Shoulda Known Better

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

If a decade of American Idol has taught me anything, it is that the popular music industry doesn't know shit about music. It's kinda like expecting a used car salesman to know how to change a head gasket. Their job is to make a profit by selling stuff. Period. This I have known ever since I was in college and most of my favorite bands were virtually unknown. It was the time when Kurt Cobain met his untimely end, and I can remember people crying (!) and saying that he was a "poet" and "the next John Lennon"... neither of which qualify as a compliment. Either way, it was bullshit. Kurt's little grunge band was little more than image and attitude. His voice had all the subtlety and nuance of a rusted muffler. And, the lyrics? "A mulatto, an albino, a mosquito, my libido. Yeah." Wow. Forget Lennon. Kurt had to be channeling the spirit of Shakespeare! But, somehow, he became the poster boy for grunge music, even though there were much better bands out there (Soundgarden, anyone?). The image sells, so we praise the image and those who make it. The ones making the good music get brushed aside for the marketable shit. It shouldn't be a shocker, it's been the industry standard since four mop-haired limeys made millions of women wet their pants just by being mop-haired limeys.

This year, however, I must admit: I fell for it. I saw a shimmering thread of light as it broke through the grey haze of grandstanding mediocrity that passes for music: for the first time ever, Dream Theater got nominated for a Hard Rock/Metal Grammy. I was shocked and thrilled. Beside myself with anticipation. Of course, it ended in disappointment. The Grammy went to those legendary headbanging gods of metal: the Foo Fighters. Oh, music industry. You were so close.

I was disappointed, not in the music industry, but in myself. I let hope rear it's fickle head by thinking that the mainstream might abandon it's standard operating procedure of dip-shittedness and actually support heart and talent, instead of image and marketing. Ergo, I hang my head. Sadly, for one fleeting moment, I raised my hopes that the popular music industry would wise up and see it my way. Shame on me.

But, the industry isn't finished with me. Oh, no. Unfortunately, the stupid continues in the case one of my favorite bands, Delain. They're a talented symphonic metal band from the Netherlands. Their third album was supposed to come out last year but their record label's parent company, Warner Music Group, won't release it. Why? Why else? They aren't as marketable as every screamo terd-metal band fronted by a talentless, testosterone-addled meathead with ten pounds of piercings and a raging case of hepatitis because he spends more time in the tattoo parlor than learning how to sing. They won't release a good band's album because it doesn't appeal to their focus-group-determined target audience for metal: the beer-swilling, aggro, douchebag, frat-boy who thinks that the quality of the music is directly proportional to the number of times they use the word "fuck."

I'm no fool. I know that a band like Delain will never get the industry to drop their panties the way that they do for propped-up hacks like Lady GaGa or Taylor Swift, but, frankly, that's a good thing. To be famous and popular in music, you have to appeal to as many people as possible; that means aiming for the least common denominator: the average person. In case you haven't noticed, the average person is kind of a nit-wit. Joe Average knows as much about music as he does about politics, good beer and safe driving. He is the one with a singing rubber fish on his wall, a scrotum on his truck, and a Kid Rock album in the CD player. Not exactly a connoisseur. Maybe that makes me a music snob. Okay, that definitely makes me a music snob. So be it. To me, winning big in the music business is a lot like coming in first in a pissing contest. So, you're puddle's bigger than mine. Congratulations. I shan't be fooled again.