
By Jean Smith, novelist and singer in the literary rock duo Mecca Normal Rather than present a quasi-factual, semi-amusing trajectory through origins of the word "underground" -- complete with references to the Underground Railroad and the Weather Underground -- I want to open a window into how and why I do things. I invite everyone reading this to compare this to conventional objectives of mainstream bands. Historically, artists have been put into categories invented by the media, defined by journalists who grapple with language to supply the general public with [...]