Are You Lost In A World Like Me

The official video for Are You Lost In The World Like Me? Taken from These Systems Are Failing- the debut album from Moby & The Void Pacific Choir.

‘Moby’s lyrics lash out at planetary polluters and capitalist greed, but he saves his most acute anger not for these faceless systems of power, but for those who personally embody love lost for him. He lashes out at the girl who lied to him on “And It Hurts,” the one who walked away on “Don’t Leave Me,” not to mention the one who he accuses of giving him an insufficient love that “was old and looking back” on “A Simple Love.”

It may be too far along to inform Moby that the conceit of a simple love is delusional and misplaced, that any romantic break-up requires a long gaze in the mirror and not just yelling about perceived slights. Maybe this sense of hurt and mistrust would be more palatable if it were distinguishable from his rage against the machine. It’s hard to sit through lines about “Selling off heaven for a perfect hell” and corporate greed when he himself opened the floodgates. Selling every last second of an album to multiple advertising campaigns (Play), peddling bottle service-style club music as nostalgia,not to mention partnering with the same luxury hotels that now litter the city. Moby’s own rising economic fortunes mirrored that of Manhattan, so his bald embrace of “the city’s absurd cult of money” is what he now blames for ruining New York’s creative culture, exculpating himself in the process. Moby’s indignation just sounds like Walrus and Carpenter-level tears of rage. Rather than feel cathartic or caustic, it’s oddly cold and rote. ‘

Written by Andy Beta

for pitchfork.com