A brief review of AC/DC's new album

Which, if memory serves, was called one of the following two things:

Highway to High Rock Voltage and Roll Hell (All Night Long) (We Salute You) (If You Wanna Rock 'n' Roll)

or

Milking the Money Cow, Volume XVI

I honestly can't remember.

AC/DC: a premature obituary

And here we are. A post I didn't really think about but kind of knew I was going to have to write since April, when the news first broke that Malcolm Young, AC/DC co-founder, songwriter and rhythm guitarist, was either "taking a break" or leaving the band, due to ill health.

Now it's pretty clear. Malcolm Young, age 61, is too ill ever to tour again and has retired from the band. He won't be on the album due out in November - so I was wrong about that - nor will he be touring with them next year.

It's Wikipedia official, people.

This is, effectively, the end of the band. Malcolm Young will be replaced both in studio and on tour by his nephew Stevie Young, 57 (Angus and Malcolm are the babies of their generation), who previously filled in for Malcolm on a 1988-89 tour while Malcolm was in rehab. Malcolm's brother Angus, the flamboyant lead guitarist, may be the face of the band and Brian Johnson may be the singer, but ask any AC/DC fan and they'll tell you that Malcolm Young is very much the power behind the throne.

So I'm sure some people will say this is premature - there's an album and a tour coming up - but I'm going to go ahead and write the band's obituary now. And also laugh at the word "premature" being applied to anything related to this band, whose lead guitarist to this day wears a schoolboy uniform on stage.

And the award for Most Misleading Headline In A Non-Political Context goes to these guys.

"Taking a break" is not the same as "leaving."

"Leaving the band" suggests he's gone for good. I refuse to contemplate AC/DC continuing on without Malcolm Young. While Angus Young and Brian Johnson are far more public - the faces of the band, if you will - it's Malcolm's band. 

Hell, even Thin Lizzy decided to change its name to Black Star Riders when they decided to do a new album decades after Phil Lynott's death.

AC/DC rumor update (updated)

Update:
From the group's facebook page:

After forty years of life dedicated to AC/DC, guitarist and founding member Malcolm Young is taking a break from the band due to ill health. Malcolm would like to thank the group’s diehard legions of fans worldwide for their never-ending love and support.
In light of this news, AC/DC asks that Malcolm and his family’s privacy be respected during this time. The band will continue to make music.

Uh, okay, so this is more ambiguous but still positive.  "Taking a break" suggests a hiatus, and "will continue to make music" suggests a return.  

At this point I will be a bit upset at the band's PR person if they turn around and tell us later that, yeah, it's over.  While I don't expect them to make such a decision hastily, I can't imagine they don't have a prognosis by now.

The way this release is worded, I doubt we'll actually see (hear) someone else play rhythm guitar on a forthcoming album... I could see a situation where the rest of the band goes into the studio and does their thing, with Angus laying down temporary rhythm tracks, and Malcolm coming in if/when he recovers. 

Also, a reminder that Malcolm skipped the 1988 tour in support of Blow Up Your Video. (He was temporarily replaced by his nephew.)  I'd be kind of surprised if they did an anniversary tour without him, but at the same time I wouldn't rule it out; in fact, because I can't imagine someone else doing the rhythm tracks on a studio album, I have to imagine that this scenario is what the release is hinting at.

Original:
Frontman Brian Johnson: reports of our demise are greatly exaggerated.

He also confirmed that one member of the band has been having health problems, but not severe enough to preclude any possibility of a future album.

So there's that.

While I have the utmost sympathy, I can't understand why a) they let the rumor run for at least a full day, b) why they're feeding speculation rather than just coming out and saying what's up. I get that they want some privacy, but I doubt that's actually going to happen.

And now a word on the AC/DC rumor

I KNOW NOTHING (Jon Snow), so don't presume this is going to change anything.

Basically there are two parts to the rumor.

1. AC/DC are retiring, because
2. One member (probably rhythm guitarist Malcolm Young) is very (maybe terminally) ill

Now, #2 is more serious than #1, so I certainly hope that's not true. If it is, then my prayers are with him and his family. Discussion of #1 below the fold.

Weekend song for those who need to get pumped

Happy Hunger Games Finals Week everyone

This is probably my favorite AC/DC song in terms of the way it's composed. Almost the entire song is in B except for the solo that starts at about 2:47. But the transition from B to A for the solo is so subtle you're likely to miss it. You don't miss the transition from A to B at the end of the solo (3:18), though, so it feels like suddenly the singer is singing in a higher key than he was before.

Also, the chords in the outro are blatantly ripped off from Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb."

From the "in the Armageddon-esque event that I have children..." file

Prompted by this article.

"It’s time to take away our children’s TVs, iPhones, iPads and all the other shit they shouldn’t have and force them to listen to music prior to 1999."

Never mind for a moment the fact that I'm 25 and don't own a smartphone - that's a lifestyle choice on my part that I've never regretted. My kids aren't getting a cell phone until they're in high school, and they're not getting a tablet or a smartphone from me, period.

And they're never getting an iTunes gift card, although that has more to do with the fact that after I moved all my music onto a new computer, the three songs* I bought off iTunes randomly crap out halfway through them. F*cking DRM.

No, kids, when it comes to music, you're getting the entire Beatles catalogue (minus Let It Be),** the entire Zeppelin catalogue,*** everything AC/DC did between and including Let There Be Rock and Back in Black, Thin Lizzy from Fighting to Renegade, Pink Floyd from Meddle to The Wall, and, oh hell yes, Iron Maiden from The Number of the Beast through Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, and Brave New World to boot.

You are welcome.

*"Big Gun" by AC/DC, "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" by the Charlie Daniels Band, and "When You're Evil" by Voltaire.  Yes, really.

**And I'll attach a note to The White Album that says "you can only do something this mindlessly self-indulgent when you've already given the world 'A Day in the Life'"

***Because as weak as the rest of Presence is, "Achilles Last Stand" is f*cking epic.

And the word that Blogger can't recognize today: catalogue. Not making this up.

F$#% the Grammys

Various Songs for Various Occasions

thiContinuing yesterday's theme...

Easter: "The Holy War," by Thin Lizzy. Yes, despite the fact that it's essentially the template for every Iron Maiden chord progression ever, it's all about Christ's temptation in the desert.

Christmas: "Thank God it's Christmas," Queen.

For the start of summer vacation (through high school): "Jailbreak" by AC/DC. Because you're free!

For the start of summer vacation (college, graduate school): "The Boys are Back in Town," Thin Lizzy. Because you and your high school buddies are back in town, duh.

Right before finals week: "For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)" by AC/DC. If you think you stand a fighting chance in Hell. Otherwise, go out in style with "Highway to Hell." And if you ace an exam you thought you'd fail, "Back in Black."

Graduation: "We Are the Champions," Queen.

The day after your first date: "I've Just Seen a Face," by the Beatles. This one's fairly obscure, I'll admit (I know, I know, a Beatles song that's obscure is some sort of oxymoron), but "she's just the girl for me, and I want all the world to see we've met" pretty much sums up what any guy is thinking after a (successful) first date.

At other people's funerals: "Wish You Were Here," Pink Floyd. Heck, that entire album.

Your first day at a full-time job that you expect to turn into a career: "Dogs," Pink Floyd. "And after a while, you can work on points for style, like the club tie and the firm handshake, a sudden look in the eye and an easy smile." Yeah, you end up "another sad old man, all alone and dying of cancer," but who doesn't?

At your wedding: "Something," the Beatles, and a whole host of others (see the previous post).

During your midlife crisis: "Time," Pink Floyd. "The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older, shorter of breath and one day closer to death." I just realized that the second verse has absolutely no rhyming scheme whatsoever. (No, not even breath/death, because if that were the case, "around" would have to rhyme with "again" earlier in the verse.)

At your funeral: "High Hopes," Pink Floyd. "Hells Bells" for irony.

"It'll Do Because It's Doctor Who:" The Danger of Branding

There's a theory, one that's admittedly hard to disprove, that says you can draw conclusions about branding. For example, cult shows had better not try to swim on FOX.

...well that's not the point I was trying to make. Fortunately, that theory can be disproved by such notable shows as...

...dammit.

Well, anyway:

People think something is worth their time and money because they know that that something is good. Is it a CD with the words AC/DC on it? No? Okay, AC(lightning-slash)DC? Okay, there we go. Yeah, that CD is probably full of overdriven guitars playing three chords while the singer praises rock and roll. Or women. Well, "praise" might not be the right word, but you get the point.

That film starts with the words "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away?" I guarantee you that at some point someone will whip out a glowing laser-sword. Also someone will say "I have a bad feeling about this."

A television show that starts with a syncopated bass line and a "oo-ee-oo" theme tune? Well, it's probably about a man with 13 lives gallivanting around space and time, probably with a young woman along to get captured and tied up every twenty minutes. If the credits don't include a phone box tumbling through a vortex, chances are the effects are going to be pretty shoddy, too.

Well, yes, nobody can disagree with me on these points, because everything I've said thus far is objective. I didn't say "AC/DC is the greatest band evar!!!" and I didn't say "Star Wars is stupid, overrated, and only for the drooling morons who want space adventures but can't get past Doctor Who's bad effects." (No, of course not. Star Wars is stupid, overrated, and only for the drooling morons who want space adventures but can't get past Star Trek's bad effects, while Nu Who is stupid, overrated, and only for the drooling morons who want space adventures but can't get past Classic Who's bad effects.)

That stuff in parentheses was a joke. But here's the thing! People think that. They may or may not have a good reason to think that. Certainly, nobody whose only experience with Doctor Who was, say Seasons 22-24, or whose only exposure to Star Wars is Attack of the Clones is going to think that either thing was ever very good.

Then there are the people who will stick with something that's obviously bad and defend it to the death simply because it's got the name of something they like on it. Let It Be isn't a bad album, they'll say. That's impossible! The Beatles didn't make bad albums.

There are probably people out there who will sit through repeated showings of The Godfather Part III just because it's got The Godfather in its title. I just want you to think about that. There are people like that out there.

...and they're allowed to vote.

The title of this post comes from the attitude taken towards Doctor Who by its own producer in the late 70s. People love this show. They eat it up. It's not for any specific reason; it just is. And that is precisely the point, Brigadier. That is precisely the point.

If you love something, be it a TV show or a band or a film series or a book, for the love of all that is holy cast a critical eye over it every once and again (unless this something you love is your significant other, for They Can Do No Harm). If the quality declines, say so! Don't eagerly lap it up just because it's got the same title as your favorite film, just a different roman numeral at the end!

There's a reason fanboys have a bad name, aside from the fact that they have no lives outside the object of their worship. They cannot look at something and acknowledge that it's bad. Even Doctor Who is only a partial subversion these days, because everyone "knows" that Seasons 22-24 were horrible, but still nobody wants to look that closely at the flaws of, say The Caves of Androzani! Are we honestly unable to look at our favorite things through the eyes of someone else?

Yes, as fans we are allowed to forgive certain things more easily (say, Doctor Who and the Silurians). But for the love of all that's holy, never, ever ever ever ever ever ever tell a non-fan that they just don't "get" it. Nothing will turn them off a cult thing faster than obnoxious and willfully blind fan-worship.

What Should Have Been Their Last Album

You know the zombie band. They've been making albums for 20 years and haven't been good for ten. There was one album that they should have stopped with, but for some reason they didn't. Frankly every band every falls into this category, and to prove it, I'll start with...

The Beatles - Abbey Road (1969)

What we'll miss: "Let It Be," "Get Back."

Okay this is a no-brainer. The Beatles started working on Let It Be, abandoned it, made Abbey Road, and then came back to Let It Be. They should have just, er, let it be.


Metallica - Master of Puppets (1986)

What we'll miss: "One," "Enter Sandman," that live album with the orchestra.

If Metallica's studio output was limited to their first three albums, they'd be legends today. Hell, if they'd all died in that bus crash, their place in the music pantheon would be assured, because we all know dead artists are better. (Just so we're clear on this, I don't wish anyone dead.) Instead, they slogged on, sold out, and helped saturate the 90s with crappy music. Puppets is the logical exit point for this band. They'd been progressing steadily for their first three albums, and they hit their high water-mark here.


Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here (1975)

What we'll miss: "Comfortably Numb*," "Hey You," maybe "High Hopes."

This is probably the most contentious one on the list, because The Wall is so very famous. Unfortunately, the best part about The Wall was the live act, because without it, the album is just a 2-hour whinge. Wish You Were Here is a tribute to their former bandmate and better days in general, starting off with a lyrical nod to "Remember a Day" and concluding with a musical nod to "See Emily Play," two of their early songs. What better way to ride out? *We'd actually still have "Comfortably Numb," it would just be a David Gilmour solo song with different lyrics.


AC/DC - Back in Black (1980)

What we'd miss - "For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)," "Thunderstruck."

Somewhere, surely, there's an alternate universe where this band decided to honor Bon Scott's memory by finishing the album they'd just started writing when he died, and then called it a day. This is the second-biggest-selling album of all time! You're never going to top that.


Iron Maiden - Seventh Son of a Seventh Son (1988)

What we'd miss - "Fear of the Dark."

See, they'd re-form in 2000 for Brave New World et seq. But Maiden without Adrian Smith isn't very good, and Maiden without Bruce is IMINO - Iron Maiden In Name Only.


Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffiti (1975)

What we'd miss: "Achilles Last Stand," "Nobody's Fault but Mine," "Fool in the Rain."

Do I even have to explain this one?

Why AC/DC Aren't Metal (And Furthermore Never Were)

The liner notes to Back in Black, written by some journalist, say "Heavy metal nation knows these riffs by heart." True, Metalheads everywhere were at one point eager to point to the #2 biggest selling album of all time and say "Yes, that's a metal album." Who wouldn't?

Anyway, let's take a look at some of the things that define metal:

1) Satan (or Cthulhu). Unless you think "Highway to Hell" and "Hell Ain't A Bad Place to Be" are meant to be taken literally, the Prince of Darkness is rather absent from the AC/DC canon. Oh, he's mentioned in "Hells Bells," true. But come on, "The Number of the Beast" is more satanic than "Hells Bells," and "Beast" is about a Nathaniel Hawthorne story.

2) Leather. Big no (Bon had a leather outfit in the early days, but that was gone by Let There Be Rock). Angus Young has somehow managed to look more dignified in a school suit than anybody who man wore leather pants, with the possible exception of Jim Morrison.

3) Lyrics: AC/DC have never written a song that wasn't about sex, drugs, or rock & roll except for the few that are about Bon's death. That's not to say that metal bands can't cover those topics, but those that do tend to wear leather. See entry #2 on this list.

3a) Songs about war or violence: Er, aside from "War Machine" on their latest album, I'm going with zero. "Hells Bells" is a maybe.

4) Technical perfection. Going back to Back in Black for a moment, the second-biggest-selling album of all time, listen carefully to Malcolm's guitar during the intro to "Hells Bells" and Angus flubbing the very first note of "Shoot to Thrill." No metal band (especially no metal band hinging their entire career on that album) would leave those mistakes in.

The 100 Greatest Albums of All Time

In my bored adventures of Desperately Staving Off Boredom in a Non-Homework Related Way, I stumbled across a list Time Magazine compiled 4 years ago of the... well, read the title.

And it's wrong. It's so hilariously wrong it's not even funny despite the use of the word "hilarious" just 5 words before the word "funny." Which means of course that I get to use this as a springboard for a massive, epic, and entirely too self-referential rant.

First off, this is wrong. No, I'm not saying Master of Puppets shouldn't be on there, but look at the first sentence. "Their next album would be the glossy, gazillion-selling breakthrough..." would have to read "Their next album would be a tragically undermixed, bass-less retread of everything one of their rivals did, and the next album after that would be a glossy, gazillion-selling sellout..." in order to be accurate.

Also Pink Floyd isn't on it. I'm sorry, but any list of great albums that does not contain a Pink Floyd album is simply wrong. What, did you have a quota? A set number of albums that had to go to rap "music" or crappy pop bands? I know music taste is subjective, but you put some criminally overhyped and undersold albums on there and couldn't find room for a legitimate masterpiece like The Dark Side of the Moon, which only stayed on the charts for a measly 14 years? I know rock critics must by definition have a love affair with the Beatles and Bob Dylan, and must genuflect at the altar of "Stairway to Heaven," but come on.

It's people like you that cause hype backlash against artists like the Beatles and Dylan. By overhyping them at the expense of undeniably better albums, you're not winning any friends among the classic rock snobs... and by putting stupid cookie-cutter pop albums on the list and overlooking albums like Dark Side, you're still alienating the classic rock snobs. What, not a single member of your staff was born in the late 50s? I don't understand how your interpretation of music history could go "Everything the Beatles did was holy and awesome, and then after they broke up there was a musical black hole broken up only by sporadic blips on the radar like 'Stairway to Heaven' before the Sex Pistols destroyed the concept of production quality, Michael Jackson destroyed the concept of musical sanity, and Slayer destroyed the concept of 'heavy enough.' Oh, and then Nirvana destroyed the concept of good music except they didn't." Well, of course it doesn't. You've somehow deluded yourselves into thinking that Nevermind is more important than Dark Side, but I maintain that the only reason anyone actually remembers that album today is a) because self-indulgent trendsetters like you have a skewed music taste and b) because Cobain's dead.

So you're not doing him any favors by promoting his album of whining over a legitimate masterpiece (The Wall was whining too, but at least it yielded a truly epic guitar solo). I don't care because I don't like him. I do like the Beatles, which makes your overhyping of them annoying, because you're not doing them any favors. Revolver, Rubber Soul, Sgt. Pepper, White Album, and Abbey Road? What, did each editor get to pick their favorite Beatles album? Under what definition except "legacy act" is the album that gave us "Wild Honey Pie" a better album than the one that gave us "Highway to Hell?"

Full disclosure: Highway to Hell is not on the list and that's as it should be, because the title track is really the only thing anyone remembers off that album. Nevertheless, I would be willing to bet you money that "Highway to Hell" gets more radio play each day (and is known by more guitarists) than all the songs off The White Album combined. Perhaps a better question would be why five Beatles albums made the list but only one Zeppelin album did.

Perhaps what the next "journalist" who wants to "compile" a list of the "greatest" albums of all time should limit himself to no more than one album per artist. After all, one of the most interesting things I found about that list was that The Black Album wasn't on it. That's as it should be. Metallica were perfectly represented by the far superior Master of Puppets. AC/DC got Back in Black, which does them a perfect service.

In fact, I would like to see a list of great albums, again only one per band, that deliberately excludes the stuff you always hear on the radio. Metallica would be represented by Ride the Lightning, Led Zeppelin by Presence (I cannot be the only person who absolutely loves that album), Pink Floyd by Wish You Were Here, Iron Maiden by Powerslave, and AC/DC by If You Want Blood. Some may say it's a live album and therefore cheating. I say it's still infinitely better than anything made in my lifetime.

Also, shame on you, the reader, for not noticing that in the second paragraph I said "It's so hilariously wrong" and then said I used the word "hilarious." Well done.

IG2EUS: Concept Albums

The Irreverent Guide to Everything Under the Sun has this to say on the subject of concept albums:

Concept albums are albums that are centered around a single unifying concept, be it sex, drugs, or rock and roll. The term is a unification of two words: "Concept," meaning that the songs have a common theme, and "album," meaning a collection of songs recorded by one band in one place and at one time.

The concept of concept albums has been around since the 1950s but the crossover to rock music was first attempted in 1967 by Paul McCartney of the Beatles. The attempt was, frankly, less than sucessful, but that's not to say that Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is not a freaking good album. It is. It is in fact one of the biggest-selling albums of all time, and though rock fans can be morons at time, the collective idiocy required to buy more than 30 million copies of a less-than-stellar recording would be too great for any civilization to actually survive this long. The fact of the matter is, however, that there are more songs on Back in Black that have to do with the death of Bon Scott than there are on Sgt. Pepper that have to do with the Lonely Hearts Club Band.

The other common example of the quintessential concept album is Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon, an example that is equally flawed for opposite reasons. There are in fact two concepts on this album. Side one deals with life, while side two deals with isolation and madness. Where The Dark Side of the Moon falls apart is on the "album" side of the equation, and it is therefore unique among non-rock-opera concept albums for having extended instrumental passages that are not parts of actual songs.

Pink Floyd built on this, er, concept, though, and in 1975 they unleashed Wish You Were Here, which is not only a perfect example of a concept album, but arguably also a perfect example of Pink Floyd at their finest (if you can sit through the 8-and-a-half-minute instrumental passage before the first word is sung). The album might as well have been called The Rise and Fall of Roger Keith "Syd" Barrett, because that is precisely what it is about. Unlike The Dark Side of the Moon, there is only one unifying theme instead of two, and all of the different "tracks" on it are actual songs instead of a mix of songs and separate instrumental passages. They did it again in 1977 with Animals before creating one of the quintessential rock operas, The Wall.

A rock opera is a concept album that leans far too heavily on the "concept" side of the equation. These albums tell a story through their songs, at least in theory. In actual practice, the listener tends to get a small number of awesome songs, while the plot is actually described in 1-minute breaks between the songs. Every rock opera ever is guilty of this. Also every rock opera of any importance involves a rebirth of fascism.

In which I post a video in which two males are shirtless

Bon Scott
July 9, 1946 - February 19, 1980

(It is also Tony Iommi's birthday. There is only one appropriate thing to do: play lots of AC/DC and Black Sabbath today.)

The big Megadeth announcement

...means that I can no longer refer to it as "the solo project that Dave Mustaine insists on calling Megadeth."

Here is my full, honest opinion of David Ellefson: He is a talented bassist who sued Mustaine for eighteen and a half million dollars when the band broke up in 2002 (he lost). Mustaine forgave him a while ago, but I never in a million years thought he'd actually let Junior back in the band.

Here is my full, honest opinion of James LoMenzo: Dude got shafted.

I think this is the first time Dave chucked someone out to get someone else back. AC/DC did this to Chris Slade back in the early 90s, because Phil Rudd clicks with them more I guess, even though Phil was originally fired in 83 because he got in a fistfight with Malcolm Young (and possibly did something else, which I've only heard about from one source and thus won't print here). In an interview back from before 2002, Dave said Junior was the only one other than him who ever really had his finger on the pulse of the band, so it's probably a similar situation to the AC/DC example.

It's ironic that Dave, the guy Metallica said (way back in the day) was "just filling in" until Kirk showed up, seems to treat everyone other than Ellefson and (possibly) Broderick as "just filling in." (And a certain more professional blog refers to Broderick as "the latest guitarist who is not Marty Friedman.")

Still, this is pretty cool. Let's hope it lasts longer than the reunion with Chris Poland.

Edit: this would seem to indicate that LoMenzo's leaving opened the door for Ellefson's return instead of what I'd assumed, which was that Dave decided that Ellefson was coming back, which meant that LoMenzo had to go. Of course, the article doesn't quote Mustaine or LoMenzo, so it's still unclear to me what really happened.

100th Post! In Which Yours Truly Saw some Bands

The names of the bands have been withheld to protect the guilty but also because I just can't remember them. Their names, that is.

Now, this was a triple bill. This sort of thing makes it kind of hard to be objective, because if the first two bands are awful and the third is only mediocre, you're going to remember the third one as being a lot better than the first two, aren't you?

Yeah, pretty much. That's actually pretty much how it went.

The first band had five people up on stage; two guitarists, a bassist, a keyboardist and a drummer. There was no singer; one of the guitarists and the bassist shouted into the microphones a bit but because the mix was so godawful no one could make out what they were saying. It was punk with bits of musical talent showing through; three bars of power chords, one bar of synchronized single-note licks. I was less than impressed.

The second band featured a guy with a stupid haircut playing some sort of unholy cross between a Gibson Melody Maker and a Fender Stratocaster while growling into a microphone. Backing him up were the nerdiest-looking drummer I have ever seen and a bassist who was probably too talented for that noise. Their slowest song was their best one, but the guitarist's insistence on employing the "stumble around the stage and stare like a madman" approach was less than endearing.

Before I get into the third band, I'd like briefly to comment on a phenomenon I've noticed among guitarists. I'll call it the "insecurity-pretention index theory" and it basically goes like this: the further above their waist the guitar is, the more insecure the guitarist is. The further below their waist the guitar is, the more pretentious the guitarist is. Jimmy Page is the only person who pulled off being able to play guitar at his knees, and that's because he's an actual guitar hero (license him already, people). (Okay, blah blah Slash. Not really in the same league, but he deserves mentioning just cuz.) Angus Young is the only person who pulled off being able to play guitar across his chest, and it works because he's really, really short (blah blah Beatles, shut up). Angus' and Jimmy's guitars probably both hang at the same height relative to the ground (no, just kidding. Angus would have to be three feet tall for that to actually be the case).

Anyway this last band had three girls in it, which was three more girls than the other two bands had put together. Two of them played the drums, one of the drummers also played keyboards, and the third one played what at first glance appeared to be a knockoff of a Gibson Les Paul with single-coil pickups. It looked absolutely ginormous on the girl, who wore it rather high, and my first thought was, "okay, Angus Young effect. The guitar looks huge because the player is a dwarf."

Thing was actually a six-string bass. Might have been a baritone guitar but if you read this post you know what I think of baritone guitars. And since I did not find this band to be totally awful, I'd rather imagine that it was a six-string bass than acknowledge that it was probably a baritone guitar.

Two drummers, one of whom doubles as a keyboardist, and a bassist/singer. Halfway through the second song the bassist/singer stops and yells at the sound guy to turn up the microphone and the monitors. "Wow, the girl singer has more balls than either of the two guys," I thought, because the mix was simply godawful up until this point, but neither of the previous bands had particularly decent singers- no, scratch that, both the previous singers were terrible. Still, the singer with the highest-slung guitar yelled at the sound guy. My "insecurity-pretention index theory" went out the window.

So imagine lots of drums, the occasional keyboards, basslines that all sounded like Megadeth's "Peace Sells" of all things, and wailing (but I mean it in a good way) that sounds like some mournful ghost of an Egyptian Queen. Why that particular imagery, I have no idea. Suffice it to say that this was the best band of the night by a looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong shot.

And then I went back to my room and tried to get to sleep, only to have to listen to some idiot drunk girl stumble around talking to her boyfriend on her cell phone and trying to find his room.

Rant #67043

You may have noticed that the average age of the things that I talk about on this blog is approximately twenty-one, and no that's not a number I picked out entirely at random, that number happens to represent the number of years I've been forced to endure existence on a planet that seems to lack any sort of quality control, and without giving the game away, I blame the internet primarily for this. But as for the number representing the true average age of things I talk about (not counting curent politics), I'm probably off by the same amount as the President whenever he talks about the number of jobs he "created or saved."

You see, there's more crap out there now than there ever was before, and by crap I mean both "stuff" and "stuff of bad quality." This blog, which will turn one year old at the end of the month, is one such piece of crap. Nobody reads it, nobody replies to any of the posts, and nobody points out that every one of my opinions are horribly biased against either the Democrat Party or just about anything younger than I am that's not Nu Who or part of the collective output of Joss Whedon or Quentin Tarantino. And frankly they don't get a free pass either because they've all had clunkers too. Oh, and if the Democrats ever want a kind word on this blog they can all go take Econ 101 and then run a small business for a few years. And frankly most Republicans should do that too. They're not in power at the moment so slagging them seems kind of pointless.

I love AC/DC, a fact that every day gets harder and harder to reconcile with my insistance on originality and quality; the Thunder from Down Under have made the same album sixteen times now (note: number does not include box sets like Bonfire or Backtracks, compilations like '74 Jailbreak, or live albums), and only about half of them are worth owning. Nevertheless, there's something to be said for a band that's never written a heartfelt ballad or a song about how the world sucks and how the singer wants to die. And there's comfort to be had in this consistency; you know you're about to listen to 40 minutes of 3-chord rock songs about the fun of sex and the greatness of rock and roll whenever you stick something with "AC/DC" printed on it in your CD player.

By comparison, music today is god-awful. This PC insistence on tolerating everyone else's artistic expression means that no matter how ear-splittingly terrible you are, you'll find at least a hundred idiots who "like" your "music" and thus give you a sense of self-importance, and speaking as one egoist to the most self-centered generation in modern history, it's not all about you. These hundred idiots will be idiotic because their music libraries are full of "free" stuff they stole. The average quality of the songs in those libraries will be comparable to the average Nirvana song, and because they don't know any better they won't realize that that's an insult. So, let me be clear in a way our President never will be: if you down-tune past either E-flat or Drop-D, if you complain about how mommy doesn't love you, if your solo doesn't last longer than one bar (I really don't care if you only know one scale, you can make something decent out of that), if you can't actually sing, if you can't write lyrics without using the words "oh" or "yeah" or "hey" to fill out the rhythm, or if you have to rely on sampling other songs to get any recognition at all, then please get out of the road if you want to grow old.

"But," says Dylan, the completely fictional reader of this blog who I in no way named after the first rockstar with no discernable performing talent (guy could write songs, I'll give him that with pleasure no matter how wrong the phrase "I'll give him that with pleasure" sounds), "if you're for originality, why won't you let us experiment at all? For example, isn't a song in baritone tuning an example of at least some deviation from the norm?"

Ah, I say, Dylan, old boy, in your haste to call me a stupid hypocrite (I am suddenly reminded of the hilarity of rock "stars" who are so obviously in it for the money and sex railing against "the rich"), you forgot to read my words more carefully. I require both originality and quality from my entertainment. Hence, I will not accept a song written in a tuning that makes it easier to bend notes or sing along.

"Then defend your admiration of AC/DC, since by your own admission they repeat themselves on every album and only half of them are worth owning," says Dylan, ignorant of the fact that I can barely hear him because I'm listening to Jimi Hendrix sing about a joker and a thief.

I believe I already have, I say, but in case you'd like me to elaborate: AC/DC were a refreshing gasp of fresh air when they pillaged England in 75 and 76 and America in 77. Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd were both getting overblown and punk was defiling all that was sacred about rock music. AC/DC did exactly what punk was supposed to do, strip rock back down to its essentials. I've got nothing against Zeppelin or Floyd, they're also two of my favorite bands and they both did a lot more experimentation than AC/DC did, but neither really did a lot for straight-up hard rock. (Blah blah "Black Dog" blah blah "Rock and Roll." Blah blah "Achilles Last Stand," which was probably the first song with thrash metal elements in it but don't quote me on that. Other than those three songs, the Zep were more blues-rock than hard rock.)

"But isn't straight-up hard rock itself fairly unoriginal?" Dylan asked, and by this point I realized that my imagination had conjured up a troll, and if there's one thing I hate more than every Cobain wannabe and rapper, it's a troll who thinks my opinion actually means anything. And for that, I especially blame the internet.