The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 3,400 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 6 years to get that many views.
Oh, yes, it’s that time of year again! Christmas music time! The time of year when you are constantly tortured by joyous music about Jesus and his birthday. It’s enough to make you sick, isn’t it? Unfortunately, this disgust falls over you in a season when all you want is to be excited about presents. It’s like the lords of music proclaim, “Endure this horrid music, presents!” Damn you, Music Lords.
But, honestly, I don’t know a single person who loves Christmas music so much that they wait all year to finally hear “Christmas Shoes” on Black Friday. Everyone I know avoids the radio at all costs for a month before Christmas. It’s really too much to handle.
The only thing that’s worse than the god-awful tunes the stations play are those sadists who purchase those Christmas lawn decorations that play music! I pray that your neighbor doesn’t awaken in the middle of the night to “Fa la la la la” and decide to egg your house out of frustration. It could happen.
If there were a bonus to Christmas paraphernalia, I would say there is a short list of Christmas movies I can watch and enjoy. That short list is: National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, The Christmas Story, and A Nightmare Before Christmas. As I said, the list was short.
So, call me a Scrooge, but I enjoy the holiday for giving and receiving presents and a splendid amount of family time, not answering the door for stupid, off-tune carolers expecting money and to spread the Christmas cheer. They instead make me want to slam the door in their face and continue playing Minecraft like the hobbit I am this season.
Merry Christmas.
When I first heard “Yonkers” by Tyler the Creator, I was so terrified, I thought I was going to need an extra change of pants. In the video, Tyler is first playing with a roach he then eats. After swallowing the insect, he then vomits and tears his shirt off, leaving him with all black eyes and two chains hanging from his neck. Continuing his rap, he places a noose around his neck and stands upon the chair he was resting on. Grotesquely, he pushes the chair away and the audience is left to watch as his feet twitch and convulse, until they finally become limp, and the only movement is the gentle sway back and forth. Giving Mr. Creator another try, I then decided to listen to “Bastard”, and the first thing I noticed was “Yo, yo **** you dough boys and **** ya writing any other ****ing n*****-ass blog that can put a 18-year-old n**** making his own ****ing beats.” The rant continued for a while, and then a deep, distorted voice of a therapist made me feel like I was strapped down to a table and forced to talk about my deep dark secrets. Then, the freakiest thing happened: the first line of the song was, “This is what the devil plays before he goes to sleep.”
Whoa, whoa, whoa. Can we take a step back from the Halloween scare tactics, please? Listen, Creator, I really enjoy your style of rapping and your creativity, but holy crap, I feel like a psycho when I watch and enjoy your music videos. I’m a big fan of horror movies, so I love being scared. Maybe that’s why I really enjoy your videos and lyrics.
One thing I’ve always loved is inner-celebrity feuds, and Tyler the Creator has many of them! Mr. Creator has feuds against a laundry list of artists including (but not limited to): B.o.B, Bruno Mars, Chris Brown, and Hayley Williams (lead singer of the band Paramore). As an added note, I very much dislike all of these artists, so I would more than likely take Tyler’s side on all arguments.
There are a few lyrics I may not agree with that sprout from Mr. Creators colorful mouth, but all in all I verily enjoy his tunage. If ever he were to read this, I hope he does not refer to me as a “bitch ass blogger” like others he refered to in “Bastard”.
Music Video: “Yonkers” by Tyler the Creator: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b98qCmhKy-c&safe=active
Believe me, I’ve looked up to all sorts of musicians in my day. Musicians that can do no wrong, musicians I now hate, and musicians I’m now indifferent to. Somewhere jumbled up in the mix of all these other musicians is Mr. Thomas DeLonge. This man’s entire musical catalog was once my daily Bible. There where school days when all I would do is doodle his song lyrics on my papers, binders, and notebooks. I was enamored by DeLonge’s music.
Starting in the late 90′s, DeLonge started a band called Blink-182. They had wild fame into the new millennium, but soon disbanded after inter-band relationship issues, and a rigorous touring schedule. (Also, a side project called Boxcar Racer between two band members, DeLonge and Travis Barker, leaving the third member, Mark Hoppus, with extra free time. Anyone who’s been through some sort of school system can understand how that feels.) After Blink-182′s final album dropped in 2003, DeLonge left the band and started his own form of music anew. In 2005, Tom brought his fans a new form of the same thing. Adding more reverb and space rock elements, DeLonge regurgitates Blink-182′s music in a bit more of a matured way. Angels & Airwaves was my favorite band of all time for about four years of my life. Was that time of my life wasted? Undecided. Angels & Airwaves has released four albums total, but after the third one, Love, a miracle occurred for nostalgic Blink fans. The trio announced they were back together during the 2009 MTV VMAs and began to re-create ten year old music. The newest Blink album of this decade was total crap. Old Blink-182 was kind of cool, teenagers playing fast bar chords and yelling about their problems, but the new Blink-182 is pretty lame, forty year old’s playing bar chords and yelling about their problems. Neighborhoods, released in 2011, was… let’s see, how to describe it? Take some crap, crap on it, and that’s about as crap as the last Blink-182 album was. It’s discouraging to the soul.
A few years ago, I would have never said a single cross word about Angels & Airwaves and the god I believed Tom DeLonge was. That is, until I began listening to all the AvA albums in a row and I realized that many of the songs are the same arrangements with slight differences. Any artist that uses the same elements over and over again isn’t a very creative artist. So this is where I began to see the flaws of my beloved DeLonge. Also, after being thoroughly educated on the talented voices the world has to offer, my views on this guy’s vocal chords have changed completely.
I absolutely believe that Mr. Thomas Matthew DeLonge, Jr. is a great guy, from what I can tell thus far, and would be an awesome guy to spend a Saturday night with at a pub, but maybe I could share a few new ideas for his albums so he doesn’t have to waste his talent on the same stuff he’s been doing for the last twenty years.
Chris Crocker dressed in drag.
Chris Crocker as a man.
Some people just should not make music. Chris Crocker is really one of those people, along side the train-wrecks that are Justin Bieber, Rebecca Black, Carly Rea Jepsen, and Hedi Montag. Most of Crockers YouTube videos are of him complaining about something (most famously, the “Leave Britney Alone” video.), so now it’s my turn to complain about him. His tune, “Second to None” came up on my Pandora the other day. Crocker was going crazy ranting about his ex boyfriends new boyfriend. Hold the gayness, chief. Let’s bring it down a bit. At first, I tried desperately to picture this song being about a girl, then I prayed for it to be about a girl, then, at the bridge, a flow of gay pride slapped me in the face.
Don’t get me wrong, I support the gays as much as the next liberal artistic northerner, but his music doesn’t have to blatently point out that he is very gay. As goes for any homosexual in music. It is an art. It’s not satire. When anyone takes music for less than it is, most actual artists get frustrated. Furthermore, any song that talks about a shlong and is sung by a male, is surely compensating for something. Crocker, I don’t need or want to hear about your you-know-what in your songs, not does anybody else. It would mean so much to me if someone out there could wipe out Chris Crocker’s music from the internet, any physical copies, and also all future copies that might wind up invading the eardrums of all innocent bystanders.
Listen, I don’t care if you’re gay, straight, purple, blue, or an alien, but I don’t want to hear about your anatomy or your exploits. I don’t like it when rappers do it, so I don’t like it when annoying YouTubers do it. This guy’s music is crap. It doesn’t matter what kind of sexuality, race, or creed he is. Crap music is crap music. No matter who makes it.
This may be a somewhat shallow review, but that is because a review, it is not. A rant, on the other hand, it is. I may be cynical, but I’m sure I’m not the only one that feels this way, but all can freely disagree.
We can pick on Brittney as much as we want, but leave music aloooone.
Am I the only one who has been wondering who this band is and how exactly they came into public popularity so quickly and from out of nowhere? They have had hits on the Billboard Alternative Rock and Rock charts, and have also had a Billboard Top 40 hit with their song, “It’s Time”. Also, am I the only one who thinks that this guys voice sounds like any other “slightly better than Vans Warped Tour” bands’ voice? Or is that just me?
I don’t want to berate this band with negative press, but I really don’t see anything outstandingly different about this artist, compared to any other. Maybe that’s why they were nominated for a 2012 VMA? Yes, that was a burn on something I once cared much about. Since beginning this blog, I have realized that an award won after being nominated by the majority of today’s brain dead teenagers, is an award to be put on the bottom shelf, hidden behind something large. Now, if this band is nominated for a Grammy, that’s saying something.
Continuing on, Imagine Dragons has four core members, and it is said that the name of this band is a secret anagram, which only the band members know. Unfortunately, this band has gone through many lineup changes, and soon, everyone in America and their Venezuelan pen pal will find out what this secret anagram really stands for. I Might Answer Genuine Imaginary Nightly Entertainment Diagrams for Reasons Anyone’s Grand Onions Now Season. Yep, that’s it. (Don’t quote me on that, I made it up.)
As for their music, Imagine Dragons have made it very clear that they want to have a pop sound with rock vocals, but this concept hasn’t been historically bright. The Neon Trees tried this style, and they have failed miserably, leaving our ears in pain in their trail of horrid tunes. Again, no wonder they were nominated for an MTV VMA. The vocals are forced and the not-quite rock/ not-quite pop music just doesn’t work for me. Also, the lyrics of their songs are about as jumbled and meaningless as “Gangnam Style” to someone who doesn’t know Korean. All I can hope for, is that these imaginary dragons stay a one hit wonder.
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Music Video: “It’s Time” by Imagine Dragons:
No, not IMAX. IAMX is a British pop solo project of Chris Corner, former front man of Sneaker Pimps. The music is inspired by burlesque and gothic styles. An easy way to explain it would be dark dance music for indie or alternative lifestyle clubs.
Since 2006, IAMX has been based in Berlin, where Corner has found “the spirit to care less about the music industry and take an independent route.” Berlin is also mentioned in the lyrics which concern subjects such as sexual identity, death, love, narcotic intoxication, decadence, critique of religion and politics, alienation, addiction, modern society and gender bending. The topic of gender bending is further emphasized by Corner’s own distinctive and androgynous image.
In 2008, IAMX released his second album, The Alternative, and that is when I discovered and became obsessed with Corner’s work. But by 2009, my devotion faded and I became interested in other bands. Forgetting about the IAMX solo project, I heard “Volatile Times” recently. I knew I had heard the voice, but I couldn’t place it. Why is this story relevant? Obviously because “Volatile Times” is IAMX’s latest single from 2011. The affection never wavers!
One thing I dislike about IAMX is that the music doesn’t seem to mature. “Volatile Times” sounds just like the songs he wrote five years ago. He has the same harmonies, the same layering of his voice going from forte to metso forte. The content of his music is all the same. Basically, it is all an intelligent and artistic way of saying “F DA H8ERS!” (But isn’t all music that is criticized And now that I’m being critical, does it mean he is now telling me to screw myself, figuratively?) “Goodbye my friends. Goodbye to the money. Adieu to the fuckers that think that it’s funny.” These are lyrics from “Volatile Times”, but do you see my point?
If someone asked me to rate IAMX’s music, I would love to give them a 4 out of 5, due to my old devotion to Mr. Corner, but today, now that the puppy love has subsided, I would give him maybe a rating of 1.5 out of 5. Sorry, sir, but you need to progress in your style and musical topics. But, if you, as the reader, likes semi-emo with an ego-trip facade, IAMX is for sure the band to put on your iPod, because you had an iPod before they were cool.
Music Video: “Volatile Times” by IAMX: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dwG4UT7JNs&safe=active
