \u201cgood ol\u2019 boy\u201d lyricism stacked on top of easy listening beats or royalty-free rock chords. The Pennsylvania native often affects a Southern drawl incongruous with the man we know from our TV screens. Most of the songs are 75% chorus. Nothing offends, especially the attempts to be offensive. It strangely reminded me of some of the songs from Turning Point USA\u2019s halftime show<\/a>.<\/p>\n Many of the songs on The Diary of A Polarizing Figure<\/a> follow the same throughline as Dookie. Things used to be tough; now they\u2019re great; the haters can eat it, and it\u2019s all good. In fact, there are three major throughlines that repeat themselves across the entire album:<\/p>\n I didn\u2019t have much before, but now I have a lot. To wit, \u201cPitbull And A Mugshot<\/a>\u201d is about a down-and-out guy who has it good now and wants people to know that the haters can\u2019t do anything about it because we are all one. \u201cYoung Me<\/a>\u201d is about a down-and-out guy who has it good now and wants his younger self to know it\u2019ll work out. \u201cBlue Collar Symphony<\/a>,\u201d which is probably the best song on the album, is about a down-and-out guy who has it good now and wants people to know he knows where he came from. \u201cOOPS<\/a>\u201d is about a guy who was down and out but has it good now (\u201cI used to not have sh*t; now I got a bidet\u201d) and wants people to know the haters can\u2019t do anything about it. \u201cRich As Shit<\/a>\u201d is also about a guy who was down and out but has it good now and wants people to know the haters can\u2019t do anything about it (\u201cTalentless suits might need to find a new scam\u201d).<\/p>\n Meanwhile, \u201cYou\u2019re Alive<\/a>\u201d is about making sure you\u2019re appreciating life because one day it\u2019ll all be over (\u201cThere\u2019s a dash between 2 dates. The 2nd one is never late.\u201d). \u201cBig Rain Coming<\/a>\u201d is McAfee\u2019s lullaby to himself about how he\u2019s \u201cpaid my dues, earned some boos, learned what pressure does\u201d and how he tries to live in the moment because you never know when you\u2019ll die. \u201cNo One Ever Knows<\/a>\u201d is a reggae-tinged song about appreciating life amid its many struggles (\u201cExpectations stacking like Pisa\u2019s leaning tower\u201d) because you will die one day.<\/p>\n This isn\u2019t to say there aren\u2019t musical detours along the way.<\/p>\n \u201cClick Clack<\/a>\u201d is McAfee\u2019s most hip-hop-esque effort, though it\u2019s mostly a generic rehash of all his aforementioned themes. I would be remiss if I didn\u2019t point out two lyrics in particular:<\/p>\n \u201cI guess I\u2019m an anomaly My mom birthed a monopoly.\u201d If I had to know that existed, so do you.<\/p>\n \u201cI guess I can agree that I\u2019m dynamical, I silenced all the sheep like Hannibal.\u201d Sorry to be pedantic, but Hannibal Lecter didn\u2019t silence the sheep; Clarice\u2019s cousin did<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cSmokin<\/a>\u201d is, as one might expect, about smoking weed. It includes six choruses.<\/p>\n \u201cGood Times<\/a>\u201d is basically the Bo Burnham country music bit<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cPolarizing Figure<\/a>\u201d appeared to be the song we\u2019d been waiting for at first, explaining why McAfee felt so compelled to make the album. However, the lyrical crux is more about attempting clever wordplay than it is about getting beyond the surface.<\/p>\n \u201cAll of us so gullible, all of it\u2019s combustible. Stories out of context, from folks considered trustable. They\u2019re reckless with their narratives, searching for comparatives. Eliminate disruptors; to them, it feels imperative. Death threats bring hairy times. High stress from scary lies. Folks you never met, wishing for your demise.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOutlaws<\/a>\u201d ends up being the song that most directly attacks what McAfee often sees as one of his main antagonists: Sports reporters. He sees them as \u201cpuppets with some pens\u2026 saying that we ruined sports televisiagain,\u201d which is not a typo. \u201cHaving your own thoughts somehow became unique; now authenticity\u2019s validity can break through when you speak,\u201d he sings, pushing back on critics and their outdated notions of how things work.<\/p>\n Finally, there\u2019s \u201cCheers To The South<\/a>,\u201d which was concerning when the first lyric was \u201ccheers to our destinies.\u201d Whose destinies? Southern destinies?? What southern destinies are we referring to??? Thankfully, the song reveals itself to be mostly about getting drunk at lakes and farms, though we are left with this pi\u00e8ce de r\u00e9sistance:<\/p>\n \u201cAnd cheers to the sun and cheers to the moon. Let\u2019s celebrate life while we have the oppor-tune.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Given McAfee\u2019s recent proclivities<\/a> and friendship alignments<\/a>, it stands to reason that this album might find a foothold with a certain audience. It is fair to admit it is well made. McAfee says on his Spotify page<\/a> that he collaborated with songwriter Ernest<\/a> (Ernest Keith Smith) and Big Loud<\/a> CEO Seth England in making it. There are plenty of references to beer, God, John Deere, and small-town values that check all the modern country boxes and, despite his warnings, the lyrics are inoffensive enough, albeit sometimes confusing.<\/p>\n We know from his TV work that McAfee craves adulation and abhors criticism. He\u2019ll likely find both here. He often sings about appreciating what you\u2019ve got, ignoring the hate, and living in the moment. How he reacts to what people think of the album will put these mantras to the test and likely be the real barometer by which we measure how he feels about the world. And himself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There\u2019s a scene early in the iconic mockumentary This Is Spinal Tap, where director Marti DiBergi presents the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":813306,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[776,236,88,216,3145,345027],"class_list":["post-813305","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-albums","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-music","tag-pat-mcafee","tag-the-diary-of-a-polarizing-figure"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/813305","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=813305"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/813305\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/813306"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=813305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=813305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=813305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThe grim specter of death is coming for us all, and you never know when it will get here.
\nGood things come only to those who work hard and earn them.<\/p>\n