Monday, November 06, 2006
Forty-six times! It would be forgivable if I was listening to a voluptuous Depression-era black diva performing a scat solo, but for a few white guys from Portland, Oregon, it’s simply unacceptable.
You remember the band Everclear, right? They were popular back in the late 90’s. They’re most notorious for gaining fame at an age when most other rock stars are long dead (their late 30’s). Their second claim to infamy is the annoying inclusion of countless oooh’s, ahhh’s, yeah’s, uhhh’s, ohhh’s, and baby’s in their songs.
I was skipping church yesterday, and since I couldn’t go home and risk being caught, I went down to the Weber County Library to check on Ogden’s thriving population of transvestite homeless. While I was there, inhaling body odor and checking out grown men wearing size 14 heels with tan nylons, I started browsing through the CDs. That’s where I found Ten Years Gone: The Best of Everclear 1994-2004. When crappy bands like Everclear are releasing greatest hits albums, you know the apocalypse is near.
Because I enjoy torturing myself, I checked the CD out and brought it to work today. After listening to what is probably the band’s most successful song, a bouncy number about the joys of a welfare Christmas called “I Will Buy You A New Life,” I decided to take a count of the numerous onomatopoetic devices used throughout. A liberal count yielded forty-six of them. Forty-six times in a single song, the band says ohhh, or ahhh, or yeah, or uhhh, or some other variation on the same theme. And that song isn’t even the worst offender.
I suffered through the first half of the album, but breathed a sigh of relief when I got to a cover song of Van Morrison’s classic, “Brown Eyed Girl.” Surely, not even Everclear could destroy a great song like that. Four minutes and fifty-six oooh’s later, I concluded that their cover is possibly the worst musical recording ever made. I had to sit on my hands so I wouldn’t suddenly rip my headphones off in disgust. To their credit, many of the oooh’s and ahhh’s are heard as a repeating background echo, but that’s almost more annoying.
But it’s not just the oooh’s and ahhh’s that annoy. Art Alexsakis (lead guitar, vocalist, and songwriter) writes songs almost exclusively about his white-trash background, taking pride in his former place as the doormat of society. Who else, besides a former white-trash superstar, would write about being abused and abandoned by his father, blasting 70’s rock through a crappy AM radio, living homeless on the beach, or of course, celebrating Christmas courtesy of loyal tax-payers? Not surprisingly, drugs are also widely praised throughout the band’s recordings. Drugs leading to poverty and homelessness? Who knew?
It’s serendipitous that I found the Everclear album when I did, because the other day I was reading an article in Blender about them. The band was recently dropped by its record label and was forced to break up. About the same time, Alexsakis’s third marriage ended in divorce. As a final insult, Alexsakis filed for bankruptcy. So along with the dubious distinction of being the worst musician in public memory, he’s also poor and lonely. I couldn’t script a more perfect ending. He’s finally atoning for all the pain he caused the world. Currently, Alexsakis is attempting to use Myspace to launch a solo career. When that fails, I'm sure he'll get married for a fourth time and ruin someone else's life. Let's pray he kills himself before that happens.
If you have any Everclear albums in your music collection, then you'd better have a good excuse. Last time I checked, my younger brother has a few of them, which begs an eternally baffling question: Is he stupid because he listens to Everclear, or is his stupidity conducive to crappy music? Which causes which? I'm afraid we'll never know.
You remember the band Everclear, right? They were popular back in the late 90’s. They’re most notorious for gaining fame at an age when most other rock stars are long dead (their late 30’s). Their second claim to infamy is the annoying inclusion of countless oooh’s, ahhh’s, yeah’s, uhhh’s, ohhh’s, and baby’s in their songs.
I was skipping church yesterday, and since I couldn’t go home and risk being caught, I went down to the Weber County Library to check on Ogden’s thriving population of transvestite homeless. While I was there, inhaling body odor and checking out grown men wearing size 14 heels with tan nylons, I started browsing through the CDs. That’s where I found Ten Years Gone: The Best of Everclear 1994-2004. When crappy bands like Everclear are releasing greatest hits albums, you know the apocalypse is near.
Because I enjoy torturing myself, I checked the CD out and brought it to work today. After listening to what is probably the band’s most successful song, a bouncy number about the joys of a welfare Christmas called “I Will Buy You A New Life,” I decided to take a count of the numerous onomatopoetic devices used throughout. A liberal count yielded forty-six of them. Forty-six times in a single song, the band says ohhh, or ahhh, or yeah, or uhhh, or some other variation on the same theme. And that song isn’t even the worst offender.
I suffered through the first half of the album, but breathed a sigh of relief when I got to a cover song of Van Morrison’s classic, “Brown Eyed Girl.” Surely, not even Everclear could destroy a great song like that. Four minutes and fifty-six oooh’s later, I concluded that their cover is possibly the worst musical recording ever made. I had to sit on my hands so I wouldn’t suddenly rip my headphones off in disgust. To their credit, many of the oooh’s and ahhh’s are heard as a repeating background echo, but that’s almost more annoying.
But it’s not just the oooh’s and ahhh’s that annoy. Art Alexsakis (lead guitar, vocalist, and songwriter) writes songs almost exclusively about his white-trash background, taking pride in his former place as the doormat of society. Who else, besides a former white-trash superstar, would write about being abused and abandoned by his father, blasting 70’s rock through a crappy AM radio, living homeless on the beach, or of course, celebrating Christmas courtesy of loyal tax-payers? Not surprisingly, drugs are also widely praised throughout the band’s recordings. Drugs leading to poverty and homelessness? Who knew?
It’s serendipitous that I found the Everclear album when I did, because the other day I was reading an article in Blender about them. The band was recently dropped by its record label and was forced to break up. About the same time, Alexsakis’s third marriage ended in divorce. As a final insult, Alexsakis filed for bankruptcy. So along with the dubious distinction of being the worst musician in public memory, he’s also poor and lonely. I couldn’t script a more perfect ending. He’s finally atoning for all the pain he caused the world. Currently, Alexsakis is attempting to use Myspace to launch a solo career. When that fails, I'm sure he'll get married for a fourth time and ruin someone else's life. Let's pray he kills himself before that happens.
If you have any Everclear albums in your music collection, then you'd better have a good excuse. Last time I checked, my younger brother has a few of them, which begs an eternally baffling question: Is he stupid because he listens to Everclear, or is his stupidity conducive to crappy music? Which causes which? I'm afraid we'll never know.
# posted by RBW @ 1:25 PM 
