I don't even know where to begin.

Let me preface this by saying I'm hardly a connoisseur of music journalism. I'm not a connoisseur of music journalism for the simple fact that it peaked somewhere in the early 90's, which can also be earmarked as the true dying days of Rolling Stone being somewhat credible. Since then I regularly read Blender, but admittedly for the funny commentary and not any genuine insight into the state of music, or the industry, or anything that actually matters to me as a music fan.

That said, I recently stumbled across an article by Boston Globe writer Joan Anderman, and have not felt so genuinely compelled to respond to an article in more than a decade. Let's take a look, shall we?

Does that sound familiar? Blame it on John Mayer.

In August I dutifully arrived at the Rod Stewart show at the Comcast Center in time to catch the opening act, Josh Kelley. Kelley, known to gossip hounds as Mr. Katherine Heigl, is a singer-songwriter. He writes pop-rock tunes, plays the guitar and the piano, and sings well. He's attractive and personable. His songs are sturdy and pretty. And he makes me feel . . . nothing.

Nothing is worse than feeling nothing at a concert. If you hate a band, at least you can whine about it to your friend in the next seat, and if you're me, you can register a public complaint in the newspaper. And odds are good I'll receive plenty of mail from readers who love the band just as much as I don't love the band, which confirms my view that music that makes somebody feel something is worth listening to.

Listening to Kelley, I just felt empty, and I found myself marveling once again that he and his ilk have become the mainstream standard-bearers for the genre.

"Garden-variety" is the term I used to describe Kelley in my review of the show - i.e. common, ordinary, of no special quality or type, according to the dictionary. And he's not alone.

So up until here I have no complaints. I've never found Josh Kelley overly burdened with talent, and have been genuinely more entertained by other artists telling stories of him stumbling around the Rock Boat completely tanked than I have been by his cds. A quick search of Joan Anderman's other articles for The Globe reveal that as many times as she finds reason to reference Josh in articles that have little to do with him, she trots out the "Mr. Katherine Heigl" moniker as if he's showing up in the pages of the Enquirer with nothing but that to carry him. I read my tabloids, girlie, can't remember the last time I even saw an article on Katherine, much less on Josh and trust me I'm no fan of hers either, so I'm on the lookout.

Another quick search gets much deeper to the root of what we're dealing with here. The review of the Rod Stewart show in question was largely positive, and very indicative of someone who has clearly had a lot of years to get familiar with his catalog. My knowledge of Stewart largely consists of people singing "Maggie May" to me on a regular basis, a Tom Waits cover that was better off left alone, and a daughter that looks like a cocker spaniel.

The description suits a whole slew of singer-songwriters making the rounds of theaters, airwaves, and soundtracks with their inoffensive, unremarkable, soul-numbing songs.

Matt Nathanson, a Lexington native who lives in San Francisco, performs a sold-out show at Berklee Performance Center tonight, the same night Howie Day plays at Northeastern University's Blackman Auditorium. Jason Mraz comes through town Oct. 17 for a show at the Orpheum, also sold out. Matt Wertz has been on the road opening for Gavin DeGraw, Mat Kearney is making a new record, and Josh Hoge just put an album out. Ari Hest, exhibiting a flash of ingenuity, has been writing and releasing a song a week this year.

All of these artists are competent. None of them has a sound.

Okay wait...what?

Hold the phone.

This is the point where I put down my glass of water and almost laughed and ended my own life by choking.I mean...seriously? Maybe someone spent too much time in her late 20's in the 80's listening to arena rock and hair bands and therefore has some damaged ear drums that led to making such a sweeping generalization on such a wide range of artists. I'm friends with a lot of musicians, or very involved music fans. I myself am someone as versed in the discography of everyone from the likes of Britney Spears, Jay-Z and Fiona Apple as I am with those of Matt Nathanson, Death Cab for Cutie, and Hit the Lights. I'm hardly a musical elitist, I just can't seem to consume enough of it. Granted, some of it is completely lost on me - the majority of country music, screaming rock anthems, and the Dave Matthews Band for a general cross section, but I know enough to know who is who when I'm stuck in traffic and hit the scan button and it settles on a station that I never listen to.

We all know that I could go on for days about the mere passing mention of Matt Nathanson, but let me just sum it up by saying that someone who can't seem to find a unique sound would never be able to sustain a career that's now spanning 15 years and was built solely on crisscrossing the country and selling out rooms wherever he goes. Howie Day may have hit the mainstream with the generally generic "Collide" but his first album showcased his unique abilities as a writer and singer in songs such as "Sorry So Sorry" and "Kristina". Hearing him pound out "Sorry So Sorry" live could put anyone's doubts to rest.

Jason Mraz has hit his stride with his new record and the reworked version of "I'm Yours" but is another artist who, with his own blend of wordplay and quick beats over his guitar playing has carved out his own niche that makes him another sure sell out road act each and every summer. Mraz has a quick tongue and churns out gems on his albums that range from quiet love songs to stumble over your own tongue rhymes and slick and sexy ballads. I don't remember anyone ever confusing a Mraz tune for a Mayer tune, even in the "Remedy" days.

I'm hardly a huge Gavin Degraw lover (I leave that for Nikki of course), but there's no denying that he's probably got the strongest voice out of his entire genre of young singer songwriters. He can literally sing the hell out of anything, from the defiant and slightly cocky "I Don't Want to Be", to a cover of "A Change Is Gonna Come" that Sam Cooke himself would approve of.

The point of this is that the genre itself is deep and unique. Insisting that this crop of artists have no unique sound is about as ridiculous as getting a Jay-Z song confused with a Soulja Boy song, just because they happen to file into the same genre when you're browsing through the iTunes store.


They seem for all the world to be using a template to write their songs. Sit down to listen to a batch of them at the same time, and you'll notice that the same pattern crops up again and again, usually in the chorus. It's made of four chords that repeat in a cycle, sometimes tenderly and sometimes forcefully but always winsomely, suggesting lost love or found love or the bad love that inspired him - no, impelled him - to write this song.

As wrong and this woman is, this argument can be applied to any genre of music. During the reign of pop it was largely argued that every pop hit was composed of the same few chords and key changes. With some slick production and a catchy hook, anyone could have a number one song. During the reign of rap it was the era of a sample. Grab a beat, obtain a sample, enjoy the millions rolling in. This is not new information, sweetie.

Love songs will always be the ones that get people talking, because those are the songs that everyone can relate to. If Jason Mraz wrote "Remedy" (a song about a close friend fighting cancer) 14 times over and released it as an album, he would have never had the chance to make a second record. If John Mayer had released a handful of albums consisting of different versions of "Your Body Is A Wonderland", he'd still be playing at coffee shops in Atlanta on nightly basis. Being cute and holding a guitar may work as a novelty for a little while, but is hardly enough to grant you the ability to tour the country and live comfortably when not doing so, especially not in this day and age. Let's face it, they all can't have the ability to churn out such obscenely creative jams as "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy?", but they do what they can to entertain those that somehow manage to find meaning in their meaningless and talentless songs, you know?


I don't buy it. This musician has studied hard. His introspective lyrics read like a composite of sensitive-guy clichés. He doesn't so much sing from the gut as use his voice, expertly, in the service of a sentiment. It cracks just so to evoke his broken heart and grows bold when it's time to be strong. He's a little soulful, a little wounded, totally ready to be saved, and with the help of a skilled producer he pushes people's buttons - especially those belonging to young women, a demographic that's especially susceptible to a cute boy's connect-the-dots charms.

And who can blame them? These guys get the job done. It's like the recipe for McDonald's Secret Sauce; you can count on it. It tastes the same every time. Nobody clamors for new ingredients every time they order a Big Mac, because reliability is a good thing when it comes to fast food. But sameness is depressing when it defines an art form where emotional veracity has always been the most compelling piece.

Singer songwriters are not the new bubble gum pop stars. The guitar boy equivalent of Lou Pearlman is not sitting behind a desk holding auditions at theme parks for the next group of boys he can clean up, give a Fender and an MTV reality show to, send to Max Martin, and then swim in the millions he makes off of them like it's the beginning of Ducktales and he's Scrooge McDuck. This would be valid if I walked into a store and was faced with seeing Jason Mraz and Gavin DeGraw lip gloss, or John Mayer and Matt Nathanson lollipops that I could buy to enjoy while watching Josh Kelley's feature film about traveling the country with some of his friends to find his long lost mother.

This is not 1999 and Howie Day will never sell 2.1 million records in a week. There is no longer endless money to be made for getting air headed teenage girls to stand outside of the MTV studios for you. To put it into reference the writer may understand better, this is not the same thing as anxiously awaiting Davy Jones' appearance on the Brady Bunch because he's OMG SO DREAMY!

I blame John Mayer. He paved the way for this wave of well-groomed troubadours with the unlikely success of his 2001 album, "Room For Squares." Mayer is a better musician than the lot of them, but the mass appeal of his sweet strummed pop tunes triggered a record-label spending spree on cookie-cutter tunesmiths. And it's working, because in this era of branding and multi-platform careerism, originality isn't the goal. Quite the opposite: The business needs innocuous, multipurpose songs that can service radio formats, dorm rooms, television dramas, film credits, and iPod ads.

The original pop troubadours carved their niche (and set the bar high) with distinctive visions spanning the literate commentary of Jackson Browne, James Taylor's graceful meditations, and fiery soul-searching from Cat Stevens. And there are formidable talents working today, among them Conor Oberst, Damien Rice, Tom McRae, Joseph Arthur, and Rufus Wainwright. Which makes it even harder to listen to the assembly-line sentiments and achingly familiar refrains of the Mayer descendants.

Ugh. I'll give you Damien Rice and Joseph Arthur. Those two have moments of pure transcendence on their albums. But Conor Oberst? Really? That almost negates the rest of the list for me. I do enjoy a couple of Bright Eyes songs, but holy Christ, pulling that name for a list of formidable talents making the rounds today is almost like putting Hanson on a pedestal or loving the Terrence Howard record...oh wait, Anderman already did that in previous articles. I guess somehow those two artists managed to avoid the trappings of the terrible pre packaged singer songwriters that you can't help but be overrun with these days.

There's enough wallpaper in the world; we don't need uniformity from the very people who are meant to be scouring their hearts and baring their souls in song. But that venerable task has been co-opted, at least in part, by music supervisors looking for a faux-emotional tune to underscore the season's faux-emotional teen drama, and nervous music execs hoping to reach the most people with the least distinguished palette of sounds.

It's bad math for music lovers, but it adds up in the short term, and these days that seems to be the main frame of reference.

To sum this all up somehow, I'll say this: if this writer wanted to bash an entire genre of music based on it's depth and genuine contribution to music a whole, she was way off base to pick this one. Go to a Matt Nathanson show, watch him play upwards of 30 songs that he himself wrote from the ground up, and then tell me that he's in it for the money and not for the genuine love for music and his gift for sharing it. Listen to a live Mraz record from top to bottom and tell me that he isn't a great lyricist and and amazing vocalist. Sure John Mayer has become commercialized and trite, but he wasn't always that way and with any hope the other greats in his genre will never see that side of themselves.

Being that Anderman still finds Motley Crue culturally relevant none of that is likely. Writing a badly researched and completely off base article damning an entire genre of music isn't exactly a reflection of a well rounded music fan, much less one that should be writing for a major newspaper.

Now if you'll excuse me, I've got some cds to listen to.

YAY! It's the Video Music Ahhhh screw it, they suck.

I remember a long long time ago when the VMAs used to be good. I'm not just saying that because I was in my teens at the time, and OMG Justin Timberlake was SOOOO dreamy! etc etc etc. They really were good. There were legitimate surprises, amazingly creative performances, and oh yeah....people actually showed up.

Remember the days of Christina Aguilera and her on stage romp with Fred Durst? When NSYNC and Michael Jackson took the stage together? When Britney showed up wearing nothing but sparkles? When the dude from Rage Against the Machine climbed up to the rafters? When the hosts were actually funny? When you wondered why the hell Missy Elliot was showing up in every performance but in the end you didn't care because she made them all awesome?

Those days are loooong gone. Last night was I believe, rock bottom.

First, lets talk about the choice in venue. I'm not sure who at MTV believed that it was a good idea to ever take those things out of NYC. You'd think they'd have learned by now that it just doesn't feel the same when they aren't there. Last night, they chose to hold the awards in a room that seemed about as big as my bedroom, and also had padded walls. I understand it was a soundstage, but really it kind of just looked like a giant cell in an asylum.

It became fairly evident early on that almost no one bothers to come to these things anymore, so holding it in a closet turned out to be an okay choice. Russell Brand? Mildly amusing. No further comment.

Since the actual awards portion of this so called awards show is clearly a joke, (I mean, way to kiss Britney's ass and throw her the pity awards MTV - seriously.) let's just move on to the performances, shall we?

It's worth noting that this is the order that the MTV site has them in, not the order they aired in...as if anyone cares.

Rihanna - Disturbia:

I actually liked this one, although I really do generally like Rihanna. She's no superstar vocalist, that's for damn sure.

Jonas Brothers - Whatever the hell that song was:

It really looked like they were sitting on the steps at Sesame Street in the very beginning. Wildly appropriate. It's a minute in, I'm bored. This would be better with Elmo. I would totally be in a band if my job could be to play the tambourine. Oh snap! The walls just opened up and now they're "rocking out" and there are screaming crying girls everywhere. OMG OMG OMG. Does that one dude really not play an instrument? What a rip off. This may possibly be the worst song I've ever heard.

Lil Wayne/Leona Lewis/etc -

I really hate Leona Lewis. Hate hate. Bleeding Love is the most annoying song on the planet, and I hate everything she has done and will ever do based on that, I'm not even going to lie, okay? We're beyond that. Pull your fucking pants up, Lil Wayne. No one wants to see that. Here's the thing, I like rap music. I like GOOD rap music. This is NOT it. There's not even anything good to look at here to redeem these five minutes of my life that I'm losing. Who is this Mad Hatter looking mfer? Man, the MTV stream quality is super crappy right now. Oh, I guess its T Pain...the talent level just keeps on plummeting during this performance. Okay screw this, I'm done.

Paramore - Misery Business

Blah blah blah, nothing is as it seems. Whoooo. Misery Business is a great song, and that little chick with the bad hair has an alright voice, although not here. I love how somehow, the person in the audience who gets the closeup never fucking knows the words to the song. It never fails. OMG MY MIND HAS BEEN BLOWN, THEY'RE NOT REALLY AT THE WHISKY?!?! Who didn't see that coming a mile away, MTV? That guy who I now know is named Josh? His guitar matches Hailey's crazy yellow pants. I got distracted by singing along, but trust me, nothing worth note happened here.

Pink - So What

I'm loving this song these days, and the video is great. This performance had a ton of ideas crammed into one. Pink smashes a mirror, Pink flies down the side of a building Mr and Mrs. Smith style, Pink throws a drill through a window and had a very real shot of almost hitting a poor extra in the head, Pink makes things explode, and now she's on a stage and boy howdy is it a good thing she remembered to put on some pasties. All I remember thinking during this performance is that this is the same lot where they shot the beginning of the RENT movie. I'm half expecting Taye Diggs and Rosario Dawson to appear on a balcony and start trading lines. Pink sings some more, and the backdrop awkwardly falls. Performance over.

T.I. - Whatever You Like

TI is super hot, but this girl he's parading around in the pink dress looks like a Bratz doll. So far this performance is well done, walking through different sets, from store to store and then a club...and then an alley...that's romantic. This song is crazy repetitive, and this girl looks like an idiot walking around LA in a "mink" coat. "Director" yells "cut" and now Live Your Life starts. I think I hate this song just based on that fucking sample. Oh good, there's Rihanna again. She's wearing a half jacket and not much else. Hopefully she didn't forget HER pasties...she keeps holding her half jacket closed, so maybe she did. She looks like some butch military sargent as she towers over little TI.

Christina Aguilera - Genie In A Bottle/Keeps Getting Better

I was really looking forward to this. I love Christina and have nothing but respect for the girl. I really do believe she's got one of the best voices of my generation. So it starts out with a montage of her evolution. New theme every album, we get it! There she is in a mask, behind a wall...lipsynching some rad new arrangement of Genie In A Bottle as she writhes around with her Brooke Hogan bangs and the cat suit she borrowed from Britney's ill fated Onyx Hotel Tour. This is very Madonna. I'm holding out faith that she's gonna actually start singing as the song switches over to a song that sounds exactly like Britney's Radar at first. The men in black come out and dance around while Christina....still lipsynchs. I love this girl and I love this song, but I feel like everyone in the world has done this exact performance before. Somewhere in the middle of this, the guys in the suits lose their shirts...I think they were supposed to look like superheros, but they really just look like they're headed to the gay club. Which would be infinitely more fun than sitting through anymore of this shit.

Kanye West - Love Lockdown

Are you there Kanye? It's me, Maggie...This thing with the drums was better in Beijing.

Oddly enough, the best performances of this whole debacle took place on the side stage, Katy Perry non withstanding. Travis Barker's remixes are good times. He managed to make Wonderwall more interesting than it is, and he and DJ AM's little VMA jam was cut off way too soon!

While I was willing to excuse them for shrugging off Lupe Fiasco and the Ting Tings to a few seconds from the side stage, its a disservice to us all to not allow us to see LL finish out Going Back To Cali. WTF, MTV! And this is supposed to be the 25th anniversary of this sorry show? That song is classic, LL is always worth looking at and I'm just disgusted! That may have redeemed this parade of suck at least mildly.

But don't worry. Britney is in the house, hair combed, dressed, and she has on shoes. MTV rewards this multiple times by throwing her every award she was nominated for. Good Lord someone at MTV feels sorry for this girl. It's not like she never had videos that were VMA worthy. Toxic? Sure. Stronger? Absolutely! Hell, I would have even thrown her a bone for Everytime before Piece of Me. But she trots up to the stage, gives the same speech 3 times and then hopefully Larry Rudolph manages to keep her under control so we don't find her wandering around a gas station at 3 am barefoot, crying, and flashing her vagina all over again.

I do wish nothing but the best for Britney. She looks healthy and happy again, and hopefully everything falls in to place for her and she gets herself back on track. That said....she still doesn't deserve a VMA this year, even if they don't really mean anything.


Edited to add:

I just realized that I forgot to mention the Kid Rock performance. That just shows you how memorable I found that one. Ahahha.

The point is this: the state of music is dire and different, and it's no longer the era of chart dominating pop stars and rappers with unlimited budgets - that much is true. However, I also am firmly aware that MTV is capable of pulling out a witty/interesting/entertaining show. Throw artists from different ends of the spectrum onstage together like you used too, have a respected comedian make the truly controversial jokes (not mocking the poor Jonas Brothers for their virginity), fuck, get Missy Elliot in her blow up trash bag outfit and get her ass back on that stage if that's what you have to do!

You're better than this, and I believe in you. Better luck next year MTV.

Seriously? ... Seriously.

Can we talk about the VMAS for a second? I mean...I have to go to work, but after? Because I just.....no.

Call/Text/Twitter/Myspace/Facebok/Me. Love ya!

With the addition of the Facebook chat-toolbar-make-it-easier-than-ever-to-stalk-your-friends-thingie, I've now come to the conclusion that its completely impossible to NOT communicate with your friends anymore.

Cell phones are one thing. Calling, texting, hell I call people from my purse sometimes without even meaning to do it. (Has that ever happened to you? The background noises ALWAYS make it sound like one of your dear friends is being kidnapped and shoved into a trunk or something. Its always somewhat alarming.) Texting is handy when you have things to say but don't really feel like actually talking to someone, or are in a place where actually having your phone to your ear is not the best plan of action. But now, with the plethora of social networking sites and instant messaging applications, I almost feel like I work for some secret government agency tracking those fondest to me at any given moment.

Myspace and Facebook alone offer the abilities to blog, comment, chat instantly with your friends, and be "cryptic" and "mysterious" with status updates, as well as updating everyone you know, wish you knew, knew ten years ago and can't remember why you stopped talking to them in the first place, or don't know at all but didn't want to offend by denying their display of cyber friendship the opportunity to be notified whenever YOU update something. You can spill your soul, pimp your favorite artists *cough* Matt Nathanson *cough*, and look like you have way too much free time by posting obnoxious glittery kittens and unicorns all over your friends pages. Its fun, I swear.

Sites like Twitter take it a step further. Twitter offers you the opportunity to type or text update to their site that you can then post on your other social networking sites of choice. The problem here becomes that some people abuse the privilege (I'm looking at you, Matt Morris), and will sometimes post so frequently that its nearly a minute by minute feed. I don't really need to know you that well dude, just get the album out already. K thanks.

There are sites like LastFM.com, Goodreads.com,and Dvd Profiler, which allow you to meticulously track the songs you listen to, the books you read, and the movies that you watch. There are also sites that allow you to go so far as to keep a record of what you consumed that day, or keep track of everything from what medicines you took, to your menstrual cycle.

A quick Google of the two screen names I use the most often brings up my recent message board posts, my LastFm and Twitter accounts, and a host of links to online friends of mine, among other things that I either participate in, or signed up for and long forgot.

The point is this - I'm a solitary person by nature. Luckily I have the type of friends who understand for the most part that its exhausting for me to be with people in a social setting, and every now and then I just have to isolate and take some me time, plug in and recharge my batteries. With the advent of constant communication, this has nearly become impossible. Dropping off the radar for a day or two is no longer an option without a barrage of messages, emails, texts, etc - all wondering where I am and if I'm okay, and if I've thought about contacting someone for the obvious depression that I must have going on if I simply haven't felt like talking to anyone for a few days.

I'm an open book by nature. I'm obnoxiously outgoing, I'm definitely not the type of girl to have secrets. This is probably a good thing, because in this day and age its simply not possible anymore.