Midweek Music News Roundup 10.28.09: I Don't Know What I'm To Say, But I'll Say It Anyway

Posted by Lucas Wesley on 10.28.2009

A-Ha get offended, the Songwriters Hall of Fame expands, new music from Ted Leo and Black Francis, maybe new music from the artists formerly known as Oasis, Kanye West explains some information about his video, Hall & Oates & Rachael Ray, Justin Timberlake is stalked by the ghost of Axl Rose's relevance and a look at word of mouth fanaticism and what it means from different people.

Have you heard? We here at 411 are doing something super cool. Starting November 2 and lasting to November 6, a series of interviews with some great rap and hip-hop artists will be posted on the site. We'll see Skratch Bastid, Apathy, Lyrics Born (of the Quannum MC crew), Masta Ace and Chuck D. Should be a great series of interviews and you should totally check them out.



In other news, last week I made some disparaging comments about a-Ha and rightly pissed off at least six people in the comment section. This isn't like the Smashing Pumpkins fiasco all those weeks ago where I feel like I was misinterpreted. I just find this funny. I can't believe of every band and artist I regularly complain about, a-Ha was the one that upset people. In the same column I was twice as mean to Bon Jovi and that didn't get a single complaint. That guy's hair has a cult. a-Ha gets remembered in karaoke bars. Alright, enough back tracking (until Star Power), let's see some news.

- The nominees for the 2010 Songwriter's Hall of Fame have been announced. Included are Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed, Elvis Costello and Tommy James, to name a few. Unfortunately, only two singer-songwriters get in per year, along with three non-performing songwriters. Such non-performers nominated include Jackie DeShannon, Luther Dixon and the team of Jerry Ragovoy and Bert Berns. Considering the great dearth of fantastic artists nominated this year, it's really going to suck when the winners are announced as U2 and Garth Brooks. Eh, what are you gonna do?

- Black Francis has a new album in the making: Non Stop Erotic. It was created with longtime collaborator Eric Drew Feldman. Details are pretty skimpy right now, but that along should be pretty good news for your average Francis fan.

- It only took, what, two weeks? Three? Whatever. Oasis siblings Liam and Noel Gallagher have both officially announced continued careers in the works, and both claim they are currently working on music. How many failed solo albums until they reunite? I say Liam gets one, Noel maybe two. In fact, read that literally and Liam may not get any: quote Our Kid, he doesn't want to be solo, but instead to form a new band. We'll see where it goes.



- The greatest artist of this generation of this decade is, as always, in the news again. First, Kanye West has finally been sentenced to 50 hours of community service following his attack on camera carrying paparazzi last year. Not a terribly bad sentence all things considered, but Björk gave twice the beating, and as I recall, she got off scotch free. Kanye will also go through an anger management chorus, which I'm sure he will blog about as being humbling (*ahem*...HUMBLING), then in a month or two he'll freak out at another award show. In other Kanye news, Spike Jonze has explained the disappearance of the short film "We Were Once A Fairytale" by saying that the leaked version was unfinished. That Kanye didn't know it was unfinished is kind of odd to me, but Jonze brushes it off as a misunderstanding, which is cool. Lastly, I've finally seen the video. My reaction can be summed up with the word "what?"

- Rachael Ray thinks she matters in the rock world, and apparently she kind of does. Recently she's started campaigning for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction of Hall & Oates. Good luck to them all, but I mostly agree with Rolling Stone when they joke that in the very least, Oates' mustache deserves a place in the sideman category.

- Justin Timberlake has a stalker! Well, I should said had. He successfully commissioned for a restraining order against 48-year-old Karen McNeil, who broke into his house three times. If it were me, I'd have gone for the restraining order after the first time, but I guess that's why JT is a world known pop star and I'm just an Internet writer. Ms. McNeil has previously served prison time for stalking Axl Rose. What kind of person do you have to be to stalk both Axl Rose and Justin Timberlake? I have no idea.


Theory: White guy braids.

- Last week was CMJ in New York, and I'm sad to say I missed it. I was personally invited, too! If only I wasn't a busy college student. For full breakdowns you can check Pitchfork or Rolling Stone, but one thing I'll say is that Ted Leo apparently debuted a rockin' new track called "One Poloroid a Day," and you can find it on youtube. It's sweet, like most Ted Leo.

Star Power

So, as I mentioned in the prelude, I upset some people last week. Namely, a-Ha fans. Again I reiterate that I offer no apologies, a-Ha are a joke and it's funny that people have fun to their defense. However, it does remind me of an interesting phenomenon: incredible fanaticism to bands that I thought no one cared about. It's one thing if you get all fanatical about The Flaming Lips or Lou Reed or something. They have their well-known fan bases and critical background that guarantees at least a few super fans along the way. Dave Matthews worship, damnable an offense it may be, happens every day, so it doesn't make you turn your head. But when you're going crazy over a-Ha, that's what gets me all confused. Today's Star Power is going to be a look at just how we become fanatics, and how it could happen to a band that I thought no one cared about. This is going to be short and different because it'll mostly be case studies, but you get what you pay for. Or something. And since you don't pay you can't complain. Or something.

My first exposure to inexplicable (to me) fanaticism came while listening to the radio. I'm in college now, so naturally I primarily listen to college radio. However, when I was younger, I didn't have that option. Because I was a rebellious young lad (ed. note: this was, at most, two years ago), I refused to listen to top 40. Since there was really no alternative, the only things I could turn to were classical, country and classic rock. Being a cliché without sophistication, I went with classic rock. Classic rock radio, perhaps more than any other kind of radio, creates a view of what is popular and what is not popular, which is probably why it shocked me so much when that very classic rock station broke the norm and had a DJ go on for a good ten minutes profiling their favorite act: J. Geils Band. And they didn't even mention Centerfold.



Like a-Ha, on the grand scale, I have nothing against J. Geils Band. The reality is they barely exist for me. One silly, catchy 80s song that I might bring up as a joke and a whole lot of nothing. But this guy talked about them on the level people talk about The Stones or The Beatles. He referred to Peter Wolf's voice as iconic. Unless he was saying "na na na," I couldn't spot Wolf's voice in a line up. Okay, so you can't do a vocal line up, but you understand the cliché, I hope. That kind of worship for a band of that stature is baffling to me on a popular level.

But what about when it isn't a popular level? I know a guy who has spoke at length about his worship for Aphrodite's Child. A fine band, I suppose, but by no means one you expect to witness worship for. I wasn't as taken aback by this if only because it was one person. But wasn't the DJ one person as well? Both of them merely expressing their opinions on a favorite band, one left me baffled and confused, the other without batting an eye. Why is it that we strive for new music and for our favorite acts to become popular, but when someone exhibits worship for something out of the norm, our only reaction is confusion?

More relevantly, how does the a-Ha example fit in to this equation? I would hardly expect the people commenting on my column were exclusively classic rock DJs. They may not be personal acquaintances of mine, but surely they're closer to that level than the other. Yet if that same acquaintance told me he was a huge fan of a-Ha, I wouldn't be shocked. Maybe a little, but I'd forget about it the next day, whereas when a group of invisibles did it, I wrote a column about it. To bring in another example, what if I heard it in a small record store?



The answer to that question can be seen in an incident that occurred to me about a year ago. I was at a small record store and I overheard two older gentlemen talking about The Cynics. I'd never heard of them, but these two men seemed to be quite the fans. They loved them and had nothing but praise to offer. I wasn't eavesdropping per se, but it was a small place, so I heard most of it. I don't know if it was the environment, if I merely respect my elders of rock or if I just had a lot of money to spare that day, but when I saw they left without purchasing the Cynics album they were discussing, I picked it up and gave it a spin. Then another, then another. It kind of sucked. I still justify that event by saying that there were two Cynics albums there, so they must have been talking about the other one. Critical response seems to say that's true, but why would I even go there? Why does their fanaticism promise that The Cynics are good? Why can't my opinion be right?

The opposite has occurred, too. Different record store, different set of older gentlemen, this time speaking about how KISS are the greatest band of all time. They've seen them all, they say: The Stones, The Who, you name it. KISS are just better than everyone else. This time, instead of grabbing Alive! when I see they didn't, I merely scoff. What are these guys on about? Did I believe the men talking about The Cynics because I'd never heard of them? Was the environment somehow different? I have no idea, but I know that I trusted one group and discarded the other.

I think ultimately what I'm ruminating on is how different people affect out opinions of music. Praise of an odd band from one might cause intrigue, from another it seems out of place and causes confusion, others still make me laugh and ridicule. Are any of these the proper reaction? I have no idea, but they are all reactions we have. Maybe I should just listen to some a-Ha and use that to decide whether or not the fans are fanatics or merely big fans. But let's face it, I'm not going to do that, because I prejudge and lead myself to a path of not caring. I'm just throwing this out there in case people are taking my opinion on this too seriously. Or maybe they went the way of the comment section and are now listening to...I can't even name another a-Ha song. One of them. With that embarrassing admittance, I think I'm going to stop there. Don't be another sequel, express your tastes.

Farewell Song

The year is 1976, and boy is our winner a doozy. Usually I go down the big list, naming every major artist that I like and saying they all made some lovely albums and all deserve a fair deal of praise. While that's surely true this year as every year, there's no need for me to go down the list. The winner of 1976 is an incredible easy decision, because it remains one of my all time favorite songs. I've never been a fan of progressive music of any kind, so it's fair to say I don't have a predilection towards the longer songs. However, at over ten minutes, this is just a perfect song. From the opening chug-chug-chug to the slow build all the way to the proto rave piano, this song has no flaws. Not to mention perhaps the greatest individual lyric of all times: "It's not the side effects of the cocaine; I'm thinking that it must be love." If you haven't gotten it yet, the song is "Station To Station" by David Bowie.



To choose the album of the year is a little harder, however not by much. While many great albums were released in 1976, only two of them rank amongst my all time favorites. One is the album the above song features on, Station to Station by David Bowie. The other is perhaps Stevie Wonder's greatest masterpiece (though not necessarily his best album...my thought processes are complicated, don't ask), Songs in the Key of Life. While it's hard to ultimately choose one over the other, I'm going with Station to Station. I'm not sure why, though, so take that as you will.

Thanks for joining us again this week and I hope you'll join us just one more time (or, well, many more times) next week and every following week here on the Midweek Music News Roundup! Hope I didn't offend your secret favorite band this time...