Perspective

[filkertom]

Rebecca Black has received death threats.

Look, "Friday" is a very catchy song with very banal lyrics. It can be done well, in a ironic-knowing-wink sort of way, such as when Stephen Colbert and Taylor Hicks sang it with Jimmy Fallon. But it's fluff. It's nothing.

Death threats!? Over this?

Whoever you are, you are really, really making something out of nothing. She's a thirteen year old girl. If you had the kind of exposure she's had, you'd be on top of the world, no matter the source. And, action movies aside, violence never solves anything. Especially viral video.

On top of which, you obviously have never heard Sheena Easton.

What musical artist could you happily never hear again?

Comments

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

Friday isn't even close to the worst song.

The worst song, of course, is "Afternoon Delight" by the Starland Vocal Band.

Just mentioning that song causes pain. My only consolation is that I might have affected a few readers to have stuck in their heads those words...

"Sky rockets in flight. Afternoon delight. Afternoon delight."

[jeffr23.livejournal.com]

No; I still maintain that the worst song is "Summer Girls" by LFO.

[shadowofsummer.livejournal.com]

Worse for me than artists I flat-out don't like is an artist I do like making a bad song. Seems to happen a lot with covers:
Flyleaf's 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' leaps out as particularly eardrum-stabbingly terrible;
Avril Lavigne's 'Knockin' On Heaven's Door' was a lesson in how to hit every note except the one you're supposed to be singing;
and Tori Amos - for someone who has produced covers I prefer to the original (her cover of The Cure's 'Love Song') she managed to turn Slayer's 'Reign In Blood' into a dirge that is so drawn-out you occasionally forget you're still listening to the album and tune it out, AND as if that wasn't bad enough, preceded it on the album with a horrible cover of 'Happiness Is A Warm Gun' that sounds like a joint drama/multimedia student's attempt at making an aural essay on the topic of gun control.

Also, I really need to check my run-on sentences at the door.

[realinterrobang.livejournal.com]

Tori Amos is right up there on my list of artists I'd happily consign to a spinning dimension somewhere. I don't believe she's ever recorded anything good.

Leonard Cohen and his four-note range, none of which is ever the right note, perpetual flatness, and smug pretension (not to mention continually winning Canadian music awards when he as far as I know hasn't so much as set foot in Canada for decades, while other genuinely good musical acts -- which is, comparatively speaking all of them -- are going begging) could DIAF and take his entire back catalogue with him. Oh, and did I mention misogyny? Yeah.

Bryan Adams. Buh-bye. Ditto Tiffany, who made so much of the '80s miserable for me. And that chick from the Cranberries, who does that fingernails-on-a-blackboard thing with her voice when she jumps between notes? Gone. Kid Rock and his racism and boring formulaic major-label Geffengarbage? Likewise consigned to some spinning dimension made entirely of Confederate flags.

[phillip2637.livejournal.com]

Because fluff doesn't annoy me as much as bombast -- and my era was big on bombastic songs with important moral messages -- I have to pick Canada's own Five Man Electrical Band over either Zager and Evans or Barry Sadler. Never hearing them again would remove more bad songs than either of the other options that came to mind.

[ldwheeler.livejournal.com]

"If GOD was HERE, he'd TELL YOU to your FACE:
'MAN, you're SOME KIND of SINNNEERRRRRRRR ..."

:-)

[zorya-thinks.livejournal.com]

Everything in here, but especially "MacArthur Park" as sung by Richard Harris:

http://www.amazon.com/Dave-Barrys-Book-Bad-Songs/dp/0740706004/ref=sr_1_19?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1303342200&sr=1-19

[purpleranger.livejournal.com]

I actually pulled up a video on YouTube that used Harris's version of "MacArthur Park" a few nights ago. I was in a coffee shop, and they were playing a cover of "I Will Survive" that was even worse than Donna Summer's version (if that can be believed). Trust me, Richard Harris was the better choice.

By the way, did you know that a version of "MacArthur Park" won a Grammy Award?

[his-spiffyness.livejournal.com]

Wow, somebody doesn't know how to use the volume control?

[morpheus0013.livejournal.com]

I thought this was old news. Did you ever see the Twitter posts someone compiled, directed toward her? They were vile, and a number of them were death threats.

Frankly, I could live with never hearing Katy Perry's awful voice on my radio again, but I'm not about to flip my shit over t.

[purpleranger.livejournal.com]

I don't think she would be at the top of my list, but Donna Summer would definitely be in my top five.

[alverant.livejournal.com]

Remember earlier this week when you posted Beaker's Ballad? Well this is that in real life then taken up a notch.

I think country/western is extremely awful and I've said some pretty bad things about it. But I would never go and suggest anyone should be killed for it. Arrested for impersonating a tortured animal, yes, but never killed.

[per_solo]

This. Just this...if I never hear it again, I'll be happy.

http://youtu.be/dQw4w9WgXcQ

[jannyblue.livejournal.com]

I bet I know what that link is...

*clicky*

*giggle*

Yup. :-)

[jannyblue.livejournal.com]

What musical artist could you happily never hear again?

Is it "too easy" to say Celine Dion?

I know it's practically a cliché to dislike her, but it's certainly not the lowest-hanging fruit I could pick...

[wyattkelly.livejournal.com]

ANYTHING by Foreigner. I absolutely detest that band.

[drzarron.livejournal.com]

Well Tom, I've been meaning to talk to you....


No, I'm with Heather. If I NEVER hear "She's Having My Baby" ever again, I'll be a happy man. Beside, it was voted the WORSE mainstream song of the 20th century.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Thanks heaps, bwana. See if I Kungaloosh with you again. Snif.

[ldwheeler.livejournal.com]

On at least one chart, this was the number-one song in the U.S. the day of my birth:

In the year 2525 ...
if man is still alive ...

That's very unfortunate.

[peteralway.livejournal.com]

Hey, when I was nine, I thought it was the coolest song ever!

[zorya-thinks.livejournal.com]

Gaah, I had to read all the comments. Now I have remembered two songs that make me gag, "Honey" as sung by Bobby Goldsboro and "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" as sung by Roberta Flack Bleech! Now I have to wash my brain.

[capplor.livejournal.com]

But Peg Seeger's version of "First time..." is a lovely little number. & The Austin Lounge Lizards take on Honey almost made the song worth listening to.

[insane-ian.livejournal.com]

anything by David Tanny.

[austinwolfclaw.livejournal.com]

*smiles* Here's a song for those who don't like Rebecca Black.
NO IT IS NOT A RICKROLL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUuO6fzFLls
I'd rather hear this song and any other song by Rucka Rucka Ali over FRIDAY any time...
Also, Gridlore, if you're tired of hearing Dylan sing Lay Lady Lay, go to a karaoke bar and hear someone else butcher it / sing it better than dylan. Sometimes hearing someone else sing it will get your mind off of dylan.
or something...I dunno.
ldwheeler : In The Year 2525 was a one hit wonder for Zager and Evans. I thought it was a pretty good song, however we all know man will be alive in 2525....but not me. I probably wont make it to 2080. :(

For a while I hated Ace of Base's The Sign, but since it stopped being played on the radio I've grown to like it again somewhat....

BTW Weird Al released a new parody yesterday.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUxXKfQkswE <-- Parody of Born This Way by Lady Gaga, and according to Al, it will not be released on any album. Enjoy!

[raven-ap-morgan.livejournal.com]

Check Al's blog - apparently Lady Gaga has now heard and approved of the parody, so the song will be released.

[lemmozine.livejournal.com]

Ooooh! SOOOOOO Many. Generally speaking, whiny egotistical singer songwriters who bang three chords, introduce every song by saying "this is a song" (we KNOW it's a song already, get over yourself!) and have no discernible sense of humor. Many of their works appear on bad TV shows on WGN.

Little Marcy singing Jesus Loves Me (or almost anything - she was the absolute height of putridity), Kenny G overdubbing on Louis Armstrong, (look up Richard Thompson's youtube video about why he agrees with Pat Metheney), Bob Dylan's xmas album (and his 2 Christian albums as well), the entire recorded outputs of Philip Glass (reminds me of water torture), Kate Bush (sounds like a cat caught in a blender), nearly every singer who is trying to sound like another singer and isn't doing an impression or a tribute act of some kind.

There are certain songs that should generally be banned from open mikes - they may be great songs, but they're either overdone or too difficult to sing - for example, Both Sides Now is a great song, but if I ever have to listen to another bad Joni Mitchell imitator, I may scream at the top of my lungs. My friend John and I operate an organization called NAOMA, National Association of Open Mike Audiences, and we've voted to ban Both Sides Now and Me and Bobby McGee, for starters.

Another thing I'd like to not hear is anyone trying to cover the IZ version of "Over the Rainbow." He can get away with a butchered version of "Over the Rainbow" with the wrong chords, tune and words because he had that haunting, eerie voice from another world. Anyone else trying to copy him (and I've heard dozens of them) just sounds like yesterday's garbage.

Oh, and please, don't be offended by anything I've said here. This is my personal taste, and I understand there are people who like some of the stuff I hate. Fine. Takes all kinds.

little correction

[camric.livejournal.com]

It was Jimmy Fallon he was performing with, not Kimmel :-) I think Friday is the most insipid thing I've heard in years, but those guys just PERFORMED the heck out of it and dang it, I have an ear worm.

Re: little correction

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

D'oh. Fixed.

[poltr1]

Didn't Sheena Easton become famous after winning some type of English Idol song competition back in the late 1970s? I can live with her pre-Prince stuff.

But the songs I can do without are "Run Joey Run" and "The Last Game of the Season", both by David Geddes. And "Rocky" by Austin Roberts.

[terriwells.livejournal.com]

"Lightning Strikes Again" I can totally do without ever hearing again, mainly because of the lyrics and the sentiment behind them rather than the tune. I could also do without "I'll Be Watching You" for similar reasons. And whatever the song is with the lyrics "Bird is the word" just because the words are soooo redundant.

[shockwave77598.livejournal.com]

I'm more inclined to believe that some PR firm paid someone to make a few posts in order to extend this girl's 15 minutes of fame into 20. I'd already forgotten all about her.

[jcw-da-dmg.livejournal.com]

Blue Swede.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Now, now. Without them, we wouldn't have this (http://youtu.be/PJQVlVHsFF8).

Oh. I see your point.

[alverant.livejournal.com]

"What musical artist could you happily never hear again?"

Not sure if there are any. Without the bad "artists" there wouldn't be a supply of songs to parody.

But the type of singers I would be happy if they all just went away:

Anyone who uses profanity so frequently it has lost all meaning
Any group who was put together by a RIAA committee
Anyone who's primary talent lies with dancing around the stage looking good and not singing.
Anyone who talks about how great it is to be a gangster and/or dealing drugs, being a pimp, killing cops, and other detestable activities.

Artists who only fit into these groups because they were being ironic or funny (like Devo Spice writing a song about rest home gangsters) don't count here.

[robin-june.livejournal.com]

Gee, if I had known that Rebecca Black was only 13, I wouldn't have repeated those negative judgments on the song.
Then again, I wouldn't have guessed her to be 13 based on the video -- she's made up to look older.

[kilbia.livejournal.com]

"The Humpty Dance" by Digital Underground. At least until Partyben or Robinsk redeem it with a good mashup.