The Blurbs
Die Antwoord – 5 Album Review
If your first reaction upon listening and/or seeing Die Antwoord (”The Answer” in Afrikaans) is a big “What the fucking fuck did I just bear witness to?,” don’t despair – that’s just par for the course.
Die Antwoord is something of an enigma – a South African hip-hop crew featuring a mullet-sporting pixie, a mute DJ, and a schlong-swinging frontman (seriously, you’ll never look at the cover of The Dark Side of the Moon the same again) who spits his rhymes in a blur of English and Afrikaans.
Some people have even suggested that the group may in some way be a Sacha Baron Cohen-esque outfit designed to fool you into believing there could be a group such as this that actually takes themselves seriously. Of course, you wouldn’t believe it if they didn’t have some skills to back it up, and as they show on their new EP, 5, they’ve definitely got skills – the only question is if the laughing is intentional or not.
The Situation and The Stars
I know, I know, we’re stretching it with this one, but Dancing with the Stars is music-related, no? Deal with it.
Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino is really milking his 15 minutes of fame (good for him, btw).
The latest might just be The Situation showing off some moves on ABC’s hit shot, “Dancing with the Stars.” E! Online is proclaiming it’s a done deal; he’s signed on for next season.
E! is comparing The Situation’s role on the show to that of last season’s Kate Gosselin — someone who will draw ratings and really stretch the demographics of the show. E! went on to say that the only difference would be people on set will probably like him. Zing!
My girl (just read over this wife, mmkay?) Audrina Patridge of “The Hills” will be on the next season, too. Former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Troy Aikman is rumored to be joing as well.
Target ain’t people
Many Constitutional scholars can’t agree whether or not corporations are recognized as persons in the eyes of the law. But somehow, over time, it has become the accepted standard that under the 14th Amendment, corporations are to receive virtually all of the rights that actual, individual human beings have.
This is fucking ridiculous. A corporation is not a person. Anyone who argues that it should be treated like one simply because it is made up of many is willfully ignorant. Here’s an appropriate quote from an essay that explains this nonsense better than I can:
People may not know exactly what Goldman Sachs is, but they know it is not a person. A person doesn’t have unlimited life or limited liability. A person is responsible for her decisions. If she makes a decision that kills or maims people she will go to jail. If a CEO makes such a decision she, at worst, receives a golden parachute.
Unlike a real person, a corporation lacks a conscience. It is guided neither by ethics nor morality but rather by laws that required its Boards to elevate the maximization of profits above all other concerns.
A real person is an independent actor, subject to many influences that affect how he votes. Warren Buffett, for example, thinks it is in his and society’s best interest for him to be required to pay more taxes. A corporation that made this decision could be taken to court by its stockholders.
Well, the Supreme Court upped the ante back in January when it ruled that corporations can spend an unlimited amount of money in our elections. Fan-fucking-tastic. Say hello to a new era of companies buying electoral results (well, moreso than they already do). And big companies have wasted no time in taking advantage of this ruling. In July, Target donated $150,000 to the campaign of the right-wing candidate for governor in Minnesota who happens to be anti-gay and oh yeah, anti-worker. (Wait, isn’t the Target corporation made up of thousands of workers? Oh yeah, those worthless peons are just necessary annoyances standing in the way of ever larger profits. So fuck ‘em.)
Well, a boycott against Target has been initiated by MoveOn.org and best of all, a small group of brave citizens brought the protest directly to Target, all in the form of a song. Rock on guys!
-Sam
Step 1. Choose a completely ridiculous hoodrat slang word.
Step 2. Spend the entire song simply defining said word.
Voila. You’ve got yourself a hit:
Seriously, those guys just brought in a paycheck for that.
-Sam
Local H Cover Album
There’s still something amazing, for me, about Local H’s Bound For The Floor track. Despite it’s rather vague lyrics, it’s still a catchy tune. I used to use it to get pumped up for ice hockey during high school. Good times, good times. I’ll still occasionally put it on and the track still amazes me.
But umm… (shot!). Local H is getting set to release a new album, but not with new material. Instead, it’ll be a compilation of covers. It’s expected to roll out October 19th and will be titled, Awesome Mix Tape #1.
We have the track listing after the jump. continue reading
New All Time Low demo
Head on over to frontman Alex’s blog to hear a demo version of the song tentatively titled ‘Actors’ from the band’s forthcoming album.
Shaquille O’Neal has reached that point in his career where he’s basically an itinerant big man for hire, playing for four different teams in the last four seasons.
His most recent team will be the Boston Celtics.
And Shaq will find a partner in crime on his new squad in Glen “Big Baby” Davis, a guy cut from the same buffoonish cloth as the “Shaprechaun” himself (hey, it’s no “Shaqtus” but I couldn’t think of anything better).
It’ll be quite entertaining to see what kind of antics these two get into together, but for starters I wouldn’t mind seeing Big Baby introduce his dance instructor skills to the Big Diesel:
First of all, can anyone explain to me what the fuck a “dougie” is? And once you’ve done that, please kindly fill me in on how this “dance” deserves its own name and song. Isn’t it just swaying from side to side and occasionally making some really effeminate hand gestures? I can tell you one thing, it’s no Chicken Noodle Soup. Hell, it’s not even Strut That Ass.
-Sam
‘Suds’gestion: Language Room
For this edition of ‘Suds’gestion, Jonathan offers up the band Language Room.
Hailing from Austin, Texas, they play bread-and-butter hard-driving modern rock. But like most of the bands that have been showing up in our inbox, there’s just nothing special about these guys. They don’t do anything to make you dislike them, but neither do they do anything to make you love them. They’re just kinda there.
Their new self-titled album is out now. Check out their video for the song “In Lines” and tell me if you disagree.
-Sam
Arcade Fire is the kind of band that doesn’t do small scale. For them, it’s always go big or go home with their arena-ready anthems for the indie crowd.
That’s a daunting task for any young band to shoulder, but it’s more or less been Arcade Fire’s ethos since day one. And whereas most bands with grand ambitions would rather gradually build towards something huge, these guys want to hit a home run every time they step to the plate.
On their third album, The Suburbs, they managed to hit a moonshot that not only cleared the park but it’s probably still yet to land.
We’ve already seen one attempt at a 3D music video, but that one didn’t require any glasses and could be a little nauseating as a result of the technique used.
But Broken Bells has posted their attempt at a 3D video for the song “October” requiring those red and blue-lensed glasses, and the coolest part about it is that it’s interactive.
I didn’t even have the glasses, but it’s still a pretty cool idea. If you’ve got the specs, tell us how the 3D looks.
And is it just me, or did anyone else notice the ice cream-pooping taco from South Park in there somewhere?
-Sam