The Music Elitist

I was told to check out this song by Kyle Andrews today, so I did. Pretty catchy little tune. I wouldn’t say this is anything groundbreaking musically, but who honestly needs to listen to trailblazing, experimental, progressive music on a constant basis?

He’ll be playing a show on May 7th in his hometown of Chicago at Subterranean with Horse In The Sea and Heypenny. If you live in the Chi, go check ‘em out.

Since this is my first posting on here I’ll give you all a quick introduction so you can better understand my views on this blog.

I hate mediocre music. What is mediocre music you ask? Let me give you a better idea of what I’m talking about here.

Tom Petty. I mean does that guy do anything interesting at all, has he ever? What an ass face.

Most Hardcore/Metal/Grindcore/Screamo/Spascore/Death Metal bull shit that you Ozzfest World of Warcraft monguloids love. They’re infesting every mall in america and what do they have to say for themselves other than “WE LIKE BLACK”.

Metallica, wow, there’s the clowns of the metal market right there. After “The Black Album” they SHOULD have called it quits. Only interesting was maybe the goofy looking Cherokee dreadlock sporting bass player who insisted he should have been in Korn.

I don’t even really like The Black Album. Kinda dug that one song, “Three Leaf Clover”, but that’s cause they had the NYC Philharmonic on that shit, and the NYC Philharmonic are classically trained rocket scientists, not a bunch of money grubbing wanna be metal heads.

Fall Out Boy. All things wrong with our day and age can single-handedly be blamed on this band and every Emo/Power Pop/Pop Punk/Jonas Brothers wanna be gazillionaires out there playing that Squier bass just cause that guy with the lame hair cut who likes to put pictures of his junk on the internet so he can be famous and marry Ashlee “my backing track messed up” Simpson. Douche.

So, now you know. I would go off on Contemporary Country and most Rap, but they do a good job of making themselves look like assholes.

So, now we’ll move on.

The world’s greatest super group unveiled their balls to the wall rock opus to the world today. Them Crooked Vultures made up of Dave “I love playing drums” Grohl, Josh “My old bass player was a coke head” Homme, and John Paul “Jesus” Jones. When I saw these guys at Roseland Ballroom a few weeks ago, I had a feeling I’d never felt rush over me.  I felt like I was being shot in the face with a shotgun full of Rock Salt n Roll and loving it. Listen to the album in it’s entirety on youtube.

My new favorite brooklyn hipster band is Bear In Heaven. Listen to them and bask in all it’s wheat grass electronics.

It’s the end of the world, zombies are eating that next door neighbor who never stops blasting the Gin Blossoms at 2am, and the nuclear holocaust wiped out you’re favorite sushi place, what you gonna do?

Listen to J Tillman, and take a nap of course.
With a brand new album of music you can fall asleep too, Tillman does exactly what he’s best at. Harmonies, Harmonies, Harmonies. With a lack of drumming from the Fleet Foxes drummer you’d think on a solo album he’d do more of it. But with him hitting anything he can that’s not a a drum, he gets a sequence of beats that boast his sparse musical arrangements into epic nothingness. I like it, and there’s a great video and vibe to “Though I Have Wronged You.” So watch it here. Best Video…Ever.

That’s all for today. Expect hell tomorrow.

So this whole thing actually started about a week ago, and I wouldn’t have given it any attention had there not been any new developments. But this week, there was a new (and rather amusing I might add) development in this story.

The basic gist is that after Fall Out Boy finishes the tour they are currently on with blink-182, they are going on an extended hiatus as they have been recording and touring pretty much non-stop for the last 5 or 6 years. The only way the band will play a show in 2010 is if they are able to play the first concert ever in the Principality of Sealand, a micronation about 6 miles off the southeast coast of the UK. The nation was founded on an abandoned British sea fort in 1967 by radio broadcaster and British Army Major Paddy Roy Bates (who calls himself “Prince Roy of Sealand”).

In any case, Prince Regent Michael (the heir to the throne of Sealand) got wind of this whole thing and contacted James Montgomery at MTV with this letter:

“Hey James -
Thank you for the story. It makes me sound old to say I haven’t heard of Fall Out Boy, but my sons say they are AWESOME. So if you would like to put us in touch with them, ‘Lets rock’ (or whatever we say these days). I am on a sunny beach in Greece sipping a cold beer looking forward to hearing from them.

Best wishes
Michael of Sealand

Sent from Michael’s iPhone
‘Nill illigitimi carborundum’”

Montgomery passed on the email to Pete Wentz who instructed him to give Prince Michael’s contact info to Fall Out Boy’s managers. So this whole thing may actually be going down and I find it incredibly amusing.

This is old news at this point, but I have a 9-5 job that I get paid for, so this is the only time I had to post it today.

In any case, being the good Christian girl that Miley Cyrus is, she decided to include a pole dance in her performance on the TEEN Choice Awards last night. Notice how I emphasized TEEN.

She also decided to make her entrance onto the stage from what looks like a mobile home or trailer. Good to see she’s not even bothering to hide the white trash now. That way we won’t be surprised when she’s knocked up at age 22, has the baby, gets divorced a year later, parties her ass off, shaves her head, has a mental breakdown and has to have her father make every decision for her til she gets her act together. Why does that sound so damn familiar?

Someone sent this my way today. I was very impressed. Enjoy!

UPDATE: Nevermind. He’s dead. Wow. I am speechless. Expect a post about this as soon as I can collect my thoughts.

Apparently Michael Jackson has been rushed to the hospital. He was not breathing when paramedics arrived. That’s all that has been confirmed by ACTUAL news sources thus far. If you think he died, you need to stop trusting TMZ and celebrity gossip blogs for your news. I’ll be updating as more info is confirmed.

If you follow music news you’re probably aware of the unusual amount of band reunions that have happened in the last 6 months or so. No Doubt, blink-182, Limp Bizkit, Creed, Sunny Day Real Estate, The Get Up Kids and many more have all announced reunions of some kind whether it be a tour, a new record or both.

My theory on this recent boom in band reunions is that the economic downturn this country (and the world in general) has experienced is forcing artists to go back to what people are familiar with and what made them popular in the first place because it is more secure. Being an entertainer is probably one of the most volatile careers because you can be at the top of the world one day and then back at the bottom the very next.  If you don’t keep people interested, you’re gonna lose them. And in a time when people are picking and choosing what they want to spend their money on, things like music and movies may be the first thing people cut out.

When it comes down to it, most people would rather listen to blink-182 than +44 or Angels & Airwaves. More people would probably rather listen to No Doubt than Gwen Stefani’s solo material (I know I sure as hell would).

This is definitely not me trying to fault these artists in any way. In times like these you gotta do what you gotta do. And on the contrary, with the exceptions of Creed and Limp Bizkit, I am pretty happy and excited about most of these reunions. At least this recession has brought us something positive.

If you want your ears to bleed, I highly recommend listening to the above audio. This is an unedited board feed from Beyonce’s performace on the Today show in November. Howard Stern somehow got ahold of it and decided to unleash it on the world.

UPDATE: Turns out this is a hoax. Oh well.

For those of you who saw South Park last night, I’m sure you were waiting for this as much as I was. But, shockingly Kanye did what I hoped he would do. It seems like he actually took the criticism pretty well, and even found it funny. Unfortunately he insists on typing in all caps and I don’t feel like editing, so I apologize for you having to read it like this:

SOUTH PARK MURDERED ME LAST NIGHT AND IT’S PRETTY FUNNY. IT HURTS MY FEELINGS BUT WHAT CAN YOU EXPECT FROM SOUTH PARK! I ACTUALLY HAVE BEEN WORKING ON MY EGO THOUGH. HAVING THE CRAZY EGO IS PLAYED OUT AT THIS POINT IN MY LIFE AND CAREER. I USE TO USE IT TO BUILD UP MY ESTEEM WHEN NOBODY BELIEVED IN ME. NOW THAT PEOPLE DO BELIEVE AND SUPPORT MY MUSIC AND PRODUCTS THE BEST RESPONSE IS THANK YOU INSTEAD OF “I TOLD YOU SO!!!” IT’S COOL TO TALK SHIT WHEN YOU’RE RAPPING BUT NOT IN REAL LIFE. WHEN YOU MEET LITTLE WAYNE IN PERSON HE’S THE NICEST GUY FOR EXAMPLE. I JUST WANNA BE A DOPER PERSON WHICH STARTS WITH ME NOT ALWAYS TELLING PEOPLE HOW DOPE I THINK I AM. I NEED TO JUST GET PAST MYSELF. DROP THE BRAVADO AND JUST MAKE DOPE PRODUCT. EVERYTHING IS NOT THAT SERIOUS. AS LONG AS PEOPLE THINK I ACT LIKE A BITCH THIS TYPE OF SHIT WILL HAPPEN TO ME. I GOT A LONG ROAD AHEAD OF ME TO MAKE PEOPLE BELIEVE I’M NOT ACTUALLY A HUGE DOUCHE BUT I’M UP FOR THE CHALLENGE. I’M SURE THE WRITERS AT SOUTH PARK ARE REALLY NICE PEOPLE IN REAL LIFE. THANKS FOR TAKING THE TIME TO DRAW MY CREW. THAT WAS PRETTY FUNNY ALSO!! I’M SURE THERE’S GRAMMATICAL ERRORS IN THIS… THAT’S HOW YOU KNOW IT’S ME!

He even acknowledges his shitty typing. I really have nothing bad to say about this. Glad the guy has a good sense of humor and he’s actually making an effort to stop being such a drama queen (or so he claims). We’ll see how this plays out.

About halfway through Britney Spears‘ performance in Vancouver last night, she and her dancers left the stage because Britney smelled marijuana. That’s right folks, Britney Spears smelled MARIJUANA at a CONCERT in CANADA, thought “Something’s not right here” and immediately vacated the stage with her dancers for 20 minutes. Here’s how it went down according to Rolling Stone:

After about 20 minutes, a voice came over the loudspeaker to tell concertgoers that smoking marijuana and cigarettes is illegal at GM Place. “It’s become uncomfortable and unsafe for the performers, including Ms. Spears. The show will resume as soon as the air around the stage is clear,” the announcement said. After performing the final encore, Spears walked offstage with the words, “Thanks Vancouver. You were wonderful. Drive safe. Don’t smoke weed! Rock out with your cocks out!” Yes, this really happened

Now, a Britney Spears concert is not the first place I would expect to smell a lot of marijuana smoke. But, far be it for me to nitpick. The fact is that marijuana laws are a tad more lax in Canada than they are here in the states, so it doesn’t surprise me that some people were lighting up at the show. Hell, I’m pretty sure the only way I’d be able to make it through an entire Britney Spears concert was if I was stoned. And Britney should be encouraging people to do so. That way when she does random-ass weird things like shouting “Merry Christmas!” at a concert in March or informing the audience that her genitalia is “hanging out”, people won’t remember because they were so high.