The Music Elitist

Oh how I wish this were an April Fools joke, but it definitely isn’t. Now That’s What I Call Music 30 is in fact the top-selling album this week on Billboard’s Top 200. For those of you who have lived under a rock since 1998, Now is a series of compilations of all of the most popular songs at the time of release. So, obviously about 95% of the songs on these comps absolutely suck. Just check out the track listing for this installment of the series:

1. Lady GaGa featuring Colby O’Donis – “Just Dance”
2. Britney Spears – “Womanizer”
3. Christina Aguilera – “Keeps Gettin’ Better”
4. Kevin Rudolf featuring Lil Wayne – “Let It Rock”
5. Kanye West – “Heartless”
6. Ne-Yo – “Miss Independent”
7. John Legend featuring André 3000 – “Green Light”
8. Rihanna – “Rehab”
9. Pussycat Dolls – “I Hate This Part”
10. Pink – “Sober”
11. David Archuleta – “Crush”
12. Miranda Cosgrove – “About You Now”
13. The All-American Rejects – “Gives You Hell”
14. David Cook – “Light On”
15. Saving Abel – “18 Days”
16. Nickelback – “Gotta Be Somebody”
17. Katy Perry – “Thinking of You”
18. Jason Mraz – “I’m Yours”
19. Taylor Swift – “Love Story”
20. Keith Urban – “Sweet Thing”

Britney Spears, Nickelback, Pussycat Dolls and Katy Perry should be MORE than enough reason to not spend money on this compilation. I don’t even know who the hell Miranda Cosgrove is. That Kevin Rudolf song is only popular because everyone thinks its a Lil Wayne song. I guarantee we’ll never even hear another single from him on the radio unless he managed to get Justin Timberlake on one of his songs too. However, I will say that I do kinda dig that John Legend/Andre 3000 song. So I guess there’s the 5%.

This is the most unbelievable load of crap I have ever seen in my life. Two high schoolers from the Bronx were interviewed about what they thought about the Chris Brown/Rihanna situation. First the girls said that when the incident was originally reported, they were sure the tabloids had to be lying about it. Then when they saw the pictures they actually said “She probably made him mad for him to react like that, you know, like, bring it on?”

Yeah, I’m sure something Rihanna did was good reason for Chris Brown to “punch her in the face with his right hand while steering the vehicle with his left hand. The assault caused Rihanna’s mouth to fill with blood and blood to splatter all over her clothing and the interior of the vehicle.” I know high-schoolers are pretty dumb, but good Lord. How infatuated with a male celebrity do you have to be to think that something his girlfriend did must have been good enough reason to hit her…repeatedly? Ridiculous.

Chris & Rihanna (The New Ike & Tina)

I have managed to avoid this topic since it all started, but I have finally decided to speak out for two reasons:

1. Recent developments have been too ridiculous for me to NOT open my mouth

2. The traffic I’ll get simply by tagging this post with Chris Brown and Rihanna’s names

First off, let me start by saying that hitting a woman is wrong. No matter what the situation, it is just plain wrong. There is never an excuse for it. When this all first happened, I was appalled. Even when stories came out about her starting the fight and physically hitting him, Chris Brown still disgusted me. I don’t care how many times Rihanna hit him, there is no way that tiny girl could have done THAT much to hurt him. Now, I’m not saying its OK for girls to hit guys, its definitely not. But responding by hitting them back is DEFINITELY NOT the proper way to go about it.

My sympathy for Rihanna began to decline a couple of weeks ago when rumors started spreading about them reconciling. When the rumors were confirmed that they were indeed back together, that sympathy disappeared completely. Then there were stories about them getting married, planning a duet together…etc. Now I am almost HOPING he hits her again just so she realizes what a horrible mistake she is making.

I understand people make dumb decisions in their early 20’s regarding relationships. I sure did. But this situation is simply ridiculous and her decision to get back together with him is probably going to ruin her life.

Photo by: MJ Kim (Getty Images)

Kanye West recently filmed an episode for VH1’s Storytellers. Seeing as how this is a show that features more talking than performing, you can understand why Kanye might have been a bad choice:

Kanye West weighed in on the alleged altercation between Chris Brown and Rihanna during a February 13 taping of VH1’s “Storytellers,” although his comments will not appear in the show.

According to a Reuters report, at one point during the taping West asked the crowd, “Can’t we give Chris a break? … I know I make mistakes in life.” Brown, who was arrested during the Grammys and booked on suspicion of making criminal threats, a felony, has not been charged in the case.
West also reportedly received loud applause when he followed by saying, “Michael Jackson, amazing. Michael Phelps, amazing … He’s a real f—in’ person; he makes mistakes.” West also made a rather puzzling comment about O.J. Simpson, saying, “O.J. Simpson, amazing. Is he not? What he did, when he did, what he did. Was he not amazing, though?”

What’s funniest about all of this, is that none of it is surprising in the least. When you give Kanye West a microphone, you’d better hope he just uses it for (auto-tuned) singing or rapping because God only knows what will come out of his mouth otherwise. Defending Phelps is one thing, all he did was smoke pot. But defending the guy who beat the hell out of his girlfriend and then the guy that MURDERED his ex-wife? Its not even like O.J.’s been in the news lately or anything. Oh, Kanye, what an enigma you are.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLaZ-8IMtt0]

DJ Earworm created a mashup of all the popular songs from 2008. So you know what that means, most of these songs are gonna suck. But, the work that went into creating this mashup is pretty impressive. Everyone have a happy and safe New Year!