Now, people are attacking her for having the worst song of all time. Even, I'm writing about her. This is what's scary about Rebecca Black...and it's not even her. It's her road to popularity. Her parents bought it. Her parents paid the producers to write her a song and make a video for her. Her parents bought her celebrity status. Apparently for only $2000. It doesn't bother so much that Rebecca Black bought her way into the pop world. Isn't that how it's done normally? Don't record labels pay off radio stations to play to their music? Isn't this just a more direct method of "Payola?" What worries me, is if you can buy super stardom for $2000...then what can't you buy? Whether you like it or not, Rebecca Black is now a permanent part of our media subculture. Her song will be timeless...just for being timely.
Rebecca Black with the worst song of all time...has more youtube video watches than all of Rise Against's videos...combined. And Rise Against isn't some indie rock band pushing their own music onto college radio music directors. They're a main-stream, Platinum-selling artist with the backing of a major label. Bands who busted their asses for years on the road, were the ones with the best chances of breaking through...now, they're the last in line to the ones who didn't even show up to practice.
Here are the 11 Best Songs By Rise Against:
1. Injection (The Sufferer & The Witness)
2. Like The Angel (Revolutions Per Minute)
3. Prayer For the Refugee (The Sufferer & The Witness)
4. My Life Inside Your Heart (The Unraveling)
5. But Tonight We Dance (This Is Noise EP)
6. Savior (Appeal To Reason)
7. Re-Education Thought Labor (Appeal To Reason)
8. Give It All (Siren Song Of the Counter Culture)
9. Ready To Fall (The Sufferer & The Witness)
10. Life Less Frightening (Siren Song Of the Counter Culture)
11. Anyway You Want It (Revolutions Per Minute)
Buy Rise Against' new album, Endgame now.
i agree, rebecca black's song is terrible. but the statement about her video having more views than all of Rise Against's videos combined isn't correct.
ReplyDeleteFor me # 1 is Prayer of the Refugee and #2 is The Good Left Undone - great list though!
ReplyDeleteidk if the rebecca black vs rise against youtube views comment is true or not. if so that is incredibly depressing. personally, the good left undone is number one. 'all because of you/i believe in angels/not the kind with wings/no not the kind with halos/the kind that bring you home/when home becomes a strange place' i mean come on.
ReplyDeleteI just stumbled across this list today (two years after it was published), but I'm guessing the blogger who posted this doesn't even listen to Rise Against. I mean, how the hell do you screw up the names of half their songs and album titles? Sure, I can see how "The Sufferer and the Witness" can be confused with "The Suffering of the Witness" and "Like the Angel" with "Like An Angel", but I don't see how anyone who listens to RA could mess up titles like "Give It All" and think that it's "Give It Away". But cheers for not neglecting songs from "The Unraveling".
ReplyDeleteCole, I'd like to say I was drunk when I wrote this but after doing some checking of my own the only thing I have to blame is Itunes. In my Itunes, the album and song titles were named incorrectly. Call this a casualty of the digital world. I own both Counter Culture and Witness on CD but never listen to them in that way. I usually only listen digitally. When I was doing the list I was copying the titles from my Itunes account. I have made the changes to my list. Not to Itunes...because there's no hope there.
ReplyDeleteIt's easy to change titles is songs in iTunes so I don't see why that's a big deal.
ReplyDelete"If you can buy super stardom for $2000...then what can't you buy?"
ReplyDeleteYou can't buy any sort of fame. Rebecca Black didn't buy this, she got lucky. There is a huge difference.