Good question, considering recent world events. Is it still possible to place upon the new routing for The Exit or the additional dates for Tish Hinojosa and Voodoo Glow Skulls, the heady emphasis that such mind altering feats of man so rightly deserve?

It’s a new world, or so they say. A world made up of an evil axis, Mulderless X-Files and the cold hard fact that Tobey Maguire is America’s new action hero. Is it any wonder that people are questioning what the itinerary for the New World Disorder Tour, featuring Gin Blossoms, Spin Doctors, Seven Mary Three and Sponge, has to do with global peace and inter-continental tranquility? Yes, this is definitely an issue that must be resolved before we move on to our appointed destinies.

There was a time when such questions concerning the new tours, like the latest listings for Stephen Bruton and Papa Mali, were considered pointless and ill-mannered. But the times were yet a changing in the recent past that concert industry scholars now refer to as the “golden age of touring.”

And what times they were! A historical epoch when no one would dare dream of upsetting the delicate balance of dates and cities found on a routing sheet for Ray Charles or B.B. King. A time when Mary Tyler Moore capped each Saturday night by tossing her tam into the Minneapolis sky, and Dr. Kissinger scheduled his planned disruption of the Chilean democratic process to coincide with his after-show Rolling Stones party where he hoped to lure Bianca away from Mick with promises of power as well as cabinet positions for her cohorts, Messrs. Warhol and Capote. And yet, the world still morphed into what it is today.

Are the new tours still relevant? One might as well ask if General Custer believed in karma or if Richard Nixon pondered the eternal dilemma of “Is it live, or is it Memorex?” Perhaps the answer can be found in the latest episode of The Osbournes, where patriarch Ozzy, when asked what the new listings for Cher and The Ghost had to do with Yassar Arafat’s feelings towards Israel’s prime minister, was heard to respond;

“F#$k%# S#$t? In my F#$k%# house? Sharon!!”

We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.