August 2006

Echoing a Sentiment

I just wanted to pop a quick note on this fetid space to plug a worthy cause:

Rock For Conrad

I've been to First Avenue or The Seventh Street Entry roughly 200-300 times in my life (which is about 500 less than Walsh), but one thought always crosses my mind, regardless of the show...

Just think if money were no life in your object, or perhaps even better, your life were a fairytale where you could be anything you wanted...what would that be? For me, a few things instantly come to mind: I wish I was a Major League pitcher, not the Roger Clemens kind, overpowering and fascist in a sports kind of way, but rather the Greg Maddux kind, full of guile and deceit; I wish I was the Linder's babiest brother, with my own fishing hat (self explanatory); I would very much like to be a Gourd (the Austin, Texas variety); and, every time I go to First Avenue, I think to myself how much fun on "show night" it would be to be Conrad Sverkerson.

Think about the shows this man has seen, and his integral participation in them. Think about the backstage warm-ups before those shows; think about the backstage meltdowns after them. Imagine the musical ghosts in his head.

Conrad was/is a fan of a defunct local band called Anchorhead. Why is that relevant. I mention it only because of perspective. Imagine a Friday night where a man who spends his working hours setting up microphones and amps for Gary Louris and Paul Westerberg comes ambling into a small bar somewhere and plops down in front of a regular old local band just grinding it out because they have a song in their hearts and 3 chords at their fingertips.

I watched this little scene more than once. "Wow," I thought, "he's Conrad, he doesn't have to go out and watch Anchorhead. Who's Anchorhead to a guy like that?"

Last night at bowling league, another local band guy told me he once saw Conrad shoot a 73 on a golf course. Apparently he's a stick golfer...a la Golf In the Kingdom or The Legend of Bagger Vance.

You got $10 in your pocket for this guy, you know you do.

Posted by Jack Sparks at August 30, 2006 9:32 AM | Comments (1)

I'm Still Right

John Reinan, Star Tribune
Last update: August 16, 2006 – 7:40 AM
The singing duo Montgomery Gentry made its name in country music with such hits as "Good Clean Fun."

But according to a federal indictment unsealed Tuesday, there was nothing good or clean about the death of a tame bear named Cubby at the hands of Troy Lee Gentry.

Gentry, half of the singing pair, bought the "trophy-caliber" bear for $4,650 from Lee Marvin Greenly, owner of the Minnesota Wildlife Connection in Sandstone, according to the charges filed in federal court in Duluth.

Yeah I was foolish and wild
she was classic and regal
we were fresh out of school, both barely legal
we were young and on fire and just couldn't wait
six weeks in, she was three weeks late

one means none and we're home free
two means three and a diamond ring
yeah i wonder what fate is gonna decide
we're just sittin around waiting on two pink lines
sitting around waiting on two pink lines

--Two Pink Lines, By Eric Church

Here's the big payoff. Mainstream Country is sliding sideways across a slick highway into the guardrail of its own destiny. THIS is it...THESE are the ultimate results.

I was sitting around the house the other day, nothing was on the movie channels, no great old westerns on Turner Classic, no hack destroying a beautiful piece of meat on the cooking channel...so I flipped over. I told myself I would watch ten minutes, and I didn't last three. Fate led me to a video for a song called "Two Pink Lines," by Eric Church.

You can almost feel the warm urine of the daytime soap commercial quality of this jingle in the few lyrics I've offered. But, the cynical product-placement nature of this piece of trash doesn't really come vomiting out of the ether until you subject yourself to 3 minutes of the video. I haven't run down to my local drugstore--like Tommy Lee Jones in "U.S. Marshalls"--rifling through the home pregnancy kits until I found the box that matched the one I saw; but, make no mistake, there was one that kept getting picked, over and over. And DO NOT THINK FOR ONE SECOND that there isn't a kit that shows positive from two pink lines, AND, that evil evil evil men like Mick Anselmo and Ed Benson aren't currently monitoring whether there's a spike in sales for that kit.

This is where it was all leading. We now have a song that is unabashedly a jingle for a feminine healthcare product. The little dog has pulled back the curtain, and there's the fat old man pulling the levers and working the dials. Fuck each and every one of you whoever doubted me. The next big hit out of Nashville will undoubtedly focus on the OTHER pressing, vaginal issue of our day, yeast infections:

She said don't worry
It's 'sposed to feel squishy
When I got down there
I thought it smelled fishy
Two weeks later
I nearly lost my hat
She said, "you big dummy
It's 'sposed to itch like that."

What rhymes with Vagasil? Fuck you Eric Church. I hope you get sick on a rotten corn dog at the Fair next Friday.

The other story above is just too good to be true. It really brings home the phoniness of these people, prancing around in their big trucks and cowboy hats, polishing their guns, tightening their camouflaged, compound rigs. "Cubby." Not only did the bear have a name, it had the cutest name possible. I'm going to tell you right now that this is a bigger issue than some phoney fucking Nashville poseur and some dumb as rocks, jock-sniffing, out-state moron killing a Disney commercial on four legs. The Duluth Feds need to seriously look at why this was videotaped. Was CMT involved? Was GAC involved? Did the men and women in the marketing department of whatever foul record company that M&G are on have a song cooked up for the duo about hunting? These peacocks don't do anything on videotape unless it's something to further their careers...remember, "this is a business." Shit, if you believe Jon Bream, major label Country stars don't come to Minnesota without calling Mick Anselmo...they all have him on speed dial. Was Mick there? Do we have the makings of Beargate 2006? Big & Rich have pushed the other duos down there to the wayside with their awful music and cynical commercialism, they've upped the ante, and now, these scared little people are shooting domesticated wildlife on videotape in some nefarious attempt to keep up with the Joneses. Somebody figure this out before a Nashville plastic surgeon attempts to sew bald eagle wings on a child to turn her into an angel for the next Martina McBride video.

Posted by Jack Sparks at August 16, 2006 9:44 AM | Comments (8)

Here's what I wrote

Here's what I wrote during the 38th CMA Awards back in 2004:

See!!!! I fucking told you. Big & Rich in a Chevy commercial. This band is all about making fucking commercials. All you people panting over their authenticity can go fuck yourselves now.

Here's what I wrote last year:

Speaking of commercials....

I FUCKING KNEW IT. I DIDN'T PREDICT IT BECAUSE IT WAS TOO TRITE TO IMAGINE.

The first commercial on this televised abortion is Big & Rich for Chevy. Hey Big & Rich, I'll be on the radio on Saturday from 2 to 4pm Central time, the 800 number into the studio is 877-646-1220. You fucking posers are fucking losers. You're about commercials and cash. You aren't edgy. You aren't talented. You're a fucking sham perpetrated on the "Country Music" public to sell dildos, laundry detergent, and pickups. Fuck you and your edgy Muzik Mafia bullshit. You aren't Country, you're Cashville, and you should be ashamed of yourselves. No one is going to buy your "comeback" album in 2015.

Hit "play"

This commercial is retarded. Martina could squeal a song at top volume about it.

Oh fuck. Pause. "Country's Newest Outlaws."

Let me explain something, then get off my soapbox so I can get through this. The original Outlaws left Nashville and retreated to Austin to get away from fuckers like you. They wanted to play their songs and make their music and not be worried about whether Nashville made money on sideshow bullshit. If Waylon was alive, he would kick all of your asses. Big & Rich, you are the two biggest cocksuckers in Country Music today.

Hit "play"

Post-WE Fest, I just want to reiterate how right I am about everything. I do get tired of my own words, and the boring repetition of my message. That's why I don't post as often as I used to. But, let's not let it get in the way of the overall message: I am right. Mick Anselmo, Ed Benson, and especially the two cocksuckers in the pic above are in it solely for the money. Muzik Mafia my ass. Cash Register Mafia is more appropriate. Fuck both of you. You're ruining country music.

Posted by Jack Sparks at August 11, 2006 4:56 PM | Comments (6)

The Top 100 Country Songs of All Time -- 2006

Luckily, another jackass wrote yet another article about the death of Alt Country. This time, he didn't even pretend to write an original article, he just rehashed the one from the New York Times that I linked to a coupla blogs ago. They're crawling out of the woodwork now, so the best thing I can do is post my list of Top 100 Country Songs of All Time. And, I should reiterate that Alt Country isn't dead, because what you thought of and think of as Alt Country has always been the true Country Music in this world. The utter dreck that gets labelled as Country as it comes out of Nashville, Tennessee to be force fed to you on shit stations like K102 by supremely evil, cynical, music-hating, corporate bastards like Mick Anselmo, is just this side of a propaganda experiment at a Hitler Youth camp circa 1942. All music must deliver the demo, and the demo must buy the product; artistic content is for Sunday at midnight, if even that.

I'm tired of detailing why each song is here...what the songs means...a funny quip about how it fills my soul with the smoke rings lapping at the neon...just read the list and invent your own reason. In fact, in the comments section, post your own Top 100 if you feel like it. Or, pick a song on my list and write the quip for it. Unless you're Mick Anselmo or Ed Benson...then, of course, all of these songs are foreign to you as none of them were designed to make women, between the ages of 25 and 54, with household purchasing power, listen to a radio station, during the commercials.

If you're loading your car, van, truck, or SUV to go up to WE Fest right now to see a bunch of assclowns like Rascall Flatts and Kenny Chesney, this list will make no sense to you or your poor taste in music. But that's okay, your moment of clarity that brought you here in the first place will soon be clouded over once again by the products used to give you your mid 80's teased up hairdo, and by the mind-numbing preservatives in the double portions of fast food you're trying to swallow with an extra large Diet Coke©®™

Jack's Top 100 Country Songs of All Time
1. I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry, Hank
2. Folsom Prison Blues, Johnny
3. Love's Gonna Live Here, Buck Owens
4. Walking the Floor Over You, Ernest Tubb
5. Crazy/Hello Walls/Nightlife(Live Medley), Willie Nelson & Family
6. Dead Flowers, Rolling Stones
7. Together Again, Emmylou Harris
8. Loving Her Was Easier (Than Anything I'll Ever Do Again), Tompall Glaser & the Glaser Brothers
9. Portland, Oregon, Loretta Lynn
10. Blue Suede Shoes, Carl Perkins
11. Screen Door, Uncle Tupelo
12. Don't Go Back to Rockville, REM
13. Interstate Love Song, Stone Temple Pilots
14. That'll Be the Day, Buddy Holly & the Crickets
15. It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels, Kitty Wells/The Wild Side of Life, Hank Thompson/Great Speckle Bird, Roy Acuff
16. Lovesick Blues, Emmitt Miller
17. Help Me Make It Through the Night, Sammi Smith
18. Knoxville Girl, The Louvin Brothers
19. Blue Eyes, International Submarine Band
20. Don't Think Twice, It's All Right, Bob Dylan
21. This Land is Your Land, Woodie Guthrie
22. Blue Yodel (T for Texas), Jimmie Rodgers
23. He Stopped Loving Her Today, George Jones
24. Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain, Willie
25. Ring of Fire, Johnny Cash
26. Coat of Many Colors, Dolly
27. Stand By Your Man, Tammy Wynette
28. Sing Me Back Home/Mama Tried, Merle Haggard
29. Husbands and Wives, Roger Miller
30. Lookin' Out My Back Door, CCR
31. El Paso, Marty Robbins
32. Sober, Tool
33. Sail On, The Commodores
34. Me and Bobby McGee, Janis Joplin
35. There Stands the Glass, Webb Pierce
36. Always Late (with Your Kisses), Lefty Frizzell
37. I've Got a Tiger By the Tail, Buck Owens
38. Good Hearted Woman, Waylon Jennings
39. Your Cheatin' Heart, Hank Williams
40. I Never Go Around Mirrors, Lefty Frizzell
41. When You Say Nothing At All, Alison Krauss & Union Station
42. Windfall, Son Volt
43. Old Dogs, Children, and Watermelon Wine, Tom T. Hall
44. The Ghosts of Hallelujah, The Gourds
45. Great Balls of Fire, Jerry Lee Lewis
46. Illegal Smile, John Prine
47. You're Still On My Mind, Byrds
48. Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town, Kenny Rogers and New Edition
49. Pick Me Up On Your Way Down, Charlie Walker
50. Up Against the Wall Redneck (Mother), Jerry Jeff Walker
51. If You've Got the Money I've Got the Time, Lefty Frizzell
52. Galveston, Glen Campbell
53. Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, Neil Young & Crazy Horse
54. Me and Billy the Kid, Joe Ely
55. I Ain't Never, Webb Pierce
56. Hey Good Lookin', Hank Williams
57. Sing a Sad Song, Merle Haggard
58. Flowers on the Wall, Statler Brothers
59. Absolutely Sweet Marie, Jason and the Scorchers
60. Postcard, Uncle Tupelo
61. Lyin' Eyes, Eagles
62. Farewell Party, Gene Watson
63. Detroit City, Bobby Bare
64. Before the Next Teardrop Falls, Freddy Fender
65. Coal Miner's Daughter, Loretta Lynn
66. Suspicious Minds, Elvis Presley
67. Behind Closed Doors, Charlie Rich
68. Concrete and Barbed Wire, Lucinda Williams
69. La Despedida, Terry Allen
70. Pocket Full of Gold, Vince Gill
71. Hands on the Wheel, Wille Nelson
72. If We Make It Through December, Merle Haggard
73. Kiss An Angel Good Mornin, Charlie Pride
74. Tear-Stained Eye, Son Volt
75. Guitar Town, Steve Earle
76. One Road More, The Flatlanders
77. Hot Burrito #1, Flying Burrito Brothers
78. Uneasy Rider, Charlie Daniels Band
79. Amarillo By Morning, George Strait
80. I've Been To Georgia on a Fast Train, Billy Joe Shaver
81. White Freightliner Blues, Townes Van Zandt
82. Elmo Lincoln, Jack Ingram
83. I've Always Been Crazy, Waylon Jennings
84. Little Ramona (Gone Hillbilly Nuts), BR5-49
85. Drive (For Daddy Gene), Alan Jackson
86. Laredo Rose, Texas Tornados
87. El Cerrito Place, Charlie Robison
88. Lucille, Fred Eaglesmith
89. Indianapolis, Bottle Rockets
90. Gringo Honeymoon, Robert Earl Keen
91. I Was Drunk, Alejandro Escovedo
92. La Grange, ZZ Top
93. Amos Moses, Jerry Reed
94. Good-Bye, Good Lookin', Robbie Fulks
95. Amy, Pure Prairie League
96. Backsliders Wine, Michael Martin Murphy
97. Tampa To Tulsa, The Jayhawks
98. Gravity's Gone, Drive By Truckers
99. Play a Train Song, Todd Snider
100. Contrails, Richmond Fontaine

Posted by Jack Sparks at August 4, 2006 2:34 PM | Comments (6)

Greatest Sports Songs of All Time... commentary

This List is terrible

Actually, it's not so bad. But anyone who knows anything knows that the greatest sports song ever is "The Fran Tarkenton Song," by Detroit...from Minneapolis.

Posted by Jack Sparks at August 4, 2006 11:49 AM | Comments (0)

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