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Currently Convinced: The Justin Bieber Edition

I am currently convinced that this could be proof that God has not forsaken us.

Indeed, Justin Bieber is starting to hit the Britney Spears trend. His original deluded fans are growing out of their age range, and new fans are hard to come by. I have never understood how or why he was popular. At best, he’s a YouTube creation using a heavy dab of Michael Jackson and Justin Timberlake. He has the sex appeal of celery. He also really doesn’t have any songs anyone knows. I defy the average person on the street to name one of his hits.

I am not joking when I say this: the first time I saw Bieber, I thought it was a joke. His thin voice, his ridiculous “choreography,” and his hideously juvenile songs were so bad that I thought I was supposed to be laughing. If memory serves, it was on the Today show a few years back, and the laudatory reaction from the Today staff finally clued me in that this was no laughing thing. People, apparently, were paying this guy to make records.

He may well be a perfectly nice kid, but everything about his music feels like something the neighbor kid does to torture the adults on New Years Eve. “Hey, I can put on a show!” Nothing about him convinced me that there was talent to be nurtured or an original voice to be heard.

So, yeah, maybe we can all put this shameful moment behind us and embrace the Post-Bieber Era.

I know I will.

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Surprising Stone Roses Hijinks

Stone Roses Poster

Here’s the timeline: In the early 90’s, the Stone Roses made pretty music. In the mid-90’s, they fell apart in an unsurprising mess of egos and general rock band stupidity. Now, in 2012, they would like another paycheck, please.

Well, that’s how I see it, anyway.

I actually enjoyed a good number of the Roses’ songs– “Fools Gold” and “I Wanna Be Adored” being the top of their catalog for me– but imagined that the band members were probably insufferable jerks in person. I don’t even mind that they wanted to cash in on some un-fulfilled Stone Roses love still percolating in the hearts of their fans. Still, the idea that them embarking on a world tour would end up in smooth sailing is a bit funny to me. I expect that this particular report from the Beeb is just the beginning of a story with twists, turns, ego outbursts, and much drunken, aging rock star tom foolery. Please, Lord, let this be the high point of the tour.

Singer Ian Brown appeared on stage alone at the Heineken Music Hall, to tell the crowd the gig was over.

[…]

Brown reportedly said: “I’m not joking, the drummer’s gone home.”

Or, at least I hope that’s the way this goes.

Either way, I did get to work tomfoolery into a post and that fills me with almost as much happiness as the wocka wocka guitar work to be found in “Fools Gold” below.