This will be the first generation that is going to be faced with the fact that their elders, their forefathers, their ancestors, had a big fucking party and they are left having to clean it up. We have traditionally had more than our parents. Better toys, better standard of living, more money. But these kids may very well end up having much less. I have said I think that after Generation X and Generation Y the next gang of kids coming up should be called Generation WTF. That being said I think the scariest is what is being done about it. Fuck all.
People have so many new and exciting ways to get their voices heard. They tweet, they blog, they comment on Facebook statuses. I do it too, hell I am doing it right now. But here is what scares me, the people who confuse that with actually "doing something".
You can compose the most biting condemnation of a political figure's behavior and tweet the shit out of it, they won't really care. You can pontificate on the true nature of secret world orders in your blog and then post links to youtube videos that support your claims on Facebook, it won't matter. You can be really bold, and find someone posting something you find foolish, erroneous or downright evil and comment on it with absolutely searing rhetoric. So what?
There was a time when if the common man thought the people in charge were excessively corrupt or oppressive they got out of the house, quietly walked to where the oppressors actually lived, and shot them in the head. It served two important purposes. It stopped whatever oppressive behavior the common man in question found so objectionable. It also sent out a message to the next leader to dial the oppression back a bit or... you know... bang bang.
Now when we see injustice, we tweet. We post. We comment. Scary stuff kids.
That being said, in a world where we feel like our voice being heard through social media validates our existence, the only people out shooting are the ones who feel ignored. The disenfranchised dawn trenchcoats and shoot up school cafeterias. Pointless killing with the only goal being simple recognition. A cry for help lost in the din of the crowd.
Don't misunderstand me, I'm not saying everyone should grab a deer rifle and head to the nearest clocktower. I'm thinking more grassy knoll. And it doesn't have to be everybody. If 1 out of every 99 regular folks took out just one of the 1%, we could have this shit cleaned up in a week. And really if you just take out 15% of the 1%, that is only 0.15%, that would probably go a long way to getting the rest of them to get their minds right. So how many of us common people need to step up to make that work? Roughly 1 in 666.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Hell in the Sell: Van Halen
As you listen to Tatoo, the latest single from the newly reunited Van Halen, I want you to remember one thing...
The DLR version of Van Halen were almost single handedly responsible for everything that went wrong in 80's hair metal. Ratt, Poisin, Twisted Sister, Warrent, Bullet Boys, Faster Pussy Cat, Mr Big, Quiet Riot, and the list goes on. Sabbath gave us great new sound, KISS gave us the cartoon stage show, but it was Van Halen's original spin on all that, that really spawned the worst of a decade.
Not that I think those bands were all bad, but there are things about their own careers that I will bet have them cringing to this day. And they were all pioneered by DLR's Van Halen. The whammy bar yanking, fret board tapping, pitch harmonic wanking solos. The posing, posturing, kicking and spinning on stage. And the costumes, oh god the spandex. It was all so childish, so put on, and so very marketable.
But let's remember this, when Van Halen did it, it was new. They can lay claim to actually having their tongues in their cheeks. They were simply asking, why shouldn't rock and roll be fun? Why does it have to be serious, or dark, or angry? At the end of the day, heavy metal has always been the professional wrestling of the music industry, and Van Halen was Hulk Hogan, running wild on you!
But like a small child who will repeat any behavior ad naseum if it gets them a laugh once, the industry totally missed the fact that the best part of Van Halen was the fact that they were refreshing and different. And so they got ripped off, bastardized, imitated, caricatured, with a creative mudhole stomped in their musical asses and walked dry.
So now they want to get back together and revisit old glory. Why not? They do have lots to be proud of and nobody likes to pass up an opportunity to make a little cash. But every time they try to do something signature, old school, golden era Van Halenesque....it sounds derivative, tired and cliche. That has to suck. You can almost hear them in the studio listening to the play back and saying, "But I'm not a wannabe poser... I AM Eddie Van Fucking Halen".
The only time I ever met David Lee Roth was in 1988 and Poisin was on the TV doing Your Mama Don't Dance, and he looked at me with a look of genuine remorse and muttered "What did we do?".
It's okay Dave, I still love ya.
The DLR version of Van Halen were almost single handedly responsible for everything that went wrong in 80's hair metal. Ratt, Poisin, Twisted Sister, Warrent, Bullet Boys, Faster Pussy Cat, Mr Big, Quiet Riot, and the list goes on. Sabbath gave us great new sound, KISS gave us the cartoon stage show, but it was Van Halen's original spin on all that, that really spawned the worst of a decade.
Not that I think those bands were all bad, but there are things about their own careers that I will bet have them cringing to this day. And they were all pioneered by DLR's Van Halen. The whammy bar yanking, fret board tapping, pitch harmonic wanking solos. The posing, posturing, kicking and spinning on stage. And the costumes, oh god the spandex. It was all so childish, so put on, and so very marketable.
But let's remember this, when Van Halen did it, it was new. They can lay claim to actually having their tongues in their cheeks. They were simply asking, why shouldn't rock and roll be fun? Why does it have to be serious, or dark, or angry? At the end of the day, heavy metal has always been the professional wrestling of the music industry, and Van Halen was Hulk Hogan, running wild on you!
But like a small child who will repeat any behavior ad naseum if it gets them a laugh once, the industry totally missed the fact that the best part of Van Halen was the fact that they were refreshing and different. And so they got ripped off, bastardized, imitated, caricatured, with a creative mudhole stomped in their musical asses and walked dry.
So now they want to get back together and revisit old glory. Why not? They do have lots to be proud of and nobody likes to pass up an opportunity to make a little cash. But every time they try to do something signature, old school, golden era Van Halenesque....it sounds derivative, tired and cliche. That has to suck. You can almost hear them in the studio listening to the play back and saying, "But I'm not a wannabe poser... I AM Eddie Van Fucking Halen".
The only time I ever met David Lee Roth was in 1988 and Poisin was on the TV doing Your Mama Don't Dance, and he looked at me with a look of genuine remorse and muttered "What did we do?".
It's okay Dave, I still love ya.
Thursday, January 05, 2012
You don't own your cold
Intellectual property isn't a term that should ever be used in association with rock n roll. Rock has always been about inflammatory expression. It is supposed to be infectious. You don't own it, you suffer from it. First you catch it as an airborne virus. Then it incubates inside your soul and blisters out through your fingers and your voice. Like any disease, it evolves with each infection. It changes as it spreads, adapting and getting stronger. The only real measure of success in rock and roll is how many people you infect. How far does the DNA of your particular strain of the virus spread? How much does it evolve through you, and do those mutations make it stronger? You don't own your music any more than you own a cold.
Engineering music as a commodity and then trying to control it's spread through profitable channels is corporate bio-illogical warfare. It ain't rock and roll. People who try to tame the process, to enslave it for revenue, are fighting against its very nature. You can't keep counter-culture on a petri dish. It is wild and alive and it will break free. Whether it is old bootlegged live records, Napster, or just other bands using your riffs, life finds a way. You can't argue with Jeff Goldblum.
So if you think you have the music bug, hack and cough and don't cover your mouth. Let the spit and snot fly. Maybe I'll catch a little of what you got. 100 years of recorded coughs and wheezes have me burning with fever, and I'll take whatever you got and cook it up with the rest and see what colors I can piss out tomorrow no matter how much it burns.
Just don't start whining and crying that I stole your cold. It's just a terminal case of influence-za. If I sweat your virus out through my music, I am only spreading your strain, enhancing the power of your infection. The less I mutate it, the more I am just your carrier. I'm not saying you have to thank everyone who rips off your shit, but suing them isn't rock n roll. If you hear someone sneeze, and like the sickness their spreading, just remember to be polite and say "gesundheit". If you recognize your rattle in someone's else's cough, be proud of your pestilent progeny.
To the corporate labs with their weaponized pop viruses, and their idiot grin ex-mouseketeer delivery systems, you can burn bodies in court all day long but you can't stop the spread. Rock and roll is already a bandemic and it has grown far beyond anyone's ability to contain. So take a deep breath and catch the fever. It doesn't kill you, it makes you rock harder.
Engineering music as a commodity and then trying to control it's spread through profitable channels is corporate bio-illogical warfare. It ain't rock and roll. People who try to tame the process, to enslave it for revenue, are fighting against its very nature. You can't keep counter-culture on a petri dish. It is wild and alive and it will break free. Whether it is old bootlegged live records, Napster, or just other bands using your riffs, life finds a way. You can't argue with Jeff Goldblum.
So if you think you have the music bug, hack and cough and don't cover your mouth. Let the spit and snot fly. Maybe I'll catch a little of what you got. 100 years of recorded coughs and wheezes have me burning with fever, and I'll take whatever you got and cook it up with the rest and see what colors I can piss out tomorrow no matter how much it burns.
Just don't start whining and crying that I stole your cold. It's just a terminal case of influence-za. If I sweat your virus out through my music, I am only spreading your strain, enhancing the power of your infection. The less I mutate it, the more I am just your carrier. I'm not saying you have to thank everyone who rips off your shit, but suing them isn't rock n roll. If you hear someone sneeze, and like the sickness their spreading, just remember to be polite and say "gesundheit". If you recognize your rattle in someone's else's cough, be proud of your pestilent progeny.
To the corporate labs with their weaponized pop viruses, and their idiot grin ex-mouseketeer delivery systems, you can burn bodies in court all day long but you can't stop the spread. Rock and roll is already a bandemic and it has grown far beyond anyone's ability to contain. So take a deep breath and catch the fever. It doesn't kill you, it makes you rock harder.
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