Oh, My God! You Don't Like Yellawolf?!

Try this little excercise: walk over to the person nearest you and ask them what kind of music they listen to. If they say something like "Oh, I listen to everything" or "I like a mix of different things" I want you to bow down and worship at the altar of my genius. One of those two responses is the answer you'll get from 90% (totally valid and heavily researched percentage by the way)of people when you ask that question. I'll even go so far as to say that 100% of those people are lying directly to your face. No one listens to "everything". Find me someone who has pop, rap, bluegrass, zydeco, acid jazz, Gregorian chant, blues, classical, afro-punk, funk,soul,techno, 70's rock,country, and shoegaze on their iPod and I'll show you a avocado made from oranges.

Most people like one or two types of music and a couple of additional artists that are mainstream forms of various musical styles. For instance if you love Christina Aguilera, Kanye West, and Linkin Park you like one type of music: pop. Just because those three artists present their pop in different formats doesn't change what it is. If you also happen to like Miranda Lambert, that doesn't make you a country music fan that makes you a Miranda Lambert fan.

Think about this: When did the term Indy rock become the definition of a musical sound and not music that was written, recorded, and distributed on a shoe-string budget by a tiny record label with no connection to the big music labels? Answer: the minute record execs discovered that some people will go out of their way to listen to obscure, poorly-played music just so they can feel unique. Speaking of unique, where did this idea come from that just because an artist doesn't sound like anyone else makes them exceptional musicians? I don't care if you're fusing afrobeat and delta blues with crust punk if it sounds like you're playing three styles of music poorly at the same time. Then there is Lady Gaga different or as I call it marketing different. Here is a woman who sounds EXACTLY like 80's Madonna with a splash of R&B, but somehow gets lauded as being the most original artist since the dawn of man because she wears odd outfits. But I digress...

Who cares, right? Why does it matter if someone is into one specific style of music or 36? It matters because it is indicative of the state of the American psyche. Everyone wants to fit in despite all of the stories we've been told of this country being the one place in the world where you're free to be an individual. No one is going to come to your home and arrest you for banging out to some Blut Aus Nord if you so choose, but the social consequences can be interesting. I often get curious glances when I tell someone that I listen to a lot of hip hop and also a lot of metal (death, black, sludge, and doom being my favorite styles). People often assume they can tell what kind of person I am solely by my musical choices. That is the very reason why everyone you meet tells you they listen to "everything"; they are afraid of being reduced to a single line definition of their existence (this happens a lot more with clothing, but that is a different post altogether).

There are people out there who do listen to a wide variety of music. Some people can go from Celine Dion to Aesop Rock to Brooks & Dunn to Agalloch and not think anything of it. I'm not one of those people and, most likely, neither are you. Our fear of being judged for saying anything out of the ordinary, even about something as trivial as music choices, goes further than most people would like to consider. The same mentality that got the American public to at one time support a war against a country with no connection to 9/11 (remember 2003? It wasn't that long ago...) in two terms as president likely comes frome the same place that makes you think people listen to Arcade Fire solely because they like the music.

It's Only Wednesday??

I'm getting sick which means I'm more cranky than usual (if that level of cranky is even possible) so here we go...


The Speed Limit:

Is there any reason why most people treat the speed limit like the sign reads "Speed Minimum"? If you try driving 30 mph in a 30 mph zone you'll probably be honked at and fingered (no pun) by every single car you see sans old drivers. I'm on my way to work today driving 40 in a 30 and the guy behind me is acting like I'm parked. We're on a one-lane road and he's constantly trying to pass me in his (insert gas guzzling SUV here)which gets even more annoying because we're on a one-lane road. When he finally gets to an intersection where he can pass me he does so by bolting past me at maybe 50 while giving me a dirty frown which promptly makes me laugh at him.
Here's the big idea: IT'S A SPEED LIMIT!!! If you can't understand these simple terms then you shouldn't be driving.

This is a damn shame:
I was reading an article earlier about how Jesse Jackson was going around some cit BEGGING parents in black neighborhoods to send their kids to school. Come the fuck on black folks!! Our people spent all those damn years trying to get a good education for us and now we ain't even sending our kids to the school we fought for them to go to?! You might as well go up to your grandmother and spit in her face. And throw whatever ideas you have of Jesse out the window; he's not my favorite person on the planet but at least this time he's getting some TV face-time over a good cause. My mom would've beat the black off of me (and believe me she tried a few times) if I didn't go to school. We lived in the projects, we had no money, but we were gonna get that "edumencation" whether we liked it or not. Why is it that the same people in our community who are the biggest seller of the "White man holding me down" game are also the same people who don't do anything to uplift themselves?

Kanye West Vs. 50 Cent = A Loss For All Music Fans:
In all the hoopla over the Kanye vs. 50 9/11 CD release, I couldn't wait until a friend of mine came over with his *ahem* advance copy *ahem* of both CDs. My verdict: Kanye's album=marginally entertaining, 50's album=shit sandwich. Which is to say they both failed to make a positive impression on my ears. The release date drama is a loss for fans and a win for both artists and their record labels. The artists and the labels get to cook up some nonexistent beef between the two artists over who will sell the most albums (which record labels mistakingly think means it was a better album)which makes the sheepish fans go out and buy more albums. It's really a wonderful strategy in a time where a top selling hip hop album may not even go platinum. The fans lose because the artists and labels are not selling you music; they are selling you image. Neither one of these CDs is a musical masterpiece despite what Kanye and 50 supporters may have you think. Go fork over your hard-earned money on 9/11 for some hot garbage if you want to, but I'll be at home with money in hand and better music on my mind.


A Gay Senator Is Only Newsworthy For So Long:
It was entertaining, it was shocking, it was an undeniably dumb move, but for the love of everything holy can we please move on from this? Whether Larry Craig resigns or shows up at the next press conference dressed as Shirley Temple, this story has lost it's flavor. Even I posted a little video connected to the incident last week...and then I moved on with my life as most other Americans did. There are 300 million other more important stories going on in the world and the media is reporting on some senator who tried to pull a George Michael in the bathroom like it's the capture of Osama Bin Laden. Keep beating the story to death and keep watching those ratings continue to fall...or take the revolutionary approach and report the NEWS. Just a thought

The Assassination of Common Sense Pt. 4: The Music Edition

Everyone talks about how music sucks these days, but no one addresses the fact that music fans swung the ax that killed good music. Tune into any radio format these days and you'll hear the same 10 songs on every dj's show and you'll get treated to 5 other songs that sound just like the 10 heavy rotation songs. Yet we keep listening and complaining.

I haven't been a radio listener for about 10 years now (which I'm sure most music snobs can't wait to tell you) not because I don't think there is good music on the radio (which there really isn't), but because I need variety in my music. If you like pop-punk (why?) and you listen to the radio you've probably been listening to Blink 182 sound-a-likes for the past 8 or 9 years. Same thing with rap and rock music. There just aren't a lot of unique and intriguing sounds coming from mainstream (or independent) music these days. The topics are the same and the music is of a very bland color-by-numbers philosophy because it has been shown time and time again that the fans will listen to what you give them and like it.

Here is where we failed: instead of getting music we have been sold bastardized versions of different subcultures and done nothing to prove that we deserve better. In our rush to categorize ourselves as a part of whatever the popular misinterpretation of a genuine article is we've stopped short of asking ourselves a very important question: WHERE IS THE MUSIC? Record companies, as I've said before, have proof that we are indeed sheep. They can sell pop music in the form of Pink or repackage it in the form of Lilly Allen or give it a new face and call it Beyonce and people buy it all. The funniest part of the whole thing is that the biggest difference between those three artists is the way they dress and whom they are dressed to impress. No one is listening to the MUSIC because if they were they'd notice that a lot of these songs have the same lyrics in the same melodies with very similar instruments accompanying them. So while teens and adults alike rush to call one genre cheesy and another the soundtrack to their lives, they are essentially just pointing out their own ignorance by not looking past the packaging and trying the product.

I've heard people who say they love punk music glorify Fall Out Boy and call NOFX pointless. I've seen rap fans turn up D4L and tune out Rakim. We have based our decisions of what good music is on the ambitions of music executives and the tastes of 14 year olds...common sense is nowhere in sight. You don't have to have talent and stand out from the crowd anymore, just hire a good wardrobe designer and you've got it made.