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2008: The Year of the Change
When history will look back at 2008, and children in future classrooms open up their
textbooks to the pages that this year will grace, they will know the year to be one in which
one a phenomenal, unbelievable and irreversible change took place:
I became a fan of Coldplay. Yes I did.
Not to overshadow the other fundamentally great event of 2008. But Coldplay deserves all
the praise they’ve gotten with their album Viva La Vida. Bands and artists always change
their game at some point in their careers. Some (the Killers) attempt an overhaul by their
second album, whereas Coldplay waited for their fourth to go experimental. And under the
tutelage of legendary producer Brian Eno, Chris Martin and co. were guided in just the right
direction, in just the right way, to produce just the right amount of familiarity, sprinkled over
heaping helpings of adventurousness. Not since U2’s seminal Achtung Baby has a band in
the same vein reinvented itself so subtly and joyously. There have been seven Grammy
nominations and Viva La Vida has led album sales on iTunes, Rhapsody, the Billboard charts,
and has established itself as the most played group of songs on my friend’s grandmother’s
iPod. No lie.
When history will look back at 2008, and children in future classrooms open up their
textbooks to the pages that this year will grace, they will know the year to be one in which
one a phenomenal, unbelievable and irreversible change took place:
I became a fan of Coldplay. Yes I did.
Not to overshadow the other fundamentally great event of 2008. But Coldplay deserves all
the praise they’ve gotten with their album Viva La Vida. Bands and artists always change
their game at some point in their careers. Some (the Killers) attempt an overhaul by their
second album, whereas Coldplay waited for their fourth to go experimental. And under the
tutelage of legendary producer Brian Eno, Chris Martin and co. were guided in just the right
direction, in just the right way, to produce just the right amount of familiarity, sprinkled over
heaping helpings of adventurousness. Not since U2’s seminal Achtung Baby has a band in
the same vein reinvented itself so subtly and joyously. There have been seven Grammy
nominations and Viva La Vida has led album sales on iTunes, Rhapsody, the Billboard charts,
and has established itself as the most played group of songs on my friend’s grandmother’s
iPod. No lie.
In the movies, too, we’ve had tremendous change. Robert Downey, Jr. has blazed a path of resurrection with the magnificent Iron Man, where he’s made Tony
Stark a flawed hero for the times, and gotten us to laugh at a man in blackface in Tropic Thunder, without the ugliness traditionally associated with blackface.
The juggernaut has been the Dark Knight, however, and rightly so. Between the Joker blurring the lines between justice and madness, and Wall-E revealing to us
the dangers of ultra-consumerism, 2008 had the smartest summer in movies…ever.
Rest in peace, Heath Ledger. You will be sorely missed.
In science, we’ve seen in 2008 the activation of the Large Hadron Collider, the world’s largest and highest-energy particles accelerator, housed in an
underground lab with a 17-mile circumference and spanning the former caverns of France and Switzerland. It was built to test all the greatest predictions of
particle physics, and on September 10, 2008, was fired for the first time. Could it have created a black hole and destroyed the very fabric of the space-time
continuum? Maybe not, but the Collider is the manifestation of many a science fiction story, and the speculation was more than half the fun.
Finally, 2008 was the year of the United States Presidential Election that made history in so many ways. Much has been written about it, much has been said about
it, and doubly so about president-elect Barack Obama himself. As a member of the youth vote of one of the Bluest States in America, my own personal leanings
should be no secret. But all politics aside, the joy felt by so many in so many countries all over the world could not be ignored, and the barriers broken can no
longer be reinstated.
The path ahead is a mystery, and the collapse of Wall Street makes it even more daunting. However, with two hundred and thirty years of history behind us,
with the fact that the economic landscape always follows a circular path, and with a new leadership in the branches of our government different at least from the
last eight years, with a new president, we stand poised to make history over and over again in 2009. With every passing year the world comes closer together, as
technology spreads itself through nations and ideals. Indeed, Apple will release their next OS X Snow Leopard, and the World Trade Center Tower 5 is scheduled
to break ground in our great city. Whatever the challenges ahead, we welcome 2009 with a new resolve, with a renewed sense of purpose, all in anticipation of the
next event that will imprint the year profoundly:
U2’s next album will FINALLY be released (No Line on the Horizon, March 3rd)!!!
Stark a flawed hero for the times, and gotten us to laugh at a man in blackface in Tropic Thunder, without the ugliness traditionally associated with blackface.
The juggernaut has been the Dark Knight, however, and rightly so. Between the Joker blurring the lines between justice and madness, and Wall-E revealing to us
the dangers of ultra-consumerism, 2008 had the smartest summer in movies…ever.
Rest in peace, Heath Ledger. You will be sorely missed.
In science, we’ve seen in 2008 the activation of the Large Hadron Collider, the world’s largest and highest-energy particles accelerator, housed in an
underground lab with a 17-mile circumference and spanning the former caverns of France and Switzerland. It was built to test all the greatest predictions of
particle physics, and on September 10, 2008, was fired for the first time. Could it have created a black hole and destroyed the very fabric of the space-time
continuum? Maybe not, but the Collider is the manifestation of many a science fiction story, and the speculation was more than half the fun.
Finally, 2008 was the year of the United States Presidential Election that made history in so many ways. Much has been written about it, much has been said about
it, and doubly so about president-elect Barack Obama himself. As a member of the youth vote of one of the Bluest States in America, my own personal leanings
should be no secret. But all politics aside, the joy felt by so many in so many countries all over the world could not be ignored, and the barriers broken can no
longer be reinstated.
The path ahead is a mystery, and the collapse of Wall Street makes it even more daunting. However, with two hundred and thirty years of history behind us,
with the fact that the economic landscape always follows a circular path, and with a new leadership in the branches of our government different at least from the
last eight years, with a new president, we stand poised to make history over and over again in 2009. With every passing year the world comes closer together, as
technology spreads itself through nations and ideals. Indeed, Apple will release their next OS X Snow Leopard, and the World Trade Center Tower 5 is scheduled
to break ground in our great city. Whatever the challenges ahead, we welcome 2009 with a new resolve, with a renewed sense of purpose, all in anticipation of the
next event that will imprint the year profoundly:
U2’s next album will FINALLY be released (No Line on the Horizon, March 3rd)!!!
Anatole Rahmen
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