Tim Armstrong of Rancid fame is preparing a solo album for release, according to this blurb over at Spin Magazine's web site.
I wonder if he'll safety pin a Crass patch to his tux when he goes to the Grammys. Anyway.
"SoCal punk legend Tim Armstrong, branded for his work with Rancid, Operation Ivy, and the Transplants, among others, will release his solo debut album, A Poet's Life, May 21 on his label Hellcat, NME.com reports.
Tim Armstrong is from Berkeley, Calif. Which, as this handy map will show you, absolves the jackass Spin writing staff of any potential idiocy I referred to when I bitched about their Henry Rollins coverage by being totally right smack dab in the middle of "SoCal" (that abrevation is soooo kewl!). Punk rock!
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Friday, March 30, 2007
Commercial Music (Read on to discover this title is a double-pun!)
I used to love “Just What I Needed” by the Cars, but now I can’t hear it without picturing a Toyotathon or one of the blue-shirts at Best Buy pointing at the flatscreen on a Kenmore fridge.
Has this happened to you, too? Has a once beloved song been drained empty by television commercials?
I remember, as a youngster, hearing the splashes of rich white people cannonballing into my neighborhood’s country club pool (I’m a white guy too, but you know what I’m saying). The kids would laugh, the silver-haired business dads would grunt, their blonde wives would squirt SPF 5 and the lifeguard would blow his whistle at the troublemakers. Streaming under it all was the sound of a cheap radio, hissing from the snack bar. Tuned to the now-defunct WHSL, it would broadcast “the hits of today and the classics we love” or something, which meant the turf between Huey Lewis and the Rolling Stones. Van Halen might have been a bit too bristly for this crowd. Anyway, believe it or not I have a vivid memory of first hearing the Who’s “I Can See For Miles” over that very FM station by the pool. The verse of the song wasn’t familiar to me, so it didn’t particularly grab my attention. When the chorus kicked in, however, I knew that song! I chimed in: “I can drive for miles and miles! I can drive for miles and miles!”
But then I stopped myself. Something was off. Those were the words I surely knew, but the band on the radio wasn’t singing that. Instead of “I can drive for miles,” the singer said “I can see for miles.” Weird. Why?
I asked my mom, who did her best to explain that this was the real version of the song that the Firestone tire company based their jingle on. It was in that commercial I always saw on TV at home. All the sudden, the Who’s version felt real lame to me, like the corny ad it now was. I never grew to like that song. Firestone ruined it. Today, every time “I Can See For Miles” streams through the radio, I can only picture a new set of Hi-Tread Potenza Pole Positions on the shiny rims of some ol’ GTO as it burns rubber into the sunset. And a jackass is behind the wheel.
Saddest thing is, that’s a song I might otherwise love.
As hard as I’ve tried, I can’t remove the commercial associations from these adopted songs. I don’t know what band does that song in the Progressive Insurance commercials, nor would I be a fan anyway, but I do remember hearing it on the radio earlier on. I can just imagine how dead that song must be to an actual fan of the band that penned it. It’s now on TV every seven minutes.
Lately I’ve noticed more and more incidences of hit songs (or could-have-been-hit songs) in advertisements and TV show intros. When I first heard the Dell commercial tracked by the 13th Floor Elevators’ “Won’t You Miss Me?,” I was really put off. I didn’t want to hate that song. I had always loved it. I didn’t want it attached to a brand. Was it, inadvertently, a test to separate true fans from the unworthy? “Ya know, if you really loved that 13th Floor Elevators song as much as you say, you wouldn’t let the Dell Corporation ruin any of its sweetness. Your will is quite weak.”
But I don’t know. It’s like having a crush on the hottest girl in school, only to find out she has irritable bowel syndrome and can’t go an hour without storming her diaper. Yes, she wears diapers too.
Know what I mean? It’s that stigma that latches on forevermore until something can, somehow, remove it. Would I hate the Shins any less if I hadn’t seen Garden State? Can I ever remove Zack Braff’s spikey nose from their plain-bagel sound? Yes, I already thought the Shins to be wholly overrated, but Braff’s generic movie seemed like a commercial for that band. They brought one-another down even further.
But back to the issue of enjoyable songs being tarnished by popular business, it kinda bugs me that a songwriter would allow their work to be woven into a brand name. Sure, I know it’s not as easy as that (sometimes the record label is the dealer, while the songwriter has no control over the fate of his/her music), but still, it kills the song. “Just What I Needed” will never again be that once-catchy summer song by the Cars. It’s now a zombie feeding on Dominoes Pizza at Office Max.
The trend of catchy, connective music to track advertisements is catching on in creative marketing departments the world over. I wonder what song will be drained next. Stephen Malkmus had a close call with that Sears ad. Let's not even mention Pepsi and the Rolling Stones.
Has this happened to you, too? Has a once beloved song been drained empty by television commercials?
I remember, as a youngster, hearing the splashes of rich white people cannonballing into my neighborhood’s country club pool (I’m a white guy too, but you know what I’m saying). The kids would laugh, the silver-haired business dads would grunt, their blonde wives would squirt SPF 5 and the lifeguard would blow his whistle at the troublemakers. Streaming under it all was the sound of a cheap radio, hissing from the snack bar. Tuned to the now-defunct WHSL, it would broadcast “the hits of today and the classics we love” or something, which meant the turf between Huey Lewis and the Rolling Stones. Van Halen might have been a bit too bristly for this crowd. Anyway, believe it or not I have a vivid memory of first hearing the Who’s “I Can See For Miles” over that very FM station by the pool. The verse of the song wasn’t familiar to me, so it didn’t particularly grab my attention. When the chorus kicked in, however, I knew that song! I chimed in: “I can drive for miles and miles! I can drive for miles and miles!”
But then I stopped myself. Something was off. Those were the words I surely knew, but the band on the radio wasn’t singing that. Instead of “I can drive for miles,” the singer said “I can see for miles.” Weird. Why?
I asked my mom, who did her best to explain that this was the real version of the song that the Firestone tire company based their jingle on. It was in that commercial I always saw on TV at home. All the sudden, the Who’s version felt real lame to me, like the corny ad it now was. I never grew to like that song. Firestone ruined it. Today, every time “I Can See For Miles” streams through the radio, I can only picture a new set of Hi-Tread Potenza Pole Positions on the shiny rims of some ol’ GTO as it burns rubber into the sunset. And a jackass is behind the wheel.
Saddest thing is, that’s a song I might otherwise love.
As hard as I’ve tried, I can’t remove the commercial associations from these adopted songs. I don’t know what band does that song in the Progressive Insurance commercials, nor would I be a fan anyway, but I do remember hearing it on the radio earlier on. I can just imagine how dead that song must be to an actual fan of the band that penned it. It’s now on TV every seven minutes.
Lately I’ve noticed more and more incidences of hit songs (or could-have-been-hit songs) in advertisements and TV show intros. When I first heard the Dell commercial tracked by the 13th Floor Elevators’ “Won’t You Miss Me?,” I was really put off. I didn’t want to hate that song. I had always loved it. I didn’t want it attached to a brand. Was it, inadvertently, a test to separate true fans from the unworthy? “Ya know, if you really loved that 13th Floor Elevators song as much as you say, you wouldn’t let the Dell Corporation ruin any of its sweetness. Your will is quite weak.”
But I don’t know. It’s like having a crush on the hottest girl in school, only to find out she has irritable bowel syndrome and can’t go an hour without storming her diaper. Yes, she wears diapers too.
Know what I mean? It’s that stigma that latches on forevermore until something can, somehow, remove it. Would I hate the Shins any less if I hadn’t seen Garden State? Can I ever remove Zack Braff’s spikey nose from their plain-bagel sound? Yes, I already thought the Shins to be wholly overrated, but Braff’s generic movie seemed like a commercial for that band. They brought one-another down even further.
But back to the issue of enjoyable songs being tarnished by popular business, it kinda bugs me that a songwriter would allow their work to be woven into a brand name. Sure, I know it’s not as easy as that (sometimes the record label is the dealer, while the songwriter has no control over the fate of his/her music), but still, it kills the song. “Just What I Needed” will never again be that once-catchy summer song by the Cars. It’s now a zombie feeding on Dominoes Pizza at Office Max.
The trend of catchy, connective music to track advertisements is catching on in creative marketing departments the world over. I wonder what song will be drained next. Stephen Malkmus had a close call with that Sears ad. Let's not even mention Pepsi and the Rolling Stones.
It's not a play and there's no music and it's not his band to get back together.
I think Henry Rollins seriously needs to shut the fuck up. I do.
A recent post on Spin Magazine's web site is devoted to "a performance" by Rollins, Janeane Garofolo and Marc Maron called "It's Not a Play and There's No Music."
Which I guess means it's a glorified stand-up routine.
"We kept the show out of the comedy club world so none of us would have the obligation to be funny -- although, I think that will occur anyway."
Henry! You've done this before! Remember, it was called a "spoken word" performance? Spoken word. I wish they would have been "thought word" performances so dumbasses all over the country could have paid $20 apiece to see Rollins' hulking, stupid ass stand on stage and think.
Anyway. That's not what this is about. Whoever wrote the article about the "punk icon" (seriously) added this sentence at the end:
Talk: Will Rollins ever reunite Black Flag?
Snob Parade thrashes about madly, knocking things over and farting curse words
Ahem. Excuse me.
DUMBASS SPIN WRITERS!
That's like asking if Pete Rose is ever going to get the Reds back together. Well maybe not quite. But Rollins - who was Black Flag's like third or fourth singer - himself said more than once, in rare instances of not being a bloated and self-satisfied idiot, that Black Flag was Greg Ginn's band to do what he wanted with.
It also ignores the 2003 reunion shows Black Flag played. With Dez Cadena on vocals.
A recent post on Spin Magazine's web site is devoted to "a performance" by Rollins, Janeane Garofolo and Marc Maron called "It's Not a Play and There's No Music."
Which I guess means it's a glorified stand-up routine.
"We kept the show out of the comedy club world so none of us would have the obligation to be funny -- although, I think that will occur anyway."
Henry! You've done this before! Remember, it was called a "spoken word" performance? Spoken word. I wish they would have been "thought word" performances so dumbasses all over the country could have paid $20 apiece to see Rollins' hulking, stupid ass stand on stage and think.
Anyway. That's not what this is about. Whoever wrote the article about the "punk icon" (seriously) added this sentence at the end:
Talk: Will Rollins ever reunite Black Flag?
Snob Parade thrashes about madly, knocking things over and farting curse words
Ahem. Excuse me.
DUMBASS SPIN WRITERS!
That's like asking if Pete Rose is ever going to get the Reds back together. Well maybe not quite. But Rollins - who was Black Flag's like third or fourth singer - himself said more than once, in rare instances of not being a bloated and self-satisfied idiot, that Black Flag was Greg Ginn's band to do what he wanted with.
It also ignores the 2003 reunion shows Black Flag played. With Dez Cadena on vocals.
Head Start
This here post serves no other purpose than being the first, anxious bit of writing at Something Vexes. Soon there will be much more to read; provocative mess that writes itself.
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