The Three Brands

[poliphilo]

 Russell Brand the whacked out, rakehell comedian was brilliant,  charismatic and horrid. I didn't like him but I was impressed.

Russell Brand the alternative media frontman, talking truth to power was someone I followed. I even bought one of his books. 

Russell Brand the guy in the limo with the perma-grin who can't shut up about Jesus I find rebarbative. I mean, he's just so unEnglish.

What links the three? Excess, Narcissism, some sense that if this person wasn't in the spotlight he'd shrivel up and die. 

But the switcheroos are so extreme that mainly I'm bewildered. They feed into my sense that our civilisation has become unmoored, fragmented, atomised. That it no longer feels real. Or serious. Or the least bit important.....

Comments

[cmcmck]

And Russell Brand the serial abuser............

[poliphilo]

There are those who suggest that his embrace of religion has something to do with a wish to get in with the American Evangelicals who will overlook any crime and misdemeanour so long as you speak their language

[kaishin108]

Ahh, that sure fits!