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QOTD 44: Record company gonna give me lotsa money...

Sell out! With me, oh yeah. Sorry, I'll try to keep the Reel Big Fish content to a minimum this QOTD. Anyhoot, I've been pondering the concept of 'selling out' and what it means, and how it can make a fellah (or lady) hate a given artist.

What do you define as selling out? Have people like Kid Rock, Dr. Dre, Eminem, and Bon Jovi 'sold out' because they changed their styles? Or are you okay with a musician adapting their style to reflect A) what they think is popular and B) the kind of music they want to make? 

Did The Rock sell out?



I believe Scott said something about Kid Rock going from a rapper / rocker to kind of a country-fried, Lynyrd Skynyrd sampling, GOP moolah taking, wuss face. And I can't blame him. If you liked Kid Rock for one thing (or two things), and then saw him performing now, you may kind of cock your head sideways and wonder where his 'edge' went. Then again the concert I went too had 4 dollar beer and 20 dollar admission and he played all the hits I wanted to hear.

I saw so many Milf Boobies because of my "Ted" shirt. So many. Like 7 and a half boobies.

When Bowling For Soup got huge they definitely sapped up all that kid-friendly money, doing horrible covers of "I'll Melt with You" (Where they changed "Making love with you was never second best" to "Being friends with you..." which caused me to puke in my mouth a bit), making a covers album, and I think they ended up recording both the Jimmy Neutron and Phinieas and Ferb songs. Barenaked Ladies' Christmas and kids albums both felt...unnecessary.

I personally don't have a problem with it, but that's because I'm fans of these bands and want to see them succeed, so if BFS gets to record their next album in a better studio cause they did a couple of crappy kids songs, great. If Kid Rock has a country bone in his body he wants to diddle, go for it.

What I really hate is when bands get so big that suddenly a good concert ticket becomes nearly impossible to kid. My mom won tickets to the Rolling Stones, and were told our tickets would hypothetically be about 120 dollars, each, had we paid for them. My mouth dropped. Don't get me wrong, I know folks are paying for the nostalgia of seeing a band they associate closely with my childhood, but there's nothing quite as damning to rock and roll than a high concert ticket price, if you ask me.

What say you, Blotters?

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Blog Otter Award: Jobber123 for making a point about Silver Linings Playbook's depiction of mental illness that I think was important. I'll shrink this down if don't wanna read my thoughts.

If you ask me, often times relationships that are emotionally abusive find themselves in a situation kind of similar to what Silver Linings Playbook presented toward the end of the film. Bradley Cooper  is violent, and crazy, and is ultimately saved, in a sense, by Jennifer Lawrence’s Tiffany.

 That whole “We’re both crazy, baby” kind of mentality is what allows an insecure gal to stay with her boyfriend through his semi-regular fits of anger that may very well land the family cat in the E.R. - and if taken in the wrong light could reinforce a person’s commitment to making a poisoned relationship work. I'm sure the issues are far more complicated than that, but I always found that aspect of the movie bugged me. 

Then again I know absolutely INSANE people (many of whom may be on this very blog, har har) who found a nice lady and got themselves all sorts of grounded in reality real freakin' quick.

I now present to you a meme that completely devalues the message of the movie in favor of single girl, self empowering, pity-seeking.




1. One for certain sell-out moment I can think of is when they attempted to broadcast the World Series of Poker's final table on PPV. Don't get me wrong ESPN, I love what you did for 'the sport' of Poker, but I wasn't born yesterday.

2. OH! Okay, so I know we have a TON of comic fans here, and let me say that if you ever wanted a casual game that's packed full of awesome comic references, pick up Lego Marvel Superheroes, TODAY. It's awesome. It's an Iron Man, Hulk Smash, Spider-man, Fantastic Four, and about 30 other superheroes, game, all in an open world with a pretty good plot, and tons of in-jokes to spare.

Even better it plays like a universe-wide sequel to The Avengers movie, but with Spidey, The X-men, and Fantastic Four along for the ride.

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