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| notes from underground - societal whispers all the news that print will fit. |
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Sunday, September 18, 2005 np: wilco - "i am trying to break your heart" i nearly vomited earlier today. as i was watching football (go panthers!), i decided to pick another channel to flip back and forth to between plays or during commercials. out of pure desperation, i gave mtv a look. it's nothing new to sit here and complain about mtv not being the grand ol' channel of yore, but as it continues to sink further and further down it's hard not to peek. and comment. i'm going to withhold my comments for two shows: my super sweet sixteen and laguna beach. if either show could get more white, i'd be bleached at the end of a half hour. the sweet sixteen show is a reality show that chronicles the sweet sixteen birthday parties of various girls (although next week, apparently, a rather fey boy is the featured debutante). i've yet to see a girl on there that wasn't a) stupid wealthy, b) seriously spoiled and c) a burden to our society. as a girl begged and pleaded with her father to get her a quite expensive car for her birthday, i couldn't help but wonder how many kids would be happy with a good pair of shoes for their birthday, let alone an automobile that she's likely to wreck in her first year of driving, only to have it replaced with another new car. honestly, i only watched about 30 seconds of laguna beach, but my main beef with it was that all the characters are white. that's it. i have that problem with a lot of shows. now the catch: when i was 14-18 years old, mtv saved my musical life. thanks to a wonderful show that cost me many hours of sleep before monday morning school, the incomparable (and legendary) 120 Minutes. when i first started watching the show, it was hosted by random bands or artists each week. they would introduce the videos, talk a bit about their own, and generally look like deer in the headlights. but eventually they settled on a new host, matt pinfield, who could probably be summed up as one of the most well-listened (as opposed to well-read) men in popular music. so during the majority of my high school career, on sunday nights/monday mornings from 12am - 2am, i would hunker down in my bed, turn on the tv and watch the videos mtv just didn't seem to feel like were worth playing during the day. a parade of new and old music. alt-rock and metal and even dabbling in some hip-hop from time to time. (i mean, christ, they played jeru the damaja!) for a student of pop culture who just wasn't satisfied with local commercial radio, 120 Minutes was a goldmine. it paved the way for eagerly jumping into the field of college radio. today, mtv doesn't even play full videos it seems. and it's the same ones. over and over. i was reminded of that infamous quote from world history. france's henry IV who said, in response to asking why he converted back to catholicism from calvinism, "Paris is well worth a mass." he was trying to stay out of the way of palpal authority and reaping the benefits at the same time. obviously, back in the early 90s, there were record labels who were smart enough to take henry's approach. if i were writing a historic fictional account of the times, i'd certainly have david geffen proffer that "nirvana was well worth a sonic youth." granted, DGC has sunk quite a bit of money into letting sonic youth run hog wild with their artistic tendencies ever since the late 80s, but they reaped the benefits of having DGC look damn cool. and thus, bringing on board some of the people who looked up to sonic youth, namely, kurt cobain. i'm sure nirvana's sales have paid for every sonic youth production and then some. so why hasn't MTV continued to think that audiences are well worth 120 minutes of airtime? people have been crying the death of 'music' television for some time, but it just gets worse by the year. those of us with ears to the ground have had to retreat to the internet (although the benefits of the internet over television are limitless, truly). i feel lucky to have witnessed the end of MTV's golden age. the replacements were well worth the groggy mornings. posted by J. Neas | 9/18/2005 05:59:00 PM
Comments:
Two things:
1) One time I flipped past MTV and that Sweet Sixteen show featured a rich, spoiled, stuck-up black girl. So, you know. It happens sometimes. and 2) I miss 120 Minutes. This summer, MTV was playing videos around 3 AM. While a number of them were the horrible TRL type videos, from time to time they'd surprise me: the new NIN video, some Ben Folds, Blind Melon, and super old-school Weezer (they played "Undone.") Nowhere near the variety of 120 Minutes of yesteryear, but still. Compared to a marathon of their dating shows? Much better.
Also: the Badgers totally whipped UNC. I never remember which NC team is "yours," so I just root against all of them, as far as the Badgers are concerned. :)
I also almost vomited while watching "My Super Sweet Sixteen" for the first (and only) time. Actually, it was the episode Sara mentioned with the stuck-up black girl. But her parents were white, which actually disappointed me a bit. I wanted it to even out. But yeah, it's a disgusting show. That our culture celebrates these people will kill us, I think.
Is it a celebration? Or more like watching a train-wreck? I would hope the latter, but it's still a pathetic thing to be on tv. Arrested Development is facing what will probably be its last season due to poor ratings and this show thrives. The most well-written comedy on tv since Seinfeld and people just aren't watching.
And UNC-Chapel Hill is "my" team, Sara. Go Tarheels. I really don't follow their football. It's rarely worth it. Of course, watching the basketball this year won't be as pretty as last year either. But at least the Panthers are 1-1 after trumping the Patriots. Now to go 14-0 for the rest of the season.
By "celebrates" I mean that ostensibly you're supposed to be disgusted by these kids, but on the other hand you're supposed to want it. It's the same thing with "Laguna Beach" too, I think. It thrives on inspiring both disgust and jealousy at the same time. It's like, "These kids are snots but in at least one way (money) they're still better than you." It's not a "Money is Bad" situation.
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