Third Time's the Shit-Show
Kings of Leon, the Killers, and TV on the Radio - this just in the past year - have fallen victim to a masochistic need to make money. Not merely enough money to satiate an indie band's aggressive hunger to take lots of drugs and pick up girls in swanky hotels, but more money than they could possibly need as individuals who decided once long ago to pursue a career in music and get signed to an indie label.
This disease, as we shall call it, manifests itself in several ways, including manliner and the purchase of lung-restrainingly tight t-shirts that display more nipple than a grown man should be proud of. But what I intend to speak of here now is the degradation of a good band's third album. Yes, that's right. Some, like Kings of Leon, hold it off till their fourth technically (but in such cases no one's ever heard of their first album). Some, like the Killers, started sucking at the second album. But the trend persists: in years past, we see weak thirds coming from Interpol and the Strokes - though arguably only weak as compared to their first two.
Here I command thee, indie rock: shut up, sit down, and write music. For heaven's sake, you're not gonna become rock legends by making grandiose albums with superciliously poppy singles. Why do you think the Libertines are living legends? They never made it to the third, the sons of bitches!
And for heaven's sake, this must stop before the most hopeful of garage rock revivalists fall as well. I speak of Arctic Monkeys. I know. I know. (I'd say pray to Bacchus but I feel like if there's a God of indie rock, it would have to be Ringo. Or Stimpy.)
The Proof That Love's Not Only Blind But Deaf
In the UK, Kings of Leon have become the Messiah. We must ask ourselves, then, if KoL is the second coming, who was the first?
The answer is clear: the brand of rock n roll that has emerged at the turn of the God-blessed new century, pulling hipsters out of the river Styx that was bubble-gum pop and Nirvana's death-eater following, is due mostly to...the seventies and eighties. Two decades that the Grammy-led musical world seemed to forget had taken place. But sifting through the archives, five men happened upon the truth of those twenty years of punk and post-punk. Those five men were the Strokes.
Since, Aha Shake Heartbreak, Kings of Leon have rightfully garnered a foothold in the ears of millions. For three albums, they kicked ass in ripped t-shirts and Christ-like hair (for two of them it sounded good). Then came Only By The Night. What happened? Who knows. Maybe Caleb got banned from so many rodeos for banging chicks with cowboy hats in the bathrooms that he forgot how it feels to ride a bronco. Whatever happened, it felt like when the dinosaurs disappeared. A hole developed where before there were four kicks and a taper jean girl. Yet despite all this, the Kings have taken their place at the throne of Britain, and their loyal subjects are forgetting their place. Arguments are running rampant through the indie world: "Who's better?" "Who's more important?" The seeds of these arguments can be found in the Followills' debut when they were hailed as the Strokes of the South. (I always thought that was unfounded in the first place, since Caleb Followill sounds like a mentally challenged child dying from a bee-sting on his tongue and Julian Casablancas sounds like he was inspired to become a singer after hearing the text-voice on iMacs that was featured on OK Computer.)
A challenge: listen to a Strokes song and tell me where they got their melodies. Tell me how Julian Casablanca's already-classic lazy vocals figured out that they should be placed upon Albert Hammond, Jr.'s mechanical strumming; tell me how that playful bass line decided to hook up with drum-machine style rock drumming - a paradox in itself, all to compose the prettiest, catchiest, most orgasmic melodies and rhythms since the dawn of time (by the dawn of time I mean Love Me Do). As a songwriter, Is This It? and Room on Fire are the works of stylistic genius. There's not a bad song on there (and, almost contradictorily, if you tell me you don't like one song, I can easily play you another song and tell you they sound exactly the same, so chill out and enjoy the 3-minute coke-binge). Then, with First Impressions of Earth, they began a dissent into something...else. It was still the Strokes but it was also...different. In any case, this caused many fans to lose interest, some hoping it was a fluke or a Revolver to their Sgt. Pepper's, others believing the era of the Strokes was over.
Even if the latter group was right, even if Albert Hammond, Jr.'s last good work was Yours To Keep, even if Julian Casablancas hit his head on the ceiling of a hotel room and forgot how to be the embodiment of Cool, and even if Kings of Leon had never released Only By The Night, how do you compare Because of the Times to Room on Fire? Granted, one is a hoe-down that got out of control due to too much drinking and the other is a rain-drenched robot whose circuits got shorted and started dancing like it was 1984, so it's sort of like comparing apples and oranges, except we all like oranges better. Don't fucking tell me you don't know in your heart of hearts that oranges taste way the fuck better than apples! Don't tell me that! Cause you're a fucking liar, so fuck you up the ass!
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