Damien Omen 2013

I have long harbored suspicions that the Canadian haircut that sings, Justin Bieber, is the devil incarnate -- the augur of the end of the world. There is much evidence supporting this position, from the aforementioned haircut to the way he terrorizes the otic-sensitive among us with not only his only drivel but that of other pop-saccharine inspired "artists" like Carly Rae Jepsen, who he helped make famous. Now a visit to the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam has further solidified my apocalyptic nightmare. After the visit, Bieber tweeted: 

"Truly inspiring to be able to come here. Anne was a great girl. Hopefully she would have been a belieber." 

I've thought of a number of clever codas, but are they really necessary?

Gossip Girl Talent Just Too Big to Contain on TV Screen Alone

Remember when bands struggled through years of poverty and degradation to get a shot at success. Thankfully we have all but eliminated this route to fame for at least one group . . . the already famous. One actor after another has taken a shot at traversing the musical big time (Keanu Reeves, Bruce Willis, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Danza, John Travolta, Peter Gallagher, Don Johnson, Barbara Streisand, Steven Seagal, Robert Downey Jr., Minnie Driver, Eddie Murphy, Jamie Foxx, Milla Jovovich, Zooey Dashanel, William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, Jason Schwartzman, Kris Kristofferson, etc., etc., etc.). Are they any good? A few are, but can we admit most are slightly better than the American Idol first round cuts.

In case you haven't got enough of these career-benders, actor-cum-pop stars, the siren from Gossip Girls Leighton Meester has joined the list: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xb1xmf_leighton-meester-somebody-to-love_music?from=feedblitz_523284_2884808. Who exactly has the poor taste to put this crap out, you ask? The same sort of people that gave us the Backdoor Boys, 'N Sync, Miley Cyrus, and just about anything you hear on the radio these days.

Rolling Stone

Several years ago I received a Rolling Stone with N' Sync on the cover. This followed a Brittany Spears cover and one for Backstreet Boys a few weeks earlier. This was too much for me and I soon sent them a letter I'm sure they never read along with my subcription cancellation. I have never bought an issue since. Maybe a silly elitist stance, or a music snob taking his utterly meaningless revenge on a music industry that has grown increasingly homongenous, uninventive and thoroughly unimaginative. Sure there is still great music on the edges, in local bars, available for download and even among the increasingly undifferentiable mainstream acts. But we essentially have three popular tones today -- the angst-ridden, attitude filled, empowered young female star singing of lost love, sex and the random musings of her mind, angt-ridden, ethereal males exhorting their own failed love, successful love and other largely meaningless though truthful confessional tunes and a variety of geriatic has-beens that continue to play because nothing better has come along to replace them. Nostalgia is certainly a strong impulse, but do we really still need to see the Rolling Stones creak their old bodies across the stage or revive the old Allman Brother with a mere two original members and fewer hit tunes than brain cells since 1973?

A little more than a decade ago, the hybrid move of music showed great promise for the future. Since then, Ipods, p2p and other technological advances have seriously endangered the fate of the music industry. Their response has been to charge astronomical prices for concerts of the hottest acts, to create carefully constructed brands that safely replicate the past and to reduce their catalogs and focus on one has been rejuvenation after another and anything teenage girls and boys will listen to. In line with this general movement is the latest Rolling Stone issue, which treats the maligned Jonas Brothers with far too much earnestness and respect. The boys have no life outside music, of course, except some dating that does not include sex (the three have signed on to abstain until marriage) and seem to have more business acumen than actual talent. Is this really the future we want for our children and our art? It's nothing new really, but the encomiums we too often offer to teenage stars and their skills at branding, marketing and essentially selling themselves as what other teenagers want may be overlooking the overarching trend to commodify everything in sight. I will stop here for now, but continue with this theme this week . . .