Politics & Power Quote by Bob Mould

There’s a sly deflation in Bob Mould’s framing: he’s not praising New York so much as describing it as an atmosphere you can’t opt out of. “Surrounded” makes electronic music feel less like a genre and more like infrastructure - the hum of the city itself. He’s pointing to a cultural reality where taste becomes geography: in New York, electronic music isn’t a niche subculture you seek out; it’s the default setting, bleeding from clubs into galleries, fashion shows, after-hours warehouses, even the tempo of nightlife logistics.

The intent reads partly observational, partly strategic. Mould comes from a lineage of guitar-forward punk and alternative rock, scenes built on bands, rooms, and sweat equity. By calling electronic music “prevalent,” he’s acknowledging a power shift in what counts as contemporary and central. It’s a subtle recalibration: if you’re an artist trying to stay fluent, New York’s ecosystem pressures you to speak in beats, not riffs. That doesn’t mean surrender - it means listening closely to where cultural energy is pooling.

The subtext carries a faint edge of awe and alienation. “One of the few places” positions New York as exceptional, almost insulated from the rest of North America’s rock-centric or radio-shaped mainstream. It’s also a reminder that scenes aren’t just about sound; they’re about density, diversity, and the constant churn of new arrivals. Electronic music thrives on that churn: modular, collaborative, endlessly remixable - a form that mirrors the city’s own appetite for reinvention.