The New Avril Song?

[salm]

There´s nothing wrong with selling out. Money is good.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

There´s nothing wrong with selling out. Money is good.

Not quite. If you get offered a lot of money to continue doing what you like doing, what you're good at doing, and what you can really put your heart behind, go for it.

On the other hand, if you get offered a lot of money to basically be the mouthpiece for someone else, and pretend to be putting your heart behind it in a sad, crude mockery of people who actually put some feeling into what they're doing, you're kind of a whore.

[Mobius]

edit: not mine, saw it on another board

[Asst. Asst. Lt. Cmdr. Smi]

"Girlfriend" might be one of the most evil songs ever recorded. IIRC, she sang versions of it in like eight different languages, so you couldn't just escape it by fleeing to a foreign country until it stops getting airplay.

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

[img]snip[/img]

That's a perfect distillation of the state of all modern pop music!

[Dillon]

"Girlfriend" might be one of the most evil songs ever recorded. IIRC, she sang versions of it in like eight different languages, so you couldn't just escape it by fleeing to a foreign country until it stops getting airplay.

Sigged.

[TithonusSyndrome]

There´s nothing wrong with selling out. Money is good.

Yeah, who needs integrity?

[Old Plympto]

If anyone tries to argue with you that she writes her own songs and they all come from her heart or some bullshit like that, here's an article that should help you argue otherwise.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

If anyone tries to argue with you that she writes her own songs and they all come from her heart or some bullshit like that, here's an article that should help you argue otherwise.

Wait, David Bowie?

But...but...I love Bowie! Please tell me this isn't true, otherwise this will be one hell of a painful disillusionment.

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

And here's a video on how it's all done.

[salm]

There´s nothing wrong with selling out. Money is good.

Not quite. If you get offered a lot of money to continue doing what you like doing, what you're good at doing, and what you can really put your heart behind, go for it.

On the other hand, if you get offered a lot of money to basically be the mouthpiece for someone else, and pretend to be putting your heart behind it in a sad, crude mockery of people who actually put some feeling into what they're doing, you're kind of a whore.

And how would you know that this particular singer isn´t enjoying what she´s doing? Even if she´s a mouthpiece she might enjoy it because she might not care too much about being a mouthpiece. We don´t really know.

<edit>She´s a whore in the sence that every company who promotes itself in ads or commercials in which they claim or leave the impression that they´re actually better than they are.</edit>

[salm]

There´s nothing wrong with selling out. Money is good.

Yeah, who needs integrity?

Well, she´s a business and no one seems to be bashing companies like Intel or VW for wanting to sell out, so why should singers not sell out, too?

[Durandal]

"Fuel" is a twangy country song being played by an arrogant alt-rock band, and the difference between it and the other songs I mentioned is like the difference between a merry-go-round and a world-class rollercoaster. To each his own, of course, but to suggest that Fuel belongs in the same class as the punishment that the other songs dish out is like suggesting that a hang glider and an F-22 deliver the same caliber of excitement.

I swear, music "purists" almost universally piss me off. It's one thing to just not like someone's music, but it's something else to (a) hate music because it's popular and (b) admonish people who dare to disagree with you.

No one on this board will tell you that I'm one of those "Oh everyone's opinion is just as valid" kinds of people. But music is almost totally subjective. Believe it or not, it's actually okay for people to like Avril Lavign's music. Yes, yes, I know she's a "sell out" and not "indie", but incredibly enough, that doesn't mean that people shouldn't be allowed to listen to her music or that her music sucks. Nor does being a snob mean that your completely subjective opinion on music is the Gold Standard.

And if you want to get technical about it, all you "OMG THEY SOLD OUT!!!" whiners base your evaluations of music exclusively on the fact that the artist actually makes money because he signed with a label. In other words, it's an ad hominem attack.

Artists don't write rent checks from a bank account filled with integrity, the "indie spirit", sunshine and farts, believe it or not. Signing with a major label does not automatically mean that an artist's music sucks. It means that someone thinks it has broad appeal.

So please. Get over yourself. I know you have strong opinions on music, and you feel compelled to express them. But you can't actually back them up with anything resembling a logical argument, so you have to posture with vaguely clever metaphors, verbiage and borderline run-on sentences. And really, it's just annoying. I know you feel more pretentious about music than I do, but I have just as much authority to decide what's "good" and "bad" music as you do.

[The Kernel]

"Fuel" is a twangy country song being played by an arrogant alt-rock band, and the difference between it and the other songs I mentioned is like the difference between a merry-go-round and a world-class rollercoaster. To each his own, of course, but to suggest that Fuel belongs in the same class as the punishment that the other songs dish out is like suggesting that a hang glider and an F-22 deliver the same caliber of excitement.

I swear, music "purists" almost universally piss me off. It's one thing to just not like someone's music, but it's something else to (a) hate music because it's popular and (b) admonish people who dare to disagree with you.

No one on this board will tell you that I'm one of those "Oh everyone's opinion is just as valid" kinds of people. But music is almost totally subjective. Believe it or not, it's actually okay for people to like Avril Lavign's music. Yes, yes, I know she's a "sell out" and not "indie", but incredibly enough, that doesn't mean that people shouldn't be allowed to listen to her music or that her music sucks. Nor does being a snob mean that your completely subjective opinion on music is the Gold Standard.

And if you want to get technical about it, all you "OMG THEY SOLD OUT!!!" whiners base your evaluations of music exclusively on the fact that the artist actually makes money because he signed with a label. In other words, it's an ad hominem attack.

Artists don't write rent checks from a bank account filled with integrity, the "indie spirit", sunshine and farts, believe it or not. Signing with a major label does not automatically mean that an artist's music sucks. It means that someone thinks it has broad appeal.

So please. Get over yourself. I know you have strong opinions on music, and you feel compelled to express them. But you can't actually back them up with anything resembling a logical argument, so you have to posture with vaguely clever metaphors, verbiage and borderline run-on sentences. And really, it's just annoying. I know you feel more pretentious about music than I do, but I have just as much authority to decide what's "good" and "bad" music as you do.

Personally, music is the one thing that I refuse to mock people for holding different opinions about. I really don't care if you think Britney Spears' music is the best thing since sliced bread, go ahead and listen to it for all I care.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

<snip>.

It's not so much the music itself I have a problem with. If someone likes the music, fine, I won't have much of a problem with it. It's more the motivation behind liking the music. I just get rather irked when people claim to like mass-produced pop because 'Oh, she's being so independent and anti-mainstream! She's a rebel! Etc!' I have the same problem with 'gangsta rap', when people claim to love the corporate funded stars, wearing nothing but name-brand clothing, because they're 'staying true to themselves', 'keepin' it real' and 'sticking to the man'.

It's not the music itself I hate (though I don't care for the style that much either, but that's a different story). It's the fact that it's essentially dishonest at its base, little more than an advertising gimmick promoting the corporate interests behind it under the guise of 'independence' and 'rebellion'. I have the same damn problem with people who actually believe what they see and hear in TV/radio commercials, which is pretty much what this kind of music is.

If someone says, "Yeah, she's a corporate whore, but I like her voice, and she's rather addicting," I really don't have much to argue with there.

[TithonusSyndrome]

I swear, music "purists" almost universally piss me off. It's one thing to just not like someone's music, but it's something else to (a) hate music because it's popular and (b) admonish people who dare to disagree with you.

I could really care less how broad their appeal is, or hell, what their stance on online music sharing is, but for fuck's sake, don't write some two-note jingly-jangly alt-rock hoedown anthem and expect me to be impressed, especially after hearing how high their first four albums set the bar musically.

No one on this board will tell you that I'm one of those "Oh everyone's opinion is just as valid" kinds of people. But music is almost totally subjective. Believe it or not, it's actually okay for people to like Avril Lavign's music. Yes, yes, I know she's a "sell out" and not "indie", but incredibly enough, that doesn't mean that people shouldn't be allowed to listen to her music or that her music sucks. Nor does being a snob mean that your completely subjective opinion on music is the Gold Standard.

I really wasn't arguing the point about Lavinge, and I don't make it my business to venture into that territory either. There's no way that anyone can come out of an argument like that enriched; I simply accept that some people are going to like it and others are going to rail against it for precisely the same knee-jerk reasons you outlined. I circumvent that entire song-and-dance altogether by not bothering with those circles.

And if you want to get technical about it, all you "OMG THEY SOLD OUT!!!" whiners base your evaluations of music exclusively on the fact that the artist actually makes money because he signed with a label. In other words, it's an ad hominem attack.

Done slashing at that strawman? As I said before, I could care less what the commercial status of the band is AS LONG AS THE MUSIC DELIVERS. The last Judas Priest and Iron Maiden albums were international multi-million sellers, but they actually had TEETH. The song "Demonizer" from the Judas Priest album, "Angel Of Retribution", could pump more blood than Metallica's entire discography since 1991 combined, and THAT is what counts.

Artists don't write rent checks from a bank account filled with integrity, the "indie spirit", sunshine and farts, believe it or not. Signing with a major label does not automatically mean that an artist's music sucks. It means that someone thinks it has broad appeal.

And typically, that broad appeal comes as a result of diluting the source to make it less concentrate.

So please. Get over yourself. I know you have strong opinions on music, and you feel compelled to express them. But you can't actually back them up with anything resembling a logical argument, so you have to posture with vaguely clever metaphors, verbiage and borderline run-on sentences. And really, it's just annoying. I know you feel more pretentious about music than I do, but I have just as much authority to decide what's "good" and "bad" music as you do.

Fine, fine, fine, I'm a "music elitist" and all the rest of the equally hackeneyed backlash if that helps you feel better about my objection, which wasn't even CLOSE to what it was. But I still have a hard time believing that a song like "Fuel", which a mentally handicapped War Amp with no guitar skills could play and a toothless hillbilly could accompany on yodelling vocals, offers anywhere near the same rush as a real thrash metal song with teeth. The kind this band used to make.

[Alferd Packer]

I heard the song on Howard Stern of all places a few weeks ago, except that they were playing this sound effect of a man screaming "FUCK YOU!" in time with the music. It actually sounds cooler with the "FUCK YOU!" sound effects in it.

[phred]

F I still have a hard time believing that a song like "Fuel", which a mentally handicapped War Amp with no guitar skills could play and a toothless hillbilly could accompany on yodelling vocals, offers anywhere near the same rush as a real thrash metal song with teeth. The kind this band used to make.

So does that make "Louie Louie" "Penny Lane" or most other songs written between1945 and 1970 suck? I happen to like Fight Fire With Fire, and Battery, but technical difficulty does not necessarily a good song make. THis is the same argument Rye makes about bands like Cannibal Corpse, who I personally cant stand

[Stormbringer]

There´s nothing wrong with selling out. Money is good.

Yeah, who needs integrity?

Well, she´s a business and no one seems to be bashing companies like Intel or VW for wanting to sell out, so why should singers not sell out, too?

And if she wants to be a corporate tool, so be it. That is her right and she's quite clearly taken it from the beginning.

But what I can object to and find obnoxious is the marketing around her that tries to sell her as a genuine independent, some one that's not a corporate shill. She's no less manufactured than Britney Spears, maybe more when you consider how intensely she's branded as not. Her "creative" output is no less a shell game than Britney Spears.

So exactly why should we not deride the bullshit attempts to sell her as a genuine punk artist?

[Stormbringer]

Personally, music is the one thing that I refuse to mock people for holding different opinions about. I really don't care if you think Britney Spears' music is the best thing since sliced bread, go ahead and listen to it for all I care.

It's one thing to have different tastes in music, one can respect a certain difference of opinion.

But anyone that gushes about a musician that can barely lip-synch "their" music deserves a healthy dose of mockery. The term musician does have certain minimum standards after all and a lot of the present performers epic fail.

[TithonusSyndrome]

F I still have a hard time believing that a song like "Fuel", which a mentally handicapped War Amp with no guitar skills could play and a toothless hillbilly could accompany on yodelling vocals, offers anywhere near the same rush as a real thrash metal song with teeth. The kind this band used to make.

So does that make "Louie Louie" "Penny Lane" or most other songs written between1945 and 1970 suck? I happen to like Fight Fire With Fire, and Battery, but technical difficulty does not necessarily a good song make. THis is the same argument Rye makes about bands like Cannibal Corpse, who I personally cant stand

I don't put the same premium on technical skill that I do on reading comprehension, that's for sure. Did you not hear me say over and over that the bottom line is that the music has to kick ass? The only reason I brought up the fact that Fuel is a two-note song is to reinforce the fact that it's an obnoxious twangy country song that couldn't keep my grandparents from falling asleep. "Louie Louie" and "Penny Lane" aren't metal songs, so they don't have to make me want to stomp accelerators or slam bodies in a moshpit, but Metallica is and that's why that fizzly "Gnar-nar-gnar-nar" sound is such a huge failure. I find it ironic that Durandal should say this:

Artists don't write rent checks from a bank account filled with integrity, the "indie spirit", sunshine and farts, believe it or not.

When Metallica wrote most of their checks on a guitar tone that sounds EXACTLY like a sequence of wet farts. To be fair, they're not the only bad to do this; the worst offender by far is Pantera, but the bottom line is that if your guitar tone sounds like an obnoxious conversation between two warthogs, then I'd be suprised if anyone but the most sheltered of all people could find that exciting.

[Mr. T]

The video for the song I found totally idiotic. She steals the boyfriend of a "nerdy" girl by being a punk-ass bitch and then proceeds to rub it in the girls face and are we supposed to be on her side?

The song itself though, meh, I wouldn't call myself an Avril fan but I don't mind some of her music and the song isn't all that terrible it's just not spectacular either. I have a hard time mustering the kind of bile for it that others in this thread have given it, even if it's going to be all over the radio the next few months.

Although I'll be the first to admit that one of her songs, "Losing my Grip" I think it was called, has some of the worst lyrics I've ever heard.

[Rye]

When Metallica wrote most of their checks on a guitar tone that sounds EXACTLY like a sequence of wet farts. To be fair, they're not the only bad to do this; the worst offender by far is Pantera, but the bottom line is that if your guitar tone sounds like an obnoxious conversation between two warthogs, then I'd be suprised if anyone but the most sheltered of all people could find that exciting.

Hmm, to like a dirty and meaner guitar tone is to be sheltered? Guess I must be a hermit since I like this, and this then.

[TithonusSyndrome]

That's nothing like what I'm talking about, the mids aren't a complete mess and they're actually orchestrating the tone by generously palm muting.

[Durandal]

It's not so much the music itself I have a problem with. If someone likes the music, fine, I won't have much of a problem with it. It's more the motivation behind liking the music. I just get rather irked when people claim to like mass-produced pop because 'Oh, she's being so independent and anti-mainstream! She's a rebel! Etc!' I have the same problem with 'gangsta rap', when people claim to love the corporate funded stars, wearing nothing but name-brand clothing, because they're 'staying true to themselves', 'keepin' it real' and 'sticking to the man'.

That's not why people like music. That's why they like artists. I find it difficult to believe that people listen to music they actually hate because the artist is a "rebel".

It's not the music itself I hate (though I don't care for the style that much either, but that's a different story). It's the fact that it's essentially dishonest at its base, little more than an advertising gimmick promoting the corporate interests behind it under the guise of 'independence' and 'rebellion'. I have the same damn problem with people who actually believe what they see and hear in TV/radio commercials, which is pretty much what this kind of music is.

The difference is that a ton of music is meant to market a fantasy.

I could really care less how broad their appeal is, or hell, what their stance on online music sharing is, but for fuck's sake, don't write some two-note jingly-jangly alt-rock hoedown anthem and expect me to be impressed, especially after hearing how high their first four albums set the bar musically.

Hm, this sounds a lot like ... mindless posturing.

Done slashing at that strawman? As I said before, I could care less what the commercial status of the band is AS LONG AS THE MUSIC DELIVERS. The last Judas Priest and Iron Maiden albums were international multi-million sellers, but they actually had TEETH. The song "Demonizer" from the Judas Priest album, "Angel Of Retribution", could pump more blood than Metallica's entire discography since 1991 combined, and THAT is what counts.

Hey look! More proclamations that your subjective opinion is absolutely correct.

And typically, that broad appeal comes as a result of diluting the source to make it less concentrate.

Actually, I would say that the broad appeal comes as a result of generalizing the solution space to include more combinations of input variables.

See? I can apply metaphors to music too that sound fancy but really have no basis for relationship.

Music isn't a liquid. It doesn't follow the same rules as liquids.

Fine, fine, fine, I'm a "music elitist" and all the rest of the equally hackeneyed backlash if that helps you feel better about my objection, which wasn't even CLOSE to what it was. But I still have a hard time believing that a song like "Fuel", which a mentally handicapped War Amp with no guitar skills could play and a toothless hillbilly could accompany on yodelling vocals, offers anywhere near the same rush as a real thrash metal song with teeth. The kind this band used to make.

Hm, a back-handed concession with more verbiage and clever sounding metaphors to stand in place of a defensible position. How original.