Me: ooh, new Dierks Bentley song!

Dierks: Like a G6!

Me: Truck no! Er, plane no! Um, what rhymes with plane?

Another one bites the dust. Here's what Dierks used to sound like



This is the kind of song I used to take for granted. Not that it isn't good, just that you couldn't walk across a field without stepping in about 12 songs like this in the 90s and early 2000s. They were unavoidable, and that was a good thing. They made me a country fan. These current songs sound so forced, like they're constipated and trying to get something out. Take some ex-lax country music, you'll feel better.

Mr. Truck Yeah himself actually had a good song in the not too distant past. Note, this was a BIGGER hit than either Fuck My Truck or Lookin' for that Ho Smack My Bitch Up (or whatever it was called).



I'll leave you with this, because I can.



Hokey as hell? Yeah. Do I love it? Hell yeah! Why? It feels genuine and sounds good. That's really all I ask for from a country song. How hard can that possibly be? Sammy also recorded a great version of "Better than I Used to Be," but nobody heard it cause radio doesn't play guys named Sammy and Bobby and Billy Joe anymore. Next generation it's gonna be all Kevyns and Hadyns and Madisyns. Lord help us.

There's one possible positive in this "branching out" of country music. I have yet to enjoy hip-hop in country, probably because I don't enjoy hip-hop period but also because putting two stupid things together isn't my idea of "diversity." But recently there were two country hits about actual tolerance, "Follow Your Arrow" and "All Kinds of Kinds." Both by female artists. Now that's diversity I can get behind.

More guilty pleasures: This damn guy!



He seems like kind of a huge doofus, and most of his songs are too hokey for me, but he somehow pulled out two I think are pure musical brilliance. "Get lost and get right with my soul, makes me wanna take a back road." Um, hell yeah? I hate the influx of stupid "back road" songs but I LOVE actual back roads, and this song does it right.

"If you're goin' through hell keep on going
Don't slow down if you're scared don't show it
You might get out before the devil even knows you're there"

Well, I'll be darned if that isn't good advice. And this from the man with a song about chicken nuggets. *shrug*

And now for something completely different - music to hem your klan robes by! Seriously, WTF?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nS6V941F5e8

No, I'm not embedding it on my blog. It has cooties. It's an anti-Mexican song, not by some random internet racist, but a singer who had actual country hits not too long ago. Both of which I liked. Both of which are, sadly, no longer on my playlist. (I can forgive Jason Aldean for bringing us c-rap if he puts out a good song or two, but this is where I draw the line.)

Bonus points though for the irony of using Mexican-sounding music in your anti-Mexican song.

Also, I think Miranda Lambert has been reading my blog.



How many of those things have I talked about in here? "Seems like only yesterday I'd get a blank cassette,
Record the country countdown 'cause I couldn't buy it yet." That's like a little snapshot from my life. Or maybe it's not just me. Maybe a lot of people feel this way. (The irony is that I downloaded this song "automatically," but if I had to leave the house to buy it I totally would.)

Our car has a window crank. I love it.

And now, something else that doesn't suck. Sunny Sweeney singing 16th Avenue.



And this, effortlessly warm and genuine country. In the 90s you couldn't chuck a cowpie without hitting a song like this, but now it's a rare gem. If only it had been a hit.



Swoon x infinity.

Part two: guilty pleasures

Every once in a while, a blind squirrel somewhere finds a yummy acorn. This is my way of saying I have two Jason Aldean songs on my iPod, and that Jason Aldean is a visually impaired bushy-tailed rodent. (It's fitting actually, squirrels are kind of douchebags.)

When this happens, I propose the Alan Jackson Test. If you suspect a song sung by a douche who otherwise makes bad music might be good, close your eyes and pretend Alan Jackson recorded it. Yes? Then download that sucker, it's a good song. Don't let the jackass stop you (unless it's that Jarrod guy, that's just too literal a translation of jackass).



Good song. Totally passes the AJ test. You're welcome.

And here's where I confess to a few real guilty pleasures, to show I'm not some purist snob.



I just... I'm sorry, I can't resist it. It's possibly the hokiest take on "country" I've ever seen, but GOD it's catchy! And at least she can sing.



I know, I know. Reality show pop-(barely)country. Blah blah blah Satan. Well it's catchy and harmless and I like it. Just call it pop, it'll sit much better.



Dierks is an artist I actually respect, but any song with the word "po-po" in the chorus is definitely a guilty pleasure. The "Ozzy's train" lyric kinda makes up for it though. I'm actually not ashamed of this one, even if I should be. Dierks is pretty cool, and not in the "AH DONE RAPPED AIN'T AH COOL" way.

I'm feeling pretty hopeful right now, the hope of a cool breeze on a hot day. I know summer's coming and we'll be bombarded with party country anthems up the yeehaw, but that might be a good thing. Cause I think fans are tiring of that schtick and the faster the storm builds, the faster it can blow outta town. So bring it on, boys. I can wait it out.

So I had an epiphany courtesy of a road trip, a cheeseburger, and Lady Gaga. The cheeseburger doesn't really figure in, but it was delicious.

In a small town burger joint, I heard a song come on the radio. It was kinda muffled but I was like, this is a pretty good country song! Who is this?



I know what you're saying - that ain't country, there's no guy from Georgia in an ugly shirt rappin'! But is it kinda... insane that Gaga's song sounds more country than half the stuff on country radio? It's not country, but it's kinda twangy and tells a story and I like it. I'd rather hear about her cool Nebraska guy and the chase than trucks and asses any day. Who knew?

The gaga-fueled epiphany came when I realized that unlike pop music, which I gave up on long ago, I can't actually live without a steady supply of good country music. I stopped listening to country radio a couple years ago. I couldn't pinpoint it, but it was starting to make me vaguely... uncomfortable. Only later did I realize it was the same discomfort I'd feel in the midst of a frat party, where women are nothing but props to ogle. What happened to all the female singers? And what happened to the male singers??? This is what country music sounded like when I got into it.



The good news is, Alan Jackson still sounds just like that. The bad news? You can only hear him singing anymore if you happen to be in his shower.

And Tim. Oh, Tim. I thought Truck Yeah was the absolute lowest someone could sink but no... oh, no.

I'm not going to embed "Lookin' for that Girl" here. I have too much respect for... life to spread that thing around. Instead, I'll remind you what Tim used to sound like.



"Your song still lingers in my mind, your mullet still makes me smile, who could ever sell his soul, with so much left unsung? So you can't be really gone." Thank you, I wrote that in ten seconds. Which is about five more seconds than it takes to write most of today's hits.

But instead of getting (totally) lost in yesterday, I decided to find some newer stuff to download. Surely, it can't all be that bad?

Truck Yeah, it can! And don't call me Shirley.

To be fair, "Country must be Countrywide" didn't immediately make me want to kill myself. There was a moment where I went YEAH, country really is countrywide! Good point bro! Then I sobered up and pretended that never happened. But anyway, I didn't let the Doucheshirt Posse stop me. I dug deeper. And I found some great music.



She actually had a mainstream top 10 hit! Not this song, this is way too country to be country, but I downloaded about 27 songs by this woman. Thank you for existing, Sunny Sweeney.

A few more gems:







Two of these were actual hits! Of course the female artist gets no airplay, but at least these guys aren't rapping about tires so it's a start. And yeah, Easton Corbin sounds a lot like George Strait, but that's about the last thing I'll complain about these days. You can clone George Strait (and his horse) as far as I'm concerned.

That actually wasn't much of a rant. I thought I was angrier, but then I played that Sunny Sweeney song and it all went away.

The right way to do pickup truck lyrics in country music, courtesy of 1989 Clint Black:

"And I still drive that pickup truck
That the same old bank still owns
But since you left, everybody says I'm not the guy they've known
The lights are on, but nobody's home"

I feel a long-ass country music rant coming on.

Why do I listen to anything, ever? Why do I read anything, ever? Why do I turn on my comp... wait, why do I even get out of bed at all??



I HATE THIS GUY. Goddammit country music. This guy needs to be bucked off the damn bronco for good. But he won't be as long as people are stupid and he keeps making money. Goddammit. This is why money is the root of all evil. Well, maybe people will surprise me and it won't be a hit, and he'll ride off into Mexico on his goddamn donkey. WHERE HE'LL GET SHOT 47 TIMES BY A DRUG CARTEL. (Miraculously, the donkey will survive and run happy and free in the countryside.)

A girl can dream.

Hey man, is that freedom rock?

Yeah, man. WELL TURN IT UP MAN!

I've been on a major "classic rock" bender lately. Listen to enough of these songs and you actually feel like you've done drugs, even if you never have. I'm not sure how songs that were mostly recorded before I was born can make me feel nostalgic for something, but they do. I guess I'm nostalgic for music NOT BEING CRAP. Yeah, sounds about right. And we could all use a little peace, love and freedom rock these days, cause things really seem to be going off the rails on a crazy train.

Also, I don't know why I ever try to connect with people anymore. It always fails and I just end up feeling bad. I think I exist just to prove clichés wrong. "If at first you don't succeed, try try again." How many "tries" do you want to stick in there before you realize you'd rather have a nap instead? At least a nap accomplishes something. "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." No, sometimes it makes you feel like a shitbag who wants to hide under something very large, like New York City. That feeling doesn't make you stronger, not even with time. It builds guilt and shame and resentment, not character. The one about "you always fail if you don't try" or whatever. Yes that's true, but some people have thought they were Superman and tried to fly by jumping off a roof. They probably should have opted for the "failure" of taking the stairs.

So yeah, it's just me and my music. I'm okay with that, man. Turn it up, man.

One of the top "news" stories on Yahoo right now:

"Kim Kardashian Squeezes Into Kylie Jenner's Bikini"

k I quit life bye.

In other news, I just put on a pair of shorts, brushed my teeth, and drank a glass of water. FRONT PAGE NEWS FOLKS.

Oh wait, you say my story doesn't involve a bikini, and my name doesn't start with "k," so it doesn't count? It's just a boring update on my day that's too mundane even for twitter? Hmm, let me consider this as I read today's news while flossing my teeth. IN MAH UNDERWEAR. OH YEAH.

That is so not sexy. :( But neither is SQUEEZING INTO SOMEBODY ELSE'S BIKINI BOTTOM EW. And it is not, not, not, not, not, not, not, not, not *gasp* not, NOT NEWS!

*middle finger*

It's like locking the barn door after the shitty metaphors get out

So I've been reading a lot about this Dark Horse song lately. No surprise, it's the number one song in the country... somehow. I think Katy Perry could pretty much throw a soggy tissue against the wall at this point and it would be a hit. Which seems to be exactly what she did!

First of all, judging by the "ancient something land" theme of the video, and the weird mixed metaphors in the song which make no sense, I think someone confused "dark horse" with "trojan horse." Not that that makes much sense either, but it makes a lot more sense than "Dark Horse." A dark horse is like, an 8 seed in the NCAA tournament who makes it to the final four and probably should have been a higher seed but they're a smaller school without a lot of name recognition so they get overlooked but dammit, they have HEART. Basically, a dark horse is not Duke. And Katy Perry is the Duke of the pop world.

Also, that is not what Ms. Perry is describing here. AT ALL. She's not really describing a trojan horse either, and the video is more ancient Egypt than ancient Greece, but I'm pretty sure the people who make videos for bad pop songs don't consult Encyclopedia Brittanica first. Trojan horse kinda makes sense from what she's describing; she's the romantic version of a thoughtful gift with a horde of angry soldiers inside waiting to kill you. She has the decency to warn you about it, she's not really hiding anything, but still. She's trying to get some serious crazy shit past this guy. So I'm going with "trojan horse." Also, it ties into the whole Aphrodite thing, which is seemingly unconnected to anything else in the song. Case closed.

Um, was this song written by an ESL class as an exercise in using American idioms? Cause, none of these phrases remotely go together or even make sense on their own. We have a dark horse, a perfect storm, levitating birds and a Greek goddess. Actually, it all kind of sounds like the End of Days, which I would totally believe this song is about.

There's also a rap about... Jeffrey Dahmer. Okay, so she's part Goddess of Love, part cannibalistic serial killer. Got it? If you fuck with Katy Perry, she will eat your face.* Are you ready for that perfect storm, guys? Just don't look in her fridge, you'll be fine.

*If you invoke Jeffrey freaking Dahmer, I see no way to take it but completely literally.

Despite all that, I have a terrible feeling this song will be played before sporting events for years to come. "ARE YOU READY FOR, READY FOR! A PERFECT STORM, PERFECT STORM!" And the Oklahoma City Thunder come charging out onto the court.* And "Dark Horse," even though it makes no sense in context whatsoever? Get ready to hear this a lot during the NCAA tournament. A lot. Jesus, they probably timed it so it would be a hit right before the tournament. Bastards. All that's missing is a random lyric about brackets. "I'll bust your brackets, I'm a dark horse!" Except, that actually makes sense. And would be awesome. I'm gonna go write that song now.

*This has probably already happened. Sigh.

In summary: Katy Perry, you are not the dark horse. You are the top dog* no one is actually rooting for.

*mixed animal metaphors ftw

Okay, so this thing

is apparently so horrible it has the power to DESTROY MARRIAGES. Yes, Robin My Last Name Rhymes with a Male Anatomy Part Herp Derp and his wife, the lovely Mrs. My Last Name Rhymes with a Male Anatomy Part Herp Derp, have decided to split.

Okay okay, obviously that wasn't the only reason, marriages end for any number of complex and sometimes inexplainable reasons and BLAH BLAH BLAH. It's a lot more interesting (and in keeping with my world view) that twerkzilla crushed this marriage than he left the toilet seat up or she nagged him too much or honey, you want me to do what with the foam finger? We kind of need that for the hockey game next week. How else will we convey to the other team that we, and not they, are number one? Also, ew.

Also, Harold Ramis died. One of the Ghostbusters fucking died. Ghostbusters is my favorite movie ever. RIP man, you were awesome.

Seriously, screw you right in the ear 2014. I'm still not over Colonel Meow yet. :(

OMG

It just hit me.

What Miley Cyrus is.

She's SKINNY CARTMAN.

You're welcome.

fun fun fun fun

Because I CAN'T POSSIBLY STATE THIS TOO MANY TIMES

Listen to the opening phrases of this



and this



and this (eww)



and this



and then this



...I SEE NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE "ACTUAL" SONGS AND FRIDAY. NONE.

WHY does music sound like this? Who wants music to sound like this?? What happened to singers using their natural voices and singing actual notes??? CAN WE HAVE THAT BACK PLEASE???

The only one of these songs whose existence actually makes sense is "Friday." Because Rebecca Black isn't a singer, and Friday is the glamor shots of music. And that's fine. If you wanna go to the mall and pretend to be a popstar or a model for a day, go for it! But actual artists HAVE NO EXCUSE FOR THIS. And any song with that whiny, reedy monotone drone sounds exactly like Friday to me.

I don't think anything else needs to be said.

I really need to stop poking things.

But I poked the hornet's nest of bad country music, and kept poking, and finally this came out and stung me right on the face.

TRUCK YEAH, by Tim McGraw. Tim freaking McGraw, one of the last of the old 90s stars who's still active, has joined the ranks of those who sold their soul for a set of tires and a six-pack. This song is every bit as awful as you'd imagine, maybe even worse. Well, I still like Southern Voice, and that wasn't too long ago... eh, that was over three years ago now. I think Tim McGraw has officially passed his expiration date. It was nice knowing you, Tim. In my heart I'll always see you everywhere, especially where the green grass grows. I liked it, I loved it, but I don't want any more of it.

This song is even more plaintive now.



"Pleeeease remember meeeeee... for this song, not some ridiculous crap I put out when I'm 45 and trying desperately to be relevant by riding the coattails of some terrible trend."

TRUCK ME.

See, what I've always liked about country music is, well, how likable most of it was. It was personable and relatable, and so were most of its artists. These weren't your airbrushed Britney Spears kind of stars.

I freaking love Joe Diffie. He looks like Zap Rowsdower, for pete's sake.

I wonder if there's beer on the sun?

In the wake of "1994," I've seen people slam Joe Diffie for no good reason. Not just his latest bomb, but his earlier music too. All I can say is, are you focusing so hard on the mullet and mustache you're not hearing the actual music? Cause I've heard as much country music as just about anyone, except maybe... Jesus, and Joe sounds pretty sweet to my ears. He deserved better.

Anyway. While I don't find rap inherently unlikable, it does kinda buzzkill the whole "down home" vibe I liked about country in the first place. And I don't mean yelling a bunch of random "country" words like you're playing a game of Outburst. Listen to "Forever and Ever, Amen" by Randy Travis or "Dixieland Delight" by Alabama or "Livin on Love" by Alan Jackson if you want a feel for what I'm talking about.

And I like a good country "attitude" song if it's done right - "Friends in Low Places" being the obvious standard. Tracy Byrd's "Lifestyles of the Not So Rich and Famous" (an RC cola and a moon pie!), Miranda Lambert's "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend," and Confederate Railroad's "Trashy Women" are other examples of some good ol' country tude. Somehow, I also dig that "cocktail waitress in a Dolly Parton wig" and I get what he sees in her. That's genuine.

These current songs just sound harsh and aggressive. All attitude, and no substance to back it up. "Chew tobacco, chew tobacco, chew tobacco SPIT." Okay... why are you spitting in my general direction? This isn't something I wanna hear about. You might as well be saying "piss in the toilet, in the toilet, in the toilet, PISS." At least, I hope it's in the toilet. You know I wouldn't be surprised if for all its modernization, country music writers want us to believe they still use outhouses.

And that's just it. Where country charm used to live, country caricatures have moved in. There's always been some of that, but there's very little real sentiment left for farms and dirt roads and first loves and broken hearts in the age of autotune, so empty stereotypes of these things have become the new normal. And you can tell the difference. The less authentic it feels, the louder it gets. They've scraped away the friendly, homespun sensibilities and reduced it to base, redneck ugliness; the sweaty underbelly I thought we were trying to get away from. And everything that was likable about country music gets lost in this stew of spittle and piss and autotune. They got one thing right, these songs are the musical equivalent of a soggy wad of chaw splatted aross someone's nice clean rug.

Also? Chewing tobacco does this to your face.

Jesus Christ, don't do that.

While I don't hate rap as a style, I do hate most of rap's sensibilites (or lack thereof). Thrift Shop works because it's the complete opposite of all the old rap standards, and they're so happy and pumped about it it's infectious. Maybe country has a thrift shop-style rap in it somewhere, if they keep it genuine and not too damn hokum. Jesus, the entire catalogue of Hee Haw has more subtlety than most of these songs. There's just nothing at all redeeming about "Boys Round Here" or "My Kind of Night" or "1994." They don't work as country, they don't work as rap, they don't even work as toilet paper. Just useless.

Please, can we have Randy Travis back? Oh wait, I think he's in jail. Joe Dif - no, that's a horrible idea, forget I said anything. Patty Loveless maybe? I do think there'll be plenty of backlash against this crap, but will record companies allow us to hear any of it? Apparently all that makes money is crap, which is a self-fulfilling prophecy really, if all you put out is crap, so why release anything that takes actual effort? *sigh* We've got a long hard slog ahead of us, country music. It's time to get lost and get right with our souls, to quote the one modern "back road" anthem I actually like. Maybe then we can find our way home.

It's Friday y'all!

So why, you might ask, if anyone besides me actually read this thing, do you spend so much time ranting about current music? Why not just go listen to your 80s and 90s music and cry? Well, that is what I do the rest of the time I'm not on here. But anyway, here are two things I'd like to share about me.

1. Music used to be my life.

Like, pretty much literally. I'm an introvert with social anxiety, so my life has never been about parties and hanging out and... going to the bathroom in groups, or whatever social people do. I'm all about cats, and nature, and books, and quiet road trips, and exploring abandoned... meat smoking plants, or whatever. And music. Back when I was really into popular music, when I was about 10 up until my teenage years when I got more into alternative, the Billboard top 40 was my Bible. I listened to that Rick Dees weekly countdown like it was the word of God. Yes, my messiah was the man who brought us Disco Duck and Eat My Shorts. LOL 80s?

I had notebooks where I kept track of those countdowns every week, and rated each song in order of how much I liked them. (And put little doodles of hearts and unicorns or whatever next to them, cause I was a preteen girl.) I knew every song by heart, I had rows of cassettes lined up in alphabetical order and obsessively taped songs off the radio if I couldnt afford them. I'm relating this not to show what a crazy music geek I was, cause nothing can fully convey how much I ate, slept and breathed music for the first half of my life. I'm trying to put in perspective how my life has changed because of how music has changed.

Pop music started going bad in the late 80s/early 90s, and this was when I turned to country. And wow, what an incredible treasure that was to discover back then. I ate that stuff up like candy. I bought every CD I could get my hands on. I did my favorite songs on karaoke. Yes, I loved 90s country music so much I was able to get up and sing it in front of other people. I had a new music life. (I also got into the grunge and alt rock scene of the 90s, but that didn't last very long and I went right back to country when rock somehow sludged into Nickelback.)

2. I'm lazy.

There might still be good music put out today, but other than the one or two flukes that somehow make it onto the charts, it's not popular. Which means, you have to look for it. You didn't used to have to look for good music, it was right there in front of you. Turn on the radio, turn on MTV, walk out your front door and you trip over it. Even alternative music wasn't that hard to find, MTV had whole shows dedicated to playing it. MTV doesn't play music anymore, and if they did they'd play the shit that's popular so who cares anyway. I miss good music being readily available. In fact it's so hard to find, it seems like it's actively being hidden. Which it probably is, so some douchebags can get rich off of the crap that's repeatedly rammed down our ears.

Up until recently, I still listened to country music. There was plenty in there I liked, even as the older stars I loved faded away, we had Miranda Lambert and Zac Brown Band and Brad Paisley. Blake Shelton started off pretty promising too, as I mentioned before. But then, as I'm far from the first one to notice, in came the slew of dumbass truck driving beer drinking woman ogling songs, and country music became more of a frat party than a dixieland delight. It kind of crept up on me too, I didn't even realize why I stopped listening a couple years ago til I read those articles about "bro country." Oh yeah, that's why!

So now? About 98% of the music I listen to is music that's already come and gone. There's nothing to really look forward to or get excited about. Not even country, my last chance saloon of music. I thought "Honky Tonk Badonkadonk"* was an anomaly, an affliction that either works its way through your system or kills you, like malaria or "Achy Breaky Heart." But no, it was just the freaking warmup act. Enter Luke Bryan and Justin somebody and a bunch of dudes with interchangeable names and faces and tight-jeaned crotches singing about trucks and women like they're truck accessories. It was here I started losing interest and wandered off. I probably thought it was a passing fad. I don't even remember what I thought about it, if anything, I just turned off the radio. That's how unimportant it seemed. But now? It's everywhere, and it's gotten SO MUCH WORSE in my absence. There's even a song that references Kim Kardashian. God, I wish I could unknow that.

*a footnote on Trace Adkins, singer of another of my favorite 90s hits, "Every Light in the House is On," and yeah, something about a badonkadonk. From that, you'd think he left all his talent in the 90s along with his mullet and just sold out, but that isn't true. Years after the badonka-crisis he had a number one hit with one of the most heartfelt country songs I'd heard in a long time, "You're Gonna Miss This."

"She was staring out that window, of that SUV
Complaining, saying I can't wait to turn 18
She said I'll make my own money, and I'll make my own rules
Mamma put the car in park out there in front of the school
Then she kissed her head and said I was just like you

[Chorus]
You're gonna miss this
You're gonna want this back
You're gonna wish these days hadn't gone by so fast
These Are Some Good Times
So take a good look around
You may not know it now
But you're gonna miss this

Before she knows it she's a brand new bride
In a one-bedroom apartment, and her daddy stops by
He tells her It's a nice place
She says It'll do for now
Starts talking about babies and buying a house
Daddy shakes his head and says Baby, just slow down

[Chorus]
You're gonna miss this..."

...wow? That's what country music is to me, a little slice of life that anyone can relate too. And this was a HUGE HIT. So... why isn't there more stuff like this out there?? If Trace Adkins can recover from badonk-itis, anyone can. Eh, he also did that "swing batter batter swing" song, which I'd probably find more tolerable if I wasn't a baseball fan and hadn't had to listen to it before every single freaking game that year.

EDIT: to make this the longest footnote ever... A couple years after that, Trace Adkins apparently released a song called "Brown Chicken Brown Cow." Yeah, say it out loud, it's not very subtle. If you're befuddled by the nuances of "Titty's Beer," this is the song for you. But... it's funny! tee hee? Yeah, it's about as funny as a field full of dead farm animals BEING BEATEN REPEATEDLY. Never mind, Trace Adkins sucks.

Anyway. I do like a few of the "get your drink on" country songs. "Am I the Only One" by Dierks Bentley is actually one of the last country songs I downloaded before I got out of Dodge. Like "The More I Drink," there's a relatable undercurrent there. Am I the only one who wants to have fun tonight? C'mon, don't make me drink alone! That's a pretty classic theme of loneliness behind that good time song. Most party songs are generic and not really relatable to the average person- I mean, they might as well be singing about going to the circus or something. Who the hell goes to the circus every day? It doesn't resonate on any real level. But "I feel like getting drunk tonight but nobody wants to come cause they're all boring and reponsible and shit?" Yeah, I've been there.

But most of this stuff is dreck and it's taking over like kudzu. I'd rather listen to kudzu grow than most of this crap. At least, I thought we'd hit bottom with those Blake Shelton and Jason Aldean and Florida-Georgia Line songs I talked about earlier. It couldn't possibly get any worse, could it?

... jesus pole dancing christ. They made a country song that sounds like Friday.



THEY MADE A COUNTRY SONG THAT SOUNDS LIKE FRIDAY.

k I quit. Wait... here's a gem from the comments section:

"I'm obsessed. And I love the autotune"

FUCK YOU ASSFACE. Seriously. Okay, this is making me swear more than I actually planned to. And I vowed to never read comments on the internet. But it was right there at the top. :/

Yeah, country music is even farther gone than I thought. If people actually want this, maybe it should become a seperate genre like "nu-country" or something. Cause this is like ordering a country fried steak and getting a giant piece of dry lettuce. Except lettuce is healthy so... no, this is like ordering a country fried steak and getting a giant plate of dog turds. There.

I'll leave you with the wise words of Wynonna, circa (you guessed it) 1994: "Rock bottom ain't no place to be."

It turns out bad country music gives you a really bad hangover. I can't seem to shake it. So here's another thing I noticed. The farther away country moves from its roots musically, the more it aggressively shouts country stereotypes at you. "TRUCKS! BOOTS! TIRES! BEER! DIRT ROADS! NAMES OF OLD COUNTRY STARS I'VE NEVER ACUTALLY LISTENED TO! YEEHAW!" Seriously, just invoking the name "Hank" does not give you country cred. I don't get it. If you want to be country so bad, just play actual country music!

I'd never heard Jason Aldean's 1994 before, and while I'd like to go back to that blissful time (yesterday afternoon), at least it gives me something to rant about. I NEVER thought country music would be what I'd be ranting about, country music was my savior from bad pop music, but here we go down that old, dusty dirt road.

Okay, 1994. If I hadn't gone into this song already knowing it was bad, the title would have given me some hope. Because nobody loves 90s country more than me. Seriously, at least half my itunes is 90s country music. This is an era and genre I know backwards, forwards and sideways. It's my heart. So, Jason Aldean, whatcha gotta say about it?

"Girl don't you worry, now your ship just came in
So go on tell your mama, tell all your friends
That your new favorite color is John Deere green
Hop in this truck aka Time Machine

1994, Joe Diffie comin' out my radio
I'm just a country boy with a farmer's tan
So help me girl I'll be your Pick-Up Man
How 'bout a night to remember and a fifth of Goose
'Bout to bust out my honky-tonk attitude
A little feel good you ain't never felt before
I'm talkin' 1994"

Well, first I was gonna make a joke about how this guy probably wasn't even alive in 1994 but, he's about my age. So he was there. He actually knows what he's talking about. Or, he SHOULD. Okay, Joe Diffie's John Deere Green, a country classic in my book, actually was a hit in 1994. So he's got his facts straight. But, considering this is horrible c-rap, who exactly is this song for? It sure as hell ain't for Joe Diffie fans. As a Diffie fan, I can safely say if I was caught in a bear trap and this song was playing, I would chew my own leg off to get away.* And it sure as hell ain't for c-rap fans, who don't even know who Joe Diffie is. So... what is the point here?? If you're gonna make on ode to 1994, make it sound like the awesome music from 1994! And wow, there's a lot to choose from. Here are some of the artists who had major hits in 1994:

Garth Brooks, Vince Gill, Randy Travis, Trisha Yearwood, Brooks and Dunn, pre-sucky Toby Keith, Kathy Mattea, Alan Jackson, Alabama, Martina McBride, Patty Loveless, Travis Tritt, Clint Black, Diamond Rio, Dwight Yoakam... JESUS! That's a freaking shopping list of greats, and that's just from one year! 1994, truly a great year for country music. And completely turded on by someone who should have known better. Thanks, Jason Aldean.

*Ok, I'd probably need to eat and stuff too. But no, NO, I'm blaming it all on this song! It's because of you, 1994, that I have to go through life with a bloody stump. I hope you're happy. *sobs*

It's amazing how much I hate this song, when I love every single song it references. Christ, I'm probably one of the few people to listen to "1994" who actually knows all those songs. I should be thrilled an underrated artist like Joe Diffie is getting a shout out, but it's just so ear-blastingly bad. And Joe Diffie's "answer" to the shout out? Oh God. I thought I wanted him back, but he should have never crawled out of whatever Waffle House he was holed up in. To be fair, cause this is someone I genuinely like, his voice sounds just as good as ever (when he's actually singing, instead of dj doucheface crapping), and the melody of the chorus is quite nice. Ironically, it sounds a lot more like 1994 than "1994" does. The lyrics are stupid but, meh. If it wasn't for the awful rap verses I might actually like this. At least Joe had the decency to stick to singing. Also, Jawga... what??? ... Oh! Jaw-JA Boys. Jawja. As in, the peachtree state. I was like what the hell is a jaw-ga, cause that would usually be a hard "g..." ok whatever, that's the least of our problems here.

Um I'm pretty sure it was Clint Black who sang "When My Ship Comes In," though it probably is from 1994 cause that was a great freaking year. So where's his rap? "Clint, Clint, Clint Black! Once you go Black, you never go BACK!" You're welcome, I'll take all my royalties in moon pies.

OH SNAP. I forgot all about Joe Diffie's "Ships that Don't Come In." These idiots actually outfoxed and out-Diffied me. For a minute. But I still think the Clint Black rap needs to happen. Even though his song is actually from 1992... goddammit. Well, maybe they were trying to sneak a Clint Black reference in there and kill two birds with one stone. In fact, I'm pretty sure Tracy Byrd and Doug Stone had hits in 1994 too. Ok I'm done.

Prior to this, I think the only Jason Aldean song on my radar was "Fly Over States," which you could argue is cheap, substanceless sentiment, but it's the kind of dumb thing I'm a sap for. This song is probably on my ipod.

"Just a bunch of square cornfields and wheat farms,
Man, it all looks the same,
Miles and miles of back roads and highways,
Connecting little towns with funny names,
Who'd want to live down there in the middle of nowhere?

They've never drove through Indiana,
Met the men who plowed that earth,
Planted that seed, busted his ass for you and me,
Or caught a harvest moon in Kansas,
They'd understand why god made
Those fly over states."

Yeah, I'm a fucking sap. But please, please, don't buy 1994. Just buy all the great music from 1994 instead.

Now, the hip hop thing. I get that this is a real thing, that a lot of fans today have a mix of hip hop and country and rock and whatever else music on their ipods. And that's fine. It's good, even. Yay diversity! And I get that hip hop is extremely popular. But, there's plenty of hip hop out there already. We really didn't need anymore. If you wanna listen to T-Pain, why not just listen to T-Pain instead of Luke Bryan singing about T-Pain? Where does T-Pain even fit into the song, it's not like he's jumping out yelling, "I fucked a mermaid." You only get a moment that glorious once in your career. So it doesn't make any sense. And usually when things don't make sense artistically, it's all about the bucks. I get that too... kind of. Country songwriters are trying to cash in on a more popular genre to make more money. But why now, and why so much of it? I mean, rap has been popular for 20 years and country has always been a sustainable genre on its own so, why is this unholy abomination coming to a head now?

And why country? I don't see hip hop in classical music, or showtunes, or indie rock. If rap = success, why not just put it in everything? Maybe country was the most ripe for selling out. Which makes me sad. I don't only have country on my ipod, I have plenty of rock and pop too. But I've never once thought, hmmm, this Sublime song really needs a banjo! or, gee, I wish Kurt Cobain had written a Garth Brooks song. I mean, Garth Brooks tried to make a modern rock record and... that didn't go so well. We like different genres to suit different moods. If artists want to experiment with crossovers I have no problem with that, but this is no artistic experiment. This is taking two genres and mashing them both down to their most stupid to try to make them fit. It's like instead of eating your hot dog and your slushie, you mix them both up in a blender for easier consumption. And that leaves you with nothing but a hot dog slushie and a bad case of indigestion.

Somebody pass the Pepto, please.

"When a culture's music is lifeless, that culture is bound for more trouble than just having nothing decent to listen to." - from that site I posted. Thus summing up my last 47 posts in one bloody sentence.

Also? LOL Toby Keith. Just LOL.

"You hear the hip-hop thing start kicking in, and you start going, ‘Is that what we gotta do now to have a hit?’ I don’t know how to do that. Is that what I need every one of my songs to sound like now?…You start playing [deep songs] to a twenty-something audience, and it’s like, ‘Naw, man, there ain’t no mud on that tire. That ain’t about a Budweiser can. That ain’t about a chicken dancing out by the river. That ain’t about smoking a joint by the haystack. That’s about somebody dying and shit.’”

um.

You, sir, unleashed "Red Solo Cup" upon the world. The song at least partly responsible for what I have literally termed the red solo cup-ification of country music. I believe you are also the purveyor of one "She's a Hottie." AND I QUOTE:

"Hottie, she's a Hottie! She got a smokin' little body
String bikini and a barbed-wire tat
She's rockin' that cowboy hat Hottie, she's a Hottie! And just a little bit naughty
Singing Kayay digidigy,
Kayay digidigy, yey Hey hey hey Hey"

Wow, he rhymed "hottie" with "body." And "digy" with... "digy." Okay, while I have no doubt Mr. Keith is a lot smarter than these songs and knows they're just garbage that'll bring in a fast buck, nobody stuck a boot in his ass and forced him to record them. This is the man responsible for some of my favorite 90s hits like "Should've been a Cowboy" and "Wish I Didn't Know Now." Seriously, go download that stuff. Toby Keith deserves to make money off those songs. Does he honestly not have another Who's that Man in him? Did the creek just run dry? I don't know, but his later stuff is proof that country doesn't need hip hop in it to suck.

And yeah, every single song on that "save country music" worst list is awful. Balls-droppingly awful. Not even awful in a fun way, just so embarrassingly bad you feel sorry for the artist who might have had a few good songs in him (and more than a few, in Joe Diffie's case.) Blake Shelton is another artist who is so, so much better than this. His cover of "Home" is genuinely soulful and pretty, "Honey Bee" is a quintessential country love song, and "The More I Drink" is my kind of drinkin' song. It's outwardly fun, but there's an undertone of desperation. I mean, you can just picture this poor drunken slob. Quick, somebody get him off the karaoke machine!

But now we have "Boys Round Here." And there is no fricking way Miranda Lambert, singer of possible best country song ever "Kerosene," thinks this thing is good. I doubt even Blake thinks it's good. "Sure, chew tobacco chew tobacco spit, whatever you want me to sing boys, my truck needs new tires. Oh, you want me to rap it? Well hell yeah, new tires for everyone!" The only good thing about this mess is Miranda's white lace dress in the video. GORGEOUS. Where can I buy one?

But anyway, we're probably talking about the worst "country" songs ever made and yes, I am aware there was once one called "Dropkick me Jesus Through the Goalposts of Life." But that's funny. All I can say about this crap is, I don't think it will last. I have faith in country fans and country music in general. I could get really worked up over this, but I think I'll just sit back, have a beer, and ride it out. We survived Achy Breaky heart, we can survive anything. Even... oh god, do I really have to type this out... "Titty's Beer." Fuck. Jesus needs to be dropkickin' somebody, that's for sure.

I'm not sure how to feel about this.

On a whim, I looked at the Billboard top 100 hit songs of 2013. I kinda wanted to see where that Fox song ended up (#70something hee! - that would be even funnier if it hadn't beat out one of my favorite songs EVER which was stuck at #89. but whatever). And anyway, 3 of the top 5 songs... I like.

I. LIKE. Them.

WTF UNIVERSE?? IT'S LIKE I'M IN THE MATRIX, IF I HAD UNDERSTOOD THAT MOVIE AT ALL AND ACTUALLY KNEW WHAT THAT MEANT.

Now, the other two songs make me want to dunk my head in a vat of bleach, but... this is progress, right? Okay, here are the top 5 songs. Maybe you can figure out which ones I like, and which ones make me want to burn my face off. Let's go!

1
THRIFT SHOP
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis Featuring Wanz

2
BLURRED LINES
Robin Thicke Featuring T.I. + Pharrell

3
RADIOACTIVE
Imagine Dragons

4
HARLEM SHAKE
Baauer

5
CAN'T HOLD US
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis Featuring Ray Dalton

Yeah, I like Macklemore and Imagine Dragons. That probably wasn't too hard. For the record, I like the music and background "woo" on Blurred Lines but the actual song and the video make me want to SCRUB AND KEEP SCRUBBING. CAN... NEVER... GET... CLEAN. And Harlem Shake is a freaking squirrel fart, why is this even on my radar. Jesus.

The rest of the list is mostly stuff I hate (two miley cyrus masterpieces in a row) or stuff I haven't heard of and probably would hate. But Imagine Dragons have two more songs on there, which just blows my mind. I can't understand how the same people who listen to that can in good conscience put Miley Cyrus and Katy Perry on the charts. Or maybe it's totally different people. Whatever. The point is, an actual band who sing and play instruments had 3 hits in a year, so I'm calling this a win for the good guys.

I don't even have to comment on Thrift Shop. Just go listen to Thrift Shop, and smile.

Also, Bruno Mars is on the list. He was kind of on my radar before the super bowl cause he wrote and sang a couple songs I like. Yeah, I italicized that shit because this man is an actual singer-songwriter who also plays a variety of musical instruments. And he sounds kickass live and seems to genuinely enjoy every aspect of music and the performing thereof. And while this kind of thing used to be a staple of the music world, these days it makes you a freakin virtuoso. So hats off to you, Bruno Mars. You're pretty decent.

I never (ever ever) thought Taylor Swift would be in my "hated" music category but God, I can't stand either of her two songs on there. They're pop songs, not country, which is fine; I actually like pop music when it's done well. I don't hate her music now cause she's "gone pop," I hate it cause she's gone bad pop. But I didn't like much of the country music that came out last year either, so yeah. It seems a lot of last year's country fell under the "trucker hat of music" category.

Apparently this "Cruise" thing was the biggest country hit ever and... yeah, I don't like it. I don't really hate it, if someone told me this had gone to like #10 on the country chart I'd be like, "Yeah, okay." But biggest country hit ever? It's just too damn slick. And I don't think country music is supposed to be slick. The hip hop remix doesn't sound much different than the original to me, and that's the problem. Hip hop isn't my favorite genre mostly because of the very produced sound it has. I don't want my country music to sound produced, I want it to sound... hatched. Like a baby chick. Okay, that's a horrible analogy, but as far as farm analogies go at least it's better than "slopped like a pig" or "ridden like a horse." Actually wait, that second one isn't so bad. I want my country music to sound as if it was composed ON HORSEBACK.

Okay, glad I worked that one out. Now I'm just gonna pretend the biggest country hit ever is still "Friends in Low Places" or "Don't Rock the Jukebox" or whatever awesome song these doucheknockers replaced.*

Jesus. Is that Nickelback, or something? I couldn't even find one photo of these guys wearing a cowboy hat. And I looked. Well, better than "all hat and no cattle" I guess, but... yecch. RIP country music. Well, except for that kickass Miranda Lambert song at #89. Um... keep hanging on life support, country music?

*It was Need You Now by Lady Antebellum. Still a pretty decent song. Which I guess beat out Love Story by Taylor Swift... meh. Okay, apparently country music has been on a downswing for a while now. And those are just digital downloads, I guess, so who knows what happened to the music that came out before digital downloads. I'm a simple caveman, your world frightens and confuses me. Well it SHOULD be Friends in Low Places, so I'm just gonna stick my fingers in my ears and go la la la and... no, I'm gonna go LISTEN to Friends in Low Places. Then I'm gonna have a beer and listen to, I dunno, The Thunder Rolls. Then I'm gonna cry and have another beer and listen to another song til I pass out cause COUNTRY MUSIC IS NOT HAPPY FUN DRINKING MUSIC GODDAMMIT, IT'S NOT PARTY FREAKING ROCK ANTHEM, IT'S SAD DRINKING MUSIC THAT SOMEHOW MAKES YOU FEEL BETTER, OR AT LEAST DRUNKER! ENOUGH WITH THE PARTY IN MY TRUCK SONGS, AND BACK TO TEAR IN MY BEER!

Country music only needed two truck songs, and they are Pickup Man by Joe Diffie* and That Ain't My Truck by Rhett Akins. Lock up the studio, we're done here.

*Someone actually considered Pickup Man to be the start of all the stupid country "truck" songs and... no. "You can set my truck on fire and roll it down a hill, and I still wouldn't trade it for a coupe de ville!" is about a million times more fun and clever than all the dumb cliches they're throwing around now. Also, country music needed at least one truck song. It's country music, for pete's sake. And this is a darn good representative. We just didn't need, you know, 17 of them, and each more vapid than the last.

By virtue of hindsight, I'm also gonna allow one of Luke Bryan's early hits, We Rode in Trucks. For one thing it came out in 2007, so this was actually kind of a fresh concept then. I'm not gonna blame this song for all the trucking garbage that came after it. And while it is about yep, trucks, it's also a metaphor for growing up in the country and feeling nostalgic for it. Maybe a bit simplistic, but it's deeper and more relatable than its watered-down spawn which is basically just I LOVE MAH TRUCK. and women. not necessarily in that order. I have no qualms about deep-fried country sentiment if it feels somewhat genuine. Which this does.

So anyway. I actually liked more of the pop songs on that list than the country songs, which frightens me to the very core of my soul. Overall, it was kinda mediocre, kinda sickening, a few bright spots, about what you'd expect out of a top 100 songs of the year list. But... those 3 out of 5 songs I like. Why doesn't this make me feel better??? I want to like music, right? And yet... I feel strangely empty inside. Quick, bring me something awful to hate on! There must be something... where'd Cher Lloyd go? Hasn't she followed up her brilliant reworking of My Darling Clementine with a rap remix of Three Blind Mice yet? C'mon, there must be something!

I'll be waiting...

In the meantime, while I was trying to hunt down the actual all-time biggest country hit, I stumbled across this. It's brilliant. Read it. The part about the aforementioned Mr. Diffie makes me sad, though. He's one of my country heroes, dammit! I saw him in concert! Well at least he made some money last year, I guess. *sigh* And... oh God, I also saw Montgomery Gentry in concert. Back in the day when they had a song called "Daddy Won't Sell the Farm" and I was all, "Hell yeah, don't sell that farm!" and now... I'm just gonna go over there. I can't be here anymore.

http://www.savingcountrymusic.com/tag/cruise

Okay, last post haha. I'm just bursting with fruit flavor today.

Well, I had to comment on this before it's forgotten forever.



So... this is a brilliant parody of awful club music with random stupid noises in it, right? I mean, it has to be. This couldn't be an actual serious song.

Oh wait, they're Norwegian, and Scandinavians have no sense of humor*. Hmm...

*just a dumb ethnic stereotype joke folks, please keep your fjords in your pants. That made no sense.

No, wait! It says the song was created by a comedy duo as an "anti-hit" and... it became a huge hit and... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Not only is it an intentional parody of bad music, it's an unintentional one because people are so used to music being bad THEY TOOK THIS SERIOUSLY AS AN ACTUAL SONG. Whether they liked it as an actual song or hated it, they put the musical version of a See and Say Farmer Says on the charts next to Katy Perry and Jay-Z and One Freaking Direction. Okay, this just blew my mind for real.

The cow says... MOO! MOOOO! MOOOOOOOOOOO! Remember torturing your parents with that? Ah, good times. You'll notice there's no fox on there, which makes these guys 100% correct. Nobody knows what a fox sounds like, not even Fisher Price.

These guys are GENUISES. I bow my head to you, Norwegians in Furry Suits, you've done something I wish I could do: prove how incredibly stupid people are AND make a boatload of money doing it! And not in the usual way all the other popstars do it! Not since Lonely Island have I been this filled with glee (the emotion, not the horrible tv show). Not Lonely Island, not even Weird Al, achieved this level of glory. Because everyone knew they weren't serious. These guys managed to pass this thing off as an actual song, by way of them being Norwegian and nobody knowing who the hell they are, and if that isn't evidence of the state of music right now I don't know what is. (Other than the 52 posts I've made about it but, whatever. You guys can just sum it up with your fox song. That's okay.)

Also? This is way more interesting and listenable than that godawful cake song or anything by he-who-shall-not-be-named* or... most of the actual serious pop songs I've heard lately. I think I'm in love. I totally wanna mary you and have your kits, guys with unpronounceable names. (Cause... heh!... kits are baby foxes. Man, I'm on FIRE today.)

*yes yes, the BIEBER. God how I hate that little squirrel fart.

Now maybe this song doesn't fill you with diabolical glee like it does me - I am pretty diabolical - but these guys are far from being the worst thing to happen to music. I doubt they're even the worst thing to come out of Norway. So cheers, or pardon me, skal,* Ylvis. I'm sure we'll never see you again, but you've been enjoyed.

*I totally googled that for you, boys. xoxo. Call me... maybe?

*dances* PA PA PA PA PA-POW! PA PA PA- I mean, um, something dignified I actually listen to!



*steering wheel motion* LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA, LA LA - well, shit.

Okay, that is seriously the worst song on my ipod. It energizes me, okay??? I feel so used. GO AWAY. *sob* And yes, I am aware she called me a bitch and I contradicted myself in the space of two posts. But at least she sounds like a person callng me a bitch instead of a robot, which somehow makes it better. Or I'm contradicting myself. Whatever. It's my hot body, I'll do what I want.

Also, because I always like to keep track of who died, comedian Sid Caesar died today at the age of 91. This was followed by the even more shocking news that up until today, Sid Caesar was still alive. Well, good on him!

Okay, back to talking about pop music. Tee hee!

Actually wait, before I do, a PS on one of my last posts. I just got back from the store, and I noticed the cover of this week's People magazine was Philip Seymour Hoffman, a celebrity I actually did care about as much as I care about any celebrity outside of the sports world these days. (Yeah, I know the sports world is full of all the bro culture crap I hate, especially football, but I enjoy watching it. And in this crazy world, you've just gotta take what you enjoy and go with it. Unless it's heroin. Don't do heroin, kids.)

Anyway... apparently an actual talented celebrity has to die of a bloody heroin overdose to make the cover of People magazine these days. I'm sure next week it'll be Kim Kardashian "flaunting her beach booty" or whatever again. That is an actual Kardashian, right? Kim, Krystal, Kevin, um... Karma Karma karma karma karma chameleon... Kardashian? That's a great song. Okay.

So, here's a song I should hate that I don't. I've hated on Rihanna perhaps a bit unfairly, mainly on the basis of that one GODAWFUL song. I can't forgive her for cakecakecakecakecakecakevagina... cake. But I actually like Shut Up and Drive, and this? This really isn't so bad.



I've seen people criticizing this for using "Tainted Love," perhaps out of some kind of misguided loyalty to Soft Cell, but it has the opposite effect on me. I like hearing that beat in the background instead of some awful noise that sounds like someone in the next room dropping their keys on the floor repeatedly. It works for me. And really, does anyone actually think Soft Cell is complaining? This was their one hit, at least in the US, and it was in 1981. They're probably thrilled that anyone still alive actually remembers them. Yipeeee! (they'd say, if brooding british popstars from the 80s said things like yipeee!), We're still marginally relevant!

But those two songs were a long time ago and her recent stuff is crap. Okay, moving on!

Britney Spears. You know, I've always disliked her on general principle but maybe I haven't been fair. Sure, she's always screamed style over substance and not in the interesting way like the early MTV years, but maybe I've been hatin' just for the sake of it and should give her an actual chance. I haven't even heard an actual Britney Spears song in a long, long time. I've heard about Britney Spears, but not a peep of actual music. So let's give this a listen, eh?



JESUS SPELUNKING CHRIST MY EARS. Okay, at least now I know why her current music has been so avoidable. Who would actually play this?? Obviously I've never been a Britney fan, but at least with her early stuff like "Baby One More Time" and "Crazy" you could make out some actual melody and vocals in there. Not a lot, but enough to qualify it as actual music. This is just... oh god, I don't wanna say "this is just noise" and sound like some 80s sitcom mom yelling at her son to turn down the Judas Priest, but ... this is literally, LITERALLY just random noises and "vocals" processed out the ass plopped down on them with all the finesse of a chimp flinging its own dung. Judas Priest was noisy but hell YEAH, that noise was produced by GUITARS and DRUMS and the righteous anger of a closeted gay man in leather pants! BREAKIN THE LAW, MOTHAFUCKERS!

*thud thud* You better work bitch *beep boop* you better work bitch. This is like that voice in your car that tells you where to go. "Turn left. Work bitch. Go 2.6 miles. Work bitch. Turn right at highway 57... bitch." Except canned GPS lady sounds MUCH MORE LIFELIKE. How is this supposed to be sexy? It sounds like she doesn't even exist. She's just been generated by a machine along with the rest of the noise. And stop calling us bitches, Britneytron 3000. That was never cute.

But I've decided, my number one beef with today's music isn't even the whole "talentless whores using sex to sell records" thing, because while that's awful and personally offensive to me, I wanna comment on the actual music. Or lack thereof.

In the 80s we had a song called Mr. Roboto, by Styx. A lot of people don't like this song, and I understand that. It's pretty goofy and over the top and well, that's exactly why I like it. But I bring it up because the song has this one droning line in it, "Domo Arigato*, Mr. Roboto," which is of course supposed to sound like a robot. Mr. Roboto, if you will. And then... the song EXPLODES into this glorious cheesy 80s goo of music and choruses and harmonies and urgent synthesizers and... exploding robots? Idk. It was excessive. It was done by a band who took singing and playing their own instruments seriously. Perhaps a bit too seriously. But make no mistake, this song was crafted. Love it or hate it, it's a giant musical waterfall cascading down on your face. SOAK IT IN.



Now take out the instruments, the chorus, the melody, the harmonies, the pure musical grandeur of it all and just play the robot voice part over someone rearranging their furniture for 4 minutes, and you've got about half of today's pop songs. (And all of them by the Black Eyed Peas.) One long drone; no beginning, no middle, and a merciful end merely because radio dictates that songs have to end at some point. Not necessarily a logical point but hey, how do you pick the best moment to end an ear-piercing drone, other than never starting it in the first place?

So how did popular music turn into this mind-numbing sludge of processed vocal farts and beats so stale they didn't even make the day-old rack? And more importantly, why did we, the public, let this happen? Why didn't we just send this back whence it came like all the other crap we've rejected, before it took over like pod people? Has anyone seen the Jonas Brothers lately, or Ashlee-eeeeeee! Simpson? (Those eeee! ending names always make me think of being on a rollercoaster. eeeeeee! anyway.) Have we really gotten that freaking lazy?? If Kurt Cobain was right and youth boils down to "here we are now, entertain us," at least give them something that's GODDAMN ENTERTAINING! This stuff is boring. And that's the most offensive you can possibly be. Like I said in another post, and possibly my favorite line I've ever written in my life, Miley Cyrus twerking does in fact make We Can't Stop more interesting, in the way a house fire makes a nap more interesting. BECAUSE IT'S THE MOST BORING, DRONEY SONG IN THE UNIVERSE. MAKE IT STOP.

*my apologies to Japan if I spelled that wrong. I like your sushi.

Also?

I know I'm pretty ranty in here most of the time and I use some colorful language like I'm one of those people who doesn't give a crap but the truth is, I LIKE WHOLESOMENESS. There, I'm out of the closet. Wholesomeness is comfortable, darnit. And I try to swear only when I feel it helps punctuate my point. It's a tool, not a... way of life.

For some reason I strongly associate cheeseburgers with wholesomeness, so yeah. My happy place is populated with a lot of burger joints, but in a 1950s malt shop way, not like now when everyone is either obese cause they eat nothing BUT burgers and chicken fingers or they're so "healthy" they don't eat ANY of that stuff. I don't consider NEVER doing something very healthy, unless it's smoking or drugs of course. And no, don't compare cheeseburgers to cigarettes. DON'T DO IT I WILL CUT YOU. Have a burger once a week for pete's sake, you're not a monk, you don't have to deny yourself things for no reason. Just don't supersize it. That's just unnecessary.

See to me, wholesomeness is a lot more fun than the alternative. Hmm, do I want to go to Disneyland or a smoky club with horrible techno music playing and people saying things like "let's hook up?" I DON'T KNOW THAT'S A TOUGH ONE, BOB. God how I hate terms like "hook up." Talk about desensitized, jesus. "Wanna put our body parts together like a couple of train compartments?" *swoon* "Why that's so romantic, how can I refuse!"

HOOK UP, christ on a cracker. I'm going to refrain from making any references to blowing whistles or cabooses. Cause I'm better than that, dammit.

Deep Thoughts (soaked in delicious, delicious meat grease)

Okay, I'm gonna try to explain what I really feel is wrong in today's world. No, not bad music, though the lack of good music as a refuge from the world certainly doesn't help. I can't imagine if I'd been forced to survive my teenage years with autotune garbage instead of REM and the Cure and even some of the better mainstream pop. But anyway.

In short, we've become overly sensitized and totally desensitized at the same time, and in all the wrong ways.

1. Pop culture is an easy place to start. When I was a teenager, I actually used to read things like People Magazine and Entertainment Weekly because they had actual celebrities on the cover I cared about, like Julia Roberts or Madonna. Who graces those same covers now? Reality show "stars." People who are famous for having no talent and doing nothing. On EVERY SINGLE COVER. An endless parade of Kardashians and "real" housewives and Ken-doll bland "bachelors" and teen sluts. And I don't blame the magazines, I blame YOU, the public, who have somehow let this happen. This is relevant because pop culture is a big part of who we are as people and a culture in general.

So, densensitization to actual talent results in more embracing of the lowest common denominator than ever. Basically, the dumber our "celebrities" get, the dumber we get. And I'm not talking about "Honey Boo Boo" which believe it or not, I think has some actual merit. Those people are way more interesting and probably more intelligent than the plastic, insipid stick figures on all those other shows. Next!

2. Schools. Ok, school was butt-tastically awful when I went in the 80s and 90s, so I'm not gonna say they're any worse now than they were then. But, they're a good example of the whole oversensitized/desensitized paradox. I don't often read the news but sometimes it's inescapable. And I've seen a disturbing number of stories about LITTLE KIDS suspended from school for "sexual harassment," contrasted with stories about high school and college girls who were raped and then further victimized for it. So... we, at least partly, live in a society where a little boy can't give a little girl a flower and tell her he loves her, or hold her hand, which I'm pretty sure are subjects of FRICKIN NORMAN ROCKWELL PAINTINGS, while a rape victim feels so shamed she has to leave school and the rapists just keep on "being boys," playing football and looking for their next target.

Yep, this young man is now a registered sex offender!

WHAT THE HELL KIND OF MESSAGE IS THIS, WORLD???

Are these anomalies? Maybe. But I've seen it too often to just ignore it, and I've felt the oversensitized/desensitized thing enough in my own life on a smaller scale to know it's real. I've written about searching for the "sweet sweet valley of sanity" many times in my posts. There must be a place in between these mountains of irrationality.

3. Food. This is a world where you can't read a damn menu in a restaurant without a million warning labels, like you're about to go skydiving or something. I'm surprised they don't make you sign a waiver before serving your meal. Yes I get that there are people with food allergies who might die if they eat certain things, but when did this become such a THING? Okay that doesn't actually bother me in itself, even though I don't understand where all this not being able to eat food suddenly came from, we don't want people to die. No, what bothers me, and fits perfectly into the overly sensitized category, is how this helps justify other people's special snowflake-ness. WARNING: PRODUCT MAY CONTAIN MEAT AND CHEESE. Well you're at Bob's Burger Barn, I sure as fuck HOPE it contains meat and cheese! If you want to be vegetarian or vegan or whatever (what I like to call "food-free") that's your right but it's a CHOICE, you're not gonna die if you get a trace of (delicious, delicious) meat grease on your salad. And there are actual vegetarian restaurants to eat at, so let's leave Bob's Burger barn out of this. I don't want Bob's Burger Barn to be sensitive, dammit, I want it to give me a heart attack and die happy. GO SOMEWHERE ELSE.

4. Childhood. When I was a little kid, I walked to school every day. I lived in an almost comically idyllic little town but, I wonder if even there kids still walk to school or if they're bundled in a billion protective layers like everywhere else? Don't get me wrong, I get that there are predators out there and it's a horrible thing, but they're not EVERYWHERE. They're not lurking on every corner. Kids need a little breathing room for pete's sake. I'll never forget the first time I saw that school buses now stop on every block. LITERALLY. I swear sometimes they stopped twice in the same block. Besides being godawful to have to drive behind, this is utterly ridiculous. A child now can't even walk a BLOCK in broad daylight to catch a bus. I can't imagine growing up like that!

And don't even get me started on what's happened to trick or treating. Jesus sitting on a mushroom Christ. Let's go trick or treating at the mall! Gee I hope there aren't any scaaaary ghosts lurking behind that spooky tree, I mean, that sneaker display at Foot Locker. Yeah, way to take the ENTIRE POINT out of a holiday.

And yet, kids are still horribly bullied in school every day to the point of committing suicide and no matter how much lip service gets paid to the issue, it only gets worse. What can schools do? Well, I'm pretty sure if they can make a bus stop at every single freaking block, they can do SOMETHING more than they're doing now. Because while being wrapped in these billions of protective layers, kids are becoming more and more desensitized to things like feelings, and compassion. And these kids are becoming adults. As in, the future of ALL HUMANITY. Maybe letting them walk on their own for a couple blocks would help them experience and feel connected to the actual world. And take the goddamn... texter out of their hands so they can look at some damn trees while they're doing it. At least it's a start.

And world, if you wanna be so sensitive, never ever ever blame a victim. For anything. In this world where cheese-eating and hand-holding can lead to dire consequences, I'm pretty shocked that's still going on.

Just some food for thought (soaked in delicious, delicious meat grease).

This just in from Facebook:

Billy Ray Cyrus: Billy Ray Cyrus Releases Hip-Hop Sequel to 'Achy Breaky Heart'

That's it, I officially quit the world.

I wonder if the girl who did the parody of "Forget You" knows that the song was originally called "Fuck You." Could she possibly know, is the word "fuck" even allowed into Utah, or do they have some kind of fuck intercepter at the border? Worst Homeland Security job ever.

Utah is actually quite lovely with its rocks and clean air and such. No hate, Utah. And that's the most f-bombs I will drop in a post, they were just so ripe for the dropping. Seriously, has anyone ever said fuck in Utah? What happens to them if they do? And why am I spending so much time thinking about this? It's oddly fascinating.

Oh, internet.

Specifically oh, youtube. I love a site where you can be roaming around watching random stuff and somehow end up at Mormon parody videos. No, not South Park doing parodies of Mormons, Mormons doing parodies of pop songs. All about Mormony things. This is a thing that exists. Thank you, youtube, for bringing this to my attention through your strange and wonderful mechanisms.

...Yeah, they're really not all that bad. Maybe it's my current state of Miley-induced horror speaking here, but they kinda make me wanna stop swearing, quit drinking, throw away all my porn* and move to Utah. Help?

*two of these three things actually apply to me. Have fun guessing which ones!

Oh they don't drink tea. Well, never freaking mind. Tea, seriously, TEA?? You can't do something little old ladies were doing in 1912? Darn you Mormons. YOU ALMOST HAD ME.

So, my favorite internet cat died. I'm very sad about this, mainly because a beautiful, funny cat is gone way before his time and I'm gonna miss him so much and I feel heartbroken for his person who loved him.

I'm also sad because it's something else that's gone.

The circle of life no longer exists, or it does, but it's become the circle of crap. There was a time when you lost something - and I am moving beyond the loss of a cat here, which is obviously irreplaceable, and into more esoteric terms - and could at least feel a small comfort that something new would come along to make you feel better. Life's about changes, nothing ever stays the same. To quote a great country song from the 90s that would make me burst out crying if I listened to it right now. Anyway.

That sentiment didn't used to send me into a GIANT SPIRALING VORTEX OF PANIC like it does now. Because good things go, but what happened to the good things to take their place? Everything I love has been replaced by reality shows and FUCKING AUTO TUNE. Real talent co-opted by fake talent, by cheap, empty, easily marketable throwaways. It's the pizza flyers left on your windshield of culture. When something that's decent, that's ACTUAL ANYTHING gets out, it feels like a mistake, like it escaped someone's watch.

But this post is, really, about a cat. So thank you, Colonel Meow and "slave beast" for giving me something I could enjoy and relate to in this world. You will be missed in so many ways. The world needs more like you. There will never be another Colonel obviously, but can I dare to hope something else great, a little tulip of hope, will spring up in his place?

Things that spawn in Satan's underpants

1. unsolicited opinions

2. people's opinions on the internet, especially in

3. comments sections on the internet

4. the new york yankees

5. truck ads (they should just say "buy this GIANT PENIS to replace your tiny one!")

6. people who say, "do you ever talk?"

7. the entire current pop music industry


It's getting a bit crowded down there.

I want to have children, but I'm not sure I want to have them in a world where this doesn't exist.*

*Okay it technically exists, but only in a time warp where people still own record players.

This record pretty much taught me all of my values. ALL OF THEM. And they're all good ones. Take care of your pet! Don't be greedy! Be nice to your parents! Don't procrastinate! (Well, I'll get around to that one eventually.) And they were sung to you by a nice woman with a cheerful voice instead of an artificially colored dinosaur, or similar. You could just tell she was nice, probably wearing her crisp 1960s schoolteacher dress and Mrs. Brady hairdo and smiling and being all "Let's sing a song, children!"

GRAAAAAAH I HATE YOU ALREADY 2014.

I mean, let's face it. Things are pretty much getting worse every year, and at a rather alarming pace. Despite progress in medicine, science, technology and civil rights (the last being sadly lost on a great many people still, but they're probably also lost on science and the subtle art of tying your shoes), humanity seems to have... backslid, somehow. I don't believe humanity is happier as a whole than it was in the 60s or the 80s, in fact I think it's much unhappier and in denial about it. Because what we've lost, is simplicity.

I want my Happy Thoughts back.

My thoughts for this and every new year are: it's nice to be hopeful about the NEW BEGINNING but the truth is, all you can really hope for is to live your life happily and right, in whatever way works for you, and not screw up. Happy new year, try not to fuck it up this time! Because this world is geared more and more towards helping you fuck up so if you can resist that, and try to find and even spread some happiness, you're probably not doing too bad.

Oh, and maybe buy a record player.

When sexy becomes annoying!

I've been watching the inevitable "worst songs of 2013" lists and so... Miley Cyrus.

I know, maybe it's pointless to rant about someone everyone talks about. I should probably hate on someone no one has ever heard of (would that make me the anti-hipster?) Whatever, I got stuff to say so I'm sayin' it. Hopefully it'll be a bit more enlightening than the standard internet comment fare of "lol slutt" etc.

First of all, I don't care if she is a slut, or is faking being a slut, or is actually a virgin and laughing at us all. Her sexuality is her own business, no matter how hard she tries to stick it down our business. The number one thing I have to say about Miley Cyrus is, SHE'S NOT MADONNA.

I was a huge Madonna fan back in the day, when I was still a fan of things that were currently relevant. And the reason these pop stars always get compared to Madonna is because SHE WAS THE ORIGINAL. Who was Madonna ever compared to? Nobody, because there was no female pop star like her before her. I don't like comparing people to each other, but the ONLY one I would actually compare to Madonna is Lady Gaga. She's interesting. Her music isn't unlistenable garbage. Miley Cyrus is like a sneeze that won't come out. There's just nothing there. I mean jesus, I'd even take Kesha over her. At least Kesha is a sneeze, for pete's sake. There is absolutely NO substance going on behind that ugly nude bodysuit thing and foam finger (I don't wanna know what is going on behind the foam finger). It all feels calculated. Madonna, in her most controversial moments, always felt genuine to me. She had star quality without trying too hard. Miley is nothing but tryhard. And I'm sorry, but while Madonna rocked the short platinum blonde hair in a 50s bad girl way, Miley just looks like Justin Bieber in lipstick.* Her whole act seems to be saying "Suck it, Hannah Montana" but at least Hannah Montana was cute. And by cute, I mean didn't look like a pre-owned blow-up doll.

*who am I kidding, Justin Bieber is Justin bieber in lipstick. And that is the last time that name will grace my blog. It's like the Voldemort of pop singers.

I also wanna say, as much as I hate the "twerking" (I cannot type that "word" without sarcasti-quotes), it actually isn't the worst part of the "song" Please Make it Stop, I mean, We Can't Stop. I'm going out on a limb and saying the twerking actually makes it more interesting, in the way a house fire makes a nap more interesting. Okay. Moving on.

Let's take Madonna's Like a Prayer song and video, which was very controversial at the time for its mix of sexuality and religion and burning crosses. I loved it, and still do. First of all, it's kind of an interesting concept to begin with. It isn't shallow. And I never thought "LOL she's trying to be controversial" it was just... Madonna.

I don't want to harp on the appearance thing too much, but... this is just gorgeous imagery. Artistic even. The lighting, the images, Madonna herself, never has someone looked so good standing next to a burning cross. Ok maybe that isn't high praise, but still.

This is just ugly... UGLY! I'm not saying Miley is ugly, she isn't. But she's making herself as repugnant as humanly possible! Is this really what we want from our pop stars? At least Lady Gaga has a kind of performance art thing going on when she looks hideous. This look says, "trailer trash under the foul lighting of a K-Mart dressing room."

And oh yeah, her "music" is horrible and she can't sing worth a crap. That's par for the course these days, but still relevant. If her "songs" didn't all sound like a woodchuck on downers in a blender, she might be forgiven more easily. OMG poor woodchuck.

Now I'm sure Madonna herself would say, "Go Miley, go do your thing," and she'd be right. Everyone should do their thing. And if this is really what she wants to do then by all means, go get it done. I just feel this stink of desperation coming off of her like, "SEE I'M AN ADULT, SEE SEE? I HAVE SEX AND TAKE DRUGS AND EVERYTHING!"

So I guess my main point here, besides what I feel makes someone a genuine star, is when did growing up = SEX TIME!111!1? When did growing up not = idk... ACUTAL MATURITY? It feels like in her Herculean* efforts to show she's "all grown up," she's acting more juvenile than she did as a teenager. I mean, "Party in the USA" is sheer poetry compared to this freaking mess. I miss her wearing that cardigan. I miss her wearing anything. And in all seriousness, this is a troubling trend in young women. You need to grow up before you "grow up." Let's call the faux I'M EIGHTEEN I CAN SHOW MY BOOBS NOW YAY kind of growing up "grown-uppiness". To be grown up you need to identify yourself in a way that isn't sexual; exactly the opposite of Miley's grown-uppiness. It's like playing dress up but the closet is filled with EVERYTHING THAT'S WRONG WITH SOCIETY instead of your mother's dinner dress and pearls.

*if Hercules were ugly nude bodysuits instead of loincloths, or whatever. And licked inappropriate things. Ok, possibly not my best metaphor.

And drugs... WTF? Being grown up DOES NOT EQUAL DOING "BAD" THINGS JUST BECAUSE YOU CAN. THAT IS THE EPITOME OF IMMATURITY. THAT IS TEENAGE REBELLION. BEING GROWN UP MEANS DOING THE *RIGHT* THINGS, OR AT LEAST TRYING TO. CAPSLOCK FOR ULTIMATE JUSTICE!

So yeah. I don't think people are hating on this crap because she was an innocent child star and OMG SHE HAS A TONGUE NOW. She's not looked down on for her sexuality, because this isn't actually sexy. It's sexuality as conceived of by a bunch of apes sitting around a table (or a bunch of drunken frat boys, whichever is lower down on the evolutionary chain). I don't approve of women actually being looked down on for their sexuality, but this is the sugary cereal version of sex. It's like Alvin and the Chipmunks pole dancing. To paraphrase the classic MST3K quote, it's so in your face and annoying it stopped being sexy a long time ago.

And as always, I might hate on these pop stars but the real culprit is YOU, the bad music listening public. Stop listening to this crap and it will go away! You can't really blame them for putting it out there if people actually buy it. Well you can, but not as much.

During my latest inevitable, seasonal depression-induced bout of 80s nostalgia, I remembered another really bad 80s song. While it definitely belongs on my list I'm glad it wasn't at the forefront of my mind, as that would likely be a precursor to some unfortunate medical condition. The song is "Rock On," sung by possibly the least rockin' individual on the planet whose name also, thankfully, eludes me.

EDIT: Damn you, cat-killing curiousity. Michael Damian, which sounds like something that spawned in the third circle of Tiger Beat hell. He was also a soap opera actor. Of course he was.

Does Tiger Beat even exist anymore? I read it as a pre-teen. If I read it now, it would be Cougar Beat. :(

So sometimes I wish someone would discover my blog and be like, "Ho!* This woman is truly the Voice of Our Times (by ranting about how awful they are, because they suck!) I must shout her message from the mountaintops, verily!" What would mountaintops be today? Twitter? *INSERT RANT* And no, I don't know what verily means. IT SOUNDED PRETTY OK.

*Ho! as in, Land ho! Not... yeah.

Anyway. Even if I knew how to pimp out my blog I wouldn't because eww, and it would open me up to People's Opinions on the Internet, which I believe we've established spawn right in Satan's underpants. And you know he wears a slightly too small black satin thong. You know he does. And no one will ever tell him how awful it looks because OW I'M ON FIRE.

So there's that.

And while we're on the subject... I look at my past posts about bad music and weep. Cause I had NO IDEA just how bad it was gonna get. Here I was ranting about that bratty chick whose name I've already forgotten while somewhere, Miley Cyrus was fermenting. Oh, the sweet days of innocence... six months ago. I officially hate tongues now. She has made me loathe not just her and the current state of pop music, but an entire part of the human body. Now that's impressive.

Well, somebody has to be the 50s.

You Are the 1950s

You are a conventional, traditional, and responsible person. You try to live a good life. You appreciate the simpler days of the 1950s, when hard work and family were valued. You believe in doing your best, even if you aren't rewarded right away. Being a moral person is its own reward. You don't like to rock the boat too much. You like your life as it is and aren't looking to change it.

What Decade Are You?

Blogthings: 100's of Fun, Free Quizzes and 3 Stupid Ones

Yes the fabulous 50s, when people could still eat nuts, and bread, and pretty much everything else. No one twerked, and if they did, they went STRAIGHT TO HELL. (Wouldn't hell really just be a stage full of people twerking, anyway? And maybe some flames?) I'm not really "conventional" but... yes. YES. "Being a moral person is its own reward". YES! What, exactly, happened to that?

On the subject of tradition... probably my favourite author, Joshilyn Jackson, wrote about real books vs ebooks, and how real books have a smell and feel, and I'm like YES, someone else gets it, it's not just me! And an author I adore, to boot! Sometimes life makes sense. Not that there's anything wrong with ebooks. I mean, whatever gets people reading instead of, idk... twerking? sexting? is a-ok* with me. But still. Y'know. Books. They have souls. You can't tell me a book doesn't have more of a soul than say, Miley Cyrus. (Yes, even Twilight.)

Here is what she wrote: "They are here and made of fresh paper and they exist. THEY SMELL GOOD. They smell like real true books. I know so many of you have converted to the one true church of e-book, and fine! More power to you! But OH, I love the book as CONCRETE NOUN."

*hugs quote tight* I'm not alone... there's no place like home.

*Probably only people from the 50s still say "a-ok." I am a-ok with that.