Your College Tastes Like Dogs**t.
By John Wiz | Posted Under Music | Comments (34)
Am I the only one expecting to see a “show” when I go to a concert? Is it unreasonable, whether liking the performer or not to expect him to make an effort? Having any predisposition, negative or positive, to said performer, is it too presumptuous to expect him to do his best to provide entertainment for himself and his audience? I like to think that an artist would have the foresight to construct a set list worthy of his talents, stuffing as much of his product into that set as he can to expose the casual listeners in attendance to more of his music. Who knows…he may just sell a few more CD’s, get himself a few more digital download or ringtone sales, or in this case, just avoid looking like the corniest rectal troglodyte this side of a hippo’s balloon knot.
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the unholy living shit-storm of terrible that is Asher Roth.
If you don’t know who Asher Roth is, allow me to open the door to this little ear rapist. Wikipedia describes him as a hip hop artist/rapper, born and raised in Morrisville, PA. I like to think of him more as a hometown hero to all the meat-necks (Shyeah bro!) and sorostitutes majoring in phys-ed or basket weaving at West Chester University…because they are the only people who could ever enjoy drooling along to his “music”. You have to be monumentally stupid to dig this guy, full on retard, or at least be missing the entire back side of your skull. Standing there in the air-conditioned tent, scanning the room, there were no surprises. Popped collars, Ugg (please will this tragic trend end already) Boots, Guido Gel-Afros, and card-carrying members of the ‘Future Date-rapists of America’ club, complete with crooked white baseball caps, plaid golf shorts, and Reebok Classic Shell tops. I knew immediately…this was going to be a performance of historical proportions.
…and was it ever.
Let me preface by making one point that annoys me more than anything. Asher Roth was third from top billing for the Picnic. Third. Fucking THIRD! Granted he was headlining the second stage, but he still got prime real-estate on the bill. This 114 pound dick stain went on after Public Enemy. After! I keep telling myself that it’s because the Roots were the headliner and played an entire set as the house band for P.E. Immediately turning around and doing their own set would have been a little too much. But c’mon. TV on the Radio was there. Their 45 minute set should have been more than enough time to recover. But no, Flave, Chuck, and Griff, from Long Island New York, a hot bed of rap talent, had to play second fiddle to this one trick pony from Bucks County. Thank you to the record label for forcing him into what was, otherwise, a good bill.
Anyhow…PE finished It Takes a Nation of Millions around 8:45….top to bottom It Takes a Nation of Millions… is about a 45 minute long album. Asher was supposed to start immediately following on the second stage, playing through 9:15, a simple 30 minute set. 8:45 came and went. So I went as well. Almost 10 minutes after PE left the stage, standing in the port-o-shitter, I heard the tent dwellers start to get restless. A chant of ‘Go, go, go, go!’ had broken out. Odds are a random college twinkerbell was removing her top because she couldn’t contain her excitement, couldn’t contain her alcohol, or someone offered her a set of 12 cent beads. I made a B-line for the second stage just in time to see Asher coming to the mic, asking the question of the night ‘Do you guys like to smoke weed?’ Fist bumping frat boys cheered and hooted. Tan-in-a-can girls with skirts so short they needed a second hair cut went into full on ‘WOOOO-girl!’ glory; closing their eyes, throwing fists in the air, screaming “Weed! Yeah! Woo! Weed!!” Then, the kingly Mr. Roth, being a fair and just king, recognized the people in the back of the room. “Do you guys like smokin’ weed?!” And so came another smattering of Shyea-bros and Woo-girls.
“Get your hands up! Get your hands up! Get your hands up!” commanded Mr. Roth.
“Shyea!!! WOO!! Hands up!!”
“People in the back, get your motherfuckin’ hands up!” shouted Mr. Roth, again, never failing to try to engage everyone in the room, including the second-class citizens in the back.
“Fuck yeah everybody!” he shouts.
“WOOOOOOOOO! Fuck Shyea! Woo!” calls the crowd in unison.
“When I say ‘Fuck’ you say ‘Yeah’!” he proclaimed.
“Fuck!”
“Yeah!”
“Fuck!”
“Yeah!”
“People in the back say ‘Fuck Yeah!’” he demanded
“Fuck Yeah!” (Wow…he sure is concerned with WTF is going on in the back of the room. This guy must look for TOTAL crowd engagement)
“You guys like getting fucked up?!” as he polls the audience.
“Woo! Yeah! Fucked up! Shyea bro!!!”
“You like smoking weed?!!” he repeats.
…OK. Stop. Here is where I pressed the ‘Bullshit!’ buzzer. Here they were, the ticket buying public, the majority in the room a combination of reality TV attention spans, vapid self-opinion, and not a brain cell amongst them. His set was passing the crowd by and a single rhyme had yet to be rocked. His opening ten minutes was nothing more than combinations of the words ‘weed,’ ‘fuck,’ ‘yeah,’ ‘hands,’ ‘up,’ and ‘people in the back.’ Surely, some music would be playing soon, right? Shyea bro! Totally. Then out of nowhere, Whitney Houston’s ‘I’m Every Woman’ blares from the PA in all its rap-filled glory. Who’s more hardcore than Whitney?! Asher motherfucking Roth, that’s who! Yay for Asher and his little 30 second clip of Whitney Houston and his oh-so-ironic dance-along.
HAHAHAHAHA!!! Awesome bro!! Now we can get to the show! This was gonna be off the fucking chain! The anticipation of Asher’s greatness would just make the release that much more satisfying… … … How I WISH that statement was true, for we were then treated to 4 more minutes of fuck, yeah, weed, fucked-up, hands, and people in the back. Then OMGWTFROFLCopter…what do we hear???? Is that Soul For Real? Is that Candy Rain? Yes…yes it was. Yet another 30 second oh-so-funny interpretive dance by Asher and the 3 other skid marks on stage with him. We get it dude. You think pop-music is funny. But I’m fairly certain that any one of the guys from Soul For Real would tear off and whip your little ass for even daring to think you are as great as they are.
Thankfully…dancing to some candy coated raindrops was his last little ruse, because he immediately broke into song. Shyea bro! This set is off the fucking meat rack now!
“Wait! What? Was that first song he just did there only 90 seconds long?” I turned and asked Whorish Mouth.
“Umm…yes it was.”
Song 2 was also 90 seconds. At this point I wasn’t even sure if he was even performing actual songs. For all I knew he could have just been babbling into the microphone and all the rich white kids were confusing it for freestyle. But then…an actual beat; an actual song. And it was like 4 minutes long. Then another that got the crowd in the front going “Jump, Jump, Jump!” Things were looking up!!!! Until…I Love College.
That was it kids. Thirty minutes of set time, comprised of fuck, yeah, weed, fucked-up, hands up, people in the back, and 3.7 songs. This was, by far, the worst overall performance I have ever seen. If I was a fan of Asher Roth, I would feel robbed. I imagine everyone there who had seen him on the local circuit at all had already experienced exactly the same performance. He brought nothing new to the table and blew no minds, but instead just blew his sweaty, scrawny frat boy load awkwardly all over the face of the crowd down front. I never thought the wee I was taking before he went on stage would have been more enjoyable…and I do enjoy having a good piss.
“I Love College” is Asher Roth’s “I’ll Stop the World and Melt With You.” Asher Roth is to hip hop what Eli Roth is to hip hop. It won’t be long until he’s in the $1 bin at your local carwash, and a topic of ‘I-can’t-believe-I-listened-to-that-shit!’ type of nostalgia; a CD you’ll find in handy supply at local flea markets and truck stops. Only a handful more of chicks need to worry about passing out in some random bed at Beta House while this song thumps in the background and Kip from the Lacrosse team bathes her in the sickening combined smell of pale ale, Aqua d’Gio, and saliva. (Fucking chicks!!! Shyea bro!) Most assuredly Asher Roth will go the way of the Dodo before the final leaf turns brown in the fall. Frat Boys and Sorority Chicks (Shyea bro! Chicks!) will find a new polished party turd with which they can identify, while Asher Roth does the walk of shame back to West Chester U to inevitably end up as a gym teacher back in Morrisville, at least until VH1 gets a hold of him.
(ed. note: Because some of you have never heard it, here’s his shitty song. Now you can suffer like the rest of us —TK)
John Wiz (aka PissBoy) is a fan of all things that don’t suck and can be found at random moments giggling at shiny things in the streets of Wilmington. When things are dull he’s a whore for corporate America while trying to be a special make-up effects artist.
Follow @pajiba
← Roots Picnic Recap | Pajiba Love 06/09/09 →
Comments
Posted by: Marra at June 9, 2009 12:30 PM
I literally spent the majority of this article trying to figure out who the fuck this guy was - and then I read "I Love College" and I groaned out loud at my desk. When telling my cubemate what I was groaning about, he said "Shyea bro! I love that song!" Then I died inside.
Excellent review, though If it helps, the pain you felt during that concert seems to be in proportion to the joy I felt reading about it.