Alanis Morissette Becomes U.S. Citizen.
Cripes, now we can’t deport her.
Northern Border Not Secure, Either
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Category: Music
Perhaps Hell Hath A Fury Like That
George Michael, bidding farewell:
In the 100-minute film, he speaks frankly about losing a lover to AIDS and the death of his mother, of the infamous lewd act in a Beverly Hills toilet and the media fury over his anti-Iraq war stance.
I must have slept through that media fury. Did it rattle your windows?
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Answering the Rhetorical
Dear Rhetorical Question Answerer:
When did Motley Crue become classic rock?
Bowling for Soup
Dear Bowling for Soup,
Motley Crue began its transition from vital music makers to the classic rock and oldies market when they released Decade of Decadence in 1991. Any time a musical group releases a greatest hits collection, it gambles. The very name greatest hits indicates that there will be no further hits as good, and a retrospective look at the band also makes the casual fan wonder if the band is done. Even if the album includes new material, its target audience is the cult fan who wants to own everything the band puts out and the people who, years later, decide they want to own a collection of the band’s songs.
Looking over Motley Crue’s discography, it proves true enough. Between Dr. Feelgood and the two releases in 1994, two complete high school classes matriculated without new Crue, and you could only hear them on album rock stations and other retrospective-looking outlets.
So to answer your question, BfS, the best date we can give is 1991.
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Acknowledgement
A special tip of the WTF hat to the advertising genius who centered the JC Penney’s Valentine’s Day ad campaign around the song “99 Luft Balloons“.
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Soundtrack to the Work Day
Interesting. KMJM is playing the song that runs through the strip club scene in Beverly Hills Cop. I think this makes my home office a hostile workplace. I might just sue myself.
On the other hand, I wonder what the title is, not that anyone would know it. It’s the Beverly Hills Cop Strip Club Song.
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Day Seven
In another scandal, George W. Bush has not interrupted his regular activity to express sympathy for Big Band fans in their loss of revered band leader Artie Shaw.
Seven days, Mr. President, and no word from the White House. You’re sacrificing America’s international hep cred by not speaking up to give hope and solace to dozens.
You make me ashamed to be an American, and I am thinking of moving to Illinois in protest.
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Sophistication, Thy Antonym is Noggle
On Wednesday, Richard Roeper identified the worst holiday songs and assigns the worst ribbon to “Jingle Bells” by the Singing Dogs, which leads me to confess: I have this song on a cassette single.
As Roeper mentioned it, I put it in the old cassette deck and clicked the play button. And sang along.
Granted, I am just a suburban schmuck and not a big-city sophisticate (pronounced as Frenchly as possible), but even I have limits. For example, I don’t care for the Singing Dogs’ rendition of “Oh, Susanna” which is the flip side of the tape.
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Top Mispronunciations of Sarah McLachlan’s Name
Like Milla Jovavich, Canadian siren Sarah McLachlan has a name that’s difficult to spell or pronounce from memory. Undoubtedly (used here in the sense of “I am making it up”), Ms. McLachlan has endured people addressing her or writing of her with one or more of the following:
- Sarah Machlachlanahan.
- Sarah Mchlandlached.
- O’Sherrie McLachlan (by Steve Perry, of course).
- Shiraz McLachlan.
- Sarah McLockedLAN.
- Natalie Merchant.
Sure, it’s a gag that amuses me, but will I think it funny when one of these young ladies mocks me in such a fashion? Probably not; I am thin-skinned and overly sensitive.
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Holiday Hint
Having trouble distinguishing between Lou Reed and Lou Rawls? MfBJN offers this handy guide:
- Lou Rawls is the guy with singing talent.
- Lou Reed had something to do with Andy Warhol, who was a mid-twentieth-century painter who was famous, briefly, because Americans were bored after World War II.
Don’t be fooled by that talking-over-a-bass-line that represents “Wild Side”; that didn’t take much talent, and hence it’s obviously Lou Reed.
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Talking Back to Christmas Carols
Yes, Ms. McGovern, they know it’s Christmas. They’re kids, for ding-donging out loud.
(Apologies to Jeff Goldstein for stealing his groove. Well, not really.)
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Memo to Harry Connick, Junior
Whistles do not belong in Christmas carols, ever. Your rendition of “Frosty the Snowman” is in violation.
Please, just rein it in a little bit, or we’ll have to contact Senator John McCain to enact Congressional legislation regulating Christmas Carols to prevent damn kids from destroying the traditional music enjoyed for generations in this great land. Without schnucking whistles.
(McCain’s got enough time if he has the leisure to tackle steroids in baseball, speaking of which, who doesn’t think that there’s enough bipartisan, nationwide sport to just freaking amend the constitution to prohibit steroids and blood doping in all sports?)
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Channelling Pejman
I feel so Pejmanic posting this love poem, but he started it with all the poems he’s posting these days. So here’s on with which I became reacquainted this weekend:
by David Gilmour
Cruise you are making me sing
Now you have taken me under your wing
Cruise, we both know you’re the best
How can they say you’re like all the rest
Cruise, we’re both travelling so far
Burning out fast like a shooting star
Cruise I feel sure that your song will be sung
And will ring in the ears of everyone
Saving our children, saving our land
Protecting us from things we can’t understand
Power and Glory, Justice and Right
I’m sure that you’ll help us to see the light
And the love that you radiate will keep us warm
And help us to weather the storm
Cruise, you have taken me in
And just when I’ve got you under my skin
You start ignoring the fears I have felt
‘Cause you know you can always make my poor heart melt
Please don’t take what I’m saying amiss
Or misunderstand at a time such as this
Because if such close friends should ever fall out
What would there be left worth fighting about
Power and glory, justice and right
I’m sure that you’ll help them to see the light
Will you save our children, will you save our land
And protect us from all the things we can’t understand?
Power and glory and justice for all
Who will we turn to when your hard rain falls
(Lyric source.) It’s from his album About Face, and somehow I think this 1984esque song probably meant it as satire.
I, on the other hand, remember the feelings I had when I sat in a stadium in southwest Missouri and an A10 flew over. An ugly machine crafted only to rain fire and death. Even though I knew this, I was happy that our technology is better than theirs. All of them others theirs.
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In Touch with Middle America
In this month’s Playboy, in between alternate Bush-bashing and baring, a round table entitled “Rip. Burn. Die.” gathers music industry insiders to discuss the problems and challenges within the industry. While discussing exhorbitant concert prices, two known figures offer nuggets of insight into the little man’s mind set:
- John Mayer:
We charge around $40 for a ticket, which isn’t a lot of money. Twenty-three year old kids have $40 to spend on a concert. They may say they don’t, but they do.(John Mayer doesn’t point out that $40 represents almost seven hours’ of labor at minimum wage. Factor in the convenience fee applied to a ticket, and you’re looking at a full day’s work. Now, imagine you’re taking a date; that’s Monday and Tuesday of your work week, which isn’t a big deal to John Mayer. Now, say you’ve got a family, and you need parking for the minivan, and suddenly you’re not buying any souvenirs or food, and the concert’s not that much of a good entertainment value, but who am I to complain? I’ve already been to one whole concert this year.)
- Sharon Osbourne:
We could charge more, but with what’s going on with unemployment in this country, we want to keep ticket prices down.(Ms. Osbourne doesn’t mention that unemployment is still at a relative historical low, which means that if she had her druthers, the marked increase in ticket prices would be even more if she weren’t afraid to lose more concertgoers, so she’ll get in a little dig at the current president if she doesn’t have anything else to say.)
Thanks for your insight, celebrities and those whose work provides them with a better-than-middle-class living which apparently has divorced them from fiscal realities here outside the stratosphere.
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When Damn Kids Become Program Directors
YGDY, your favorite hits of the 1980s, with none of the hard rock or rap. This next song was the only hit from California-based Faith No More, it’s "Epic"….
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MOR of the Same
Of course, I hear the Bowling for Soup song quoted below on 93X, which is Adult Alternative Music.
Which is one step from Easy-Listening Alternative Hits of Yesterday and Today.
Maybe less. Perhaps 7/10 of a step.
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Good Morning, Middle Age
Yea, verily, I quote from the book of Bowling for Soup, and the prophets saith:
Debbie just hit the wall
she never had it all
one Prozac a day
husband’s a CPA
her dreams went out the door
when she turned twenty-four
only been with one man
what happen to her plan?She was gonna be an actress
she was gonna be a star
she was gonna shake her ass
on the hood of Whitesnake’s car
her yellow SUV is now the enemy
looks at her average life
and nothing has been alrightBruce Springstein, Madonna
way before Nirvana
there was U2 and Blondie
and music still on MTV
her two kids in high school
they tell her that she’s uncool
but she still preoccupies
with 19, 19, 1985
Of course, for we in Generation X, riding in the slipstream of the sonic Boomers, 40 is only the end of adolescence these days. Thanks, sixties generation. Now grow up so we can.
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Drink Up That Geritol, Generation X
Duran Duran, Poison, Huey Lewis, and Whitney Houston are as fresh to kids today as Cream, Traffic, and J.J. Jackson were to us.
I SAID, DURAN DURAN, POISON, AND…. Oh, never mind, you won’t remember it anyway.
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I Guess Nobody Caught Her In Concert
Okay, let me get this straight. Smash Mouth is not allowed to perform at Fair St. Louis because they’re not family-friendly.
Now appearing at River Splash, Liz Phair.
Perhaps the bookers had not heard the songs “Fuck and Run” or “H.W.C.” (neither of which is particularly work-safe and will earn you content-scanning demerits should you click the links). Of course, I have never heard those songs, but I know Liz Phair might be moderately radio-friendly these days, but family-friendly, she ain’t.
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I Blame Peer-To-Peer Music Sharing
Summer concerts are failing to attract crowds — Lollapalooza is the latest victim of the trend:
Bongiovanni saidticket sales went south about the middle of April, when shows already on sale dramatically slowed and new shows failed to ignite.
“Price has got to matter,” he said. “Ticket prices are elevated to where they are not a frivolous expense.” But industry insiders say it’s not simply high ticket prices and a bad economy that caused ticket sales to drop, but a variety of larger issues, ranging from the lack of exciting attractions to a growing reluctance to patronize the suburban amphitheaters (called “sheds” in the business) where most of the summer tours play.
Quickly, Senator Hatch, do something to force people to pay $75 dollars to sit on a patch of dirt to watch a band play a number of songs the listeners won’t even recognize. Or else music promoters can key the cars in movie theatres’ parking lots to penalize consumers for misusing their entertainment time and money.
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I Am With You In Spirit
Summerfest opens in Milwaukee.
High temperature on Thursday in Milwaukee: 61 degrees.
Dance on a picnic table, poorly, to one Surf Boys, Streetlife, Rockerfellas, or Booze Brothers song for me, brothers.
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