I have re-watched this video like 30 times since I put it up. It's SO GOOD! I think this for many reasons. One because, like the Arnold Schwarzenegger post above, it's just good editing. Some guy took the time to record an intentionally shitty and smooth jazz version, then had to sync it up with existing footage, while tirelessly slowing down/speeding up parts so that everything came together as seamlessly as possible. Plus, it speaks volumes about how totally shitty and pointless Metallica became after the mid-90s and highlights the extent to which a once powerful song can fall so far. I mean, compare 2010 Metallica to 1991 Metallica:
Obviously, there is no comparison. Youth, alcoholism, thousands of Russian teenagers and Jason Newstead make for an infinitely more compelling performance. These are players at the height of their powers in the primes of their lives. The husky shells they would become 19 years later is of course depressing and a joke. Has everyone seen Some Kind of Monster? Everyone needs to see Some Kind of Monster.
Snack & C'Mish from TTL asked me to drop in to the store a few Sundays ago, drink beer and play MP3s on Serato plates. I was like "sure!" Thanks guys, I had a lot of fun. I played stuff I like (many jams of which have appeared on THIS VERY BLOG) and at the end had an interview where I wasn't talking loud enough and forgot to shout-out Kevin until 20 minutes after the interview ended.
Caveat! The mixer was run through another interface that put a 1-second delay on everything going to the system.
"Who cares." -You
In other words, I was live mixing to a not-live monitor and that explains why a few mixes are FUCKING TERRIBLE. I personally apologize to everyone for the Passions/Stevie Nicks/Fleetwood Mac mixes. When you can't do it live in one-take, you're not a professional, so I'm not a professional.
Aside from that gigantic boner, the set is a lot of fun and I play a bunch of different music. Enjoy!
You also failed to provide the A-level swag! I know all the good stuff jeans were at the Levi's Fader Fort, and that was pretty much it. Who's working marketing for all the various groups that gave stuff away, Bag of Swag? Who? This is slightly embarrassing, even for a bag of free crap:
The swag itself is housed in a lovely cloth tote bag, depicting what appears to be Betty Rubble hauling a Marshall stack across Mexico. I guess! Who cares, they probably got a local artist at the last second to make this. And since I like the B-52's, I like this.
Right away the tote is weighed down with a giant phone book listing all the bands. This is the ONLY worthwhile object in the Bag of Swag. It is a comprehensive list of bands, playing times, venues, local cab #s, etc. Essentially, a SXSWepdia.
Next up we have so many crappy magazines. GTF outta here Bass Player. Phil Lesh? Come on you guys, there has been literally 60 years of recorded music since Phil Lesh had his playing style influenced more by Bach counterpoint than by rock or soul bass players (although one can also hear the fluidity and power of a jazz bassist such as Charles Mingus or Jimmy Garrison in Lesh's work, along with stylistic allusions to fellow San Francisco psychedelic-era bassist Jack Casady). Also, guess which sentence in this paragraph excerpts liberally from Wikipedia?
Like, I wouldn't be averse to be reading an interview with Flea (yes I would), or that ogre guy who now plays for Metallica, or that caveman that used to play bass for Nirvana, or even someone wearing a Jaco Pastorious mask. You got thrown into the garbage in the first 2 minutes, Bass Player, and don't think you're getting away with it either, American Songwriter and Music Connection! Only Alicia Keys stays, because she's pretty and I want to see more pictures of her in the magazine.
SXSW is big on themes for their day parties and events, and here are some guides... British Music, German Music, English Folk (apparently different from British Music). The Flatstock 24 guide was tops though, it was a listing of all the vendors who were selling awesome tour prints in one of the exhibition halls at the Austin Convention Center. You can see a lot of the vendors and some of the stuff they have available here. I don't really pay attention to tour prints, and sure Peter Saville and all the books about like Grunge era Peter Bagge/Sonic Youth/Mudhoney freakout posters, but I was very happy to see modern, elegant posters (usually for terrible bands, but NONETHELESS!).
Hey Green Label Sound and Severe Records! It's the 90s! Compact Disc technology is the wave of the future! Now let's go buy some slap bracelets and Koosh Balls! Also, Reebok Pumps and Captain Planet.
No one should give away CDs, for so many reasons. And if you do, come on Severe Records, try to spend that extra 5 cents a CD and make some actual packaging. Trent Rhodes man, you should not be bragging about your position with this CD. Just put in a Polaroid of you picking your nose! I would accept that!
And I actually like Green Label Sound -- there are a lot of neat artists on that sampler, but just... don't make a CD. Give me a fortune cookie with a download link inside it or something.
Precious energy! At SXSW we ate like 11 year olds whose parents were out of town for the night. That basically means fried cheese and street meat for every meal. We didn't even have time to eat delicious BBQ! For as far as vision permitted, there were no salads. If you're vegetarian or vegan, forget it, have fun eating white bread and Diet Coke for dinner. Food options at music festivals are already an embarrassing state of affairs, so the fact that the Bag of Swag gave us an energy bar and some pretzels was like "YESSSS"
Now we're talking some slightly more inventive swag. Good work, ASCAP and, I guess, MySpace! Now MySpace has not exactly been knocking the grand slam viral balls out of the idea park, but flimsy little plastic key ... condoms I guess? are memorable and fun. ASCAP also gets point for pure function: matches. I don't know what "I [screaming mouth] SXSW" means exactly, but sure, I'll put it on. And actual condoms are also a good idea. Musicians like sex, after all.
Here we have what is known not-at-all-affectionately as the dregs.
Aside from the random stickers, which I like, I don't think it's unfair to say "what the hell is this." Midem, what word am I spreading exactly? The word of a red electricity-conducting M? The word of "solutions, business, connections, knowlege" (four meaningless words, placed side by side)?
Hey The Rose, I don't care what your slogan is, it is not physically possible to play a world tour in just one night, neither metaphorically nor literally. And Billboard Bungalow, I don't even know where to begin with you.
This is pretty neat. The top 2 items in this picture are both earplugs. See above with ASCAP re: form < function. Bottom left we have a dinky little first aid kit with 2 Lifesavers (ha! I get it now!) and on the right we have a neat little waterproof container thing with yet another pair of earplugs. Thanks, AOL!
Hahahaha! I saw on the Ninjatune blog (I see you, England) that the Dub Pistols are desperately trying to get on the viral spiral bandwagon by having their fan base vote their terrible song "Ganja" onto the British charts.
LOL, and also XD, and while we're at it, :p
I mean come on dudes. The viral campaign to make Rage Against the Machine the #1 song for Xmas was inspired, singular, and not at all historic. Trying to do the SAME THING, in the Springtime, for a song no one cares about, is idiotic. I quote from what I can only imagine is the heavily edited and official press release:
Calling all slacktivists!
After the farcical debacle of the lip-synching Brits recently and the runaway success of the RATM campaign at Christmas, let’s do it again and break the stranglehold of contrived, manufactured pop and get some real, home-grown talent into the charts.
March 7th sees the release of the Dub Pistols new single ‘Ganja’, which brings together tight reggae rhythms and calypso steel drums with a lyrical hip hop vocal from the legendary Rodney P. At Unofficial Chemical we want it to ease its way into the charts as part of a chart hijack campaign. What are the charts if they aren’t about people themselves choosing what they want to listen to and buying a particular song at a particular time? Just because they’re not on the Radio 1 playlist or manufactured by Simon Cowell, it doesn’t mean credible music should be shut out. Time was when The Clash, The Specials, The Jam, the Happy Mondays and Oasis all got into the charts with cool, uncompromising music – let’s see a return to those times – after all, the download revolution means that major label marketing budgets have less sway. We have the power now.
If you ain’t heard of the Dub Pistols yet, let me introduce you to the hype - come and smoke a peace pipe! Dub Pistols are a British band who formed in the mid 1990s whose music is an eclectic fusion of dub, dance, reggae, ska, hip-hop and punk. They’re underground legends, and this campaign originates from Unofficial Chemical – the Dubs’ fanclub network.
With ‘Ganja’ the Dubs mash up different sounds and genres into a sublime sound so summery and catchy it can’t help but put a smile on your face. We’re not talking here the A class drugs like Kate Moss did, and we’re not advocating taking drugs of any kind but, if you feel like flexing a bit of people power and want to see a genuinely original, high grade (anti-pop) song in the charts, join this group, spread the word, forward it to everyone on your profile. We’re calling upon you fellow slacktivists out there, we know you feel like us, add your voice to the growing movement to eradicate the charts of highly stylised, manufactured talentless crud and have your voice heard – utilise your purchasing power from the comfort of your armchair and enjoy some meditation for the nation - download “Ganja” between etc etc
And while you're at it, check the video, which spoofs horror flick The Ring as well as a growing number of unofficial videos fans have produced to support the campaign!
Like, what are you talking about, Unofficial Chemical? Enough with the weed references, I understand: you like getting high. This press release makes Toto look like the model of humility. I'm glad you called to mind the Clash, Jam and Specials to recall a golden age of music, but don't even try to put the Dub Pistols in the same category. That makes you no better than Disney.
Unfortunately, the "growing number of unofficial videos fans have produced to support the campaign!" is a bit of an over-statement. Like, hey Mr Rexley I guess 3 is more than zero, so technically the number is growing, but 3 videos of literally the same thing does not constitute a campaign.
However I must kindly thank this press release, as it informs me that the video was all along a spoof of The Ring.
I'm going to be in Austin till Sunday. No new posts! In the meantime, two things:
ONE! This is really good, duh:
TWO! I did a radio show for TTL Radio last week and you can listen to it if you have internet power. Simply (this is not simple) do the following: go here and click on the "Listen" tab for the March 11, 2010 show, which will download a .m3u file, which you will then have to open in iTunes. I'll throw up a full tracklisting later but I play a lot of fun stuff, and it's all done live, and there are some GIANT BONERS in the mixing department but in my defense the system was on a 3 second delay from the turntables. Then Matt interviews me at the end of the show, and I believe I make fun of Michna and forget to shout out Kevin till much later.
I made this video the other day. Man I hope it goes viral. To have it go into a viral spiral would be the best. It's hard to make memes, you know? Kids don't care unless you shove a Rick Astley/Cat jumping in or out of something/terrible movie trailer/tasteful montage of someone's career/screaming redheaded Christian in their face.
From now on if someone starts complaining to you, instead of giving them one of these, how about you give them one of these:
I always found this song extremely offensive. It is the summation of all that is terrible about desperate-last-hurrah-era Eagles. Nevermind old haggard Don Henley, EVERYONE is literally dying on stage here. The very premise of the whole Hell Freezes Over project is offensive -- it's the Eagles obnoxiously rubbing my face in something I don't care about.
-Remember when we said we would get back together when hell froze over?! Well, that's the name of our reunion tour! So FUCK YOU!
-Jesus, Joe Walsh, stop waving that knife around, I get it!
To celebrate this old folks home, Glenn Frey and Henley wrote "Get Over It," which is simultaneously their response to outraged fans/critics who are angry they would reunite (a population of literally zero people*), and their take-no-prisoners tough guy response to the impotent PC-obsessive 90s. Come on, now dudes. What kind of enemies are those. That's like Eminem taking on Will Smith and the Insane Clown Posse.
Also, Wikipedia? Try to pretend to have just a little bit of impartiality. Like,
The song is about Henley's frustration with others (such as TV chat show contestants) placing their shortcomings, failures, mental breakdowns, and financial problems on those who don't deserve it, then believing that the world owes them a favor, to which he replies, "the big bad world doesn't owe you a thing," the constant whining, and complaining of others, even to the point of them blaming their present failures on the past, eventually forces the man to state, out loud, "I'd like to find your inner child, and kick its little ass!" [Exclamation point IN the article!]
LOOK at these dudes:
What's most offensive of all is Joe Walsh's endless parade of "Reee!!!"s. Over time it becomes less a punctuation to Henley's out-of-touch fist-waving, and becomes more like a grating challenge to the listener to get over the badness of the very song we are listening to.
Of course, if I ever brought any of this to the attention of the Eagles, I know what they would say in response.
*You know you've finally gone off the deep end when your band starts addressing anonymous enemies. No names, just "those that prey on your downfall," as Jay-Z once said. Eminem, KRS-One, Nas and Tupac have all fallen down this navel-gazing rabbit hole.
Jim Steinman is one of the greatest musical Jews that ever lived. Sorry, Wall Of Jews and Gene Simmons, but it's true. After all, this is the blinding visionary genius who made Meat Loaf a household name (Steinman wrote basically all of Bat Out Of Hell I + II). I mean, Meat Loaf was involved too, I guess, by actually singing the songs, but it is Steinman who penned the epic over-the-top ballad rock operas that have defined Loaf's literally enormous body (of work!).
Rock operas are obviously the dumbest things in the world right after hip-hoperas: even with the windmill-guitar-bashing lunatic antics of the Who in their prime, everything in "Tommy" is terrible and idiotic. We all know this. "A Quick One While He's Away" is obviously amazing, but have you ever tried to sit down and listen to "Pinball Wizard?"
He ain't got no distractions Can't hear those buzzers and bells Don't see lights a flashin' Plays by sense of smell Always gets a replay Never tilts at all That deaf, dumb and blind kid Sure plays a mean pinball -Shut Up
Not so with Jim Steinman. This sagely semite has written the most urgent music in the world. In "Paradise by the Dashboard Light," for example, when what's her name says "STOP RIGHT THERE! I gotta know right now! Before we go any further blah blah blah" How great is that? That's literally what every single girl has thought in her brain since the beginning of time, and how lucky is whoever it is that got to sing it?
Meat Loaf himself also has never equalled himself when singing Jim Steinman material. "Paradise," "Do Anything For Love" and "Objects In Mirror" are all Steinman jams (the last two had their videos directed by a young idiot named Michael Bay), and when the fat fool released "Bat Out Of Hell 3: What Am I Doing" without the help of Steinman, nobody cared.
Steinman has done a ton of stuff outside of Gigantic Stomach'd Meat Loaf. He wrote a few little songs like Total Eclipse Of The Heart, Holding Out For A Hero, and Making Love Out Of Nothing At All; Andrew Lloyd Webber wants to hump him; he recorded 2 songs for the Streets Of Fire soundtrack; he wrote the only good Celine Dion song.
This song is so amazing it has been released three times. Once by Steinman's band Pandora's Box, twice by Meat Loaf from his shitty and pointless album Bat Out Of Hell 3: Come On Help A Guy Out, and thrice by Celine Dion, hated Canadian. Of these, Celine Dion's version is the industry standard.
Celine Dion > Pandora's Box because there are simply things you cannot know if you are not famous and have not recorded dozens of hit singles. Simply put, the chick who sings on the Pandora's Box version is inferior to Celine Dion by very virtue that she is not Celine Dion, and this song requires a Celine Dion over-the-top epic-ness.
Celine Dion > Meat Loaf because Meat Loaf's version is shitty and tossed off. If he had released it during Bat Out Of Hell II: Still Got It, it might have been a different story. His voice is just... off and not as commanding, he looks as out of it and over the hill as he did in Fight Club, and the song is recorded as a duet. NO! The very spirit of this song is about the kind of loss and regret and you can only share with yourself. There's a reason why both the Celine and the Meat Loaf videos are about some distant dead and lost lover.
I will admit though that I do not for a second buy Celine Dion singing this part:
There were things I'd never do again But then they'd always seemed right There were nights of endless pleasure It was more than any laws allow
When I started this blog, I had no idea that eventually it would just devolve into me keeping tabs on things I hate.
For example, my mission statement of bringing you all things 3oh!3 related has kind of fallen to the wayside (I even neglected to post/rant about their video with noted drunk idiot Ke$ha), so you KNOW I'm only kind of trying to stay on top of shit. That's because it's hard to keep constant, unceasing vigilance on awful things. It wears a man down.
However, 2 music videos have recently made me realize there is another market I must address, and that is the genre of white reggae. Is there anything more absurd than white reggae? By now I would hope we are all familiar with the summum bonum of this genre -- I speak of course, of Puff Puff Give. This amazing video literally has it all. Nevermind Elvis Costello, the Clash or Ted Leo, who actually took white reggae and made it listenable, HannaH*s Field has taken any good will created by them, rolled it into a joint, and stuffed it into their dreadlocks for safekeeping. HannaH*s Field's very earnestness, their very cluelessness raises their video to the level of beautiful art form. At least, higher (get it) than anything Canadians have done.
I say this because it is perfectly reasonable to have songs/videos about weed. And white people love weed, obvs. Just don't take yourself seriously. I love Udachi and Jess' "Smoke Rings," for example. And Ras Trent is basically the last word on the subject.
And yet, terrible videos continue to get made. Here I offer you 2 ends of the horrible and green spectrum.
On the one terrible hand, we have the new Dub Pistols' video "Ganja".
Remember the Dub Pistols? The Dub Pistols circa 1996 do. These 45 year old British stoners have been bashing away for the last 15 years and have finally arrived at a place where they can stretch out their legs and give back to their fans. Give what, exactly? A homo-erotic weed-huffing video, apparently:
1. Let's set up a camera in our apartment to tape our friends when they come over to get high, because sure 2. Let's sniff a giant bag of weed like it's a pair of panty hose 3. Let's use every available medium to smoke pot 4. Let's pull rips out of a giant dick-sized bong 5. Let's toke from an even gianter dick-sized spliff 6. How about some seemingly endless slow-mo shots of smoke wafting "seductively"' from our hideous mouths? 7. Let's not forget that we're a room full of dudes, where 8. the only woman present is a ghost that presumably is an ethereal embodiment of the weed we are smoking/positive vibrations we are sharing
There are so many head-shaking moments of barely contained homo-eroticism that I was basically "are you kidding me"ing the whole video, when the TWIST AT THE END (not really a spoiler) is that surprise and whoops, the imaginary weed lady is in fact ANOTHER DUDE.
Like, what? Also, no.
Who is this for? Is this for me, because I am a fan of Dub Pistols? What am I supposed to take away from this, aside from that queasy and unpleasant wanna-go-to-bed feeling one gets after smoking too much pot and hanging out with cackling pot-heads for too long? And by the way, please note the name of the VHS tape that Buckingham Pot-lace puts into the machine:
...which of course conjures up the fact that this guy, somewhere in his "flat," has a giant box FILLED WITH VHS TAPES with literally hours of footage of him and his "mates" cramming "prawn crisps" into their gaping, mal-toothed faces, guffawing and knee-slapping the night away.
By the way, if you want to play the YT comment game for this video, you could do worse than chime in with SamanthaH3arts2Danc3:
UGH-ernaught!
On the other, but no less terrible hand, we have a new video by the DIRECTOR OF "PUFF PUFF GIVE"!!!11!1!!!one!!1!
Obviously this is a watershed moment.
To be perfectly honest with you, I think this video is directed pretty well. The colors pop and the high frame rate on the close-up was a good idea. The only thing I take issue with is the inclusion of children. That is not OK. You don't need to pollute the minds of kids, Jah Sun. You and your band sell the song hard enough.
Who exactly is Jah Sun? He is this guy: And who is a friend of Jah Sun? These people: What I take away from this video is a shiveringly needy sense of overcompensation, which brings to mind one of the great elements of Ras Trent -- By coming from a knowledgeable place about reggae, the SNL skit references real songs, real lyrics, and even more impressively, blasts dudes like Jah Sun who also use these references as a way to scream "LOOK! I AM DOWN WITH REGGAE CULTURE!"
Like, how many Jamaica/reggae references are there?
Look at that last still! There are so many lions in it! The lion on the bottom left of the lion-mural looks like it's vomiting up the lion-sun that's on Jah Sun's lion-sun hat!
Perhaps the most offensive aspect of the video though, is the premise itself. The conceit is that we are being educated, via Jah Sun, about reggae and Jamaican culture in a slideshow. Oh and by the way, I guess Jah Sun himself falls in that rich heritage? Because there he is, right next to Bob Marley!
Yikes. In conclusion, Jah Sun's hair and Jah Sun's bassist.
EDIT: I asked Reggae Monkey (literally the most reggae-knowledgeable person I know, outside of maybe Queen Majesty) if he could ID all the various reggae/Jamaica items in the slideshow. This is his response:
starting from top left and working down the page l-r, row by row
Portmore is one of the main cities in Jamaica, mentioned in a lot of songs Irie FM - main jamaican radio online pretty sure that's capleton not sure who is in sunglasses visit of haile selassie to Jamaica dont know what stoney hill is marcus garvey dont know bob marley ocho rios - beach area st elizabeth- parrish where a lot of stars were born dont know buju banton negril - tourist area plant? Jamaican flag dont know kingston - main city
Haha. You hear that Jah Sun? Reggae Monkey doesn't know who you are.
*bonus joke: That still with the mess of lions? I didn't even mention the literally 3 other lions that are in the lion mural. A pride of lions, more like a shame of lions etc
From now on, if anyone ever steps to your shit, give them one of these:
*Note: The 21 Gun Salute has never heard nor plans to ever hear any of K-Bizzil's music, and endorses him entirely based on his choice of imagery. The 21 Gun Salute does not promote or endorse any views that K-Bizzil may have regarding gender, class, race and labor.
I was having lunch the other day and this song started playing while I was eating. I was like "I LIKE this!" and then I put my thumbs up and smiled, because that's what Facebook has taught me to do. I then took out my shitty hated iPhone and put it up to the speakers and didn't move for 30 seconds, because that's what Shazam has taught me to do.
Turns out the song is this:
I think the only reason I like it is literally because of that little radar "ping!" sound that recurs, not unlike that amazing Pitbull song from last year. Also it's "world music" so you can get your Buena Vista Social Ponytail on.
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