The 12 Worst Things To Happen to Music This Decade

Because of the demand for arbitrary lists at the end of the year, The Rolling Scone Blog has given in to blog pressure and prepared a list of the 12 lamest things to happen to music in the past decade.

In no real order...

12.) Self-Aggrandizing Music Blogs
One of the worst developments of the past decade is the proliferation of music blogs on the internet. Now everyone with a 56k modem and an Ipod is a "music expert," mucking up the internet with their opinions and insights, forgetting of course that literally, no one cares. Fortunately most of them die off quickly, as their creators eventually figure out that 6 of the 8 people that visit their sites each day are in fact themselves, checking on their own site meters.

11.) Popular Country Music
The homogenized, sterile world in which country music operates is a world much like the one that exists on the Disney Channel. There is no swearing, no overt sexuality, everyone looks really pretty, and no one ever has a problem that can't be solved by singing about tractors or trucks. Country music has its own magazines, its own award shows, its own producers. There is little interaction between the worlds of rock and country and the results are bland, uninspired music made by talented session musicians.

10.) Awards Shows
Quick! Name the last 4 winners of the coveted Grammy for Artist of the Year. No, the answer isn't U2, U2, U2, U2. Or is it? No one knows, that's the problem, and no one cares. There are plenty of other music awards shows to ignore, like The People's Choice Awards, the MTV Music Video Awards, The Billboard Awards. The only person who seems to care about these awards is Kanye West, who makes it a yearly event to bitch about being snubbed from something. The solution to this problem is to completely ignore it until it goes away.

9.) Pitchfork Becomes Important:
There are so many things wrong with Pitchfork that it's hard to chose just nine, much less only one. Pitchfork's ascension to the top of the indie taste making charts is based primarily on the fact that they are, in fact, assholes. Like an insolent 11 year old, Pitchfork has made its living by needlessly insulting the work of others, unless those "others" happen to make music that no one really wants to listen to. Pitchfork is equivalent to that annoying high school friend who only listened to bands that no one has ever heard of, thus insuring that they could scoff at anyone "still listening to Coheed and Cambria. By basically ignoring 95% of popular music, Pitchfork gives off the impression that they are cool, thus inspiring millions of gullible kids in tight jeans to mindlessly cling to their elitist opinions.

8.) The Continued Death of Rock N Roll
Rock may still be alive in neutered form, that is if you can call Trapt, Breaking Benjamin, and Three Days Grace "rock," but rock n roll has been dead since at last 1992. Guns N' Roses may still be around, but even them, rock n roll's last bastion of hope, now, sadly, sucks. Bands like Coheed and Cambria, Queens of the Stone Age, White Stripes, Ash, My Chemical Romance and the Foo Fighters continue to rock in various forms, but the bluesy take no prisoners rock n roll attitude of Zeppelin, GNR and AC/DC is long since gone.

7.) The Rise of Indie Rock
Indie rock, which towards the end of the decade finally supplanted emo as the "rock" genre of choice, is a way to inclusive genre that includes virtually every band in the world. The biggest problem with indie rock is that it just doesn't rock. There are plenty of good indie bands in the world, but as the leading flag bearer of the rock movement, they are woefully unprepared. The charts are completely dominated by rap and R&B leaving almost no space for rock. Indie rock, whose biggest bands are based almost exclusively on hype generated by Pitchfork and Rolling Stone, just can't drum up more than cursory interest.

6.) Rolling Stone's Lists
Jack White being #11 on Rolling Stone's top 100 guitarists. Edward Van Halen, who basically invented modern guitar playing is tucked up in the 70's. A blatant disregard for anything from the 70's and 80's has  
become Rolling Stone's MO. Metal doesn't even exist in the world of Rolling Stone, and that is painfully obvious by looking at their exclusive lists.

5.) Rolling Stone: The Magazine
This is the same magazine who gave Black Sabbath's Paranoid 1 star and trashed Led Zeppelin's early work. Their continued existence is one of the biggest mysteries of the music world. They continually miss the boat on new trends whilst suckling the teat of the old guard, passing out 5-star reviews to U2 and Mick Jagger's vastly uninspired work.


4.) All Music Sucks
Obviously all music doesn't suck. But really, music sucks these days. Lady Gaga is probably the most interesting artist of the past year. Radiohead now sucks. Outkast doesn't even exist in any real form. Coheed's last album was a disappointment. Ash isn't releasing any new albums and Stevie Ray Vaughn is still dead. Nickelback remains a viable musical entity. Creed reunited. Ke$ha has the #1 song in the world. Prince is a Mormon. The list could go on and on... but it won't.


3.) Led Zeppelin Reunited
Obviously this isn't a bad thing, in fact if that was the whole story it would be the greatest thing to happen to music since the electric guitar. Unfortunately the rest of the caption should read: Led Zeppelin Reunited... For One Show. God forbid they should embark on a world tour and let all their hundreds of millions of fans a chance to see them.


2.) Rolling Scone Remains Undiscovered
Somehow, despite the constant evidence to the contrary, Rolling Scone isn't the most popular blog on the internet. Despite millions and millions of incredible articles and opinions, our work remains as un-viewed as a Whoopi Goldberg porno. If there was a God then Pitchfork would be struck down and everyone would love Rolling Scone instead. Unfortunately that means that there is no God. Sorry to break the news.

1.) The Death of a Bunch of Good Musicians
Michael Jackson, Layne Staley, George Harrison, Rick James... just to name a few of the people that died. Although most of them were well past their musical primes and thus virtually useless, its still sad. Unless you hated their bands, or looked down on child molestation. Then it was a pretty good decade for everyone, except for fans of music.

American Music Awards Still Laboring Under Delusion That They Matter

What if ABC aired an awards show and no one cared? The 26th annual American Music Awards show aired last night, unbeknownst to most of America.

The AMAs were founded by Dick Clark in 1976, when he was just 127 years old and still in the height of his popularity. According to Wikipedia, the AMAs are part of the "Big Three" major music award shows, the others being the Grammy Awards and Tiger Beat's Super Cute List. The AMAs have two major differences that separate it from the Grammy Awards: the AMAs don't have an award for Best Single/Record, and while Grammys are given out according to complicated system of examining ram entrails, the AMAs give out their awards based upon a survey of the last 100 people featured on PeopleOfWalmart.com.

According to many artists, winning an AMA holds roughly the same street cred as winning a Teen Choice Award, except that the actual award isn't nearly as cool as the Teen Choice surfboard. The last 20 winners of the "prestigious" Artist of the Year Award gave it to their valets as a tip upon leaving the ceremony.

The show featured many artists pantomiming songs they didn't actually write. Janet Jackson opened the show with a 30 minute performance of songs that no one knew. All of last night's nominees and winners signed an anonymity clause, thus making their names and the awards they won are not available to the public. Some nominee's include Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift, Kings of Leon, Beyonce, Hootie, and Twlight. Because Michael Jackson is deceased, it was announced that he won four awards including Best Death, Best Celebrity Scandal, Favorite Rock/Pop Album and Best Jackson.

Adam Lambert, America's favorite 2nd place winning gay American Idol not named Clay Aiken, had the biggest controversy of the night when he did something deemed too homosexual for ABC, who cut it from the program. Lady Gaga also provided some controversy when she had sex live on the stage during the 4th hour of the broadcast.

Last night's American Music Awards drew a 12.4 rating, which means that twelve people watched it. A thirteenth person had the television on but was making out with his girlfriend at the time and wasn't paying attention.

Recent Murders "Thrilling" Gary, Indiana

GARY, Indiana - A blanket of fear has been cast over this industrial Midwestern town as the recent deaths of 6 citizens have led police to believe that an evil force has set up shop in town and is intent on killing again. The killer, nicknamed "The Thriller" has been terrorizing the local residents since the first body was found June 30th.

Police believe that the 6 deaths are the work of a serial killer and have cautioned all residents not to go out of their houses when the midnight hour is close at hand. However, many residents are convinced that the deaths are the work of something far more sinister. Local Occultist Vinny Price believes that "The Thriller" is in fact an evil creature back that has come back from the dead to terrorize the city.

Although no one has gotten a close up of "The Thriller" local Gary, Indiana resident Ola Ray has taken the only known photograph of what seems to be a man or creature in a red jacket.

"It was close to midnight on June 30th," Ola Ray said in an exclusive interview with the RollingScone. "I saw something that almost stopped my heart, this 'thing' seemed to be doing some sort of dance on the street outside of my cul-de-sac. I tried to scream, but terror took the sound before i made it. I started to freeze, this horror looked me right between the eyes. I was paralyzed. Fortunately I was able to snap out of it and get out my iPhone, which is what i used to get this picture. As you can see, this "Thriller" was dressed in red leather and had a very pale face with black jheri-curled hair."

Talking to local Vinny Price, he believes that he has discovered the origins of the "Thriller" in an ancient story that he found in one of his occult books.

Darkness falls across the land/The midnight hour is close at hand/Creatures crawl in search of blood/To terrorize y'alls neighbourhood/And whosoever shall be found/Without the soul for getting down/Must stand and face the hounds of hell/And rot inside a corpses shell/The foulest stench is in the air/The funk of forty thousand years/And grizzly ghouls from every tomb/Are closing in to seal your doom/And though you fight to stay alive/Your body starts to shiver/For no mere mortal can resist/The evil of the Thriller.

The story seems to foretell an evil creature from the depths of hell, what he believes could be a zombie or ghoul like creature. "I'm not sure why the beast seemed to arise on June 30th, nothing I could find in any occult book points to that date as a date of significance. There seems to be no astrological significance either as the moon was in its first quarter and didn't become full until July 7th. The police don't seem to be interested in any of this, but I believe the killings will continue and I don't believe they will ever be able to stop the evil of this 'Thriller.'"

Rev. Sharpton, "I think 'Thriller' more than makes up for all the molesting"

In the aftermath of the Michael Jackson death, many questions have been raised about the legacy he will leave behind. Jackson had a checkered past, with allegations of drug use and child molestation, however, all those questions have been put to rest thanks to the mild mannered and soft spoken Reverend Al Sharpton Jr., who recently spoke out against critics of Jackson. While some may question why Sharpton would defend the bleach-white Jackson, critics must remember that while Micheal died a child-molesting white man, he was once a mega-successful black superstar.

Reverend Al Sharpton Jr., who has long been a vocal proponent of Michael Jackson, issued a statement saying that, "The joy that the album, 'Thriller' has brought to over 28 million Americans more than makes up for the hundred or so small children that Jackson drugged and molested in his Neverland Ranch -- just by numbers alone, the thirty million American men, women and children who have been touched by Michael's song and dance far outnumber the few that Michael touched sexually. If he had never released 'Thriller' and instead was just judged on 'Bad' or 'Dangerous', I could see how all the sexual abuse might tarnish his legacy. But c'mon, we're talkin' about over 100 million copies sold around the world and seven top ten singles from one album -- seven. It's outrageous, it's ludicrous, it's so beyond bad it's good. 'Billie Jean' alone would make up for most of the molestations. Throw in 'The Girl is Mine', 'Thriller', 'Wanna Be Startin' Something', 'Beat It', 'Human Nature', and 'P.Y.T.' and Micheal could have bombed the World Trade Centers and I would still forgive him. Michael was the greatest, the king of pop, the sultan of soul, the greatest the world has ever seen, he was and will always be a king in our eyes, even though he wasn't a black man anymore and truly had nothing to do with our race and in many ways was a disgrace to every black man women and child in the world. However, let's not forget that he could moon walk better than Jesus; So that's good enough for me, and it should be good enough for America."

Media: Unimpressive; Michael Jackson's Death Doesn't Live Up to Reputation

"Unimpressive." That was the word from CNN head honcho Ted Turner following the death of Michael Jackson yesterday. "Kind of disappointing," said Entertainment Tonight.

The US media has not been kind in their reviews of Michael Jackson's death. Ryan Seacrest was disappointed by the understated manner of Jackson's death. "Celebrities of this caliber usually go out in a much bigger way. Drug fueled suicides, being gunned down by stalkers or jealous lovers, a high speed chase or car crash, heart attacks while naked with small children... these are the kind of deaths that we expect from these types of world class celebrities. The King of Pop really didn't live up to his name this time. Slipping into a coma and dying? It's a little disappointing when you think of the possibilities."

Mixed Jackson death reviews came from the cables news world, as well. Joe Scarborough of MSNBC's "Morning Joe" took the optimist's route, saying its still early and that the autopsy could reveal really exotic drug use drug use or possibly even alien probing and that could really inject some spice into the whole thing. However, Anderson Cooper of CNN went negative, saying the timing of the death could have been better and noting that sweeps week had long since passed. He also fretted that all in all he expected something better, fireworks, jealous monkey lovers, a triple murder suicide, something that would befit the man who sold 26 million copies of Thriller. "At the very least I would expect some sparklers, some sequins and a crouch grab or too. Frankly I just dont feel satisfied, but I suppose Madonna or Bono could die at any minute... hopefully while doing coke off each other, naked, in a plane crash on their way to help starving children in Africa... that'd be huge ratings."