Why do I know who this person is? Why is it considered newsworthy when dippy 13-year-old girls act exactly as you'd expect them to?
What sort of weirdos and morons are asking her for her autograph? Television appearances, "news" articles acting as if something that sensible people would be embarrassed for is somehow noteworthy, free shit, free notoriety -- for what? For crying like an idiot at some goofball's god-awful rendition of You Really Got Me? Are you fucking kidding me? Of course you're not kidding me; why would I even bother asking such a dumb question anymore?
I'm past the stage of wondering why I bothered to learn how to write; I pretty much have no idea any longer why I learned how to read. The whole thing, this is just flat-out retarded. I have no doubt that if some reality-show whiz decided to air this kid doing nothing but picking her nose and sorting her sock drawer, people would watch it, and worse yet, so-called "news" people would write about it.
At least I now have a better idea of what to watch out for with my own kid in about seven years. Maybe I can train her to do something utterly pointless, and parlay all that free publicity into some coin. Oh yeah.
Gee, thanks for that! I was blissfully ignorant; next time, howzabout suffering in silence?
ReplyDeleteI've thankfully never watched an episode of Idol, but it's impossible for me to not hear about it, as I happen to personally know a certain bald-headed star of last year's show who has now gone on to be a double-platinum rawk gawd with his Nickelbackish radio-friendly unit-shifting music. Yes, I'm serious. I don't mean "know" as in, "We lived in the same area", I mean as in, "Dude's been in my house, played my guitar, and he goddamn still has some of my old magazines that he never returned." I've even got pictures of him with hair and dressed like a Backstreet Boy as well as CDs of his local band here (a Tool/Creed hybrid, basically); speaking of coin, I wonder how much those would fetch me on eBay?
From what I hear by way of mutual friends who still hear from him (I last talked to him about seven years ago at one of his shows), he's definitely letting it go to his head, as I guess could be expected. I just wonder if he's actually going to have any longevity to his career, given the fickle nature of the audience that made him.
I've never seen the show either (though I did watch most of the Supernova one); I'm just still stunned at the ease with which they get supposedly legitimate news people to do their cheap publicity for them. Why pay for ad time, when MSNBC will gladly pay someone to write about some dingbat mooning over mediocrity? Pretty good scam, when you think about it.
ReplyDeleteI assume you're referring to Chris Daughtry, right? I think you should post some of those Backstreet Boy pictures, personally. You're right, you'd probably make a bundle on eBay with that stuff. Pretty cool.
Career-wise, it sounds like he's tried to ride whatever current wave as much as possible, which is standard, but only lasts as long as your pop-culture instincts are strong. I've had a million "integrity" arguments with band members over the years, and I guess everyone's gotta draw their own line.
I agree that there's a fly-by-night whiff to the whole AI phenomenon, that most of the fans will simply move on to the next season rather than continue to follow a given performer. And because the show seems to be more of a teenybopper demographic, hard rock is not really the big draw there. So he can't really ride the Kelly Clarkson/Carrie Underwood train of association with the program; he probably should have taken the Fuel gig when he had the chance. There are worse things, such as that weird little Ed Grimley dude that sings Celine Dion covers.
Yeah, that was my first reaction to hearing he was gonna be on that show - "Why would anyone who wants to be taken seriously as an artist take that route?" Ah, but therein lies the rub - from what I've heard, fame was always the first goal, the vehicle taken to get there was secondary. Apparently it was going to be acting before it was music, so who knows - maybe in a few years, we'll see him starring in some straight-to-video releases, especially if his next release gets greeted with a yawn.
ReplyDeleteAnd yeah, isn't it about time for this "post-grunge" thing to get blown away? I remember hearing all the bastard children of Layne Staley and Eddie Vedder polluting the airwaves back in the mid-90s and being tired of it then; ten to twelve years later, and still nothing huge has really come along to make them start seeking new employment (I don't count the wretched resurgence of boy bands combined with the whole rap n' roll phenomenon, as those are both best forgotten and never spoken of again). I mean, there's plenty of innovative stuff I would be pushing like mad if I controlled the nation's airwaves, but I learned a long time ago that the stuff I think is brilliant would get me canned in a hurry as a record industry exec. I guess no one's figured out a way to tie any of them in to a new fashion statement.