Can’t ugly people sing? You’d think not if you survived on a diet of MTV and pulp radio. It seems these days in order to ensure your place in the musical limelight, you need to slap on the make-up, whip of your clobber and pout like a porn-queen. At that stage it really doesn’t matter if you can sing or if you can’t because no one is really listening anyway, there simply goggling your jiggly bits (which hopefully don’t have excess jiggle).
Anastasia, Kylie, Madonna, Christina Augiuarialiarioai (or however it is you say her name), and loads of others have been patching into that old adage that ‘sex sells’. But can they really sing? Well, yes. But are they where they are simply because they have a great butt or nice set of silicones? If they weren’t doing things to guitars that guitars weren’t invented for would someone else with less sex appeal and more talent be there instead?
There is plenty of evidence that this epidemic of hard bodied nearly naked (or completely naked) ‘singers’ is something new. In bygone years anyone with a good voice could release a record, because in truth you weren’t likely to know what they looked like because you would only ever hear them on the radio. The first you would ever see of them was when you bought their record, and even then only if they had a picture of themselves it. At this point they could be as ugly as sin but you wouldn’t care because you were buying their music based upon nothing more than just that, the music.
Then MTV came along and spoiled everything for those with bad hair and double chins. Somehow it’s hard to imagine the likes of ‘Country Crunch’ in some Jacko style choreographed dance video, crutch thrusting their way into the top 40. With MTV came the need to have ‘an image’. And these days image is a big business. You can bet that Christina Awgoolmaleria didn’t come up with that ‘I’ll get my kit off’ idea all on her own. No sir! Someone somewhere is earning boat loads of money getting these pop stars naked. I’m not saying that the beautiful people have no talent and can’t sing. But wouldn’t it be good if there was a little less dross to sand to sift through before you found the gems.
Tonight I am going to Manchester to see one of music less beautiful people play live. No-one could say that my ‘chum’ Josh Ritter has his looks to thank for his success. A series of lucky breaks launched Josh to relative stardom, albeit not to the same heady altitudes of Christina Ooogliareailia. His latest record, Hello Starling, continues to enjoy critical acclaim around the world which he is now seeing thanks to it’s success.
They’ll be no Jacko style crutch thrusting, or shirt ripping moments. But the beer will be in full flow which will loosen up the vocal chords of those in attendance I’m sure. And should I feel that I am in need of the sight of flesh, there’s always MTV when I get back home.
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Josh Ritter’s ‘Hello Starling’ on Amazon.com
Josh Ritter’s ‘Hello Starling’ on iTunes
Josh’s website
AUDIO : NPR reviews Josh Ritter’s music.
Wrote the following comment on Nov 19, 2004 at 7:45 pm
josh ritter seems really familiar. I’d go to the links, but this computer is crap for listening.
Wrote the following comment on Nov 20, 2004 at 3:57 am
Well he’s been getting a lot of coverage this year, so you may have heard of him. Plus I have probably chatted about him before on the phone to you. It was great to see him again last night. He always seems so happy. I think he is a guy who loves life as much as I do :-)
I didn’t have a back stage pass last night and at the end of the gig after a few ‘hang around’ minutes the staff were trying to kick us all out, then the keyboard player came out to get something from the keyboard and he saw me and came right over and started chatting to me then said “Well hey, what you doing here, come and say Hi to the guys.” which was cool because the staff at the venue were keen to clear the place very quickly.
Josh was cool, I was laughing with him that he has vanalised all my CD’s with his little messages, then he grabbed a copy of ‘Hello Starling’ and wrote on it ‘Simon, thanks for sticking with us for all this time. Josh Rittedr.’ So now I have two copies of the CD :-)
Wrote the following comment on Nov 20, 2004 at 8:58 am
LOL! Josh naked on a camel :-)
Wrote the following comment on Nov 20, 2004 at 5:26 am
What you failed to realize about good ole Josh: he DOES flaunt his “stuff” to get an alternative following. He has been known to sit for nude pics atop camels in Jordan, or lying on fine persian rugs in Baghdad. He’s just not as big in euro-centric communities. Those who want to see his skin and hear the tunes go right ahead unbeknownst to those appreciative of his musical “honesty”.
Wrote the following comment on Nov 20, 2004 at 4:54 pm
I’ve noticed this about featured Xangans as well. But back to your point, I can think of a few artists who aren’t so aesthetically racy and still sell pretty well: Clay Aiken….ok nevermind you’re right.