Hey there, I’m the latest monkey recruited to be covering Sundays here at 411. No doubt you have no idea who the hell I am, so here’s a bit about myself: name’s Trevor, I work at a record store, I’m 21 years old and I have entirely too much time on my hands. I listen to way too much music and I’ll be sounding in with my own commentary regarding the news whenever I feel it’s necessary. No one likes reading the same old news report that’s been regurgitated ad nauseum; that’s no fun and besides, what’d be the point of me having this writing gig? Hopefully I’ll be able to keep you interested in this column as I work at it. Also, I’m a dirty, stinking CANADIAN, so expect a bit more babbling on about Canadian music and the such than what’d you normally be accustomed to. Right, anyways, enough babbling, let’s get down to covering…
Da News
– Yeah, so Bono had his Superbowl appearance cut because the NFL doesn’t like ‘promoting causes’, and instead we’re treated with the breast baring stupidity of Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake. You know, I joked in my sample column that the NFL/CBS/MTV/Whoever would instead provide us idiot viewers out there with some real quality entertainment, such as Britney Spears simulating sexual intercourse with a Shetland Pony, but I didn’t actually think they’d go ahead and do something this, well, stupid.
On top of that, it only took a couple of days after the Breast Offense before the lawsuits started piling in. Yeah, it would appear that Terri Carlin, a resident from the liberal stronghold known as Tennessee, filed a class action lawsuit against Janet Jackson, Justin Timberlake, CBS, MTV and Viacom. This idiot is alleging that the exposure and sexually explicit conduct by the performers injured viewers. Naturally the nature of the injuries aren’t specified, so expect this stupid lawsuit to get laughed out of court much like that guy that was suing fast food restaurants because the food made him fat. Seriously, how the hell do you incur injuries from seeing a breast? What happens when this woman steps into the shower every morning? Have a seizure?
– Album sales, for the first time in over 2 years, are up roughly 10% for the month of January, according to SoundScan data. This, coming off of two independent studies involving file sharing that, depending on whom you ask, state file sharing is either on the rise or has gone down dramatically. The NPD Group showed a spike in file sharing late last year, while the Pew Internet Group showed a 50% decline in filesharing. I’m more inclined to believe the NPD study, as they tended to be more thorough and include newer programs that the Pew study didn’t focus on. Could it be that the recording industry might just be full of shit and their claims that the sky was falling was garbage? Nah, that’d be SILLY!
– Talking about file sharing, it would seem Australian police raided the offices of Kazaa and Kazaa’s owner, Sharman Networks Friday. Police were looking for evidence of copyright infringement for an upcoming civil suit that’ll be filed against Kazaa and Sharman by Music Industry Piracy Investigations, which is made up of entirely of major labels. I guess the recording industry isn’t too optimistic about their chances regarding the appeals case against Grokster and Streamcast. That, or they’re pretty confident about the upcoming lawsuit against Kazaa in the States and they’re planning on striking while the iron is hot. At any rate, who still uses Kazaa? Soulseek and Bit Torrent seem to be the p2p programs du jour right now.
– Finally, to end my deluge of p2p news, here’s a parody ad of the iTunes Pepsi ad that was played at the Superbowl. Bonus points for using Twisted Sister, although to make it a true parody, they should’ve used the Bif Naked cover version of this song from Ready To Rumble instead of the original.
– So this upcoming Tuesday we’re going to be treated to the lyrical stylings of Courtney Love’s latest audio abortion, American Sweetheart. As though that’s simply not enough for all of us poor, beleaguered folk out there, Love is also planning to release her diaries, following the success of her deceased husband’s journals last year. David Vigliano, Love’s literary agent, has stated that the journals “couldn’t be more unlike Kurdt’s”. Well gee, Dave, could that be that unlike the rest of Courtney Love’s material, this stuff will actually be written by Courtney Love?
On the topic of Courtney Love’s ‘solo’ album, which reads as a who’s who of producers/songwriters, and sounds like a Jake Roberts meets Scott Hall solo effort, I strongly advise every single one of you out there to take a HUGE pass on this piece of dreck. We got the album in on Thursday and I spent my break listening to it. Half the songs are of the ‘rock star, syringe, DRUGS DRUGS DRUGS’ variety, whilst Courtney’s voice, despite all the studio scrubbing that was done to her voice, still sounds like she had gone on a 4 week bender before heading into the studio. Seriously, she sounds drunk, and not in a Brody from the Distillers way. No, she sounds like she’s on the verge of passing out, like someone at karaoke night at your local bar who’s trying to stumble their way through ‘Ruby Tuesday’ and failing miserably. Terrible. If you’re looking for a Hole fix, though, you should wait for former Hole/Smashing Pumpkins bassist Melissa Auf der Maur’s disc, which is slated to drop in the States in May. You can hop on over to her site to get a taste of her record, which sounds a hell of a lot better than Courtney’s…thing.
– Moving along, last week Def Jam found itself under the hammer amidst allegations that it was manipulating SoundScan. In a $22 million suit filed by former sales executive Theressa Rossi, she claims that she was utilized as ‘front woman’ for Giaco Entertainment, a marketing firm that was hired by Def Jam. Apparently Def Jam was offering free copies of their CDs to independent music retailers who would swipe certain titles repeatedly to garner more ‘hits’ for a particular album. Representatives from Def Jam, UMG and Giaco and deny any of the accusations.
This wouldn’t necessarily be the first time that this sort of manipulation has occurred regarding album sales, so I wouldn’t exactly be surprised if what’s being claimed IS what went down. On the other hand, what we might have here is a disgruntled employee who has an axe to grind with her former employers, so the whole suit could be bullshit and get thrown out in court. If true, it’ll only help to provide more reason to laugh at the major labels when they claim that album sales are ‘down’ and woe is the music market at this point in time. Why should we believe anything they say regarding album sales when they’re attempting to cook the books? You would think that leaving things sit as is and letting the numbers speak for themselves would help to convey the ‘dire’ situation the major labels are in thanks to downloading, but I guess not. Oh well!
– Sheryl Crow blames Madonna for the decline of Western Civilization as we know it. Apparently Madonna ushered in the era of ‘sex as power’ and things have been going to hell ever since. Yeah, um, Sheryl? Maybe you should drop strutting around onstage in hot pants and maybe people will start taking you seriously.
– Dave Grohl also decided to join the Moral Majority this past week, chiming in with his 2 cents regarding the Janet incident, calling it self-promotion and ‘blatant exhibitionism’, going on to say “get them on the Playboy Channel…keep them out of my MTV.” Umm, Dave? Didn’t you just tap Suicide Girls, a site that’s a franchise of Playboy for your Probot video? I normally like most of what you do, but get your head out of your ass, guy.
– David Bowie has extended his North American tour with 29 extra dates and also has plans to re-release 3 albums that were released in the 90s. Outside, Earthling and Hours will all be remastered and come with extra tracks. For those of you who live in Alberta, Bowie’ll be making another appearance here in April, with a Good Friday showing up in Edmonton. Road trip, here I come!
– Thom Yorke of Radiohead recently did a piece for England’s The Guardian last weekend, setting his sights on Tony Blair, and addressing the Hutton Report, (a fascinating read regarding the Hutton Report can be found over in Black, by William Cooling, I recommend you check it out) and the utter shitstorm that’s going on in British politics right now. You can read Yorke’s article here. Nothing here really left unsaid that I feel I need to chime in with my own two cents with, so I’ll leave it at that.
– The reanimated corpse of Jimi Hendrix will now be playing at the Coachella festival in May. Details can presumably be found on the Coachella Website.
– Those of you who looked at Evocator’s TITS this week will know that Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst’s quest to wrest the crown of village idiot from George W has reached new heights, or lows, depending on how you view it. Last week Freddy got into an argument with a Spanish journalist that resulted in Durst posting a nasty little message at limpbizkit.com. But the idiocy doesn’t end there, oh no! Earlier this week the journalist who instigated this brouhaha, Jordi Meya, fired back with an open letter to Fred Durst, claiming Durst insulted him and overreacted to some of the questions he was asking. Durst, in the manner of oh so many 14 year old internet message board users, responded with a witty retort of his own, saying he’d like to kick his ‘fake ass’. You should be able to read the original bitchfest here. Kudos to Fred Durst for picking a fight with someone who doesn’t speak very good English and then going to sulk and whine about it on his website.
– For you death metal fans out there a new book chronicling the 20-year history of the genre will be coming out later this year. Choosing Death: The Improbable History Of Death Metal & Grindcore will be released by Feral House Books this fall. The book will be written by metal journalist Albert Mudrian and will contain an introduction by famous BBC DJ John Peel. Further details can be checked out at choosingdeath.com, if you’re interested.
– Ben Kweller and Death Cab For Cutie are embarking on an ambitious tour that’ll see them covering 46 dates in roughly a two-month span. Tour information can be found at Ben Kweller’s website. Also, Kweller is busy finishing up his third album, titled On My Way, with a release date of April 6th, and Death Cab will be performing on Last Call With Carson Daly on Friday the 13th. If you haven’t checked out Death Cab For Cutie, currently one of my current ‘faves’, then take the opportunity to catch ’em on Last Call. If you like ’em, check out Rilo Kiley and The Postal Service as well.
– Silverchair frontman Daniel Johns has a new sideproject up and running with Australian producer Paul Mac. Mac assisted with Silverchair’s Diorama album, as well as production on Silverchair’s third disc, Neon Ballroom. The Dissociatives, the name of the group made up of Johns and Mac, released a single from their forthcoming album on Aussie radio last Friday, with an internet release coming up tomorrow. You can go here to check out the tune come Monday. Plans for a release in Australia are set for April, with no international plans made as of yet.
Gramm-amma-mam-a-phonies!
I guess it wouldn’t hurt to offer my own predictions regarding the 46th Annual Grammy Awards, considering the show is occurring TODAY. Elliot Smilowitz also has his own predictions regarding the Grammys, as well, Chris Biscuiti has his Grammy picks over in Black, if you’re looking for more Grammy opinions hours before the show actually broadcasts.
Anywho, without further adieu, here’s my picks for the Grammys:
Record of the Year
Crazy in Love – Beyonce f/Jay-Z
Where is the Love – Black Eyed Peas f/Justin Timberlake
Clocks – Coldplay
Lose Yourself – Eminem
Hey Ya! – Outkast
Beyonce should get the nod here. Hate the song, and as much as I’d like to see Hey Ya! win, I’m not about to jinx it by making it my official pick here. Of course, by going out and saying that I’ve negated the whole jinx process, but you win some, you lose some. My ‘pick’? Beyonce. My pick (shhh!)? Outkast.
Album of the Year
Under Construction – Missy Elliott
Fallen – Evanescence
Speakerboxxx/The Love Below – Outkast
Justified – Justin Timberlake
Elephant – The White Stripes
Two of the five nominated are hip-hop albums and out of the two, Outkast is the far superior record. Don’t think Evanescence will be getting the nod, as I have them pegged for best new artist, although the idiots at the Grammys might surprise everyone and award Justin Album of the Year, considering the amazing year he had. But then, there were his hijinks last Sunday at the Superbowl, so he might be in the doghouse. Tough call, but I’m going with Outkast here.
Song of the Year
Beautiful – Christina Aguilera
Dance With My Father – Luther Vandross
I’m With You – Avril Lavigne
Keep Me In Your Heart – Warren Zevon
Lose Yourself – Eminem
Eminem won an Oscar for Lose Yourself so it’s doubtful he’s going to win here. ‘Beautiful’ is a pretty weak song, in my opinion, and I can’t see Christina walking away with the hardware here. Avril loses because of the other two contenders, and between the two, I have to say giving the award to Zevon, who is deceased, will probably be the right thing to do here, although I wouldn’t be surprised if Luther Vandross walks away with it. Luther gets my vote here.
Best New Artist
Evanescence
50 Cent
Fountains Of Wayne
Heather Headley
Sean Paul
50 is going to clean up in the Rap categories, and I doubt Sean Paul is going to get away with anything this year. The winner? All of us, so long as Fountains Of Wayne aren’t winning, although Evanescence stands a good chance of getting the best new artist award this year. No clue who Heather Headley is, and, given the people she’s competing with, it’s doubtful she’s going to be even given a moment’s consideration. Evanescence would be my pick, then.
Best Pop Vocal Album
Stripped – Christina Aguilera
Brainwashed – George Harrison
Bare – Annie Lennox
Motown – Michael McDonald
Justified – Justin Timberlake
Good god. THIS is what counts for pop nowadays? As much as I like George Harrison, Justin Timberlake has got to win SOMETHING. Give it to Justin, although I have to wonder what the HELL Annie Lennox was doing on this particular ballot. Do people, yes, even the mummified corpses that constitute the Academy, still listen to her? Ugh.
Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
Beautiful – Christina Aguilera
Miss Independent – Kelly Clarkson
White Flag – Dido
I’m with You – Avril Lavigne
Fallen -Sarah McLachlan
So we have Christina, Christina’s Clone, a Brit, an idiot-Canuck and, um, Sarah McLachlan. I’d like to see Dido win here, as I can’t stand any of the other songs, and hey, I happen to actually like her new record. Chances are Avril will walk away with it here, though. Cos god knows we haven’t had enough Avril in our lives.
Best Male Pop Vocal Performance
Any Road – George Harrison
Ain’t No Mountain High Enough – Michael McDonald
Send Your Love – Sting
Cry Me a River – Justin Timberlake
Keep Me in Your Heart – Warren Zevon
It’d be nice if George Harrison or Warren Zevon get the award here, although there’s a snowball’s chance in hell that Justin Timberlake isn’t going to walk away with this one. JT by a landslide.
Best Dance Recording
Love One Another – Cher
Easy – Groove Armada
Die Another Day – Madonna
Come Into My World – Kylie Minogue
Breathe – Telepopmusik
Next.
Best Male Rap Solo Performance
Pump It Up – Joe Budden
Lose Yourself – Eminem
In Da Club – 50 Cent
Stand Up – Ludacris
Get Busy – Sean Paul
50 Cent rules it here. This song earns the distinction as being the most overplayed tune for last year and he was THE heavyweight on the Billboard charts this past year. Eminem’s got the Oscar, so he’s out of the running, and I just think the Grammy people will find Sean-a Paul-a to be too esoteric and disqualify him, and I just don’t see Ludacris of Joe Budden snatching this one away from 50.
Best Rap Performance By A Duo Or Group
Gossip Folks – Missy Elliott f/ Ludacris
Magic Stick – Lil’ Kim f/ 50 Cent
Shake Ya Tailfeather – Nelly, P. Diddy & Murphy Lee
Dipset (Santana’s Town) – Juelz Santana f/ Cam’Ron
Can’t Stop Won’t Stop – Young Gunz
Quite the assortment here. Disqualifying Lil Kim on basis that I dislike her and can’t see her winning anything. The only two I can see walking away with this here are Nelly and Missy Elliott. Missy has Ludacris backing her up while Nelly & P. Diddy are heavyweights in their own right. Both won awards last year, too, so it’s hard to decide. I’ll go with Missy and Ludacris simply because I happen to like that song more than ‘Tailfeather’ and I think Ludacris needs some sort of recognition here.
Best Rap Album
Under Construction – Missy Elliott
Get Rich or Die Tryin’ – 50 Cent
The Blueprint 2 (The Gift & The Curse) – Jay-Z
Speakerboxxx/The Love Below – Outkast
Phrenology – The Roots
If Outkast is getting album of the year, that leaves 50 and Jay-Z in the running for Best Rap Album. While Jay-Z may seem to be the favorite to win this award, I’m expecting 50 to clean up here as well, much to the dismay of some people I know.
Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
Are You Happy Now? – Michelle Branch
Losing Grip – Avril Lavigne
Trouble – Pink
Time Of Our Lives – Bonnie Raitt
Righteously – Lucinda Williams
I see this coming down to Pink & Avril, with Avril succeeding. Simply put, Pink’s star seems to be waning right now and I daresay she might be considered to be far too weird for the Grammy’s liking, and Avril has a new album coming out May 25th and is still pretty damn popular, so expect The Bitch-Queen of MTV to walk away with this one, as this will keep her in the public eye and give her some ‘legitimacy’. Cos we all know how hallowed and sacred the Grammys are.
Best Male Rock Vocal Performance
New Killer Star – David Bowie
Down In The Flood – Bob Dylan
If I Could Fall In Love – Lenny Kravitz
Gravedigger – Dave Matthews
Return Of Jackie & Judy – Tom Waits
Oh man. 4 out of 5 nominations here ain’t too bad at all. While I’d love to see Bowie walk away with a Grammy here, or hell, even Tom Waits, I think Dave Matthews is going to get the nod here. Boo urns to Kravitz being on here, though. Couldn’t Neil Young have garnered a nomination…even if he wasn’t going to win?
Best Rock Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocal
Times Like These – Foo Fighters
There There – Radiohead
Calling All Angels – Train
Seven Nation Army – The White Stripes
Disorder In The House – Warren Zevon & Bruce Springsteen
Foo Fighters won with a One By One track (‘All My Life’) last year, so I don’t see them winning another award off of the same album. The Academy most likely won’t stand for being snubbed by Radiohead who most likely won’t be appearing at the show. Warren Zevon might get the award here if he doesn’t pick up song of the year, although I can see this particular category qualifying as the ‘HUH?’ winner for this year and from out nowhere having Train winning. White Stripes SHOULD win, although Train, boring, vanilla group that they are, will most likely get it here.
Best Hard Rock Performance
Like A Stone – Audioslave
Bring Me To Life – Evanescence Featuring Paul McCoy
Straight Out Of Line – Godsmack
Just Because – Jane’s Addiction
Go With The Flow – Queens Of The Stone Age
Evanescence here, although it’d be awesome if Queens Of The Stone Age could take it. Then Josh could come up with Brody, half drunk/stoned, mouth off obscenities towards Tim Armstrong, who is sitting in the audience with Pink, and they could have a brawl right in the middle of the awards show. Teach Britney, Madonna, Janet and Justin all a lesson on causing a ruckus. Yeah, in my dreams.
Best Metal Performance
Did My Time – Korn
mOBSCENE – Marilyn Manson
St. Anger – Metallica
Smothered – Spineshank
Inhale – Stone Sour
Metallica. As though there is any doubt whatsoever about this particular category. It’s too bad Jethro Tull wasn’t nominated this year, as I’d have picked them over Metallica in a heartbeat. Cough.
Best Rock Song
Bring Me To Life – Evanescence Featuring Paul McCoy
Calling All Angels – Train
Disorder In The House – Warren Zevon & Bruce Springsteen
Seven Nation Army – The White Stripes
Someday – Nickelback
White Stripes. They need to win something, and I’d rather see them getting the more important category here. Only other possibility would be Nickelback and they’d be high to let them win over the White Stripes or Evanescence.
Best Rock Album
Audioslave – Audioslave
Fallen – Evanescence
One By One – Foo Fighters
More Than You Think You Are – Matchbox Twenty
The Long Road – Nickelback
To finally cement the fact that yes, Tom Morello and other former members of Rage Against The Machine have finally sold their souls to the CORPORATE DEVIL MACHINE….THING, we’ll see Audioslave picking up Best Rock Album.
Best Alternative Music Album
Fight Test – The Flaming Lips
Hail To The Thief – Radiohead
( ) – Sigur Rós
Elephant – The White Stripes
Fever To Tell – Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Hmm. Well, Sigur Rós is in the studio right now, and we’ve established that Radiohead won’t get an award for being, well, Radiohead, so that leaves last year’s Grammy winners the Flaming Lips (Best Alternative Instrumental Piece) against the Stripes and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. This year belongs to the White Stripes, and in a decision that’ll shock no one, Meg and Jack White walk away with the award here.
And that’s the Grammys. Nothing all that exciting or shocking here, although I’m sure the Academy will mix things up just enough here so that all the obvious winners won’t walk away with everything. Tonight’s performances should prove to be fairly interesting, given who is performing.
Sound Advice
Okay, what with this being the inaugural column, explanations are in order.
As said, I’m planning on showcasing Canadian talent and music, and this is going to be one of the experimental portions of the column. What I’m going to do is a quick feature on an artist and tell you why you NEED to be buying the artist’s records. I will be taking submissions and suggestions, so feel free to e-mail me with stuff you think needs a pimp or two and please realize that I won’t necessarily cover Canadian music, so feel free to submit anything. My first induction to this list would indeed be a Canadian musician by the name of Hawksley Workman.
Hawksley has released three full length discs, his ’99 debut For Him & The Girls, sophomore release (Last Night We Were) The Delicious Wolves and his most recent release, last years Lover/Fighter. Additionally, he’s released a Christmas album entitled Almost A Full Moon and has a book of prose under his belt, called Hawksley Burns For Isadora. In my opinion, his best work has been (Last Night We Were) The Delicious Wolves and it’s worth checking out if you’re a fan of uppity, jumpy folk music. Songs like ‘Striptease’ and ‘Your Beauty Must Be Rubbing Off’ show that this is a song writer that can write good, catchy pop songs, while slower tracks such as ‘Old Bloody Orange’ and ‘No Beginning, No End’ showcase the quiet, tender side of him. He’s been compared to Rufus Wainwright and Jeff Buckley, although I’d say that both of those comparisons aren’t fair, considering that Hawksley seems to fit into a genre of his own. This is a guy who has done covers of the Beatles, Joy Division, The Clash and Frank Sinatra and made them his own. He’s a guy who puts 110% into his live performance and if you ever get the chance to catch him live, it’s most assuredly money well spent. No two Hawksley Workman shows are the same, as he enjoys mixing things up and creating new and different things for his audience.
He’s also has done some production for fellow Canadians Tegan & Sara and Sarah Slean (who, incidentally, does an absolutely brilliant cover of Radiohead’s ‘Climbing Up The Walls’…if you’re able to snatch this off of Kazaa or some other file sharing program of your choice, pick it up, it’s well worth the download), and has appeared in a couple of Canadian films (one of them, Stormy Weather: The Music Of Harold Arlen, has a soundtrack available that features a Hawksley song as well as a couple of Rufus Wainwright tunes). This isn’t some fabricated pop artist who was selected by Simon Crowell or some other vapid, retarded corporate suit, this is the real deal and the difference between him and some other idiot with a guitar such as John Mayer is that there’s some sort of an ‘oomph’ to Hawksley’s music.
Anyways, if you’re interested in checking out some more about Hawksley Workman, you can go to his website www.hawksleyworkman.com or go to www.justconcerts.com which features a mini-session Hawksley Workman did back in October. It’s Real Audio, unfortunately and I know that some people detest that format. If you’re still interested in checking out Hawksley, here’s an abbreviated playlist that you can keep an eye out for on your file-sharing program of choice:
– Striptease
– Jealous Of Your Cigarette
– Paper Shoes
– Bullets
– No Beginning, No End
– Dirty & True
– No Reason To Cry Your Eyes Out
– Love Will Tear Us Apart (A Joy Division cover that has to be heard to be
believed)
– I’ve Got The World On A String (Frank Sinatra cover I was talking about
earlier, again, another amazing track)
– Tarantulove
– Old Bloody Orange
– Your Beauty Must Be Rubbing Off
As always, you can get his stuff off
of Amazon, so if you like what you hear, please go and buy his CD. He deserves it!
That’s about it for this column. E-mail me to let me know what you think of my efforts. Hope you all had a good weekend and tune in on Monday to check out the second new columnist for 411 Music. Ciao!
