The Decade Wrap-Up That Wasn't

For the last few months of 2009, the staff at Anthony Is Right were planning a major decade-wrap up, celebrating 100 Artists Who Released More Than 20 Songs In The 2000s That I'm Bothering To Keep On My iPod with a Trouser Press-style summation of their work over the last decade. Pre-production was mighty nifty, but these ambitions were scuttled by a non-crippling but totally annoying ear infection that lasted well over a month, soon followed by an obnoxious cold that lingers on today. Combined with moving plans, wedding plans, work and nitrome.com, you should be able to see why it didn't happen.

Thankfully, my buddy Keith Harris (who probably shouldn't write more and move back to NY, but I wouldn't stop him if he did), is doing a very different, but possibly even more awesome decade overview on his revived Useful Noise blog. This space should get more active as soon as sinuses permit - at least until that damned wedding - but I feel like the oh-those-aughties train has passed. So go ride his, if you're not already.

P.S., please check out One Star Music, a tumblr I'm curating of YouTubes from albums that received one star or less in a published music guide. If I'm doing it for my health, it hasn't been working.

Read Scandalist!

If you do, I promise to make more stuff like this.

All love slipped away...

"Reviewing Chinese Democracy is not like reviewing music. It's more like reviewing a unicorn." - Chuck Klosterman, AV Club.

Axl is the unicorn, Chuck. Chinese Democracy is unicorn shit. And shit is shit.

Another thing.

I really don't need an indie DJ "validating modern-day filth" for me. I'll either ignore it or take it straight, thanks.

So that's what I'm doing wrong.

Robert Christgau, giving it up for Girl Talk's conceptual majesty:

"Only when I printed out Wikipedia's list of samples -- good enough for downloaders, though an official version comes with the official release -- did I get it." [italics mine]

On paper (like Christgau), I'm all for chipmunking totems, mining classics and fabricating duets. On iPod, I prefer songs rather than an hour-long, flow-free medley. But my insistence that Girl Talk take all these elements and create new pop (like hip-hoppers and earlier mash-up celebrities always have), rather than a beat-diffusing bricolage of gone-before-you-know-it signifiers, may just be a sign that I don't get it. Sadly, I don't own a printer.

Scared, Not Out Of Here

I'm half-surprised that Matthew Perpetua's Q&A with Michael Stipe on his PopSongs blog hasn't gotten more attention (I hope fan boards are burning up over it at least). Stipe is remarkably candid (this couldn't have happened in 1994) and Matthew doesn't waste the unexpected access. That his comprehensive song review blog could achieve such a grand finale is proof that music blogging of the non-commercial variety is still a worthwhile thing.

But I'm only half-surprised, because REM hasn't made more than a handful of worthwhile songs in the last decade. As much as I enjoy a track like "Imitation Of Life" or "Hope," I'd happily give them up if it meant history could be altered - if the band had stuck to their oft-repeated promise that if anybody left the group, they were done. What could have been remembered as the college rock Led Zeppelin is now an amalgam of the worst aspects of late XTC and late Rolling Stones. Imagine if their reunion for the Rock'n'Roll Hall Of Fame had been their first performance since 1996! We might not have minded Michael Stipe over-enunciating "Gardening At Night!"

In that alternate reality, Matt and Michael's dialogue could be a highly publicized book. It could probably still get published in this one, too. If you are now or have ever been a die-hard REM fan, you owe it to yourself to check it out.

Got memed! (Thanks, Alfred.)

“List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re not any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now, shaping your spring. Post these instructions in your blog along with your 7 songs. Then tag 7 other people to see what they’re listening to.”

I'm taking this as an opportunity to write about seven of my Top Ten Singles Of 2008 So Far, ignoring "Pork And Beans," "Beat It" and "I Will Possess Your Heart" as I've already said plenty about them.


Chris Brown, "Forever"
We've only got one night to double your pleasure, double your fun, and dance forever. Again. We've only got one night to double your pleasure, double your fun, and dance forever. Read it slowly. We've only got one night to double your pleasure, double your fun, and dance forever. This the biggest lyrical vortex in pop since the Backstreet Boys' "empty spaces fill me up with holes." It's so insane that I sometimes forget Brown opens the second verse with "it feels like we're on another level" and rhymes it with "we could be two rebels." Thanks to the blithe, carefree music and Chris Brown's jubilant delivery, resistance is futile.

Coldplay, "Viva La Vida"
Watch out, Arcade Fire! Thanks to you, these guys have figured out how to make grand music without being messianic or singing about love, and their leader doesn't sound like a turkey when he gets excited. The perfect song to celebrate the existence of term limits to.

Gnarls Barkley, "Run"
I enjoy the zebra-stripe sequence, but the goofy video gets in the way of the lyric, which does apocalyptic dementia even better than Dick Valentine. With every listen this song sounds better than "Crazy," better than "Hey Ya," better than just about anything I can think of. No other song sounds more awake to the world at large; it's as fun as a fire alarm gets. Where Electric Six is trying to live in the nightmare, Cee-Lo still thinks there might be hope, but only if we run(!).

The Hives, "T.H.E.H.I.V.E.S."
Interscope, are you really just going to throw "Tick Tick Boom" in a bunch of action ads and then call it a day? I know "Throw It On Me" stiffed, but come on, this song has fluke novelty hit written all over it! You said this was going to be a single in February, so fund a video! Put it in ads! It's perfect for The Gap! They got together with Pharrell and made you a classic, now do your damn job!

MGMT, "Time To Pretend"
Indie is the new alternative, but what I'm psyched for is when it becomes the new alternapop. Between Myspace shrinking bands down to a four-song introductory EP and labels of all sizes trying to hook their acts up with advertising companies, I'm thinking bands are going to learn how to focus fast, leaving us with a bunch of cool songs from disparate sounds that only have some vague social context in common. Indie used to be about using your collegiate leisure time to find the diamonds in the coal, now the bands have some impetus to do it for us.

Nine Inch Nails, "Discipline"
The Slip inspired me to finally revisit Trent's pre-With Teeth full-lengths, and I was surprised to find I enjoyed Pretty Hate Machine even more than his recent arena boogie, thanks to his punkest vocals and late '80s percussion tracks that undercut any metal power-tripping (a flaw that sinks much of The Downward Spiral, despite the extreme production detail that also fails to keep Trent from hitting the wall on The Fragile). I originally took "Discipline" for "Only, pt. 2" but its contradictions are far more interesting than that sum-up would imply. Why is he more comfortable than ever with pop on pop's terms now that no one's asking him to conform? And how awesome is it that he decided to give the evidence away?

Trina, "Single Again"
Sometimes I'm inordinately bothered by female self-contradiction (Xtina's "words can't bring me down so don't bring me down," for instance), sometimes I'm not, like when Trina tries to act triumphant after getting dumped. Sure, she's clearly not as over it as she's claiming, but it's hard to fault her mix of heartbreak, anger and dismissive disgust. Maybe it's because she doesn't throw in self-pity.

And now to pick seven other blogs to send the meme on to.

Blackmail Is My Life

Kitty Power

Her Jazz

b-r-double o-k-lyn drama

what?

Mind Your Own Goddamn Business

Flaming Pablum

Love Theme From "Web 2.0"

I was hoping to spend today thinking about anything other then the internet, but Emily Gould's "Exposed" and Weezer's "Pork And Beans" video put the kibosh on that. Both kind of feel like tail-eating themselves moments, and naturally I prefer the one under three minutes thirty with great editing and overdrive pedals more than the one ten webpages long and written like a college admissions essay. But while there was plenty to prune, I'd rather read "Exposed" than a piece by or about Gould extrapolating insights into "the blogging generation" from her experience. The newsworthiness of it (at least to those actively participating in Web 2.0) is obvious by the number of people who've read it all the way through, whether or not they were bored the final product*. While, thankfully, she didn't trump up the piece by claiming so herself, many of her observations could be seen as common among folks with an online social life, even universal.

Knowing that the worst of my online oversharing is still publicly accessible doesn’t thrill me, but it doesn’t scare me anymore either. I might hate my former self, but I don’t want to destroy her, and in a way, I want to respect her decision to show the world her vulnerability. I’m willing to let that blog exist now as a sort of memorial to a time in my life when I thought my discoveries about myself and what I loved were special enough to merit sharing with the world immediately.

That this penultimate paragraph is followed by one repping her current blog is annoying, but "Exposed" gives a definitive look at where personal blogging can take someone, emotionally and occupationally. An article "about" bloggers would be written to the uninitiated, and the debate would be over whether the piece "got it right." Having a livejournal post on the cover of the NYT magazine doesn't suggest how things have changed, it proves it.

"Pork And Beans" is nowhere as self-revealing, but the way Weezer exploits, legitimizes, celebrates and identifies with the subjects of viral internet humor is equally an acknowledgment that things have changed; its such an overt surrender to web culture at its most potentially humiliating that it might as well be titled "Youtube Killed The Video Star." The clip is oddly moving for me, providing a context for the song that takes my attention away from the overly specific whiny meta of the verses and puts it on the defiant, unapologetic chorus: One look in the mirror, and I'm tickled pink. Where most entertainers are looking for a way to maintain some dignity and distance, Weezer soaks in it.

The information industry is being sucked into a new marketplace, and will be whether or not it can find a way to turn public attention into enough loot to maintain its current size and structure. I appreciate Emily Gould and Weezer speaking up for the people caught up in it, whether or not that was their intent.


==
*I don't usually claim that attention proves merit, but people aren't angry because she's wrong, they're angry because they think she's overpaid.

Fred Durst needs to start directing videos again.

Just cuz you didn't know Puddle Of Mudd had several rock #1s doesn't make them anonymous, Al. Their sound is shrill Nirvana/Local H rather than groany Pearl Jam/Creed, and, Vines aside, that's been an anomaly in rawk since the days of Durst. Thanks in part to that Kurt-like wail, their romantic paranoia has slightly less of a cock-rock undertow than most of their peers. Still, the hits on Come Clean were early examples of the misognyist psychosis that is "active rock," with "Blurry" more disturbingly vulnerable and "She Hates Me" more disturbingly giddy than most of the truly anonymous bile that's followed. Wes Scantlin was (is?) freqently seen in photos and videos wearing a black cap over his blond mane, and for that alone they were more identifiable than Fuel then or Three Days Grace now. Those videos were pretty damn memorable, too (respect the Durst).

Recent singles have been merely more of the same, but the success of "Psycho" and "Famous" imply that Scantlin may be a radio lifer, an emotionally unstable Tom Petty, rather than the eventual prison lifer he comes off as. I'm not saying everyone should like them, but they wouldn't be as "repulsive" as Al finds them if they were as "anonymous" as he claims.

I believe this is the first rebuttal to a negative Puddle Of Mudd review that wasn't at least 50% profanity.

Hello, you bastards. I am here to present you with a story. One day when I was playing with my Ron Popeil food dehydrater, it occured to me: you all suck. How's that for a story? I've got another one. Dear everyone, you suck. How's that? Have you ever heard the expression, "suck the shit out of my ass?" Just wondering.
From "Der Springer."

I am proud to present Letters From Andy, an ever-expanding resource compiling the correspondence and erotic fiction of a gentleman considered by a privileged few to be both the Henry Miller and the William S. Burroughs of central Pennsylvania. Not for the humorless, not for the weak of heart, and not safe for work.

Some recent highlights:

Spasm, a rumination on the legacy of Allen Ginsberg

The confessional Hey.

Smoke, Poisoned Freedom, Diseased Tongues Of Lies, a poetic critique of George W. Bush.

A Special Night With The Family Dog, the story of a boy screwing his family dog.

Please tell your nastier, more seasoned peers about the delicious work of this undiscovered literary genius.