Case in Point

The other day, I was reading some user comments on a favorite blog/website of mine. It is written by one my favorite musicians, who happens to be extremely knowledgeable and articulate. He is also generous enough to take time out of his busy schedule to respond to most, if not all comments. Although, to me some of the user comments come across as totally off base, uninformed, or just stupid. Case in point: "...the 90s' were a terrible decade for rock and metal period."

Seriously? Period? Here is a brief list of rock/metal bands that formed in the 90s', released some great albums in the 90s', or made it "big" in the 90s':

White Zombie

Alice in Chains

Pearl Jam

Soundgarden

Prong

System of a Down

Pantera

Metallica (granted they were "big" in the 80s' but they really broke in the 90s')

Red Hot Chili Peppers

Tool

Faith No More

etc....*

Yeah, the way that rock/metal sounded and looked changed; BUT to say that the 90s' was "terrible" is just a silly thing to say. These bands wrote good songs and albums, had great tones, pioneered new tunings, and song structures. Saying something like that is very short sighted. If one just looks through their CD collection, iPod, Zune, or even just Wikipedia you can find out that the 90s' did produce some good rock/metal. Now this is not to say that it was with out it's low points, but it did produce very well.

* I know I left off a ton of groups/musicians. This was just a quick off hand list, I know that dozens of groups qualify for this, as well as the albums that they produced. So this was not a slam against any group or musician.

Public Encounters Volume 1

Normally when I go out on Muni (San Francisco public transportation), I wear headphones. Mostly so I don't have to listen to the throngs of people and their borderline retarded conversations. Although, the other day I was on the bus with my lady as we were headed to the vet and naturally since I was with her, I didn't wear any headphones. What I heard was awesomeness. Pure awesomeness. The "conversation" in question was between a super aging skateboarder, a hippy pot smoker, and his drugged out girlfriend who was BARELY awake and taking.

HPS: Dude, you know who is the best bass player ever?

ASB: Oh man, I'm an old metal head, so Cliff Burton is the man for me.

HPS: Uh....who?

ASB: He was the original bass player for Metallica. All of their early songs were structured for him.

DOG: .......picnic.....fries....

HPS: Oh he's the guy who died right? What about Les Claypool? Or Flea?

ASB: (mocks air bass playing) Nah, man those guys are all technique....here's my stop...

DOG: .....I GOTTA GO....

The other part to this entry is as follows. I recently started a job (yay?!). I won't say where, but I meet people from all over the country/world/universe everyday. It's really cool, meeting these people. Every once in awhile though, I meet some real dumbasses. Here's what happened between 2 women and myself.

Me: How long are you guys in town?

Lady 1: Oh just a few days. We thought we'd check out some of the sites in the city.

Me: Oh that's great! You gonna see Alcatraz? It's really cool!

Lady 1: I'd like to. I have to see what she thinks (points to Lady 2).

Lady 2: What's up?

Lady 1: He asked if we were going to go to Alcatraz...

Lady 2: Is that fake? It can't be real?

Me: What?

Lady 1: She is always skeptical...

Lady 2: It can't be real...

In summation; this lady (Lady 2) THINKS that Alcatraz is fake. The island, the prison, the documentation, the history, etc...is all FAKE.

What the hell?

Blast From The Past

I was surfing the interweb the other day and ended up on youtube for awhile and instead of watching dogs play with shopping bags or guys getting hit in the garbage, I was watching something that made me hate when I grew up. I was watching a ten part "best of" series of Headbangers Ball (the old one) and it made me feel bad that I missed out on such a great show. No instead I lucked out and got stuck with that show the second time around and boy does that suck ass.
Back in the early 90s' they had great, great ass rock/metal/alternative stuff that they just don't have anymore. Bands like Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, Anthrax, Alice In Chains, Prong, Pantera, Sepultura, Faith No More, Soundgarden, and the list goes on. Plus there were good interviews and segments that made the show entertaining, you got to see and get to know some of these bands; now, I don't want to know these bands. They are all generic knobs who sound the same and look the same, the show is so generic and run of the mill. It's screaming this, downtuned guitars this, and blast beats galore. Plus it's like you can't even acknowledge the fact that you like music from the 80s'-90s'. What the hell is the deal with that? It makes me cringe. I don't want to say that all newer bands suck giant wieners BUT for the most they do and it's not just heavy bands. Throw in the alternative bands, the indy bands, and the metal bands. It really is a sad state of affairs these days. Anyways that's my little rant, fuckin' MTV.