And it’s lonely at the top. It ain’t easy staying ahead of everyone else. Not in the Internet age, where a decade equals a day and a year equals a moment.

Take concerts, for instance. I’d love to see Sum 41 and Cher, but the former has sold too many records and the latter too many concert tickets for someone as hip as me to sit in their audiences. You see, that’s the problem with being hipper than thou. My job is to influence the people who influence you. As soon as a band, say, O.A.R., hits the mainstream, starts selling CDs and concert tickets, I have to move on to something else, or people will no longer think of me as the hippest man in the world.

How hip am I? Stupid question. I have more hipness in my little finger than David Cassidy, The Smothers Brothers and Yanni combined. Oleander worships at my hip feet, Calexico wishes they could be me, and I never been photographed with Bono or Bob Dylan. That’s how hip I am.

So, go ahead. Be one of the crowd. Check out bands like The Donnas and see artists like Cyndi Lauper and Peter Case. I’m too hip to do what everyone else is doing. I need to see bands that have yet to find an audience, bands that have yet to cut their first demo. Heck, I see bands that aren’t even bands yet. That’s how hip I am.

And come tonight, when everyone is making plans to see Fairport Convention, Nickelback or Kittie, I’ll be rockin’ out like there’s no tomorrow with groups that you’ve never even heard of. I’ll be listening to bands that never get played on the radio, that don’t have a hit single and are never, ever listed on the charts. You can have your Pearl Jam, your Wallflowers and your Whitesnake, for tonight I’ll be sitting alone in my living room, listening to the silence of bands that have yet to play a single note. And you know why? Because I am the hippest man in the world.

My only wish is that the hippest woman in the world would return my calls. But she’s too hip. Gosh, it’s lonely at the top.