Saturday, January 1, 2011

The Gift That Keeps on $h¡+t*ng

What a year 2010 was; full of exciting new experiences, good tunes, and “karate and friendship for everyone.” But, merely speaking from a musical standpoint, there have been so many great releases it’s been hard just keeping up with them, even on a weekly basis.

Fortunately, none of that matters.

In fact, none of the albums released in 2009 matter either. The people have spoken; 2010 has a crowned champion and, boy, is it a blast from the past. The best selling hard rock album of Oh-10’ was neither Disturbed nor Godsmack’s best rehashings of their past works, nor was it Linkin Park’s most (self) important release to date. Nope; this record is in a league of its own. The big winner is… triggered drum roll please …


[2]


Now, I know what you must be thinking- “how can an album possibly be this good? It’s a great question, one that I was forced to grapple with a few years back, when I reviewed the release (http://www.sputnikmusic.com/review/28033/Nickelback-Dark-Horse). Unfortunately, Dark Horse is a work that eschews simple explanation.

In 2006 Donald Rumsfeld, in commenting on U.S. military expenditures in the Middle East, said, “from my standpoint, I think numbers are almost distracting” [1]. Rumsfeld makes a great point in this excerpt; that in applying rational concepts to irrational things one can easily lose sight of the topic at hand. When one starts throwing around words like “great” or “phenomenal” in discussion of a Nickelback album he almost fails to grasp the essence of it, the real emotionality, its “truthiness,” if you will.

So, if you will allow it, I want to paint you a picture. You must forgive me if my language at any time gets flowery or grandiose, but I feel that this is the only way that I can truly help everyone to understand this most interesting of anomalies. It’s holiday season again (hey guy; today is still Kwanzaa...) so in that spirit I have a scene that I find very helpful in illustrating the Dark Horse phenomenon:

You’ve just finished a big meal with the fam, (whether it be at the Christmas or Hanukkah table or even at your Umoja Nia Kuumba feast of unity, purpose, and creativity). Your spirits are high, but your stomach isn’t quite on the same page. You know well that your floor level waste receptacle can only handle such an amount of "holiday cheer" and the wrapping paper that comes with it, but that’s not your chief concern, at least at this particular moment. As my great uncle once said in a similar situation, “you know, it happens!” You do the dirty deed and spend the rest of the evening pretending that your foulest of transgressions never occurred; that it’ll just “go away,” but deep down, you know just as well as your horrified guests that your little “yule log” is a holiday relic that’s here to stay.

Nickelback’s Dark Horse is not simply their crowning achievement, but it is that very log, here to spread fumy yuletide goodness and bad facial hair for years to come. Absentmindedly pick one up for someone you love this holiday season and get em' while they're still hot. 

Mmmm, smell that? That's the smell of fun.

Happy Holidays all,



[1] Why We Fight, Eugene Jarecki
[2] Fshock.com

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