I don't mind admitting my tastes in music. I especially don't mind saying that I enjoy music that tends to be a bit weirder than the normal. Hell, one of my favorite albums of this year, The Dirty Projectors "Bitte Orca", is bat-shit insane. Most credible music critic websites tend to go for it as well(as they should). But is it just me, or is the Flaming Lips new CD, Embryonic, a CD that's just filled with noise and unlistenable filler. So many critics are rambling about how inspirational and expressive the album is. Yeah, it's expressive if you count looping a simple guitar/bass rift for about five minutes with an occasional gong going off in the background while Wayne is saying some common bullshit that he usually writes.   
 
    
 
I really don't mean to come off as being a Flaming Lips hater, because I'm not. I respect a lot of their work, the only real experimental stuff from them to make be interested needs to have a gimmick behind it(like when they put out 4 CD's and told you to play them all at the same exact time). Embryonic isn't completely terrible, there are some redeeming songs on here that they are playing on night shows and public appearances, but the rest of the CD, even though it is interesting to hear what they have done, has nothing to offer.  
 
    
 
I take this topic and I move it further with the ultimate evidence. Animal Collective. Animal Collective is, at most time, the worst band ever. It's just constant noise and randomness that goes nowhere. But critically, everyone loves them. My Girls could be one of the best songs this decade, but it's by one of the worst bands. You know why My Girls is awesome? Because there is structure, it goes somewhere.   
 
    
 
Then again, music is an art form. Art ellicits a response from it's viewers, and Flaming Lips/Animal Collective just gives me a negative response, while others love it, so my opinion is just an opinion. Just one question I need to ask. Does anyone like experimental noise music that isn't on hard drugs at the moment?

 Jay Z

The past ten years of Jay-Z's career has been hit or miss. We have the best out of Hove with 2007's "American Gangster" and Jay-Z's first retirement album "The Black Album". The latter of the two might as well be more known for the future "Gray Album" by DJ DangerMouse, but that's a different story. We have also seen Jay-Z's worst with "Kingdom Come" and All of the collaboration albums with R Kelly. The Blueprint 3 is Jay-Z's latest attempt and falls somewhere in between his best work and his worst work. It's nothing to pass off, as it defaults to one of the best hip-hop albums of the year, but it's nothing that anyone should get to excited over either.
 
    

In the Giant Bomb panel at PAX, Alex argued about how hard it is to write about a mediocre product, and that's just what this is. Jay-Z lead sing, DoA(Death of Autotune) is so brilliant and ferocious at the third track of the album, he never has the true ability to follow it up with anything. Run This Town immediately follows DoA, and while you can definitely enjoy the rest of the album on the first couple of listens throughout the CD, it gets stale really quick, on each listen, you eliminate songs in the rotation each time, untill your down to about three or four songs.
 
    

It's not flat out terrible songs, they just don't have anything to new to offer or say. Most of the worse tracks also will tend to feature some unknown rapper(at least to me), and it just seems like filling time up on the CD to make it longer. Young Jeezy is the opposite of what I like in a rap song, so I might be a tad bit biased here, but Young Jeezy can seriously piss off. All of the beats are slightly amusing, but nothing compared to Jay-Z's back catalog. One beat had potential by Swizz Beats on the song "On To The Next One", when I read that it was sampled from Justices "D.A.N.C.E.", I imagined the song to be fun not unlike "It's a Hard Knock Life", but the song ultimately disappoints by being dark and meaningless. Another lowpoint of the CD is "Venus vs. Mars". Try not to feel a little embarrassed that this song was made by Jay-Z. Ludacris will usually stoop this low in sexual song writing, but it's really weird hearing it come out of Jay's mouth, with the chorus being "(Girl) Daddy get it in, (Jay) Baby go hard" over and over. The song is just dirty and filthy, it's really awkward to listen to. 

     

There are a few standouts to point out on the Blueprint 3. DoA obviously being the biggest. DoA is just four minutes of Jay-Z trying to save Hip-Hop, while also taking a couple of stabs at Scene rockers in one line. A Star Is Born might be a controversial pick, cause I can see people hating it, but I love that song for some reason. The song is about Jay-Z justifying why he is one of the greatest rappers today by naming rappers of the past, and how they didn't survive, but Jay did. The last of the greats can also be Hate-able(irony), the song is called Hate. While I'm on this subject, the best thing for Jay to remain fresh, and for Kanye to regain some fans back after his shenanigans at the VMA's would be if Jay-Z and Kanye released some kind of collaboration album. Hearing them rap off of each other(with albeit, ridiculously dumb rap patterns) is very fun to listen to.


Overall, Jay-z disappoints with the Blueprint 3. He raps about moving the genre forward, but doesn't back it up with any legitimately game changing songs. Everything seems pretty tacked on, despite the hype of hearing something different(Hey, what happened to that MGMT song, by the way?). A couple of years ago, he made a CD that he said he would retire on. After hearing Blueprint 3, it could be time for Jay-z to hang up his Yankees hat and focus on running his label behind the desk, not in front. 

After this week, I've been going back and forth throughout the beatles catalog like I have never before. Playing through Rock Band has let me gain a new appreciation for most of the beatles work. Harmonix has totally given us something much better and much more loving than any documentary could ever do. So going back and forth, I'd just like to point out some of my new favorites. 
 
Maxwell's Silver Hammer - Actually, I loved this song way before Beatles Rock Band came out. Due to a flash on newgrounds.com(that website ran by the Behemoth guys). The flash kinda perfectly captures the brilliant mix of playful, fun rhythm and delivery with some very psychotic, creepy characters that could definantly drive the story of a horror movie.... It's a less praised song, but I absolutely love it. 
   
I Am The Walrus - Obvious choice #1. This song never gets old, Lennon nails the delivery of the lyrics, arguably the best vocals that he's ever done in any song. LSD has never sounded better.
   
Dear Prudence - When Considering the best Beatles songs, this has to be in there. This song tears into your soul. Paul gives one of his best bass lines, everybodies voice is beautiful, George's continous accoustic guitar loop keeps the song going, the band jams the song briefly in the end. To me, this is the perfect Beatles song. 
   
Come Together - Super Obvious Choice #2. Listening to this song  makes you wonder what happened to Top 40 music. Psychedelic Beatles at their best. 
  

for question of the week... on my third take of the song(I didn't have time for more because I had to go to class) 
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2N2-eQ20Qx8  
 
lyrics: 
  There's gonna be a Giant Bomb tonight
that these four duders saved us from the Giant Bomb! 
 
Make fun of me as much as possible. 

Ok, lets get some music discussion going.