The VMA’s: A State of the Music Union Address

If video killed the radio star, as the iconic song indicates, then the VMA’s killed music as we know it.

While MTV’s relevance and credibility dies a little every time they show an episode of “Room Raiders”, the channel’s impact and social reach is ever growing. This was on full display Sunday night as the network presented their yearly Video Music Awards, an event that used to bring out the biggest names in the industry. I would reason that in the heyday of the show (roughly the mid-90s), winning a VMA was a bigger deal than winning a Grammy from a social viewpoint. However, Sunday’s display is a perfect example of how MTV has ruined music for an entire generation.

Admittedly I didn’t watch the show Sunday, but a quick search on Google and the constant Twitter updates told me all that I need to know. Besides the fact that someone named Russell Brand hosted the show (who?), it seems that MTV somehow lumped all of five or six music videos into multiple categories and drew straws to decide who won. Let us review:

A check of the award winners shows that Lady GaGa won Best New Artist, a category presumably created to showcase the best and brightest upcoming stars. I don’t even know where to begin with her. There is nothing interesting, original, entertaining or unique about Lady GaGa. Her songs are forgettable, and the fact that she relies so heavily on her “crazy” personality and fashion sense make it obvious that she is attempting to hide her lack of talent. Others in this category included equally forgettable acts like 3OH!3 (though that album is catchy at times, it is incredibly gimmicky and will wear off soon) and Asher Roth, who I’m fairly certain has never spent time at an actual institution of higher learning. This list of nominees would indicate that all new music is boring and sounds the same. Luckily, there are acts like Santogold, MGMT, Vampire Weekend, and Fleet Foxes changing the game a bit since hitting the big time within the last year. However, I would never expect the people at MTV to know who these artists are.

The best hip-hop video category is an even bigger joke, falling back on the same old boring artists who have nothing relevant to say, except for maybe Jay-Z, though Kanye West is way too involved in Hova’s new album for me to enjoy it. And while we are on the topic of West, why are people shocked when he does ridiculous things? Much like Lady GaGa, West has to rely on his crazy sunglasses and pompous attitude to generate attention because his music is severely lacking. Many of the comments from Twitter and Facebook mentioned something about West not being a good artist anymore. When was Kanye West ever good? His lyrics have never been meaningful (though he tries to slip in random lines about current events to make it seem as though he is full of witty and biting social commentary…nice try, but no). Not only is his style choppy and unlistenable, but has proven on more than one occasion that he can’t sing (as evidenced by his song “Love Lockdown”, which somehow managed a nomination in this category). The real problem here, however, is that talking about this incident and making it front page news only motivates West to keep doing things like this. Stop talking about him and go buy a Del tha Funkee Homosapien album to hear what hip-hop should sound like.

Lastly, and the thing that bothers me the most about MTV as a whole, is that they still try to appear hip and on the cutting edge, as evidenced by the Breakthrough Video category. I am a fan of many of the artists that were up for this award, including favorites like Passion Pit, Cold War Kids, Bat For Lashes, and the always amazing Death Cab For Cutie. The problem is that MTV has never played these videos, and if they had, the majority of viewers would never see them. A check of the 24-hour program schedule for MTV shows that the channel devotes only two hours a day to showing videos – at 3 a.m. This category is nothing more than a weak attempt to seem trendy, and it fails miserably. These artists gain nothing from this subtle MTV mention because, in all honesty, the average MTV viewer cannot appreciate why these artists are groundbreaking. Because these artists are doing new things and staying away from the trappings of pop music, they don’t have mass appeal to a culture that places Beyonce on the highest pedestal. I wouldn’t be surprised if the powers-that-be at MTV had some poor intern scour Pitchfork and Sound of the City to find out what the cool kids are listening to so that they could fill this joke of a category.

So what does all this mean? I see this as a defining moment in terms of music’s role in society. Gone are the days that people purchased albums. The single-minded, ringtone culture that has grown over the past five years has killed our ability to decide whether or not a particular artist is actually, you know, good. Instead, pop music has turned into a game of copy-cat, with each new artist rehashing a popular song and tricking the listeners into thinking that what they are hearing is new and exciting. And, even worse, outlets like MTV have figured out a way to take this simplified music and market it to a generation of listeners who never got to experience a record store or a concert where the musicians played music instead of relying on fireworks and pageantry to entertain.

However, there is hope. There are so many great bands going right now, and a lot of classic artists that have been lost in the shuffle. My original intention for this blog was to reflect on why I love music so much, and I have been slacking when it comes to doing that. However, my new goal is to get the word out that there is much more out there than what you hear on the radio, and that it is truly a disservice to ignore it. I hope you will allow me to share this with you, and I also encourage you fine readers to let me know of great artists that you feel are doing something outside of the norm. I plan on updating every day, so please, check back.

And now, to get the bad taste out of our mouths, a reminder of what good music sounds like from The Boss:

Note: Hiatus

I want to apologize for the lack of updates. With working for The Post and taking classes, things have been a bit hectic the last few weeks.

The good news, though, is that I’ve had a lot of time to come up with ideas over the last few weeks, and I intend to update every day from here on out. Expect daily updates to start tomorrow.

Until then, I had the pleasure of attending a friend’s wedding over the weekend in Cleveland. The groom, hailing from England and currently living in Liverpool, had a lot of family and friends make the trip over. Needless to say, it was a very Beatles-heavy reception, down to the photo of the groom and his groomsmen recreating the Abbey Road album cover. I also got to witness real live Brits dance to “Twist and Shout”, something that resembled this:

Thanks for reading, everyone. More to come…

Note: Jamboree Week

After a year of waiting, the week that many of my friends and neighbors have been looking forward to is finally here: Jamboree in the Hills.

As a kid, I couldn’t wait until I was old enough to attend the four day “Super Bowl of Country Music”. Every year, I would watch and listen from home as some of my favorite musicians performed in front of that huge crowd just a few minutes from my hometown. I had grown up listening to country music, and at the time didn’t know other types of music existed. I could never have imagined liking anything else.

However,as my tastes changed, so did country music, and that is what I am hoping to explore on the blog this week. In the span of less than 20 years, country music has gone from an instantly recognizable genre of music,full of rootsy lyrics and themes and steel guitars to a mere shell of its former self. The focus has been taken off of the songwriting and traditional, down home approach to musicianship and has become more about the spectacle of entertaining and combining as many different genres as possible to become more marketable. Later this week, I will take a look at why I think this has changed, and what it means for the genre in the future.

Until then, I hope to relive some memories with some of the songs from my childhood. These are songs that, even after years of not hearing, I know every word to and still feel are some of the best written songs I have heard. I also hope to share some songs from current artists that are trying their best to keep the tradition of country music alive. And finally, I will look at how country music in the most traditional sense is showing up more and more lately, and in the oddest of places.

But for now, please excuse the creepy intro to this video and enjoy the superb songwriting, killer harmonies and genuine energy of Alabama.

Playback: John Mayer’s Continuum

Often times, the experience of listening to an album for the first time can dictate how you feel about it.  In the time of records, and even still with CDs, part of the thrill was putting an album on for that first time while going through the album artwork and liner notes in a painstaking manner, searching for clues or hints as to what the lyrics could mean.  My experience with John Mayer’s Continuum is similar, though perhaps a bit adapted for the digital age.

John Mayer, Pittsburgh, PA, August 2008 (Photo Credit: J.W. Johnson Jr.)

In the fall of 2006, change was all around me.  For the first time, I was living in my own apartment and was in charge of doing everything for myself for the first time.  Though I had been at college for a year at this point, the idea of having nobody to answer to was new and exciting.  At the same time, however, I was in an incredibly complicated relationship that deep down I knew wasn’t going anywhere; still yet, I forced the issue out of fear of loneliness.  This was a new stage in my life, and I wasn’t sure how to go at it alone.

The day before the album hit stores, I remember a particularly angry phone exchange regarding said relationship, ending with the uncertainty of whether or not there would even be a relationship to worry about the next morning.  I suppressed my confused feelings with the promise that at midnight, I would be able to sit and listen to Continuum in peace.  As the clock struck midnight, I frantically refreshed my iTunes, hoping that the next mouse click would give me my fix.

I should clarify that until this point, though I was a pretty big Mayer fan, I had very low expectations for the album.  His previous albums, though great, took some time to get used to, to dissect and search for meaning, and the only new song that I had heard was “Waiting on the World To Change”, which seemed to be just another basic Mayer song.  This time, however, I was set on sitting with the album until I figured it all out, no matter how long it took.

As I sat in my bedroom, illuminated only by the string of Christmas lights that adorned the walls (I thought that’s what you did in college), I began to listen to the album that would come to define the next few months of my life.  From start to finish, Continuum is the perfect explanation of love gone wrong.  Songs like “I Don’t Trust Myself (With Loving You)” perfectly summed up the hesitation one gets when in new relationship and the idea of letting go of one’s inhibitions, while the slow jam blues of “Gravity” shows the pain of needing someone you know isn’t right for you.  Other songs, like “The Heart of Life” crushed me in a way that was both sad and uplifting, with its talk of a “silver lining” and the fear of being in an unfamiliar situation.

The rest of the disc’s tracks seemed to speak to me and my situation in a way that only a few albums had before.  There would be no repeated listens necessary to find the meaning in this one; as the album played on, I needed no liner notes to tell me what the lyrics meant.  Everything I needed to know about this album I already knew.  Mayer had defined, to perfection, what it was like to be scared and vulnerable and unsure of yourself.  He even summed up my feelings about things I hadn’t thought much about before, like my parents and getting older (“Stop This Train”) and the necessary evils of war, both literally and as a metaphor for relationships (“Belief”).  The song that hit me hardest, however, was “Slow Dancing In A Burning Room”, which described the failure of a relationship between two people who were not right for each other and their realization that no matter what they do, their relationship is essentially over already.  I didn’t know it at the time, but this song would come to define the next few months of my life as my relationship disintegrated and I began to question whether it was worth the effort I was putting in.

I listened to Continuum on repeat for the next four hours, and then for the next three months.  Something about how painfully beautiful it was, both lyrically and sonically wouldn’t let me press the stop button.  And, as dark as the content may have been, there was some hope mixed in.  After the end of the messy relationship, songs like Mayer’s cover of the Jimi Hendrix classic “Bold As Love” gave me reassurance that it wasn’t the end of the world, or that “my yellow, in this case, was not so mellow”, if you will.  Nothing was as bad as it originally seemed, and this album made me realize that.  I came to understand that the past few months was something that everyone goes through, which is how Mayer described “my” situation so well.  I was “In Repair”, and it was going to be alright.

Listening to this album now reminds me that good songwriting is something that not just anybody can do.  Though the content is relatable to just about everyone, we often cannot come up with a way to describe our feelings.  I knew in my gut the way that I really felt, but it would have been impossible for me to spell it out in the way that Mayer did.  Thanks to this album, I’ll always have a way to remember that particular part of my life forever, for better or worse.

Video Break: John Mayer – ‘My Sweet Lord’

Sorry for the lack of updates this weekend. It was a holiday, after all, and I didn’t have much time to devote to writing. I did, however, spend a ton of time in the car listening to music, and I’ve come up with some great ideas for features that I hope to start posting soon. Also, later on this evening I’ll have a new Playback for you to consume.

To wet your appetite, and perhaps give you a hint on what to expect, today’s video break is a great cover of the George Harrison classic “My Sweet Lord” by John Mayer. It is a mark of great song that it sounds so good no matter who is playing it, and this is a prime example. Harrison’s songwriting often gets lost in the Lennon-McCartney shuffle, but it was as solid as anything those gentlemen were doing at the time. Couple that with the fact that Mayer and his band are incredible, and you’ve got the recipe for a perfect performance. Enjoy your day, everyone.

Video Break: Ryan Adams

So I know that I said I wouldn’t update every day, but I felt compelled.

Ryan Adams may be one of the best songwriters going today, and I say that with no caution whatsoever.  He consistently turns out songs that are equal parts haunting, melodic and personal.  Not only does he turn out quality work on a consistent basis, but he released three full length albums in 2005, and the equivalent of 11 more on his Web site in 2006.

It is a shame that Adams isn’t considered in talks of other great American songwriters alongside Dylan and Springsteen.  This particular video, featuring a cut from the 2000 classic Heartbreaker, shows exactly why Adams has been so successful in moving the alternative-county genre forward.  I can promise that this will not be the last time I write about Adams, so if you plan to read this blog on a regular basis, you should start getting familiar with his work.

–J.W.

Playback: Longwave – “Tidal Wave”

The Fab Four, December 2007

I am always amazed that while I often have a hard time remembering when to use “its” or “it’s”, I can still remember the first time I heard a certain song.  This is a prime example of this phenomenon.

Everyone seems to have that one summer that they always remember.  It is hard to top that summer, and usually we tend to forget about all of the bad things that may have happened and exaggerate the good things.

However, I can say without exaggeration that 2002 was the best summer of my life.  Other than football practice, I had to obligations or commitments.  My evenings were spent driving around Wheeling with Dominic, Ben, Adam, B.C. and whoever else decided to tag along.  At the time, we thought we were being cool, cruising the strip with the top of Dom’s Jeep down (in retrospect, we were, in fact, not cool at all).   Typically, we would cruise around looking for something to do, and when that inevitably failed, we would head to the Wheeling Coffee Shop where we proceeded to act cooler than we were while attempting to drinking multiple cups of sub par coffee (I didn’t develop a love for coffee until many years later, though I tried my damndest to drink it as much as possible because I though that’s what the cool kids were doing).

I had some of the most eye opening conversations in my life that summer.  I learned more about the group of guys that would become my best friends than I could have ever imagined.  We all had big goals in life and plans to get out of “the Valley”.  Coincidentally, this was the summer that I realized that we were much different than the majority of the people our age.  It seemed that all that these people ever wanted to talk about was girls and getting drunk, which seemed a bit odd to me.  It also seemed that whenever someone found out that I spent my evenings with a bunch of guys drinking coffee and listening to music like this I was immediately heckled for not being “man” enough (whatever that means).

I didn’t care though; I looked forward to these lazy summer evenings more than anything else at the time.  I wasn’t concerned with meeting girls or boozing in a field somewhere.  The feeling of the wind rushing past my head and the smell of fresh cut grass as we drove circles around Wheeling was exactly what I wanted.

Which brings me (finally) to this song.  I remember Dom telling me that had a new band that I needed to hear, and that he would pick me up in an hour.  At this point in my life, I was in my punk rock phase, and I was fairly certain that this new band wouldn’t quench for thirst for something fast and loud.  However, as we drove around, sun setting, music blaring, I was mesmerized.  Even though the quality was terrible (this was long before any of us knew what “fidelity” was), I was instantly hooked.  Longwave was the perfect blend of garage rock and melody, a refreshing sound that I wasn’t expecting.  I was floored at the new discovery, and didn’t think it could get any better.

As the summer began to wind down and we all prepared to return to “real life”, it seemed that every deep conversation and poignant moment of those final days was set to “Tidal Wave” playing in the background.  Though on the surface the lyrics are simple – a guy expressing his feelings for a girl – they embodied much more to us.  The tidal wave meant responsibility and growing up, facing real life, and making decisions that would impact the rest of our lives.  It stood for a time that we were all together, and, most importantly, happy – “all the little things that once could make me whole”.  We longed to “feel it again”.

Seven years later, a funny thing will occasionally happen.  Inevitably, I will be sitting at my computer, unable to sleep because I have something on my mind.  As if iTunes senses that I need to talk, this song will come up on the shuffle, and remind me that though my best friends are living in places from Boston to L.A., they are always a phone call away.  I never mention it to them, but having a conversation with them about the most pointless of things, along with this song, helps me forget about being an adult for a while.  For those three minutes, I’m a nerdy high school kid, having the time of his life with his best friends, and I don’t have a care in the world.

–J.W.

Press Play

As of today, there are 13, 651 songs in my iTunes. That breaks down to 1,200 albums. I could press play and not hear the same song again for almost 38 days. You get the point.

I have spent the majority of my life immersing myself in music. I grew up in a musical household, surrounded by people who took playing and listening to music very seriously (for example, my grandmother and her sisters all played the guitar, and not just a few chords here and there – they could put some of today’s popular bands to shame).

I’ve listened to everything in my 23 years: from an early age, it was bluegrass and country; I then did a complete 180 and began listening to rap (I bought into the whole Kris Kross thing); that turned into a love of all things pop-punk, which leads me today, where my tastes embody just about all of these genres.

With some exceptions, I haven’t heard a song I didn’t like, and in many cases, certain songs have changed my life or will stick with me forever. That’s what this blog is about: exploring these songs and albums in an attempt to gain some perspective on what I find appealing about them while trying to understand a little about myself in the process.

If you are still with me at this point, I promise this won’t be boring. My intention is to update this blog at least three times a week with each particular day falling into a specific topic (it is much easier to follow than it sounds, I promise). Every Monday, I will explore a song or album that has a specific memory attached to it. This will be more of a creative non-fiction portion of the blog, but I hope that it will be interesting and give you some insight into why I like the music I do.

Wednesdays will be reserved for my take on new artists (or artists that are new to me) and my thoughts on them. This, hopefully, will keep my journalism skills sharp.

Which leads us to Thursday, where I hope to take a popular song that may not necessarily be my cup of tea and try to figure out what the mass appeal is (anything by T-Pain immediately comes to mind). And, of course, I may update from time to time if I see or hear something that I think is really interesting.

I hope that you enjoy what is to come, and if you feel compelled, please leave me a comment or two. It can be about anything really: why you hate a song, why you agree with me, what songs or albums I should consider next (this is a big one…I’m always looking for new music).

Thanks for visiting.

–J.W.