A Very Raging Christmas – Crap Music Is Over, If You Want It

In a land far, far away, called Great Britain a yearly war wages every winter. In this magical Narnian Isle, music is still a viable commodity taken very seriously. Their denizens actually record new holiday songs every season in the hopes of having the top Christmas single of the year.

We cynics across the pond are fine to do with the recycled, rehashed songbooks – over the river and through the wood, decking the halls and all that. Why would you need MORE freaking Christmas? A trip outside for a few hours on Black Friday and we’re drowning in so much Christmas it’s enough to move to the Aboriginal outback.

But England doesn’t mess around. Music and Christmas are a very serious thing. I mean, they still have music programming on TV, AND the government pays for some of it. Can you imagine if our government gave PBS money to make old school MTV styled programming? I might actually still want to live here.

Yes, England gets downright fervent about music, specifically the ‘single’. Especially when it comes to the OZ like machinery of Simon Cowell and company, who pump out yearly soft rock balladeers with their contest shows like Pop Idol and X Factor.  Yes, we have our American Idol, but it pales in comparison to the juggernaut that X Factor brings to the UK every year.

I was treated to the wonders of X Factor this October when I was staying in London. I politely watched with some fervent friends over Sunday roast and found myself drawn in by a bigger, cattier, more sordid and maudlin type of idol where the judges mentor the contestants, take sides and cut each other down so furiously I’m surprised they’re not allowed swords onstage. I have to admit I did get a little hooked. OK, a lot. It wasn’t the music, which was mostly dreadful. It was the huge soppy spectacle of it.

X Factor Judges

But truly music is the loser in this scenario, if it’s nothing more than a soapbox stump for Rhianna or Janet to pimp their new album, in between green faced kids being forced to sing George Michael covers. The winner of this contest releases a single and that song, most likely, goes on to be the Christmas single winner, no doubt to be over played through out the holiday season and beyond, knocking struggling bands off the charts and out of our memories as the new year chimes in.

This year’s X Factor winner, pie eyed Joe McElderry is an 18 year old Geordie accented charmer with a lilting, soaring voice who is as sweet as a Disney cartoon heroine. Blech. They even chose for his first single, the Christmas single in question, to be ‘The Climb’, a Miley Cyrus cover. Jesus. Come on, England! Throw some tea overboard!

Well, Jon Morter for this revolting enough to do something.  Sick of the slick promotional big label machine and the ‘crap’ it pumps out, he decided to take a stand and protest by simply using social media. Jon made a Facebook page called RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE FOR CHRISTMAS NO.1. On the page he asked the fans to buy his favorite band’s 1994 single, Killing In The Name Of, instead of X Factor Joe McElderry’s new Cyrus single “The Climb”.

The kid, Joe McElderry, seems nice enough – benign in a musical theater, syrupy sweet kind of way. He wasn’t even my choice to win the thing – I would have gone with the song and dance man Olly Murs, if I were holding a UK green card, but there I go, tipping my hand as someone who has seen enough of the show to care.

The fact is, there has always been pop music that was put together in a board room. Girl groups formed in the offices of the Brill Building weren’t exactly an organic creative process but still some of the best songs ever sung.

So some pop music can’t be denied, even if the singer didn’t pen the song themselves…but the pervasive problem today, it seems, is the onslaught of boy bands and mall makeovers done on any kid with half a voice who are put on diet pills and thrust into the spot light like Three Octave Barbie.  In a month their CD, filled with tuneless drivel, is overstocked at Walmart and outselling the grassroots band that actually writes music.

If you throw money and PR at a turd, the public will spend money on it. Sheeple are Sheeple, as the D Mode song goes…and the loser is not only the smaller musician out there, but ultimately the music listening public.

Enter Rage Against The Machine. Now they were invited to the party, unbeknownst to them, not because they are a small unknown indie rock band. No, they are a huge successful act on Sony, the very same Goliath label that Cowell and McElderry call home. But RATM started from humble beginnings and won each of their hundreds of thousands of fans, one by one. Not from a television show contest, but by playing small gigs and then larger ones. By touring relentlessly. By making music. And yes, by being political loud mouths and standing up for the little guy.

In an interview with UK paper The Sun, RATM frontman Tom Morello stated: “It is a historic campaign to save the UK pop charts from the abyss of bland mediocrity and we’re 100 per cent behind it. It’s really amazing and completely a grassroots uprising. It’s not like the band put this forward, it was the people. I found out about it when some friends of mine from the UK texted me.”

As the race between the two tightened, things got more heated. And weirder. Cowell kept accusing Rage of being bullies. Then the Facebook page went down and suddenly thousands of fans were inexplicably lost. And of course there were rumblings that this was all just an underground ploy of Sony executives to drive up sales of both singles – a major payday for Sony either way.

However, to show that it wasn’t a Sony plot, Morello promised that the band would reunite and play a free concert for London fans if they were to win the number one spot. This earned him some scorn and harsh words from X Factor kingpin Simon Cowell, and fellow X Factor judge Cheryl Cole, a former member of all girl group Girls Aloud, who was Mc Elderry’s mentor on the show. Cheryl stated “If that song, or should I say campaign, by an American group is our Christmas Number 1, I’ll be gutted for Joe and our charts.”

Cheryl Cole and Joe McElderry on X Factor

Morello flattened Cowell and Cole’s jingoistic pleas for support of Geordie Joe.

“The X Factor song was written by a cabal of highly paid professional songwriters and was already made a hit by a pre-teen artists from the United States. That’s nothing I would feel too proud about hoisting the flag up on.”

“The X Factor suits have been pulling out every dirty trick in the book to get their single to No 1. They’ve been pressuring the big retail stores over the price of the single and there were some shenanigans that happened with the Facebook page where it went down mysteriously on the second day.

“Some of the things they are doing seem almost desperate and that’s because they’re afraid of the people.”

As the deadline neared for the tally, Joe was in the lead by a narrow margin. Tom Morello took to twitter and urged his online fans to download on itunes and help push Rage over the edge. They upped the ante by stating that they would be donating their proceeds from their Christmas single to charity. No Sony payout for the people who helped put Rage in the number one spot.

It looked as if Joe had the Xmas single sewed up, but in a Christmas miracle come from behind victory, the American revolutionaries toppled Cowell’s teen idol and took the number one spot. Davey had conquered Goliath!

Of course Cowell was ‘gutted’ for his protege, McElderry, but was gracious enough to concede the spot to a song with well over fifteen ‘fuck you’ s laden in the lyrics. Well done. Cowell supposedly even offered Jon Morter a job doing marketing for his music label, though that might just have been the PR equivalent of licking his wounds.

Whether or not you think that this contest of wills will actually change the stranglehold that Cowell and X Factor has on music, the fact is that this small group on Facebook has managed to raise 83,000 pounds (approximately $132,700) for the charity, Shelter, they’ve helped to break  two UK chart sales records…and it’s made music history and social media history.

It’s also an example that we do not have to sit idly by and listen to crap. Crap music is over, if you want it. If you don’t want it, turn it off. If you hate the television you keep seeing, turn it off. Or make your own. Vote with your dollar, your time and your energy. If you don’t like what is out there. DO NOT give it your time or energy. “I am listening to it cause it’s on” is no longer a viable option as we enter 2010 a supposed enlightened era. If you don’t like it, do something. If you can’t create an alternative, then at least turn it off.

When asked if they’d attempt to overthrow the Christmas No. 1 again next year, Jon and his team admit that it probably wouldn’t work again nor would they want it to. But they are most proud of the fact that they were able to motivate people to take a stand against mediocrity and change something in pop culture history.

On top of that, raising money for a good cause and making friends with their favorite band of all time…well that’s just part of the best Christmas gift ever.

Getting It On & Taking It Off – Sunset Strip Music Festival 2009

The crazy train has left the station…and either you were on it or you’ll have to wait until next year’s local trip.

The Sunset Strip, long a place where spandex covered dinosaurs crawled between the Rainbow and the Whiskey has had a resurgence, mostly due to Roxy owner Nic Adler’s social media make over experiment. His crazy communist manifesto of community based music and entertainment has created an alliance with the Viper Room, the Andaz Hotel, The Comedy Store and a few other hot spots. Their online presence,  from tweet crawls to ticket twofer giveaways, has lured hipsters back to the place where rock music once reigned. The fact that the Sunset Strip has gotten it’s own music festival, now in it’s second year, shows that the Strip’s death rattle has reversed course and the infamous piece of WeHo history begun a little rock renaissance. And this year’s renaissance faire got the go ahead to shut down the boulevard to honor the Prince of Darkness himself, Ozzy Osbourne.

The festival kicked off with a big tribute to Ozzy at the House of Blues, which funnily enough for a frenzy of social media mavens, seemed to be a twitter dead zone. The night was MC’ed by Billy Morrison who was most memorable for his cheekbones which could cut glass. There was a pre-taped congrats from Lemmy…uh, what, he couldn’t stumble from the Rainbow-only mere yards up the strip-to say it in person?

Brought up to roast/honor Ozzy were comedian Jim Norton, who showed a slide show of mainly photos of himself with famous people (yawn). Then followed a spirited anecdote from Henry Rollins about underestimating the roar of an Ozzy crowd. Next up was an unfathomable speech of nonsense from Tommy Lee about drinking his own urine (Ugh, Tommy). Nothing much interesting from Slash – just a tale of  listening to Iron Man on acid.  Slash, we really want you to lead us here. You are positioning yourself as a rock hero and guitar legend. Let’s work on the public speaking charisma, dude. If you’re going to wear the Monopoly top hat, then let’s act like the mayor of Guitarville, mkay?

And theeeeen what followed, what I was really curiously waiting for, a few quips from Billy Bob Thornton.

Now Billy Bob was an interesting choice for a few reasons…one: I was hoping he’d do the whole speech in his Sling Blade voice and then he and Ozzy could have an unintelligible-off.  Two: Now being known as a ‘musician’,  I am obsessed with him wanting to give any kind of speech after he completely melted down on a CBC radio show. If there was ever an awkward music interview, Billy Bob takes the cake. I have a sick, twisted desire to interview him and let the train derail and then sort through the wreckage. Oh please, pr gods.

Though I do have to give him credit for mentioning Sharon. He was the only one to say that if we were all honoring Ozzy, we also had to honor the woman who made Ozzy possible. Never would have pegged you for a feminist, Mr. Thornton, but kudos and a plate of french fried potaters to you, sir.

The plaque ceremony and photo op with a quick “I love you all!” from Ozzy, was followed by a performance from Camp Freddy.  I couldn’t help thinking that for Ozzy, this must be like watching a bunch of his friends do karaoke. Sober.

With a couple fun softball performances from Donovan Leitch and some hot rocking blasts from best Freddy member Franky Perez, they bring out Mark fucking McGrath from Sugar Ray. Yeah, the host of that cheeze wiz entertainment show. Either Mark is going grey, or he overdid it on the frosted tips just for this occasion. Doesn’t he have some McG beach blanket music video shoot to go host? He pointed up to Ozzy in the balcony and said “Ozzy, my brother, this goes out to you from Newport Beach!” And then he began to butcher ‘Cat Scratch Fever’. It’s at that point I had to leave. Come to think of it, the balcony seats emptied out pretty quickly too. CAMP FREDDY FAIL.

Friday was reserved for the big Andaz Hotel party and the House of Blues Rock N Roll wine tasting event. I was lucky enough to be staying at the Andaz, which is quite plush since it’s remake, but still underneath has a bit of that riot house/Hyatt house vibe.

With guests like Ozzy staying there too, it had to still have that edge under all the class. The Virgin America/Andaz party boasted a red carpet event up by the rooftop pool with the promise of a few performances, including one by Chris Cornell who had been strangely left off all the set list time announcements. (Was Cornell forced from the festival by the Osbourne train or did he bow out on his own accord?) Although Chris made an appearance to shake some hands and pose for pictures, he didn’t perform, which prompted me to put forth divorce proceedings. The gorgeous hotel view skyline and ample cocktails made for a fun evening, even when an Aussie actor ambushed my camera techniques and turned the tables on me…

The day of the festival was bright and sunny with everyone in hot anticipation for Ozzy’s big performance. The music kicked off with spirited performances from The Donnas and Fishbone.

credit: eric voake

As the afternoon wore on and clothes were stripped off, Shiny Toy Guns played a very low key quiet set…(did they think they were playing for KCRW?) and Korn played angry head banging anthems proving that they lost one too many games of dungeons and dragons when they were kids. I skipped festival favorites Nico Vega to catch Brooklyn’s best, Earl Greyhound, whose new material shows a maturity yet they still know how to kick out the jams.

At last, I settled with my VIP vetted friends on the Bank of America parking lot roof and awaited the crazy train. Ozzy took the stage in front of a mass of all ages – toddlers to senior citizens. And hie performance was pleasing to all. Despite lobbing the f word here and there and hosing people down with foam, it was essentially a good, clean, tame Ozzy (minus Harriet) show. As Thornton had said earlier “Who says the Prince of Darkness can’t be a nice guy?”.

credit: Eric Voake

Here’s some choice moments and interviews with The Donnas, Iglu & Hartly, Norwood of Fishbone and The Mashup Brothers:

ALI ON THE AIR on Antiquiet – Roxy Owner Nic Adler On Ticketmaster / Live Nation

My Antiquiet interview (in the bathroom) with Nic Adler of the Roxy. We chat about Ticketmaster, twittering and social media in the rock club world.Part Two!

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