RuntheDamnBall

It would stand on its own in an eighth grade English class. It is riddled with cliches. There are very few 'poets' in rock music. And the ones who claim to be poets (like Jim Morrison, for example) rank up there with the worst.

Don't confuse the image with the genre or music. Classical music has always had references to prior pieces, look it up or go ask your Berklee College of Money professor.

Not only that, but when bands like Zeppelin are whoring themselves out for Cadillac, it tends to threaten their place in the canon. People want to believe that rock occupies some higher echelon. It's all just business for most of these people, folks. What some rap artists lack in creativity for coming up with their own beats they make up in business acumen. What better way to create a hook than to use one that references the past in a new spin? I am not saying I like it (generally, I hate it). But it is what it is.

Hmm, when you said singers "modified their song voice" and then cited Cher I leapt to conclusions. Apologies. I don't think it's so much covering a lack of ability to adopt twang, as much as adopting one's own singing voice or persona. I return to Neil Young a lot, but he had something singular vocally that suited his songs well, even if his is not a "great voice" so to speak. His music would have suffered if vocalize by someone like Rod Stewart. I think the definition of a good singer is wide open for debate, where it now includes phrasing (which Dylan did masterfully despite his never having a 'touch' to lose vocally), the persona of the singer, intensity, etc in addition to all the classic qualities we tend to judge. I mean this in the way that I like that Joe Strummer sounds like Cookie Monster to me sometimes.

I have recordings of Henry Rollins from Def Jam Vendetta II (he's the trainer) yelling "Come ON!" "Work Harder, Maggot!" If I worked out I would use those.

Beating a dead horse, but, why not? Marino is a douchebag.

I think he rightly gets a little annoyed, because you are denying a certain validity to the music he enjoys. I don't think most of the stars I've mentioned cover up their voices; Cash didn't. Certainly Welch, Parton, Lynn don't (I know Welch and Lynn do all their recordings with analog gear -- not very easy to auto-tune or roboticize it without digital). Basically this software tends to over-perfect a voice, strip it of life, and I just don't hear it in the recordings of the artists I've listed. And I've been listening to this stuff for awhile. Cher used the auto-tune effect on overdrive to great success. She sings, but like a 60 year old lady in a body patched together by plastic surgery to look (kind of) 30s. Anyway, that was a trick for that one single ("Believe"); I am sure that she uses auto-tune regularly -- it has become a pop standard. I think to deny the aging process of the voice as one that is interesting to hear is just a bias imposed by the music industry that should be broken. If it is not hip and new, it ain't worth it. Whereas to me, the change over time of Tom Waits', Johnny Cash's voices is an amazing process to listen to. But again, this is my life. I've learned (and I think punk was my entry-point) that a great voice does not need to be a "musically perfect" voice. If it were, we'd all be listening to Andy Williams and Luther Vandross all the time. People like something with a little grit now and then.

That has a certain ring to it

Cash? Come on, man, you dig the man in black. You know it. Voice of gold.

Please tell me what elements of country and not POP that current country has aside from its practitioners being from the south and an occasional slide guitar and cowboy hat? I think it's moved full-scale into the pop realm, "countrified pop," so to speak. It features few of the qualities of what was originally defined as country music. It would be akin to calling Miles Davis' work in the early 60s swing.

I don't think that's a racist stance at all. It's a case of taste. I think a racist stance would be to say that rap / hip-hop are not a valid form of expression and cannot have any value whatsoever, or that black artists are somehow less capable of making a valid artistic expression. You haven't given that indication. Anyone who would call you a racist on the basis of that statement is a fool.

Actually, country is music (sound organized into some kind of cogent whole, and John Cage might have an even more broad argument against that -- ie your fan noise is music, but i digress)... What current country is not is COUNTRY! It is as Hollywood-produced, drug-addled and inauthentic (though I have problems with the term authentic, but here I mean closeness to the subject of country life) as any genre out there. Give me Gillian Welch, Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn, Dolly, those folks are all real musicians with real stories; you can't discount them.

Do you mean your slant is totally biased and uneducated or that of rappers labeled 'socially conscious' or 'political'? If you mean the rappers, then some of them may not be as grounded in the kind of education valued in the U.S., especially by white people, but many of them have seen enough and learned enough from life to know injustice when they see it (and have educated themselves in different ways). 99% of current rap/hip-hop, like most music, is crap -- but there are a handful of interesting people out there. I kind of liken these days in hip-hop to those when hair metal ruled the airwaves in the rock scene. There are very few people doing something of integrity. I know because I spent two years in the studio working with a lot of clowns, waiting on them, watching them waste time and seeing what they were doing it for. Very few of the rap 'artists' i ever worked with impressed me (a few that did were Jay-Z and LL Cool J, as people). One thing people don't realize right now is that hip-hop albums are dirt cheap to produce, technically (not factoring in the Cristal and diamond-encrusted IPods). So it makes sense for the industry (which has lost just about all its "music" people and replaced them with "business" people), which is more focused on the bottom line than ever. The days where CEOs stuck with artists over time knowing they would develop great careers (like Neil Young, Joni Mitchell) when they didn't yield immediate returns, are over. Dylan, Young, Aretha Franklin would never happen right now. Anyway, personal lamentations on the music industry aside... I think anyone who is looking for something musical in hip-hop would be well served to check out some MF Doom / Madvillain, Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul and the myriad projects of Del Tha Funkee Homosapien (Deltron). Also there are some pretty amazing instrumental hip-hop artists like DJ Shadow and Prefuse 73 who have a real knowledge of musical history and do some pretty amazing things (not all scratching and cutting either).

SD is sitting pretty. They can dangle a bounty of draft picks or one of two QBs for just about whatever they want. I agree, the cap hit is not a big deal considering. Perhaps they can even get Rivers to restructure some of his bonus money into guaranteed contract money, to let the team that takes him on take on the cost. Considering that this would mean Rivers gets a chance to play vs. not, I think he'd be down.

I think the problem is that we're letting the extremists dictate the discussion and hence the final actions. I don't think most scientists have a problem with God or believers, regardless of whether or not they necessarily believe. It's about whether religious theories should be taught as SCIENTIFIC ones in a science classroom setting. Where they seem to conflict, teachers can always address and be open to questions in class, but when we're talking about children who may or may not all be of the same religious backgrounds, teaching a religious version of scientific history is a big problem, particularly if the knowledge may be foundational to other studies or jobs in the future, as Mick has pointed out. Try and begin any college class report with "10,000 years ago, when the world began," and I think you'll elicit more than a few laughs. Unless you go to Bob Jones or something. If you want religion, put your child in Sunday School. It's not like they're in short supply. Just as much as no child is going to be brainwashed by learning a little bit about Christian history (a common reply around here), no child would be brainwashed by learning about the theory of evolution, if they've learned what theories are vs. laws. They (and parents) can make their own decisions.

True. I think I would be more worried if Cotrell went out and got a HC job right after his Bills years. But he didn't. There are a lot of good candidates out there. Let's not forget Fassell is still kicking around, Gregg Williams could be sought, Philly's guys have to be in demand... And while I think Gray has done a good job, you can't argue with the talent this team has on defense when it's healthy, either.

I've pointed out before that the author of the Declaration of Independence pretty much said in so many words that he was a Unitarian. But I never read anything about that in my history books. I had to find it out for myself. Yet raving Unitarian heathens are among the reason for social decline in some people's books, and the religion isn't taught as one of founding values, even as an offshoot of Christianity. And I think you can begin to see the problem with Christianity as "the religion" when even its followers don't necessarily agree on a right way to practice it or even one set code to follow (hence denominational differences). One has to realize that any grouping of information is going to end up being a selective, subjective one by the very nature of the process. That is fine, you can't make children's history books into encyclopedias. However, then one must realize that the information in the book is fit to several criterion: those that suit the people in control of production (in this case the publisher) and the version of history that is going to be most widely sought (in this case, those of the Texas and California school systems). In this sense, the "map of history" is pieced together by profiteers and school systems that may or may not speak for the rest of the country get to inform what the rest of the country's children learn.

Because depending on who is in power, what is defined as "not doing anything wrong" would be malleable. I understand your point, but it's just not constitutional. And sacrificing rights would be to the detriment of the country, not for the good of it.

It's alright, I got a sweet lady to take care of me who thinks I look just fine I'm glad I don't have to worry about what some dude thinks about how I look. Then I'd be worried. And as for your being right, well, we can agree to disagree.

As long as religion is taught as "a religion" rather than "the religion" and it is done in relatively equal, historical terms, I have no problem with it. I grew up with it. And you're right, it cannot be divorced from history. It's when we get to the latter method that issues arise.

Well, it is certainly ironic that someone asking if a (sure, slightly combative) remark is necessary somehow finds :fyous: necessary. I gave you clarification. You gave me a label, and it's much easier to put that label on me than address my post. I don't think you're not as smart as me, I've never met you. I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt enough that you're a swell enough guy. You and I can at least root for the same team. But somehow you have to question my patriotism just because I practice it differently and, I would argue, in a more complex way that actually advances progress more than the blind love you're asking for. I don't blame this country first. Those who don't think it could be made better, and those don't think that trying to make it better is a mission worth taking it on, have a severe failure of the imagination to say the least. Utah Phillips makes a beautiful statement: "Loyalty to your country always. Loyalty to the leaders when they deserve it." And that goes for people 250 years ago as much as it does today.

Well, it is certainly ironic that someone asking if a (sure, slightly combative) remark is necessary somehow finds :fyous: necessary. I gave you clarification. You gave me a label, and it's much easier to put that label on me than address my post. I don't think you're not as smart as me, I've never met you. I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt enough that you're a swell enough guy. You and I can at least root for the same team. But somehow you have to question my patriotism just because I practice it differently and, I would argue, in a more complex way that actually advances progress more than the blind love you're asking for. I don't blame this country first. Those who don't think it could be made better, and those don't think that trying to make it better is a mission worth taking it on, have a severe failure of the imagination to say the least. Utah Phillips makes a beautiful statement: "Loyalty to your country always. Loyalty to the leaders when they deserve it." And that goes for people 250 years ago as much as it does today.

No, but it still gives you the out of calling out an Other who has no morals, instead of calling for an ethic that is inclusive. I understand completely that you are not personally responsible for any of the atrocities committed under the banner of an American morality (and not under the ideals of America, let me get that straight before the echo-chamber prepares another "Blame America First" for me). However, to look at some of the situations present today (broken African American families, American Indian communites) and not understand that they are rooted in the atrocities of the past is to deny a certain worth and depth that is necessary to correcting the problems. And to say that everything is alright with America while we deny that worth is to deny our past and to deny the betterment of this country.

If you read anything I say there and get "Blame America First" out of it, you've got better eyes than I do. My point is, if you want to base America today on the shining examples of our ancestors, it ain't all lily-white virtue. I am much more interested in learning from the past and yes, I do think American "moralism" is a fraud, to assume that our country is based and was founded on morals and not in ethics and law. The morals may have been had in mind, but this is not a theocracy and, again, what you call morals are not independent to the Judeo-Christian tradition. And the right seems to have an awful lot of what it decides are morals without one iota of Christian humility. Blame self-righteous people from the dominant cultural order first. I know it's not an easy soundbite for you, but work on it.

Would this be assuming the ethics of the ten commandments are independent or belonging only to the Judeo-Christian theology? Also, what do you make of the fact that a great many of the "original" settlers in the U.S., who came to practice their own religion, and their ancestors, pretty much proceeded to wipe out the culture and population of the land's actual original inhabitants? The notion of an American purity rooted in the ideals of white settlers borders on laughable.