‘Dynamite’ by Taio Cruz, an Exegesis
Exploring an apocalyptic text after a non-Rapture
This essay is for paid subscribers. Light up your inbox by upgrading today!
I throw my hands up in the air sometimes
Sayin’, “Ayo, gotta let go”
I wanna celebrate and live my life
Sayin’, “Ayo, baby, let’s go”
I was thinking the other day about “Dynamite,” the 2010 electropop smash hit by British musician Taio Cruz. It wasn’t that I heard it while out and about. It was that my friend was telling me about the Rapture and “Dynamite” popped into my head. I think the two are related.
The Rapture is a pretty American idea. It’s the theological equivalent of a bomb. It’s quick and explosive and you can threaten people with it. I’m writing to you on a Thursday. Last week, my friend told me that the Christians on TikTok were of a general mind that the Rapture was on for Tuesday. I doubted this. I’m something of a theological dilettante and my gut says the Rapture will be on a Wednesday, Friday, or Sunday.
And lo, it’s Thursday. So either the Rapture didn’t happen, or it did, and we’re all, every last one of us, not ripe for picking; rotten. I’d put my money on the former, which is too bad. I find myself itching for rapture these days: a decisive, unambiguous end. BOOM.
The problem is I’m not much of an apocalypticist. I’m not optimistic like that. This puts me at odds with some of my buddies, none of whom are TikTok Christians, at least not to my knowledge, but several of whom do seem to believe we’re in the End Times. That, or they just like talking like that’s what they believe. I got a text last week that read, “I know it’s the apocalypse, but how are you doing otherwise?” I hope he called his mother first!
This secular posturing is aptly called Doomerism. As fatigued as I am with strangers telling me “Hope you’re doing well all things considered” and with the word “hellscape,” I’m recognizant of the underlying sentiment. It feels like things are falling apart. All around me is decay. Things don’t smell quite right. Yellow lights are blinking and our democracy is issuing troubling metallic belches from its mechanical guts and the most recent technological innovation of my noble race is a Magic 8 Ball that’s making people forget how to read (some people claim to be dating it).
There’s a general notion that things aren’t going great. It’s inspiring different reactions from different groups. Nihilism. Accelerationism. Hedonism. What they have in common is sweet surrender. The Rapture is to TikTok Christians what Doomerism is to the progressive big-city set; a sublimated desire for annihilation. There’s a collective yen for something that would exempt us all from the long slog of gradual, aching decline: hundreds of somber hospital visits vs. pulling the plug.
I’m sure every generation thinks they’re standing at the edge of the world. Every epoch is attended by its looming calamities, and every era’s eschatology has its unique prophets and sacred texts. Sitting here two days after a failed Rapture beside my country’s hospital bed, bored and staring into my phone while it mutters about Charlie Kirk, I’m thinking of one such apocalyptic text from another time: “Dynamite” by Taio Cruz.