All that ice cream was paid for with Time Warner money.
We’ve already gone over this: People who accuse others of “selling out” are just pissed that no one’s waving a check in their faces. These whiners are simply bitter hacks. If you do something really well, someone should come along and give you a bag full of money because, well, you’re really fucking good at something. Nice job.
I bring this up because of a trailer that I recently saw. It’s for some new show on HBO and it features Japanther’s song “Challenge.” Check it out:
Now, Japanther are a fucking great band who deserve all the money, recognition, and pussy that comes their way. No beef for getting paid. The only reason this irks me is because of Japanther’s ostensible political rhetoric, which is alluded to in these lines from their song “Um Like Yer Smile Is Totally Ruling Me Right Now”:
So get on our bikes
Ride downtown
By the Clear Channel billboards
Tear them down!
Angst, direct action, anti-establishmentarianism, anti-corporatism, environmentalism — it’s all there in a passionate, anarchic call to arms. But let’s get this straight: Clear Channel is a villainous corporation and Time Warner, owner of HBO and the fourth largest entertainment conglomerate in the world, is cool to do business with? How do you square that? This almost as bad as when the song “Tho You Are Gone I Still Often Walk With You” by A Silver Mt. Zion — another band with anarchist sympathies — was featured in a trailer for LOST.
Go ahead and make your music and your money, but you can’t expect be all anti-establishment, pro-anarchy, then go and collude with monstrous corporations similar to the ones you’re deriding as evil, and not expect to get shit for it. Either tell those ruinous capitalist pigs to fuck off when they come around offering their fat stacks because, like you said, “[you] believe it,” or just make all your songs instrumentals.
P.S. For the record: I fucking LOVE Japanther.
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01.15.10 at 5:14 pm
Color me uninterested. I’d rather here how often they bang art school girls in bathrooms.
01.15.10 at 5:23 pm
We both love the old TV Carnage VHS tapes
Wow, how edgy and retro! When were these guys born anyway? 1989?
01.15.10 at 6:15 pm
^That’s probably why they sing into phones instead of mics….to show everyone how unique they are
01.15.10 at 6:16 pm
OM OMG OMG!!!!! everybody on here gives a shit! great article, though i must say this piece is representative of the kind of shit this site has been spraying around as of late on its downhill slide.
01.15.10 at 6:17 pm
[...] Gavin sent my last post over to Japanther, who wrote a point by point rebuttal (the parts in bold), sorta dropping me on my [...]
01.15.10 at 7:11 pm
Japanther? “Um Like Your Smile Is Totally Ruling Me Right Now”? Jesus fucking christ, hipsters make my skin crawl.
01.15.10 at 7:48 pm
apparently the key to Arv writing a really good post is to piss him off
01.15.10 at 8:08 pm
arv, you could’ve saved yourself (and all others) the trouble of writing another intolerable post about how typical your tastes are by simply referring yourself to the first sentence of this entry.
01.15.10 at 8:24 pm
when is nice guy rock finally gonna get the recognition it deserve? i’m rootin tout tooting for all nice guys! lets clean our rooms together!?!
01.15.10 at 9:56 pm
yeah, and godspeed you black emperor was all anti getting paid for shit too. so what. they’re musicians. what, do you want them to dumpster dive for the rest of their lives, even after their little fame has washed ashore? if you answered yes then fuck you, playa hata!good musicians should get paid for their work! you can oppose capitalism all you want but you’re still whinin in a squat. its do or die, assholes and japanther fuckin did! cuz they’re a great band that makes better music than you ever will. let them taste the spoils of victory. its a shitty economy right now so quit being teet-sucking pooseys and get some!!! if you are unable to do that then shut the fuck up and die!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
01.16.10 at 5:42 am
I feel emasculated by that picture of them.
01.16.10 at 9:31 am
Rock on Arv!!!!!!!!!! Fight the power!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Youll never sell out by plugging shitty bands your friends with or streetwear, and in no way is that equivalent to genuinely talented people selling out on a larger scale!!!!!!!!!!!
01.16.10 at 3:33 pm
Kinda like how Gavin shills for Teva amirite?
01.16.10 at 8:48 pm