Rock ‘n Roll in the Obama Era: The Ass-Kissing Years
by Mr. Wrestling IVYou know, when you do something really stupid late at night, like read Henry Rollins’ Dispatches section on his website, and you come across his characterization of the tea parties happening around the country as “Small groups of grouchy white people acting out and being ridiculous,” not only do you realize that Rollins is a self-hating grouchy white person, but also that we have entered a whole new era of Rock ‘n Roll: The Ass-Kissing Years.
–
Where this… meets this.
Now let me get this straight: there are a number of protests by free citizens who think the government confiscates too much of their money and spends it unwisely, and the angry rock anarchist Henry Rollins is on the government’s side? What the hell happened to Rollins? He was head of the band Black Flag in the 80s, a hell-raising, system-smashing anarchist punk band. He wrote songs like Family Man, and lyrics like “swimming in the mainstream is such a lame dream,” for crying out loud. But now, in his dotage, he spends his time ridiculing anyone who speaks up against the almighty State, and calling out anyone who refuses to kiss Presidential ass with him now that his guy won. Then again, maybe he’s just feeling guilty and trying to make up for writing White Minority way back when.
Sadly it’s not just Rollins. John Mellencamp recently incoherently blamed Ronald Reagan’s trickle-down economics for ruining the music business, proving that he knows nothing about economics or the music business (which might explain why he hasn’t had a hit since he covered a Van Morrison song fifteen years ago). Oh, wait; unless you count that Chevrolet commercial, where Mellencamp became a tool for an evil American corporation by singing a song pretending that he loves America, a double scoop of hypocrisy with sprinkles and whipped cream that is so rich and multi-layered that it’s hard to stomach all at once.
Bruce Springsteen pushed his 2007 album “Magic” on “60 Minutes” by foolishly reciting a list of President Bush’s “crimes,” including illegal wiretapping and “no habeas corpus“, and yet now that President Obama has continued these very same policies (making them not only legal, but possibly divine), the Boss’s mouth has been noticeably shut, probably because it’s very hard to speak when your lips are fervently puckered up and moving respectfully toward the nearest powerful Democrat’s ass.
Jon Bon Jovi, among other distasteful acts of sucking up to various Democrats, went on Larry King in 2006 and called Al Gore “the smartest man I’ve ever met…. We do get together socially and I just sit in awe of him.”
Good Grief, Jon, what happened to “Livin’ On a Prayer“? What an anthem of self-reliance that was! “We’re halfway there, take my hand, we’ll make it I swear?” Now you’re sitting in AWE of some hack politician who won’t even turn off his own lights for Earth Hour? Mellencamp? What happened to “I fight authority, authority always wins“? “Ain’t that America, home of the free”? And Springsteen? What happened to “I’ve got this guitar and I’m learning how to make it talk”? Did a government program teach you to play, Bruce? “This is a town full of losers/and I’m pulling out of here to win”? If the government guarantees that there will be no losers, how the hell will anyone ever win?
What happened to the rock and roll I grew up with that was about freedom and individuality, about working for a living, taking pride in your independence, making your own way, not letting anybody tell you what to do, etc. etc.? Or even about ”YOU GOTTA FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHT TO PARTY,” for God’s sake? What happened to good old-fashioned rock ‘n roll rebellion? When did these big rockers, who made it by their talent and their hard work, with no help from the government, all turn into big government-worshipping statists?
Maybe Rollins and Springsteen and Mellencamp and all the other members of the new breed of hell-raising rock ‘n roll ass-kissers were never the big rebels we thought they were. Maybe they never believed that stuff they sang about. Maybe the whole point for them, all along, was just to be popular. Maybe they were just guys suffering from short-man syndrome who wanted everybody to love them and think they were cool. And now, since they’ve lost the knack for writing cool songs that people dig, they have found the ultimate easy path to coolness just by being a cool Obama supporter.
But then again, maybe it’s not even that complicated. Maybe they’re not that unique, even though they can sing and play the guitar. Maybe they are just some typical self-righteous liberals, who think to themselves, “I am so great because I voted for that BLACK GUY! He was BLACK, and I’m so cool and non-racist that I voted for him ANYWAY! And look at all those RACISTS over there who voted AGAINST the BLACK guy! I am SO much way cooler than them!” They call conservatives who have a principled stand against Obama’s policies racist, when in fact it is they for whom it is all about race.
Because there are basically two kinds of Obama voters:
1) True believers who want a powerful, totalitarian state that enforces fairness by confiscating property from one American and giving it to another, and that provides all basic needs for every American so that noone suffers, and…
2) People who don’t really care what Obama does or says, and just like him because they think it makes them cool.
You can at least respect the former as adversaries. The latter are just trifling thinkers, who don’t care if their President quadruples the spending of the last President, or if he sends more troops into battle. Because it’s not about policy to them. It’s about how Obama makes them feel.
So pucker up, all you aging rockers out there. It’s a new, exciting time in rock history. Gone are the days when the Young Rascals sang “People Got To Be Free” :
All the world over, so easy to see
People everywhere just wanna be free
I can’t understand it, so simple to me
People everywhere just got to be free
If there’s a man who is down and needs a helping hand
All it takes is you to understand and to see him through
Seems to me, we got to solve it individually
And I’ll do unto you what you do to me
There’ll be shoutin’ from the mountains on out to sea
(out to the sea)
No two ways about it, people have to be free
(they got to be free)
Sadly, these Old Rascals, like Springsteen and Mellencamp and the others, are singing a much different tune these days, and it goes something like, “People everywhere, just kiss ass like me!”
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378 Comments
Its funny one of the most libertarian leaning rock albums every created and dedicated to Ayn Rand, was 2112 by Rush. A band from Canada. Go figure.
Great article! Please, please…more articles exposing the revolting corruption of the music industry. The people in it are the scum of the earth! And they portray themselves as morally superior! This industry as it exists needs to die a painful death!
The thing is Barak isn't mainstream. Only conservatives are. If you are anything but a conservative you are perpetually grandfathered in to the out of the mainstream cool kids club. Regardless if you are a sell out or not. You get a pass on that.
Remember Joey Ramone? Punk founding father. Repressed and belittled because of his politics. The fact that he was one of THE RAMONES couldn't rescue him from scorn. Somehow in spite of his politics he managed to be part of one of the most popular punk groups ever.
The thing is Barak isn't mainstream. Only conservatives are. If you are anything but a conservative you are perpetually grandfathered in to the out of the mainstream cool kids club. Regardless if you are a sell out or not. You get a pass on that.
Remember Joey Ramone? Punk founding father. Repressed and belittled because of his politics. The fact that he was one of THE RAMONES couldn't rescue him from scorn. Somehow in spite of his politics he managed to be part of one of the most popular punk groups ever.
Wow, I had no idea about any of this. Perhaps it was never about principle to them.
Then again, it is the music industry.
Great post, thanks Mr. ! this so nails the "rebels", yeah, the rock n rollers were rebels all right. They just happened to be "Sandinistas" rebels a la the Clash (a band I loved and saw many times) when I was stupid a**. Old rockers and their old hippie fans are now "The Wall" of conformity that holds up the new central state government.
My GF is a psychology major and she says that once people have made up their minds that something is a particular way (eg. Bush is Evil, Obambi is the Messiah and A Great Thinker) then they stop noticing the information that contradicts their viewpoint. It's possible that these peoples' brains just don't see what Obama's doing, as crediting Bush for anything would make their tiny heads explode.
Dictators and monarchs have always had Court Musicians. Why should Barry be any different? So you lose your edgy cred. Liberal chicks will still give it up if you voted correctly (or if you claim to have done so).
I'm pretty sure White Minority pre-dates Rollins' time in Black Flag (they had three singers before him. You don't remember Chavo Pederast?!). But yeah, he doesn't seem to realize he's part of the "establishment" now. Growing up as a punk in the eighties is what gave me my healthy skepticism about government. It's too bad he lost his, unless he was only skeptical about conservatives. Some of us took the slogan "Question Authority" seriously and still do, even when the Democrats are the authorities.
yes- '2112' railed against the Evils of Communism, and the great Objectivist song 'Free Will' has this chorus:
You can choose a ready guide in some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice
You can choose from phantom fears and kindness that can kill
I will choose a path that's clear
I will choose free will…
great stuff…
You should try some Megadeth.
Henry Rollins couldn't spell CAT if you spotted him the C and the T. It's funny that his lips are firmly stuck to Obama's buttocks, because I doubt the Obamas would allow Rollins in their home….
What these a-holes don't realize is that it was the individualism supported by conservatives that allowed them to become millionaires. And Jon Bon Jovi needs his head examined, last time I checked Tipper Gore was not a big fan of rock and roll…..
You mean Johnny. Joey was a (very patriotic) liberal. Johnny was the conservative.
The slogan now is "Question O-thority"
Unfortunately, the latest manifestation of court musicians encompasses court jesters. They've lost their musical talent, and they aren't funny so the Obamists have ruined two former trades. Rollins is just a tired tatooed loudmouth. Protest songs go way back. Woody Guthrie was my first introduction to them, but he was getting pretty old by then, so we got Dylan. Folk music had a lot of protest, but rock and roll was where it was at. It was my generation that coined the phrase "sex, drugs and rock and roll." I'm still trying to decide if that was all good.
But throughout most of my lifetime, there were popular singers and groups on both sides and in multiple musical genres. Sadly, there are very few patriotic R&R groups outside of Southern Rock today. It used to be about protest, but now it's about hate, and for the most part the hate is directed at the middle and the right. It's going to be a long four years both politically and musically. The politics will be exciting, and the music will be dull.
I think what it comes down to is that many of these musicians have been told "You're So Great!" for so long, they forgot what it was like NOT to have the talent…NOT knowing how to hold a guitar or write a song. If you believe yourself to be a Rock God and forget all the hard work that goes into your craft, you don't think others are capable of doing great things.
Maybe it's the guilt of success or general contempt…I don't know.
"Bodies–I'm not an animal!"
I don't know if Johnny Rotten would take that one back or not, but that's a protest song against the status quo.
It's pathetically tragic that "legends" like Dylan, Mellencamp, and Bon Jovi are living solely off their old hits. As your article states, they haven't had a hit in decades. Thus, the ONLY way they think they can remain valid even as they middle age (or become senior citizens) is to blast everything conservative, and live/eat/breathe the Obama Nation.
Little do they know the Kool-Aid's been poisoned.
Rock and Roll was always about getting the chicks. And chicks dig rebels. Hence rebel songs. This one was easy.
Tipper saw the devil on her MTV…
Is it just my imagination, or does Rollins moonlight as a second stringer for the WWF?
To be fair, Dylan's recent albums have done quite well, and Bon Jovi's last album hit #1 in 2007.
so true. Ran in to him at a Duran Duran concert at the Park West in Chicago back in, say '77 or so. Great guy, loathed Jimmy the Peanut… and was the only 'real' Italian in The Ramones…
Will chicks dig rebels who rebel against Obama? Not in my town…
If he could figure out how to lace up his tights….
I saw him in an interview once and he just came off as a complete moron. Some musicians are quite brilliant, they can express a coherent thought. Not Rollins. That guy might be mildly retarded.
they do- and we're not sure Rollins really believes the stuff he says now anyway- what is most distressing about this is that what they are is scared- scared the hissing vipers will turn on them if they don't toe the party line. And they're most likely correct. Bad Henry Rollins. Afraid of dissing Obamunism. Too bad, so sad…
It isn't just the enterainers who have swallowed the Obama Kool-Aid, the rock D.J.s seem to also have "tingly feelings running up their legs. One prime example is KLOS's D.J. Jim Ladd. Hardly a night goes by without him gushing over Obama. If it wasn't for the music he plays (he's actually a great D.J.), I probably wouldn't bother listening.
Tipper and Al suffer from the same malady. They both need to be saviors.
One wanted to censor everything to save us from ourselves, the other wants to scare everybody into adopting ridiculous "green" laws to save us from ourselves….
I wonder how we got along without them….
ok I stand corrected.
But my point remains the same
Everyone with a working mind is inherently distrustful of authority for good or ill. Trouble is, most people are fairly narrow and inconsistent about it's application – i.e. authority that supports certain things that they LIKE doesn't look "so bad." The same guy who boasts about what a big lover of the local cops he is when they "bust" the punk kids down the street is muttering under his breath about "effin' cops…" and "my tax dollars at work…" when he gets pulled for speeding.
When it comes to it most "liberal" artists and entertainers (at least, the ones that actually ARE well-versed in it to begin with), they aren't nearly as "down" with federal authority as they seem to be during Democrat administrations – they just tend to have a MUCH bigger issue with the authority thats seen as dominating "conservatism;" i.e. The Church.
That was Johnny. Although I do remember a benefit the band played around 1979 with an ad that read "Guns For Afghan Rebels" [who were fighting the Russians at that time, for you new comers
]
Great article, Mr Wrestling IV. Most of these rock and rollers, and Hollywood type in general, were much more patriotic when they didn't have agents, managers, groupies to kiss their asses. Being around some of these bands before they made to the mainstream, I can see how fame and money changed many of them. They soon alienate their original fans for the mass to sell their records (CD's and iTunes to the young'uns, sellouts to us older folkies).
Mr. Wrestling, you just listed a bunch of MILLIONAIRES as well as liberals. These people, even fringe dwellers like Rollins want to stay on the "A" list in Hollywood and New York. Share the G-5 to Cannes, get asked to Obama's White House. All these punks would sell their souls for $1.00. That's why they don't mind selling our country down the toilet for free.
I remember Chavo Pederast, he was great! Rollins didn't write lyrics for a while with BF, I think Greg Ginn did all music and lyrics for a while.
I've seen him a couple of times live (if you can use that term to describe him). He has a perpetual scowl on his face, and it never seems to change, regardless of what he is trying to express. Botox, maybe? Or is it something in the dye they use for the tattoos?
Your guess is as good as mine. Personally I think it's a grimace of pain as the 2 surviving brain cells fight over supremacy….
And didn't Bon Jovi slip into darkness about the same time he got his metrosexual chest hair wax?
This is known as building a cognitive frame or map. If you really get stuck in one, no other data can get in there.
Mellencamp is a mental midget as well as a physical one.
Ask Sir Mick.
I am still waiting for BO to tax the rich. Start with these twerps and take 90% of everything they make. Money where your mouth is!
Idjit.
This column isn't even worth the paper it's printed on. Which means you owe me money for even deigning to read your puerile craps, you simp.
I really hate to bash the guy. He's from close to where I am and he seems like a generally good guy. But to be in awe of Al Gore……wow…….just wow…….
He can't be all bad. He worked for Hillary before he worked for Obama. Of course that's a little like choosing between Lizzie Borden and Alfred E. Newman.
Henry Rollins loving Obama isn't a big surprise – he's been an outspoken left-winger for as long as he's been doing his boring 'spoken word' appearances. He's also a fabulously wealthy celebrity who probably has some guilt.
And I don't doubt that some of it his about his showy love for black people – in one of his 'shows' he makes a point of talking about how he defended a black fellow worker from racist Southern co-workers at some factory at which he worked. It's a really pointless story (like all of Rollins' stories), except to make a public spectacle of how progressive and amazing he is.
"Money & Corruption, are ruining the land, crooked politicians betraying the working man, pocketing the profits, and treating us like sheep, we're tired of hearing promises, that we know they'll never keep" Song by the Kinks from l973 Preservation Act l album – written by lead singer Ray Davies
So, what are/were Mr. Wrestling I/II/III's political views? Any other conservative wrestlers we can hear from?
Actually, kidding aside, I read this site on a daily basis and I find interesting the diversity of the contributors. Keep it up. I think the greater variety of contributors, the more people will see that the views here are mainstream.
The Times, they have a-changed. Challenging the political establishment isn't what it used to be.
OUT: Sticking it to the Man.
IN: Getting the Man re-elected!
The Times, they have a-changed. Challenging the political establishment isn't what it used to be.
OUT: Sticking it to the Man.
IN: Getting the Man re-elected!
Hey I'm not saying he's the sharpest crayon in the box. Hell, next to Henry Rollins Bon Jovi is a Rhodes scholar.
Lizzie Borden and Alfred E. Newman…..a more apt comparison I can't think of, bravo….
Peace sells? Who's buying???
In the movie "Heat," there's the scene where 140 lb. Al Pacino slams 200lb Rollins through the sliding glass doors. I always watched that scene with my "suspended reality" hat on, thinking in real life that most likely wouldn't happen.
After seeing what a CONFORMIST WEENIE Rollins has become, I guess little Al probably could take him.
Jon Bonjovi's only two hits were: Livin on my hair, and You give Rock a bad name.
Shorter "Mr. Wrestling IV":
"These libtard rockers are so completely irrelevant that I'm going to write 500 words on how much they enrage me."
Springsteen would have to cheat off of Mellencamp's paper and they both would have to hide in the locker room during P.E. I never knew anyone with a pair that ever owned a Springsteen or John Cougar album in the in the 70's or 80's. Maybe let it play on the radio, but not spend $$$ on them.
Next to Henry Rollins, my cat is a Rhodes scholar. But her little claws damage the guitar.
True. How many patriotic liberals do you see around here nowadays?
What do you mean I don't believe in God? I talk to him every day.
I love that song!
Hey, their guy won.
All that stuff about challenging authority? You've been punked.
Well, at least you can't say there was no truth in advertising.
so far, so good- so what?
Ever see the cover of the Henrietta Collins and the Wife Beating Child Haters? He's in Black face. I'm sure he won't be pressing that album any time soon.
and bully to them, I don't begrudge anyone their hard work and profit from the fruits of their talent but none of these guys has had to sweat it out financially lately. You think Rollins has had to live in his van since the 80's? Get up on a cold morning and warm the old Buick up, get into crappy traffic and work at a lumber yard or even pound the pavement at the car lot like I did for years? Nope. For Rollins to critize average hard working Americans at a protest shows that he has lost touch. Money must do that, I wouldn't know.
"Holy Wars" is a song that never gets old either.
Mr. Wrestling, the way you continually slam the lefties to the mat, we may just start referring to you as "Sgt. Slaughter" !
It's funny to see the bad-ass anti-authority rebels of rock music all of a sudden turn into a bunch of kiss-ass Nellie Olesons who lavish in tattling on anyone who doesn't worship the policies of the state.
While it's true that Bruce put out his "The Ghost of Tom Joad" album during the Clinton years, he and Mellencamp usually only shine a light (and assign blame) at/to the state when 1600 Pennsylvania is inhabited by a Republican.
In fact, back in 2003, when we California voters used the recall election in order to oust the corrupt Gray Davis in favor of The Governator, Mellencamp rushed to Davis' defense by unironically saying (and I paraphrase), "Aww, in California, they're just trying to blame Governor Davis for some fiscal problems."
Yeah, Johnny Cougar, and you've nevvvvver stooped to blaming a governor or President for "some fiscal problems," right ?
Ha, ha, ha.
Pretty sure Greg Ginn was with them when they wrote "White Minority" but I could be wrong.
"Bodies" is one of those songs that the trendy new punk kids try to pretend never existed.
Rollins is clownshoes, and to me all his "spoken word" is are the inane babblings of some pretentious twit who can't be bothered to write music anymore. It's not art, it's talking, and not coherent talking either.
As for patriotic bands, Three Doors Down wrote a pretty good song for the National Guard, Drowning Pool has performed for the troops in Iraq and I think Joan Jett either has, or is approaching, the record for the most USO concerts for the troops. But they're in the minority on the patriotic rock scene for sure.
Nobody likes to admit mistakes even to themselves, especially when they invested their credibility in a public way. Once you have screamed and hollered how great Obama is, and cried over his speeches in front of your peers, how can you go back? What will this do to your standing in the group? Like any young guy who can´t admit the car he saved so hard for is a lemon. Like the father in "A Christmas Story" who won´t concede that his leg lamp is an abomination. I have certainly done it. I´m sure there´s a name for that condition?
Waiter212, if you were dumb enough to print out something you could see for free on the screen, then you owe Wrestler IV an "I'm an idiot" fee instead.
he always seemed like a 'rocker' whose mom ironed his t-shirts, to me.
Oingo Boingo had some great songs like "Capitalism" http://www.lyricsfreak.com/o/oingo+boingo/capital...
and "Only a lad".
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/o/oingo+boingo/only+a+...
And as far as i know he and Bridget Fonda (his wife and niece to Jane) have kept silent on their politics.
You want to make me sick? Just show that photo of President Obama with his arm around Springsteen or Jackson Browne or whomever else used to, at least, seem to matter but now are happy to be "cool" political accessories. They should truly be ashamed of themselves. I can only hope that one day they wake up with the biggest case of "the icks", as someone once called it, that anyone has ever come down with.
I'll have to check them out. I know there are some out there, but the utterly overwhelming left wing, anti-American numbers are depressing. And the proof of the pudding is in the bad taste it leaves behind.
Don't bring up pudding man, I'm still really upset about the whole pie thing. I really was looking forward to some pie.
"they aren't nearly as "down" with federal authority as they seem to be during Democrat administrations"
Ok, so when do they start complaining? Otherwise where is the point?
they just tend to have a MUCH bigger issue with the authority thats seen as dominating "conservatism;" i.e. The Church
They are ok with the Christian left.
You are maybe overthinking it. This is aristocracy we are talking about. Freed from traditional needs and restrictions, there is not much to do for them but to care about their self esteem and image and of course their peers. Being a rebel carries a prize. Ideally, you want to feel brave, but not actually do brave things, or hard things. So they simulate. Like Don Obama and Boss Pelosi are simulating that they´re making hard and new decisons when they dole out our money to special interest groups.
The Kinks. What a band. "The tax man's taken all my dough, and left me in my stately home, lazing on a sunny afternoon. And I can't sail my yacht, he's taken everything I've got" Timely then, timely now.
Yes, that "love" is highly self serving. Do these progressives defend brilliant intellectuals like Clarence Thomas and Thomas Sowell (both have fascinating life stories and, quite unlike Obama, overcame serious obstacles) or black Republicans like Ken Blackwell and Michael Steele and Lynn Swann? Do they celebrate their historic achievements? No, they ridicule them. Conservative blacks aren´t "authentic" and can be attacked by whites.
Agreed. Rollins however didn't write "White Minority" and in fact he hardly wrote anything in Flag. 90%+ of their material was by guitarist Greg Ginn. "White Minority" pre-dates Rollins membership in the band (though he did sing it a lot on stage).
Might as well give up. We ain't never getting that pie.
Shorter Blarty Blarckleblart, "This BigHollywood.com website is such an 'irrelevant' right-wing crackpot hang-out, that I'm going to spend 3 hours every day taking a fine-toothed comb to everything they say !"
(and after pushing 'submit comment,' Blarty has the following revelatory stream of semi-consciousness)
"Why do I spend so much time at this irrelevant website ? Is it because I know it is actually a RELEVANT website ? My elderly mother is pressuring me to go out and get a job. I think I can say, "Would you like fries with that ? I feel guilty about freeloading off my mother—-I should be supporting HER. Nah, wait….that's what the government is for !!"
Ha, ha, ha.
[...] Comparisons Rock
Ah, my old nemeses Mr. Wrestling I…aw shoot, I gotta give it to ya. Great article. The only silver lining in this whole Obama thing is that these aging rockers now have officially lost any shred of cool they had. They're now the man. We'll have to listen to their great songs and pretend they're singing about Obama. But on a good side there are some great rockers like the Melvins or the OC punk bands or even Five For Fighting if that's your thing who aren't down like that.
he seemed cool back when i was rebeling against my dad. But now? Not so much
It is amazing how things that once impressed me seem passe now that i have some perspective.
Excellent post. I too, am dissapointed with Rollins. Just listen to the song LA Money Train, where he rants against the plastic narcissism of Hollywood. Now he's become a plastic narcissist, supporting a plastic narcissist POTUS.
I regret the error. I am not as familiar with the early imbecilities of Mr. Rollins as I could be (notice I did not say "should" be). Sloppy research on my part.
The more hear these guys babble the more I think they need to have their prescrips upped tenfold. It's not doing the job. These people are fools. The less we buy, the less they make, the less they can spew their drivel.
The more hear these guys babble the more I think they need to have their prescrips upped tenfold. It's not doing the job. These people are fools. The less we buy, the less they make, the less they can spew their drivel.
Rollins has to keep his fanbase happy, the hipsters who read his blogs, the old punks that became gainfully employed and actually buy his poetry books and attend his readings. These days, music is an afterthought with Rollins, it's all about his spoken word damage and has been for many years (anyone remember his solo efforts? "I'm a liar"?)….I liked some Black Flag, but they were one of the crappier SST bands. They did a good live show but that's when Henry was a hair farmer. Minutemen and Husker Du did the label much more justice. But Black Flag helped give Henry a crack at his true passion – poetry & to be a critic who is 'of the punk rock ability' ! But he doesn't offer much in the way of humor or insight–he has fantasies of making Ann Coulter his sex slave. Or he bashes U2 for ten minutes at a poetry reading in Dublin, which the Irish crowd lapped up like it was a refreshing sermon but let's face it, anyone going to a Rollins appearance isn't going to be a big fan of U2 or care what anyone says about them. Besides, the South Park guys dissected Bono five ways from sundown and more effectively than Rollins did. And it was funny. Henry Rollins is neither deep nor funny, just a blast furnace of hot air and a fraud.
kind of like saying "Bush was a good president."
Talent and character are not interchangeable, and I never understood the media or the public's knee-jerk assumption that, just because undereducated, unwashed Troll A can play some wicked electric guitar licks, Troll A is automatically an insightful, interesting or even likeable person with anything even remotely valuable to offer society beyond those groovy gee-tar licks. Same with athletes: Pituitary Case A can extend his arms overhead, leap a foot or two, and stuffs a basketball through a hoop. Somehow this qualifies him to offer social and political commentary. More insanely, I am somehow supose to listen in slack-jawed awe and follow in lock-step conformity to whatever he (or she) says.
I blame a fawning, sychophantic media and a non-discerning public. Both reap what they sow and deserve what they get. For every decent, thoughtful athletic or artistic "celebrity," there must be dozens who are sheer narcissistic, nit-witted buffoons. I wouldn't want them mowing my lawn, never mind telling me how to live my life.
Excellent article!! You are to be commended sir, for standing up for what you believe in.
Sadly though, as I'm sure you're well aware of, the Obamabots will come looking for you and shut you down, because after all and as you said – anyone who doesn't follow blindly The Supreme And Beloved Leader and The Chosen One is labeled a racist and homophobe. And this is how a supposedly "tolerant and all inclusive Party, regardless of ideology" is supposed to act?
Oh that's right. I forgot that now He has been elected, they don't need to be nice anymore. How telling…
Furthermore…I have heard countless musical types confess that their initial inspiration for picking up their instruments was a desire to get laid fast and often. Okay, I'm down with that. That's as laudauble a goal as any, I suppose. Certainly it's a whole less noxious than when they, like old ALvin Lee of "Ten Years After," start singing that they'd "love to change the world." Worse yet is when they start acting on that desire. Then we're all in trouble.
Wow. Just when I thought that no better proof exists that the collective stupidity of the whiny, elitist, knee-jerk, bleeding-heart (solely for your own elitst ilk as well as for welfare cheats and illegal immigrants – you know, the Democrat Party voting bloc?) Anti-America/American, uber-liberal, communist/socialist/Democrat Party is surpassed ONLY by their incredible and mind numbing intellectual dishonesty, here you come spewing your oral diarrhea all over the place. Well done, you imbecilic child.
Now run along and go back down into your Mommy's basement where you still live and play with your Barbie dolls and leave the political discourse to those of us far more intelligent than you, little boy.
Bye-bye now!
The old hippies, the old rockers, the old "fight the power" rebels, how wonderfully ironic to see them bowing to the establishment.
You guys are just now figuring it out that maybe rocknroll "Rebels" just might be selling you a bill of goods? Gee, ya think?
Rock "music" has been marketed like toilet paper for over 50 years. "Rebellion" and "Speaking Truth to Power" are just brand names and marketing shucks, and you da shuckee. Pay attention, for chrissake. No wonder the Koskids can't keep their chins wiped for Gore and the Zero – look what their parents have bought.
I use Bruce's albums to help put me to sleep. Eerily soothing or I just want to sleep so I won't hear them anymore. I like some of Bruce's stuff but find most (95%) of it is very bad. He's highly overrated. Now I know why the girly left loves him – they're highly overrated.
Did someone say "Individualism"
Bravo
Pssst! Blarty
Please copy the foloowing message and post it on Alec Baldwins next post under the name "Froody Headed Mr. Whipple Where's my Towel" The password to that ID is I@mSuc{AT001. It's spells something in eLite but I don't speak that language.
The message is
Ja boo3 f8re h8 y0 m@m@ y2 libt@rd sn0b
Make sure Shatner does not read the message that is very important!!!!
Pssst! Blarty
Please copy the foloowing message and post it on Alec Baldwins next post under the name "Froody Headed Mr. Whipple Where's my Towel" The password to that ID is I@mSuc{AT001. It's spells something in eLite but I don't speak that language.
The message is
Ja boo3 f8re h8 y0 m@m@ y2 libt@rd sn0b
Make sure Shatner does not read the message that is very important!!!!
Dave Matthews comes off as a moron when he is interviewed and he always sounds like he has just huffed a can or two of paint.
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