So bad, So bad, So bad!

Audience sing alongs suck in general. Nothing wrong with singing along to your favorite band in concert, but when said performer stops midstream to let the audience fill in the blank, then you know said performer has jumped the shark.

So that brings me to my latest subject.

In spite of generally considering myself an "alternative" rock fan, I have confessed here before about some of my guiltiest pop pleasures. And there was no more guilty pleasure than Neil Diamond. Now I'm not professing to be a fan of "Turn on Your Heartlight, " or "You Don't Bring Me Flowers", but I will argue the the pop virtues of "Craklin' Rosie" or "Sweet Caroline" all day. Hey, it's not just me, his songs have been covered by everybody from UB40 to Urge Overkill. And he wrote my favorite Monkees tune, I'm a Believer, which was recently a hit for Smash Mouth.

But Sweet Caroline has been forever ruined for me by the Boston Red Sox. In fact, I'm not even sure it's the Red Sox fault. The original sinner may lie elsewhere. Whoever it was who decided to turn the song into a 7th inning fan singalong anthem should be shot. Play the song, fine. But who is the fuckin' clown who decided it would be cool to turn the volume down every 5 seconds so 35,000 boozed up fans could sing " bop bop bop" and "so good, so good, so good" It's fuckin' horrific.

And now it has spread. Was at our local fireworks show in Beverly last night, and the song come on just before the show. My only thought was, well at least I can hear the non-bastardized version.

But no, comes to the "Sweet Caroline" part, and sure enough the sound goes off. Of course the Beverly crowd wasn't that hip to the Fenway version, so it was mostly just dead air. Is there an actual altered version that has the dead air in it, or are DJs all over New England copping Fenway, and just turning down the volume? Whatever it is, it's fucking horrendous. Like the god damn Macarena or something. I can never stand to hear the fuckin song again now.

Just What I Needed (Not!)

If Ric Okasek decided to get the original Cars back together and tour, the chances that I would go see the show would be about point-five percent.

Like most people who went to college in the 80s, the Cars were certainly a part of the soundtrack of my life. I was never a huge fan, but I owned many of their albums on vinyl, and generally liked most of their songs. But I saw them in concert a couple times, and was underwhemed both times. They were a studio pop band, and to me it just never translated very well to the stage.

So add 25 years, and how does their music hold up? Not very well. You know how I know this? It's the age of the IPod. I have 1000+ songs on my IPod. I have made quite the effort to round out my primary music of choice (postpunk, power pop, and alternative country) with good tunes and even guilty pleasures from every other genre. So in addition to The Replacements, Old-97's, and Fountains of Wayne, my IPod contains everything from Dean Martin to the Monkees to Duran Duran. I even have a Tom Jones song, a Tony Orlando and Dawn song and a couple Neil Diamond songs. Yet I have not a single Cars song.

Now to some degree that is probably an oversight, but their stuff just does not hold up very well.

So what would be less interesting than a reuinted Cars tour? How about The New Cars. What a ridiculous concept! Ric Okasek was smart enough to sit this one out, but original guitarist Elliot Easton and keyboardist Greg Hawkes must have needed some cash bad, so they hooked up with Todd Rundgren, a relic of an even earlier era, and a couple other members of his band to go on tour as The New Cars.

Now who the hell would go to see this? If there were still any diehard Cars fans, why would they go to a show without Ric Okasek? It's friggin crazy. The best people could hope for, I guess, would be for them to roll out Todd's one hit "Hello It's Me" a song that probably actually holds up better than any of the Cars songs.

Still to come, Ricky Martin

OK, that's my cue to go to bed. I've been sitting here working on the computer with the Olympic closing ceremonies on. Not really paying much attention, just noting periodic cheesiness. A band of marching clowns playing YMCA. Some ridiculous looking ice fishing skecth. I missed the guy who ran on stage during some speech when I went to the bathroom. But hearing Still to come, Rickie Martin just before a commercial break, finally has made me turn it off & go to bed.

G'night.

Greg Brady is creepy

For some reason I had on a 70's music infomercial on for a while tonight. In addition to learning that I could get a digitally remastered version of Billy Don't Be a Hero, I also realized that Barry Williams (aka Greg Brady) is the creepiest of former child stars. I guess I always thought this, but never had a blog to write it down before. Think about it. Danny Bonaduce and Leif Garrett may be more fucked up, but I don't think there is anyone else you has the creep factor of Barry Williams. Maybe KC, of KC & The Sunshine Band, but I think Barry has him beat by quite a bit. Maybe it adds to the creep factor thinking of him hitting on his TV mom Florence Henderson. Ahhhhhhgghhh!