Link to blog post:

http://thisisbenslist.blogspot.com/2006/02/neko-case-abandons-seattle_114093949871751371.html

I have been looking forward to Neko Case's upcoming album Fox Confessor Brings the Flood. I was disappointed this morning to stumble into an article in the Canadian publication Macleans stating her distaste for Seattle and its millions of greedy, mean assholes.

Case is quoted as saying:

"Mean people came to the Northwest, like the greediest, meanest assholes -- millions of them. People who would walk around yelling at you for the way you drove and complaining that it rained. Why did you move here? A lot of them have left, but not before they bought up a bunch of property and tore a bunch of great shit down and just abandoned it. There are condos they can't fill where there used to be a really great record store. I've had it with Seattle, it's a broken town. It bums me out."

The writer describes Case's view as, "In person she has a real hate-on for Seattle -- thanks to a youth that coincided with the software boom..."

But while she misses B.C., and believes that at this point in her life she could probably get a visa to live here, at the moment she refuses to abandon the U.S. "My country has never been in worse shape," says Case, who's outspokenly anti-Bush. "Lots of people are like, 'I want to move to Canada,' and I'm like, 'Now's not the time.' I love America, I think the people are wonderful and the geography is amazing and I love it as much as I love Canada, for sure -- and not in a yucky patriotic way, but in a sweet, bittersweet way. It's where you're from -- what are you going to do?"

The irony of this article is Case's confessed love for the US, it's geography, it's people, standing awkwardly alongside her powerful indictment of Seattle and its residents. If she refuses to abandon the US in the face of a corrupt Republican administration, wouldn't she similarly maintain a degree of loyalty for Seattle as it struggles to evolve itself post .com revolution?

Have you truly abandoned Seattle Neko?

Link to the article:

http://www.macleans.ca/culture/music/article.jsp?content=20060227_122245_122245

Review of the forthcoming album:

http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Content?oid=30706