The SUSA polls showing Beshear slaughtering Fletcher have put me in a righteously optimistic mood. This one goes out to Stan Lee in particular, courtesy the Tweedy/Bragg Orchestra . Both albums are great, I highly recommend them.
And did I mention the Draft Horne petition?
Well, I'm off to Chicago for the YearlyKos Convention to get my ass kissed by Hillary/ Obama/ Edwards/ Pelosi etc... Should be a lot of fun. And I am coming in town just as my Cubbies have taken over first place with a walk-off win last night. In honor of the lovable losers (the Cubs, not the Democrats), I present to you the happenin' 1969 Hey, Hey, Holy Mackerel song from that promising but ultimately crushing season.
Oh, and Kerry Wood is back!
I don't think I'll have any computer access up there, so I'll probably be gone until Sunday.
But if you've stopped by, go sign the Horne petition!
Ack, my wonderful Le Tigre song isn't working.
I'll work on it.
For this week's featured music, we go way back to Media Czech's motherland. My grandparents were proud Bohemians who loved their polka. Here we have some Czech polka sung in the native tongue, Around the Moon , by The Jodie Makula Orchestra.
bav se dobře!
So begins a new installment on BlueGrassRoots, the Thursday Music Post, in which our good readers are introduced to a band that they should know about but don't.
Today's feature is The Fanged Robot, Lexington's own garage rock bums. The Fanged Robot is run like Mussolini by our local music scene vagabond Robbie Catholic, drummer for Scourge of the Sea, The Apparitions, and Lexington's greatest band ever, the now departed Pontious CoPilot. Robot is all about Robbie's noisy guitar and big time hooks mingled therein. Once a three piece, now Robot is just Robbie and (insert random drummer here...currently Justin Craig of Scourge). Imagine them as the Ramones as a 2 piece. With beards.
Check out their Myspace page for some songs, but they've graciously allowed me to put my favorite Fanged Robot song on here for your enjoyment, Awkward/Cute . Their next show is July 14th at The Dame, opening up for Emily Hagahara. They'll probably start around 10:00, so check them out. They've promised to spit on you there...twice. But in a good way. I'm assuming. Yes.
Wilco will be providing 6 songs from their new album.....to Volkswagen for 6 commercials.
(sigh)
Good luck on those widgets Mr. Tweedy.
Well, for someone whose blog gets about 50 hits a day, this whole “sell out” thing is quite the scene. Since even the Great Light-Blue Satan has devoted several posts to the subject today, I figure I’ll throw my response out there.
First of all, for all of those that are able to continue enjoying these songs after they’ve been in a Taco Bell commercial, I envy you. Really. Whenever I hear ‘New Slang’, the image of a bloodstained Ronald McDonald pumping BGH into a sedated cow pops into my head, and I assure you its completely involuntary. (Though Natalie Portman, mercifully, pops in there sometimes)
“Selling out” is certainly subjective. For some it is signing to a big label, to some it’s making videos, to others it’s charging more than $10 for your show. I tend to reject each of those arguments. I even don’t mind letting your song be used in a film, because it is at least being used in another art form (though if it’s some shitty Brockenheimer film/matching video synergy thing, that’s very questionable).
I happen to draw the line at allowing your song to be used to sell widgets. The commercialization of every aspect of our culture is something that really sickens me. You might be one of those people that watches the Super Bowl to see all the new wacky commercials, but I think that phenomenon is a sad commentary on our society. I don’t find being manipulated to give my money to Wal-Mart amusing. And if I hear someone at my work gush about how cute the talking duck/frog/lizard/dog/anus is on the Ex-Lax commercial, I’m gonna fucking snap.
If you’re only making music to get rich, live in a mansion or get laid, go ahead and sell your song. Your music is likely crap anyway. But for those with genuine talent such as the Shins or Modest Mouse who present themselves as serious musicians to sell your song for a Nike commercial, I think this says something about how seriously you value the music you make. Which is entirely up to you, not me. But if you don’t object to your music being used in this manner, don’t expect me to take your music seriously either. I’m sure you’ll get lots of new fans, so that’s no loss to you.
Its also fair to judge bands differently based on what “level” they’re at. For Bob Dylan to sell ‘The Times They Are A Changin’ to the Bank of Montreal for a TV ad….there’s just no excuse for that. He’s been an embarrassment for the last 30 years, so this and the Victoria’s Secret and Ipod commercials merely cement this fact in my snobby book. And Elvis Costello pitching luxury automobiles for rich white guys makes me vomit in my mouth a little. Ditto White Stripes and Coke.
For unsigned bands struggling to get by, it’s certainly a different story. But again, I think it says something about how seriously you’re taking your music. Bands like the Shins and Modest Mouse don’t fit in this category though. Modest Mouse was already well known and could sell out any place they wanted to. There was no reason to allow the minivan commercial other than wanting more money, or being “bigger”. Which again, is their right to do, and some might not care at all, but it really rubs me the wrong way.
Amanda says in the comments that selling your song to a commercial could allow more of your music to flow freely through the internet and allow the band to lower their prices to $20 a show. Ideally, this might be true, but I don’t think it will work out this way. Modest Mouse shows are $30+ through Ticketmaster (at least) despite the minivan money. And the Shins, post-McDonalds, rarely tour and I’d be surprised if their tickets prices aren’t similar. Considering how unimpressive their new album is (IMO), its also possible that commercial money will make bands rest on their laurels, touring less and feeling less pressure to put out the best possible music possible. It’s certainly selfish on my part, but I think that bands touring to make a living gives the fans more access and also pushes a band to improve their music. Bands inevitably get older, or richer, have kids, grow apart, get burnt out, lose the creative ability and drive they once had. The commercial money might exacerbate this process (not the age…yes).
I take politics and music very seriously (in that order). It may be silly, but I get just as upset when a band whose integrity or music I respect sells their song to a commercial as I get when a politician who I respect makes a terrible vote. So when Obama refused to campaign for Lamont and rid us of the dreadful Lieberfucker, I had a similar reaction to seeing the Elvis Costello Lexus commercial. And if Sonic Youth sold ‘Teenage Riot’ to The Gap, or R.E.M. sold ‘These Days’ or ‘Begin the Begin’ to Ford….my head would explode.
Well, as I watch Elvis Costello hawk Lexuses (Lexi?) on TV, I wave goodbye to one of the last holdouts from the pre-80's era. Its now assumed that if you were a rock star with any integrity from this era, you now have no problem using your song about "social revolution" to sell jeans, trucks and Carnival cruises. The Who, Dylan, The Clash, Iggy Pop, Mellancamp, Sting...the list is long and depressing. The only holdouts remain Neil Young and Bruuuce, who turned down $12 million to use Born in the USA for Chevy.
And then there's the wave of new bands that are ready and willing to have their art help in the sale of widgets. The Shins shill for McDonald's, Modest Mouse for minivans, White Stripes for Coke, Iron & Wine for M&M's, Postal Service for UPS, The Go! Team for Honda, Of Montreal for Outback Fucking Steakhouse, and Moby for....well, everything.
What's odd is that the great bands of the mid-80's to mid-90's avoided such tactics like the plague, and they continue to today. In the 80's, bands like Fugazi, Sonic Youth, the Pixies and R.E.M. set a clear precedent that such behavior was taboo and cheapened the value of your music. R.E.M. continued this into the 90's, turning down millions to use 'Its the End of the World as We Know It' for Windows 95, saying "our music is not for sale".
The aforementioned bands served as mentors/role models for those that followed them into the 90's, such as Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins, Pavement, Pearl Jam and Radiohead. You never saw your favorite song from these guys pop up selling Big Macs, and you (hopefully) never will. (The notable exception being Nirvana, whose 'Breed' was used in a video game commercial this year, thanks to Courtney, I'd imagine). Its fair to say that Eddie Vedder or Thom Yorke would rather slit their own throat than give their songs to Burger King.
So why are these bands unique when it comes to avoiding "selling out"? As far as the old folks go I'd say its mostly due to feeling marginalized and lacking importance anymore. Unable to make the music they once could, they're relegated to whoring themselves out to companies in order to stay in the limelight.
For the new bands, I'm not entirely sure. I don't accept the argument that its tougher for bands to get exposure, so they have to resort to commercials these days. Sure, corporate radio sucks, but its sucked for the last 30 years, thats nothing new. And with the Internet, MySpace and YouTube, there's a whole new way to get your music out there.
And the #1 way to get your band off the ground remains the same: work your ass off and tour the country relentlessly. R.E.M. didn't hit it big by selling 'Radio Free Europe' to BMW, they did it by touring in a rickety old van all over the country, playing in every dive imaginable, until they built a loyal fan base and grew as a band to the point where they were a much better/tighter band.
And there are new bands that still do this, of course. But its a shame that really talented bands like the Shins are known as "that band from the McDonald's commercial".
At the risk of disappointing those people that hate what I typically write about politics, I'd like to solicit a little bi-partisan help on picking a new portable music player. My Sony mini disc player is officially DOA thanks to my 2 year old's insatiable desire to break anything remotely resembling an expensive electronic device. I'm not too disappointed really, the software platform was a nightmare and although when I purchased the player the storage capacity per disc was phenomenal, new technology made it look like the 2001 equivalent of the original Walkman tape player.
I haven't kept up with iPod or similar type players in terms of what's good, bad, or ugly, so only have marketing materials to go by. That's why I want real life testimonials before making a decision. I'll explain my usage on the other side....
I don't usually talk music on BlueGrassRoots. That's what Crazy Talk's for. Anyway, yesterday I got to interview drummer Glenn Kotche of Wilco.
It ruled.
I write on a music blog, Crazy Talk!, with a bunch of music mavens I met in college. You should check it out. It could totally rejuvenate your interest in music of all types.
If you run a blog, we would LOVE a link on your site. www.crazytalk.org. If you do link to us, leave a note in the comment box here and we'll give you mad props.
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