Hey, it's Alan, and I just wanted to let you know that you can now listen to the ongoing

history of new music early and ad-free on Amazon music, included with Prime.

You don't need me to tell you that this is a complicated universe.

In fact, it's not only more complicated than we imagine, it's weirder and messier than we can

imagine. Yet we still try to impose some sort of order on everything.

Take rock music, for example. I was in Paris once, and I walked into a megastor on the

Chez-Dle-Dle-A because, you know, that's what I do. I drag people into record stores while I'm on

my vacation. Anyway, this particular store had individual sections for what seemed like every conceivable genre of rock and roll.

All these individual sounds and styles grouped and gathered into individual racks.

And at first I thought this was pretty cool and convenient, but then it really got confusing.

In which section would I find band X?

Why was 9-inch nails under under electronica instead of industrial? If there was a grunge section, where was Nirvana? Oh, they're over in the

mainstream rock rack. Who made that call? And should goth and death metal be on the same shelves,

or should we separate them because it might get ugly?

Anyway, this got me thinking, whatever happened to the word alternative music?

Does it still exist?

Should it still exist?

What's the difference between a major and an indie?

See what I mean?

See, the bottom line is that I can get very, very confusing for the average rock fan.

Let's see if we just can't sort of sort things out a bit.

So rock snobs, you take a break.

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