by Rodney Eric Griffith | Armour of Rod | |
I bet Charles Manson wishes he had the same amount of what he and Michael Jackson both have.
I am supremely tired of apologists (a surprising amount of whom are European). Michael Jackson’s career (as a chronological adult) was built on meglomania and payola (I think Hit Men had an anecdote about how the success of each successive single was prearranged), not music. He paid tribute to a pathetic, dying old Hollywood crowd, and they returned the favour so his delusions of grandeur might thrive. He is evil. I’m not joking or being ironic. I realise that Jackson has not, so far as we know, had anyone slaughtered. But there are too many points of commonality between Jackson and Manson to be ignored.
He is the enemy of adulthood, and there is simply, by this point, too much smoke for there not to be a blaze behind it. His career runs on an insidious charisma, the same as Charlie’s, only there’s more of it. It frightens me to think that he’ll not only walk, but thrive, and people will defend him. However, I’ve yet to run across any “fan” who can hum five of his post-1980 songs—take away the gaudy 1950s epic promo films and you’re left with a series of very unmemorable soundtracks. 1980s preteens, brought up on bad movies, lapped up the videos, but the music couldn’t touch anyone because it was little more than a necessity, a mere background element—nothing important.
Last night I received an email from Warner Bros. promoting custom-printed blank Green Day CD-Rs made ostensibly so you could burn your own Green Day compilations (do Green Day really have 5 CDs worth of B-sides?). This could become a nice service, however. I’m aware of one label artwork website where low-quality RGB jpeg scans of label art are available for collectors who want to produce an authentic-looking replica CD (of course, since they’re happy to sacrifice the lifespan of their disc by using contraindicated adhesive labels, what kind of collectors could they be?). It would be good to have the major labels make custom-printed blanks available for purchase featuring desirable label artwork, e.g. the UK Apple label, Harvest, the yellow and black Parlophone, et al.
Rodney | 7:01:00 PM [permalink]My Caroline pointed out this staggering list of Bush double standards published in The Independent, excerpted from Graydon Carter’s What We've Lost.
Rodney | 7:01:00 AM [permalink]BBC 2 has aired excerpts from the recently-rediscovered Vanilla Tapes, soon to be part of the upcoming anniversary edition of London Calling.
Rodney | 7:01:00 PM [permalink]Westlife (or, as Caroline more accurately refers to them, “Wastelife”) have topped the first official UK Download Chart. The chart, overseen by the British Phonographic Industry, is compiled from sales figures from such sources as iTunes, mycokemusic.com and Napster.
Rodney | 7:02:00 PM [permalink]This year’s commemorative John Lennon reissue will be Rock ’n’ Roll, his brilliantly inconsistent LP of cover versions. My favourite track from those sessions, “Be My Baby”, is not listed amongst the bonus tracks. I was surprised to read in Dave Thompson’s Wall of Pain that the traditional story of Phil Spector being out of control while Lennon attempted to press on is backward, but it makes a lot more sense in Thompson’s description.
Rodney | 7:00:00 PM [permalink]Before we left Canada, I had to get a copy of the Globe and Mail because we don’t get newspapers worth reading in the US. I found myself reading articles in every section, even on subjects I would not normally be interested in.
By contrast, whenever I have a copy of the Sunday edition of the local paper, I immediately throw away about 80% of it. If The Plain Dealer would let me customize my subscription I’d take the section Dick Feagler’s column is in and the coupons and pass on the rest.
