Did anyone notice the radio station Rooster 106 suddenly switched to Hip Hop format? I never listened to the Rooster very much. Seems like it was caught between the classic rock of 105.9 the Rock and the harder alternative rock of 102.9 the Buzz. Never really found its niche. One thing we don’t need around here is more hip hop music. This one genre of music is killing good music. Oh well, back to setting 107 The River in place of the Rooster on my car radio. The River does a great job of annoying me. Occasionally it will play a good song, and then ruin my listening experience by playing a boy band song right after the good song. Ugh.
No, I didn’t go to Baskin Robbins last night for my free ice cream scoop. I figured there would be a long line and I didn’t feel like driving all the way out to Donelson for 2 bucks of ice cream. Maybe next time.

Layne Staley, lead singer of Alice in Chains band is dead.….actually to be more specific, a body was found in Staley’s home, and they can’t confirm if it is Staley himself. This story hasn’t exactly hit the mainstream media yet. Somehow I doubt that MTVers know what Alice in Chains is.
Alice in Chains had some good music. I especially liked “No Excuses” and “I Stay Away.” It’s a definite loss for good music. It might not generate as much media attention compared to if they found some boy band member dead.
Let me make some predictions. Within a few days, perhaps today, MTV will begin playing “Alice in Chains Unplugged.” VH1 will roll out “Behind the Music: Alice in Chains,” if they haven’t already made it. Sony Music will roll out a bonus album of rarities and live performances of Alice in Chains. They’re already got a Greatest Hits album out now, so it would be a little redundant to roll out something similar.
Ignorant news commentators will make the inevitable comparisons to Kurt Cobain and grunge music in general. Kurt and Layne were 2 different people. I’m not sure the comparison is justified.
In other music news….
Gene Simmons wants to Help Sharon and Arafat make Peace….how completely strange. Whenever they’ve interviewed Gene Simmons, he’s always talked about KISS so intellectually as if there was some type of substance to their music. KISS didn’t have any deep meaningful lyrics. Come on….”I Want to Rock and Roll all Nite and Party Every Day” …. “Lick it Up” …..these are hardly anything earth shattering. Let’s tell it like it is. KISS was a glam rock band with great merchandising skills….nothing more, nothing less. I have a hard time taking a band seriously when they dress up in outrageous costumes and paint their faces.
On a side note, when I was in elementary school I thought KISS stood for Knights In Satan’s Service. That being the case, I found it a bit shocking when I saw another kid wearing a KISS shirt to school. The kid wasn’t worshipping satan; he was just had no fashion sense.
Currently listening to Moby’s “We are All Made of Stars.” I’m not a big Moby fan, but I like some of his music, but definitely not his politics. From looking at his website, moby.com, it’s pretty clear that he’s one of those silly vegetarians. Unless one lives in India, all vegetarians are hypocrites. I can guarantee that somewhere located deep dark inside of all vegetarian’s home is a product made from animals. Whether its their leather watch band, or their leather shoes, its there.

Sometimes I think the music world has run out of ideas. For example, Mary J. Blige’s latest song “No More Drama” is a blatant rip off of “The Young and the Restless” soap opera theme. Puff Daddy/P. Diddy is notorious for ripping off songs like Sting’s “Every Breath You Take” and Led Zepplin’s “Kashmir.” Doesn’t anyone have any unique ideas anymore? I would certainly hope this rip off artists are paying the original composers sufficient royalties for making money off their songs. I don’t think I mind a short sample such as EMF’s sampling of Andrew Dice Clay in “Unbelievable” or the short sample of the Jackson 5’s “ABC” on the song “OPP.” Such small samples can actually enhance the songs. But when the entire song is the same tune as the original, just different lyrics, it provides no new enhancements to the original song.
Speaking of music, I stopped by the Lebanon Outlet mall. I didn’t find anything I wanted…..except at a music store. Ironically the only thing that I’d wanted to buy, I can’t buy. It’s a bunch of Better Than Ezra promotional posters. The music store clerk said that he’d call me about the posters once they were going to take it down, but I’m not going to hold my breath waiting for his call.

One Hit Wonders: Those bands and musicians that only had one hit to their name. I’ve run across several bands that broke into the mainstream with their one hit, then faded into obscurity. I’ve made a list of the best One Hit Wonders:

• Blind Melon – “No Rain”….such a good band, it’s a shame their lead singer had a fatal overdose.
• Blur – “Song 2” ….otherwise known as the Wooohooo song as seen on Pentium Commericals. Blur has a large following in the UK, but I can’t name a 2nd song of theirs.
• Spacehog – “In the Meantime”….nice guitar song.
• Breeders – “Cannonball”….nice guitar bass.
• Son Volt – “Drown”….the best band you’ve never heard of.
• Len – “Steal My Sunshine”…this song was on the radio very breifly during the summer of ’99
• Nixons – “Sister”…great sounding song. I wish they’d get played on the radio more.
• Mr. Big – “To Be With You”…I thought the lead singer was a girl when I heard this song.
• EMF – “Unbelieveable”…this was a huge hit in 1991.
• Jesus Jones – “Right Here, Right Now.” They always play this song over images of the Berlin Wall falling down.
• Radiohead – “Creep.” Another band with a huge following in the UK. They’ve even got some rabid fans here. However you’ll never hear anything other than Creep on the radio.

Speaking of music, ever wonder why lame bands like No Doubt, Sugar Ray, and Smash Mouth put out multiple sorry sounding albums while outstanding bands like Wallflowers and Better Than Ezra have only put out a limited amount of albums over a long period?

I watched a show last night on MTV called “All Access.” This particular episode was a behind the scenes look at Limp Bizkit’s tour. During the episode they showed kids waiting outside the ticket counter for days (literally) in order to be first in line to buy Limp Bizkit concert tickets. I had seen the episode before, but now more than ever this seems so sad. Limp Bizkit is probably five years away from VH1’s Where Are they Now? segment. I have to wonder if these rapid fans are as fanatic about Bizkit now. Personally I think they are just showing this episode again because Bizkit has a new CD out of lame remixes.
Anyways the part of the episode that I really got to me was the part they showed right before the concert. Before going on stage the Limp Bizkit members got into a big circle while Fred Durst lead a prayer. In the prayer he asked God for a good show. The next scenes show Fred onstage spouting his filthy lyrics. Every other word had to be bleeped out. It’s a bit hypocritical for Fred to lead a prayer offstage, and then go on stage having a potty mouth. Fred, either love God and keep his commandments or don’t. Don’t try to live 2 lives. MTV is trying to show that it is ok to have religion in ones life when it is convenient…while at the same time is it ok to spout filthy lyrics in one’s songs. The whole situation is absurd.

George Harrison is dead. At this point I have to ask myself if the Beatles were all that great? Or does their music serve as easy fodder for VH1 addicts? Having been born a few years after the Beatles broke up, I never experienced Beatlemania. I don’t remember Lennon being shot and I never thought their retrospective album, “The Beatles Anthology” was all that great. Apart from “Let It Be” and possibly “Revolution” I don’t recall any of the Beatle songs being groundshaking musically or socially. Looking back, the Beatles’ spiritual trip to India could easily be seen as some type of publicity stunt to show their political correctness.
The Beatles were a pop band. “Twist and Shout” and “She Loves You, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah” could just have easily been put out by N’Sync as it would be by the Beatles. As far as I’m concerned, I liked the Rolling Stones better.
You can bet that the networks will cash in on Harrison’s death by showing the Beatles Anthology again.

Garth is on Hollywood Squares this week. Everyone knows that when a star reaches Hollywood Squares, then their career is washed up and they can pretty much count on a VH1 “Where Are They Now?” segment. (I mean when was the last time you saw Whoopie Goldberg in a recent movie besides a Sister Act sequel ?). Garth is arrogant. His massive ego gets in the way of everything. Remember when he tried to play ball with the Padres? Come on, Garth. No one really thinks you can play ball. They’re just trying to be nice to you’re supposedly a big star. His supposed retirements from the music business are only publicity stunts to sell more concert tickets. Remember the Chris Gaines fiasico? No one understood it. Alternate identities worked for David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust. It failed miserably for Garth. How about the time Garth had some executives at Capitol fired because his album didn’t sell as much as he desired?
I first began to dislike Garth when he threatened to pull his album from stores that sold used CDs. He called the practice of selling used CDs “evil.” As far as I’m concerned the owner of a CD can do what he/she wants to do with a CD.
I live in Nashville. Anytime Garth sneezes it make headline news around here. Note to the Nashville papers: no one cares about Garth anymore.

It’s been a while since my last update. I’ve placed my review of the Better Than Ezra concert on my music section. Plenty of pictures are there too.
The concerts at Big Spring Jam were great. I do remember alot being said at the contemporary Christian stage. Alot of the performers were saying “We’re here to worship God.” I would tend to disagree. Anytime I have to pay to get into a venue, I’m not worshipping. Just my opinion…. Not having been to alot of contemporary Christian concerts, I see that there are different point of views as to what worship exactly is….
I’ve been working from home for about a week now. Everything seems to be working out fine. Having a cable internet connection at home makes working alot easier.
This weekend I’ll be at a hayride in Kentucky.