Burgernoodle

I feared this day more than Armageddon itself.  The day Heidi Montag’s music video for “Higher” hit the internet.  Why?  Because it’s equally disastrous yet - unfortunately - we’re still here to witness it.  After the boob enhancement and nose job, you knew stardom was next on Montag’s to-do list.  You were just praying the end of the world would come sooner.  Somebody should have told her that just because The Hills aired on Mtv, a singing career isn’t the logical next step.  If the show had aired on Fox would that have given her the right to run out and become a GOP strategist?  I think not!

Her awkward poses, rhythmless dancing, and hellish vocals make Paris Hilton look like a Grammy winner.  Here it is, the video that I’m pretty sure her boyfriend, Spencer Pratt, filmed with his camera phone.

As I am topped the charts last week, something I’m sure Alicia Keys was thrilled about.  However, she’s probably not celebrating the news that the total number of sales was the second lowest ever for a #1 album since SoundScan began monitoring album sales in 1991.  It sounds like Debbie Downer swooped in just in time to prevent any sort of celebratory affair.  “Congratulations, you have the most popular album this week! Too bad you didn’t sell enough to cover your rent this week…Wa wa wa wa waaahhhhhh.”

Keys’ album sold a total of 60,519 copies last week.  The lowest before this was the Dreamgirls soundtrack which sold 60,064 copies in its second week about a year ago. 

Listen to the sweetest single off the album before Debbie works her voodoo and turns it into a repetitive radio favorite that 13 year olds can download as their ringtone. Whoops, too late! 

Remember when Lindsay Lohan used to be in the news because of her singing and not because of what she put up her nose? Wait, of course you don’t.  Let me refresh your memory.  Lindsay Lohan has two previously released pop music albums and now she plans to put out a third with a little help from a famous rapper. According to Yahoo News, 50 Cent plans to work with Lohan on her upcoming album, allegedly titled Nobody’s Angel.  Lohan’s dad, Michael, claims the two have known each other for some time now and are in “talks” about working together.  Believe it, people.  No source is more reputable than Michael Lohan, the deadbeat dad who’s probably still living off of her Parent Trap royalties.  I hope for 50s sake this isn’t true, it’s much too soon to commit career suicide.

This is a sad day.  Not because I’m suffering from a ruthless upper respiratory infection that might just leave me without a lung, but because American Idol winner, Jordin Sparks, made a disappointing appearance on the Billboard charts this week.  Her debut album (self-titled) wound up in the 10 spot, the lowest ranking for any debut album by an Idol winner.  It sold a mere 119,000 copies (to give you some reference, the unpopular winner of Season 5, Taylor Hicks, still sold about 298,000).  Don’t get me wrong, I’ve seen the video to her new single “Tattoo” and let’s just say it definitely isn’t en fuego.  In fact, I’ve seen it several times now and I couldn’t even hum the chorus to you.  I still have Clay Aiken’s “Invisible” running through my eardrums.  And he didn’t even win!

Anyway, I’m genuinely saddened by this news. According to this article on CNN, Sparks wants her image and music to reflect who she is - just a wholesome girl who’s not ready to sing raunchy, sexy love songs.  Like Britney back in the day, except in her case we all suspected that someone different lay just beneath the surface.

I know what you’re thinking - boy bands are all but extinct in the year 2007.  That’s what I thought too.  But we were all wrong, like we’ve been wrong so many times before.  Fifteen years after the birth of the ensemble, the boys are back with a new album and plans for a new world tour, which will kick off in Tokyo this February.  The band memebers talk to Reuters about their 6th album “Unbreakable” and the lessons that they’ve learn during their years off.  Unfortunately, the only one they didn’t learn was that you don’t do the whole boy band thing when you’re in your 30s (Nick Carter, the youngest member of the group who joined when he was 12, is now 28).  I’m just worried that their concerts are going to seem more like Hello Kitty conventions since the average age of a BB fan is around 13.  Maybe there’s actually a genius behind this - for every pre-teen ticket sold, there’s one going to a chaperone as well.  Nah bad marketing. 

One of the lessons they did learn?  Give people what they want (even if those people also want pink rinestone phone cases from Claire’s).  According to band member Howie Dorough, who is getting married next month:  “This time around, we made a conscious decision to go back to what people know us best for, which is our live entertaining shows, vocal harmonies, good, easy pop listening songs, up-tempo songs.”

Biggest surprise of the week?  The Eagles are still alive!  Second biggest surprise?  The band’s first studio album in 30 years debuted at no.1 this week on the Billboard top 200.  Many people predicted that Britney Spears’ Blackout would come out on top with The Eagles’ Long Road Out Of Eden falling to a close second, but many people also believe that The Hills is real and American Idol is rigged.  People can be oh so wrong.  Two things Britney is not going to be psyched about: 1) this is her first album to not debut at no. 1 and 2) The Eagles sold 711,000 copies to her 290,000 even though their albums were sold exclusively through their website,Wal-Mart, and Sam’s club retailers.  Ouch.  In any event, I’m not buying either one. 

For Jay Z’s 10th album, released today, he drew inspiration from the movie American Gangster, starring Denzel Washington, Russell Crow, Common, and T.I.  According to Mtv, it isn’t a soundtrack album, but rather Jay Z’s American Gangster is “being positioned as the rapper’s first concept album, a collection of tracks inspired by the film.”  Jay Z, who’s come out of retirement more times than Britney’s been caught without underwear, is not only a great hip hop artist/producer, but a sagacious businessman as well.  What a smooth marketing move to release his concept album just a few days after the movie hit the big screen.

‘Blackout’, Britney’s first studio album in four years hits stores tomorrow and so far most of the reviews have been on the positive side.  Whether we can attribute these praises to Britney herself or the magical producing of Timbaland protégé Nate “Danja” Hills and the Swedish duo Bloodshy & Avant is really up for debate.  Here are a few of the reviews, according to AOL Music:

Nekesa Mumbi Moody of the Associated Press raves about Britney’s new work. “‘Blackout’ is not only a very good album, it’s her best work ever - a triumph, with not a bad song to be found on the 12 tracks.”

PEOPLE gave ‘Blackout’ three stars, musing, “There is plenty of hot music for dancing one’s troubles away.”

The New York Times was decidedly mixed in its review.

“[Britney] has done almost nothing, in the recording studio or outside it, to convince fans that ‘Blackout’ is really hers, or really her. That doesn’t make it any harder to delight in how good the best songs sound. But that may well make it hard (or impossible) for fans and skeptics to treat this CD as a serious comeback attempt.”

I’ve got to be honest, I’m curious about this album and although I won’t drop 10 bones to purchase it, you can bet your bottom dollar I’ll sample 30 seconds of each song from the iTunes store and then unleash some wild opinions on Burgernoodle next week.  It’s completely understandable if you can’t go buy the album because of last minute costume shopping…or because you’re watching ants traverse across the plains of your backyard.  Understandable.

As it turns out, bigger isn’t always better.  According to the New York Times, Radiohead will likely sign their latest album, In Rainbows (the album they let their fans determine the price of) to an independent label.  In lieu of one of the larger contenders. 

“Major labels including Warner Bros. Records, Columbia Records, and Starbucks were reportedly engaged in a bidding war for the album, but it looks as though Radiohead will be leaving the major labels behind for a more independent business model.”

Whatever the band’s reasons may be, and as noble as it may seem, it makes complete fiscal sense.  You could be an indie band that makes a couple of albums and gains enough popularity to sign to one of the big guns and then risk having your fans call you a sell-out or you could beef up your piggy bank first and then finish your career with the artistic freedom that goes hand-in-hand with an independent label.  It’s like working for a corporate monolith and then suddenly deciding to tap into your creative outlets and boom, you’re self-employed.  Except you have a much smaller paycheck. Or no paycheck.  Support my advertisers!

In April 2002, Alice in Chains frontman Layne Staley died of a cocaine and heroine overdose after years of struggling with addiction.  Six years ealier the band spent one of their last performances together on Mtv’s Unplugged.  According to Billboard.com, on September 18th Columbia/Legacy will re-release that album along with three other classic Unplugged performaces (Bob Dylan, Mariah Carey, and Tony Bennett).  The reissues will include a DVD of tracks and extras that weren’t part of the original television production.   The somber intensity of Alice in Chains’ music made them one of the pioneers of the Seattle grunge scene in the early 90s, but their hard rocking nature also appealed to metal fans.  This Unplugged release is a chance to see an amazing band (who’s music crossed over sub-genres of rock music) perform in an intimate accoustic setting before the darkness of addiction took Staley’s life.

The latest issue of Rolling Stone Magazine has posted the “College Radio Top 10 Albums” and here they are:

1. THE WHITE STRIPES (Icky Thump)

2. SPOON (Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga)

3. WILCO (Sky Blue Sky)

4. THE NATIONAL (Boxer)

5. BEASTIE BOYS (The Mix-Up)

6. METRIC (Grow Up and Blow Away)

7. THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS (The Else)

8. BATTLES (Mirrored)

9. THE POLYPHONIC SPREE (The Fragile Army)

10. QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE (Era Vulgaris)

Question: when did college kids become so cool?  What happened to 18 year olds who leave the nest gripping onto their Cat Stevens, The Doors, DMB, and Phish cds?  Oh and don’t forget Alanis Morissette.  The top college album in the late 90s (burgernoodle’s years) was probably August and Everything After, for chrissake.  Is music getting better or are college kids getting smarter?  Or do they just not want to look at their cd collection when they’re 30 and realize Amoeba won’t buy them and they’re too embarassing for the yardsale?  Who really knows, but three cheers for Music Darwinism.

Who knew Travis McCoy, lead singer/rapper of the indie hip hop group Gym Class Heroes was a secret fan Daryl Hall & John Oats?  Well, apparently a lot of people now!  The band has decided to do an album mixing tracks from their latest album, As Cruel As Schoolchildren, with over 40 Hall & Oats classics.  Young kids will bop their heads to the music videos as soft rock lovers pushing 40 will listen in amazement as “maneater” and “private eyes” creeps back into top 40 radio .   This is very exciting news (at least for many H&O lovers), but don’t hold your breath too long - the “match-up” (which DJ J.J. Brown who is mixing the album prefers over the commonly used term “mash-up”) will probably not be released until the end of the year.  Take a look at the video of the Heroe’s incredible Supertramp mash-up from their 2006 album…Here

This is what Bon Jovi looked like the last time their record hit #1 on the Billboard charts.  Those were the days of “New Jersey”… the great 80s.  Oh how we miss that pop metal goodness.  19 years later, their latest album “Lost Highway” hits No. 1 again, selling 292,000 copies just last week.  Time will tell if the album is any good (check the Reviews page in about a week), but it sure as shit must be better than that “Have a Nice Day” nonsense.  Plus it beat out the White Stripes new album by about 70,000.  Could it have been Jon Bon Jovi’s star performance in this past season’s American Idol?  Richie Sambora’s celebrity hook-ups?  Their new country fan base?  The fact that their newest radio single is sounding more and more like Snow Patrol?  Is it because Phil Stacey went down in a blaze of glory???  Again time will tell.