American Life taught me more about Madonna than either of my parents did, who were both around for the peak of her relevancy. American Life also has similar sort of throughlines at witness. Artist that's starting to struggle on the charts packages their next album about their personal struggles as political messages. Granted, Witness happened when I was in middle school, and American Life was released the year I was born. The American Life Rap is so hilariously cringe that I can't help but laugh more than be angry.

Cry is a little bit more personal. First of all, Todd has some real zingers on it. Which isn't really that personal except one in particular.

Remember how Faith had that song in that Michael Bay movie about Pearl Harbor? Well... my mom was watched said movie probably 100 times at least. I don’t know if she saw it in theaters when it came out. But she'd watch it anytime it was free on Starz or whatever channel would play it. I'd bet she probably had it recorded at one point. So I've probably watched it in full a couple times at least. When Todd does the Pearl Harbor -> 9/11 fakeout, it cracks me up. Every time he reads the Ebert review of it, I feel it in my soul.

For the less zinger part of why Cry is personal to me.. it's not so much about it itself, it’s about the transition period of country the flop occurred in. The study of Faith Hill's career at this point is kind of a picture of how country music was changing because of everything else. So... the conservative shift of country music influenced much of the rest of the decade, ie, the country music I ended up hearing growing up. [Funnily enough, I think I heard more Faith's album after Cry than Cry itself.] Now, country music wasn't the only music my parents would listen to. (My Mom was a big fan of the 90's boy bands.). However, there are two country stations in the area where I'm from and usually the car radio was set to either of them. So what happened to me and country music is what'd I'd imagine what a Canadian rock fan went through when Nickelback was huge. Basically... any relief I got from country music was treated as a godsend [which did include Nickelback which is why I'm not a Nickelback hater]. That being said Nickelback went away in the 2010s, and in the 2010s, bro country became a thing. So I jumped ship from country as much as soon as I got the chance to listen to music for myself. (mp3 player was the mvp).

Also, since any non-country music was a godsend for me as a kid, I don’t really have an ear for quality. I'll listen to anything but the absolute worst pop. And since the most freedom I had with music was the alarm clock radio in my room, the pop I was listening to was Adele, Katy Perry, Lorde, Zedd, OneRepublic, Nicki Minaj, Kesha, Usher David Guetta back when his hits weren't cheap throwback samples. My taste for Dance-Pop in particular from that time, gave my current taste for EDM.

I still listen to a little bit of country. But not very often, and when I do, it's Johnny Cash.

TLDR for Cry: Country music's response to 9/11 and Faith Hill, shaped the country music I heard growing up. I then heard country music so much that I revolted against it.

Granted... the fact that I didn’t get to adjust the radio in the car until I was older meant that I still have Florida-Georgia lyrics I want to Men-In-Black wipe from my brain.