I share music with my friends. I almost always have something playing - and I like hearing new stuff. But I'm not someone who spends a whole lot of time worrying about what's good and what isn't. What's cool and what isn't. I know I'm not cool. I'm cool with that. And when I put a list up like I did a few day's ago, I'm just sharing what I like.

But, I love a good Rock Snob.

Greg Kot, of the Chicago Tribune, posted his best of 2005 here. He now has a podcast available on iTunes. Kot may be a wonderful guy, but I really don't enjoy his writing. He doesn't really seem to so much have opinions, as act as a synthesis of others' opinions. He name-checks all of the "important" bands that no one really listens to, using as many Rock Snob cliches as possible.

My favorite thing about Kot is how he sucks up to the major artists of the moment in Chicago. A few years ago, he wrote a gushing portrait of Poi Dog Pondering. He talked about their communal live/work space, and how their multiculti membership was bridging the racial divide. Shortly thereafter, Frank Orral, the leader (and owner) of Poi Dog, fired most of the employees in the band. So much for multiculti. I thing most of the black people in the venue at a Poi Dog show were on stage. I would be amazed if the audience makeup came even close to reflecting the racial distribution in the community. To me, this is the musical equivalent of the "Magical Negro." I think its a shorthand way for musicians to play up racial stereotypes, borrowing "soul".

On the other hand, this year we had Kanye West (Kot's #1 for 2005) using producer Jon Brion to try to borrow highbrow indie cred. Time magazine called him "Hip Hop's Class Act". Here are the lyrics to "Gold Digger" from "Hip Hop's Class Act":

She took my money when I'm in need
Yea she's a trifflin friend indeed
Oh she's a gold digga way over town
That digs on me

[Chorus:]
(She give me money)
Now I aint sayin she a gold digger (When I'm in Need)
But she aint messin wit no broke nigga
(She give me money)
Now I aint sayin she a gold digger (When I'm in Need)
but she aint messin wit no broke nigga
get down girl go head get down (I gotta leave)
get down girl go head(yeah!! she kill me man)

Cutie the bomb
Met her at a beauty salon
With a baby louis vuitton
Under her underarm
She said I can tell you rock
I can tell by ya charm
Far as girls you got a flock
I can tell by ya charm and ya arm
but I'm lookin for the one
have you seen her
My psychic told me she'll have a butt like Serena
Trina, Jennifer Lopez, four kids
An I gotta take all they bad butts to show-biz
Ok get ya kids but then they got their friends
I Pulled up in the Benz, they all got up in
We all went to din and then I had to pay
If you messin with this girl then you betta be paid
You know why
It take too much to touch her
From what I heard she got a baby by Busta
My best friend say she use to be wit Usher
I dont care what none of ya'll say I still love her

18 years, 18 years
She got one of yo kids got you for 18 years
I know somebody payin child support for one of his kids
His baby momma's car and crib is bigger than his
You will see him on TV Any Given Sunday
Win the Superbowl and drive off in a Hyundai
She was spose to buy ya shorty TYCO with ya money
She went to the doctor got lipo with ya money
She walkin around lookin like Michael with ya money
Should of got that insured, GEICO for ya moneeey
If you aint no punk holla We Want Prenup
WE WANT PRENUP!, Yeaah
It's something that you need to have
Cause when she leave yo butt she gone leave with half
18 years, 18 years
And on the 18th birthday he found out it wasn't his

Now that's class. I think Calzone treats his bitches better.

Thankfully, my Playlist post only has one artist in commmon with Kot's: LCD Soundsystem. I'm sure that the LCD song "Losing my Edge" haunts Kot:

Yeah, I'm losing my edge.
The kids are coming up from behind.
I'm losing my edge to the kids from France and from London.
But I was there.

I was there in 1968.
I was there at the first Can show in Cologne.
I'm losing my edge to the kids whose footsteps I hear when they get on the decks.
I'm losing my edge to the Internet seekers who can tell me every member of every good group from 1962 to 1978.

To all the kids in Tokyo and Berlin.
I'm losing my edge to the art-school Brooklynites in little jackets and borrowed nostalgia for the unremembered eighties.

I can hear the footsteps every night on the decks.
I was there in 1974 at the first Suicide practices in a loft in New York City.
I was working on the organ sounds with much patience.
I was there when Captain Beefheart started up his first band.
I told him, "Don't do it that way. You'll never make a dime."
I was the first guy playing Daft Punk to the rock kids.
I played it at CBGB's.
Everybody thought I was crazy.
We all know.
I was there.
I was there.
I've never been wrong.

I used to work in the record store.
I had everything before anyone.
I was there in the Paradise Garage DJ booth with Larry Levan.
I was there in Jamaica during the great sound clashes.
I woke up naked on the beach in Ibiza in 1988.

But I'm losing my edge to better-looking people with better ideas and more talent.
And they're actually really, really nice.

I heard you have a compilation of every good song ever done by anybody. Every great song by the Beach Boys. All the underground hits. All the Modern Lovers tracks. I heard you have a vinyl of every Niagra record on German import. I heard that you have a white label of every seminal Detroit techno hit - 1985, '86, '87. I heard that you have a CD compilation of every good '60s cut and another box set from the '70s.

I hear you're buying a synthesizer and an arpeggiator and are throwing your computer out the window because you want to make something real. You want to make a Yaz record.

I hear that you and your band have sold your guitars and bought turntables.
I hear that you and your band have sold your turntables and bought guitars.

I hear everybody that you know is more relevant than everybody that I know.

But have you seen my records? This Heat, Pere Ubu, Outsiders, Nation of Ulysses, Mars, The Trojans, The Black Dice, Todd Terry, the Germs, Section 25, Althea and Donna, Sexual Harrassment, a-ha, Pere Ubu, Dorothy Ashby, PIL, the Fania All-Stars, the Bar-Kays, the Human League, the Normal, Lou Reed, Scott Walker, Monks, Niagra,

Joy Division, Lower 48, the Association, Sun Ra,
Scientists, Royal Trux, 10cc,

Eric B. and Rakim, Index, Basic Channel, Soulsonic Force ("just hit me"!), Juan Atkins, David Axelrod, Electric Prunes, Gil! Scott! Heron!, the Slits, Faust, Mantronix, Pharaoh Sanders and the Fire Engines, the Swans, the Soft Cell, the Sonics, the Sonics, the Sonics, the Sonics.

Note for the anal retentives, yes I condensed the lyrics a bit. But shit, dog, the bitches don't roll with the scroll!

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 17, 2005 at 9:48 AM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.