Archive for the 'iTunes' Category
WANT TOP SONGS ON iTUNES? JUST DIE.
Well I took a few weeks off from posting and the inventor of modern pop music went and died on us. If I wasn’t paying attention, I might assume that the late king of pop had staged a comeback. Nothing makes people appreciate you like a little bit o’ death.
As of July 1, 2009, Michael Jackson currently has four songs in iTunes Top 10 Songs, four albums in Top 10 Albums, and eight music videos in Top 10 Music Videos. iTunes is the number one seller of music on the planet, so one must deduct that Michael Jackson has four Top 10 albums right now - and he’s dead.
It’s nice to see a gem like “Man in the Mirror” at the #2 spot in the world. That song, along with just about every song released on 1982’s Thriller and 1979’s Off the Wall are better than any pop song since recorded.
One must hope that it didn’t take a death to get people excited about Michael Jackson again. Yes, the man was insane, but does his lack of sanity distract from the fact that “Dirty Diana” and “Billie Jean” are outstanding pieces of music?
The American obsession with personal life often exceeds absurdity. If Michael Jackson’s death is what prompted you to finally have his music on your iPod, then shame on you. Don’t be the one who waits for Paul McCartney to die before you start actively listening to The Beatles either.
NEW GREEN DAY, “KNOW YOUR ENEMY”
There are a few current bands that release new content and I won’t even bother to listen to the 30-second clip before buying their latest single or album. Green Day is no exception.
Green Day’s newest album, 21st Century Breakdown, hits stores May 15, and the band has just released the album’s first single, “Know Your Enemy”. It’s unfortunate that it will always be the second best song titled “Know Your Enemy” (Rage, of course, always holding the #1 spot…)
The song is classic Green Day style, and clocks in at just over 3 minutes. It’s not much of a departure from American Idiot, which for some is a good or bad thing. It doesn’t have the same epic qualities as a few of the tracks from Idiot, but it’s a solid first single from their highly anticipated and long overdue 2009 release.
Watch a preview and hear a clip of the song below. It’s available for full download on iTunes.
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BILLY CORGAN AND TILA TEQUILA…
The earth just tilted even slightly more off axis and every Smashing Pumpkins fan has died a little inside after discovering that 90s rock god Billy Corgan is dating reality TV “star” Tila Tequila. The pairing marks the first documented relationship in United States history between a pygmy and an albino. I’m already taking their kids’ lunch money.
2:1 odds that Tila Tequila has zero Smashing Pumpkins songs on her iPod. The couple made their public “debut” at Bravo’s 2009 A-List Awards last week. I honestly can’t remember if I ever took Billy Corgan seriously, but now there’s no doubt in my mind that any music released while he’s under the wrath of Tila Tequila will not make its way into my iTunes library.
How about some “Disarm”? Good excuse to post it.
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THE #1 SONG IN AMERICA? REALLY?
I monitor the iTunes Top 10 on a daily basis, and before about an hour ago, I’d never heard of the new number one song (as of today…), Black Eyed Peas’ “Boom Boom Pow”. If I had a DeLorean, I’d go back to a time before I had heard this awfully auto-tuned, vocoded excuse for music and dig myself into a hole until it went away. I hope this isn’t a preview for the rest of 2009. This is coming from someone who has Miley Cyrus and Flo Rida on their iPod……….
Here’s my challenge to you: listen to this entire song without getting a headache.
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TSF’S TOP 25 MOST PLAYED PT. 2
Instead of doing the usual “New Songs For Your iPod” post, I decided to give you 25 tunes that all kick ass. I reset my iTunes top 25 most played list a few weeks ago and here’s the result. 3 weeks of TSF listening and 25 songs for you to check out - both old and new. I did this back in September as well, here’s that post.
TSF’s TOP 25 MOST PLAYED SONGS
KINGS OF LEON: Their new album Only By the Night is a must own.
LUCERO: Gritty country/rock. Listen to “Raising Hell” below:
“GOOD MAN” & “GOD OF WINE”: The best Third Eye Blind songs you haven’t heard. “God of Wine” below:
Oh and Pinkerton is by far the most underrated album of the 90s. You haven’t heard Weezer until you’ve heard Pinkerton. The Beatles and Michael Jackson are up-and-coming, expect to see them make a mainstream splash in ‘09.
iTUNES RELEASES MUSIC “PASS”
Digital media Juggernaut Apple has just released the latest in the progression of digital content: an iTunes pass for select music content in their online store. Similar to the season pass you can purchase for television shows where each show is downloaded to your computer as it’s released, the music pass allows artists to bundle products (songs, videos, etc.) at one flat price and deliver content to your computer over a given amount of time.
This feature has already been implemented with British electronic group Depeche Mode’s latest album, Sounds of the Universe. I decided to take a look at what exactly they are offering through the season pass, and here are the details:
Upon purchase of the Sounds of the Universe pass for $18.99, you receive an advance download of two songs from the album set to release on April 21, 2009. During that time period, you receive exclusive singles, videos, remixes, and “more”.
iTunes uses this line to bait you into purchase: “Buy the pass now, and you’ll get the blazing new single “Wrong” as well as the Black Light Odyssey club remix of the new track “Oh Well” before the rest of the album becomes available.” But, you can already buy “Wrong” without buying the pass … so in layman’s terms, you’re paying $19 for one song and unknown content to be released over the next few months.
But here’s the kicker - in the fine print lies these two sentences:
Pass contents are subject to change without notice.
The final pass contents are subject to change, and purchase of the Pass does not guarantee deliver of any specific content.
This is the music business’s way of telling us that they’re pissed off that no one is walking into CD retail stores anymore and paying $16 for a 12-song album. Fifteen years ago, you heard a song on the radio and you purchased the CD. Ten years ago, you heard a song on the radio and you went home, turned on your computer, and downloaded the song for free on Napster. In 2009, you hear a song on the radio and you open iTunes and purchase it for $1 or you go to YouTube or other sites and listen to it for free.
Napster creator Shawn Fanning is responsible for setting into motion the last ten years of perpetual decline in album sales revenue. The iTunes “pass” is the first attempt to instill the ideal into the mind of the average music listener that an album should be sold around the $15 price point. The thought that people will pay more for “exclusive” content such as music videos and remixes is ludicrous. Go back to the drawing board and give me discounts on concert tickets, access to B-sides, a GUARANTEE of the content, and then we’ll talk about $19 music passes.
What do you guys think? Does this interest you at all if they offer it for a band you actually like? ‘Cause let’s be honest, Depeche Mode isn’t exactly the best choice to launch this feature.
10 WORDS TO DEFINE THE 21ST CENTURY
First, I must apologize because this is my longest post ever on That’s So Fetch. This post is a microcosm of why I created this blog in the first place. This post is my best attempt to define a generation; Generation Y, if you will. Those born between the early 1980s and the 21st century. Those born into a life with computers.
Every generation seems to be strikingly dissimilar to the generations preceding it due to not only cultural changes, but advances in technology. In the 21st century, we are upon a generation driven by the advent of computers, and more precisely, the internet. Being born in the early 1980s makes people my age one of the last to understand a world without texting, Google, or listening to music on anything other than a tape or disc. In the mid-1990s, chat rooms and instant messaging changed the face of social interaction, but texting, social networking sites, and video conferencing is shaping a generation.
Eight-year-olds with cell phones. Twelve-year-old girls taking pictures of themselves in front of mirrors for their MySpace profiles. Sixteen-year-olds who have never purchased a CD because all music is “free”. Adults who spell “your” as “ur” and update their Facebook status every 30 minutes because they think people care.
I know these aren’t all just one word. Just pretend they are…
10 WORDS TO DEFINE
THE 21ST CENTURY
NARCISSISM
If you have ever taken a picture of yourself and you’re the only person in the picture, this applies to you. Facebook and MySpace have spawned a strange sense of self-importance among American youth. Hundreds of pictures, most taken in some stupid pose in front of a mirror or what I like to call “The MySpace Picture”, where one holds the camera with one arm and snaps a photo of themselves in a “glamorous” pose. Usually perpetrated by underage girls baring their midriffs or depressed emo boys with stupid-ass haircuts. Otherwise extremely boring people thinking their lives are important enough to update us with their every move, whether they’re at the grocery or “out 2 lunch with tha gurlz!”, they seem to think we care.
BAD GRAMMAR
Before the internet, people actually had to write - GASP - on paper to each other. Spelling “your” as “ur” and “to” as “2″ wasn’t acceptable. But give a 21st century child an email address and AOL screen name and you will struggle to find at least an attempt at writing like an educated human being. Awful spelling and absent punctuation are commonplace in the 21st century. The shift key has become an afterthought.
TEXT
We all have that friend whom you will call and they won’t answer, immediately followed by a “hey, what’s up?” or a “you called?” text. Texting, instant messaging, and Facebook/MySpace messaging has made communication too easy and is ruining interpersonal skills. Keeping a conversation on the phone in the 21st century is like pulling teeth. Not to mention, hitting on chicks has become way too easy. Impersonal flirting via text and Facebook wall posts has made getting laid much easier for boring (or lazy) dudes.
MP3
In 1998, a computer program called Napster bent the music business over and made it it’s bitch. From that point on, music has become degraded and to this day, there are people who don’t pay for the music they listen to. The iPod and listening to music through the shitty speakers on your laptop or your cellular phone has become the standard for most American consumers. Apple’s iTunes is both the worst and best thing to ever happen to the music business. While artists are getting paid for their songs (as opposed to not paid at all), people are getting their music a la carte. Instead of paying $15 for an entire album, the average person will pick their 3 or 4 favorite songs and move on. That’s a loss of $11-12 an album. The “mix tape” has taken a whole new meaning in the 21st century and it’s slowly killing an industry that was on top of the world 10+ years ago.
CHILD MEGA-STARS
The late 90s ushered in a new kind of star: the child mega-star. Currently, three brothers (two under the age of 18) and Disney channel stars (all under 18) are the biggest celebrities in America. Fame is being achieved, and cashed in on, at younger and younger ages. Miley Cyrus and The Jonas Brothers are walking dollar signs for deep pocketed corporate executives and are products, not human beings. I’m not saying that there wasn’t a fair share of child stars before the year 2000. We must not forget the Jonathan Taylor Thomases and Olsen Twins of years past. This century has bred insane parents living vicariously through their children and frankly, getting rich from turning their offspring into a product.
GOOGLE IT
Encyclopedias. Libraries. Books. Three things that the 21st-century person does not need because of one company: Google. We are obsessed with instant satisfaction and Google is the poster company for this necessity. Anything you want to know can be solved from a search engine. It’s like taking every book in every library in the world and condensing it into pages of text refined to your specific query. As someone born in the 1980s, I can say that I do not remember the last time I opened an encyclopedia or used a book for reference.
METROSEXUAL
Women’s jeans. Skin-tight clothing. Leather pants. Facials. Botox. Spray-on tans. Chest/Leg/Arm waxing. Somewhere around 5 or so years ago, all the aforementioned items suddenly transformed from taboo to accepted. A man without chest hair was suddenly “hot” and dudes wearing their sister’s jeans were picking up chicks. Straight guys in women’s jeans, a fake tan, walking out of a salon after a pedicure? No problem.
HEALTH OBSESSED
“OH MY GOD, high fructose corn syrup? WTF … I’m not eating that.” Eating a cheeseburger in the 2nd millennium A.D. is now equatable to killing one’s first born child. In a country where 20% of its population smokes, indulging one’s self in a milkshake or a basket of french fries has become a no-no. We live in a world where if a female celebrity gains 5 or more pounds, the media thinks she pregnant. A guy with some meat on the bones is overweight and love handles are frowned upon.
ADD
“Oh, my kid has two Fs, but don’t worry, he’s ADD.”
“Dude, don’t laugh at my G.P.A., I have ADD.”
At some point in the 90s, the amount of children “diagnosed” with Attention Deficit Disorder, or “ADD” as it is more commonly known, began to skyrocket. Parents began blaming the shortcomings of their children on a medical disorder, subsequently medicating them with prescription speed. I am just going to give it to you straight: children with ADD are one of the following: 1) bored with their coursework, 2) lazy, 3) stupid, or a combination of all three. I am not saying that every child claiming to be ADD is stupid, because being bored with school or laziness doesn’t necessarily make someone dumb. It’s an overused excuse for the below average test scores of incompetent children.
REALITY TELEVISION
A lot of things have been created that directly make the general population dumber. Reality television is at the top of that list. Telling you that I don’t enjoy a good dose of reality television every now and then would be a lie. The Real World and Survivor were some of the first, but the 21st century has brought upon the worst of the worst. Everything from Hulk Hogan’s family getting their own TV show to most recently, True Beauty on ABC, a show that searches for the “hottest” person in America. Reality is equally the same as turning on your TV and watching train wrecks. Scripted nonsense and unlikable characters make it one of the most embarrassing aspects of the 21st century.
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