Don't you just love it

Don't you just love it when a music book is by some british dude who uses quavers and crotchets instead of eighth and quarter notes?

rant-a-riffic

i think it says a lot that as much as i care about music, i couldn't give a shit about the grammy awards. i mean, i watched the fucking SAG awards, but i didn't watch the grammys. ok, so i was in class during the grammy awards so it's not like i had a choice, but i probably wouldn't have watched them anyhow. some of the performances interest me (thanks internet!) but the awards are pretty lame. take for example the following list of nominees:

• The Arcade Fire
• Beck
• Death Cab For Cutie
• Franz Ferdinand
• The White Stripes

What field do you think these bands were nominated in? If you could name the type of music they make, what would it be? Well, apparently it's not rock, because this is the list of nominees for best "alternative" album of the year (an award which is not televised), all of which by the way, were WAY better than most of the nominees for best rock album (which is televised). For the record, Franz' "Do you want to" was nominated for "best rock performance by a duo or group with vocal", but the white stripes aren't making rock music? who the hell comes up with this shit?

Also, the sheer number of awards is insane. In the "rock" field for instance, there are no fewer than 7 awards: solo w/ vocal, duo or group with vocal, hard rock, metal, instrumental, best rock song (this is for the song itself: the other awards are ostensibly for the "performance"), and best rock album. All in all there are 108 awards.

Let's repeat that in case you missed it: the recording academy gives out no fewer ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHT grammys every year. Total number they show on tv: eleven.

In a field where we celebrate rising above categorization, the academy's response is to be as specfic as possible. i'd love to meet the guy who had to decide that feel good inc. was a "pop collaboration with vocals" while "daft punk is playing at my house" is a "dance recording."

most inane categories: "pop instrumental" album and performance. if it's an instrumental, then it's not a pop song. even if it was written by burt bacharach.

conclusion: the grammy awards are irrelevant. not that i'd turn one down or anything.

"perfect situation" is probably the worst weezer song ever. i really like it. i know, i know, i am a horrible person. meh. grammy rant coming soon.

jerry, how could you

oh man.

i saw a commercial for what i thought would be the deleriously wonderful Devo 2.0 on the tv. this led me to the the website (http://devo2-0.com). a fairly competent bunch of kids covering devo songs, and hey, a girl as the lead singer. why not! most of the performances seemed pretty good for a bunch of 12 year olds, even the drummer (all-important for devo). at first i was amazed. how awesome that DISNEY of all people is pushing songs like "freedom of choice" on youngsters. the videos reveal that the kids don't quite have the insane energy of the original band, and that the keyboard girl probably shouldn't be singing. but hey, i'll take what i can get; and there are even references to potatoes! so what if they made it "freedom of choice is what you want" instead of "freedom from choice"; the basic message is largely intact, and besides they're not the first. also, the two new songs aren't bad.

then i got to the beautiful world video.

let me be clear: i was not expecting them to leave the S&M stuff in "whip it". i was not expecting them to cover "jocko homo" at all, lest have the kids rolling around in giant condoms in the video. and i was definitely not expecting this version of beautiful world to live up to the original. i was surprised they even dared to include it. the original is easily among the greatest music videos ever made. i was CERTAINLY not expecting images of starving african children and men being blown up with grenades. but holy crap; they changed "it's a beautiful world for you, but not for me" into "for you, i guess me too."

ugh.

this pretty much renders the song completely pointless. i'm wondering why they bothered to cover it. couldn't they just stick to the less obviously politically perverse stuff if they were going to strip the songs of any signifigance whatsoever? how are mark mothersbaugh and jerry casale (who directed the videos!) justifying this to themselves? are they telling themselves the song is just even more ironic now? come on.

i think it says a lot that much of the sexual stuff made it through. they toned down "girl u want" a bit, and also made a "boy u want" version which is pretty fun. but they also covered "uncontrollable urge" and "jerkin back and forth." what the hell. granted, devo's "sexy" songs are mostly about sex as a primal instinct which shows us for what we really are, but i think that's exactly what's going on here. the establishment is fine with sexualized youth (regardless of what they say) because sex sells. a primal society is a controllable society.

to their credit, they did steer clear of what is probably the least ironic of their "protest" songs, "gates of steel." i only hope this leads some kids to go find the first devo album, which is among the most awesomely mind bending listening experiences in rock and roll.

bonus points go to the bass player, who in his website bio wrote "Maybe I could be the singing, guitar-playing, bass-playing DEVO-Ninja."

BEHOLD the power of music in a movie trailer: Brokeback to the Future!