Music News 05/26/09

Enjoy The Silence, WalMart

By Felicia | Posted Under Music | Comments (17)

Michael Jackson has postponed portions of his “This Is It” 50-show stint at London’s O2 Arena. Opening night was supposed to be July 8th, and is now pushed back to July 13th. Three other early July shows won’t happen until March 2010. Jackson’s people are citing the need for more rehearsal time as the reason behind the postponement. Refunds will be issued for those who can’t attend the rescheduled shows.

Depeche Mode cancelled three more shows this week on the European leg of their Sounds of the Universe tour. This brings a total of 9 cancelled shows overall due to lead singer Dave Gahan’s gastroenteritis. The band is currently deciding whether to reschedule the missed shows or cancel them. Depeche Mode is set to continue their tour in the U.S. in July, so here’s hoping Gahan makes a full recovery by then.

The one retailer that has single-handedly ruined America, Wal-Mart, is refusing to sell Green Day’s new album 21st Century Breakdown due to profanity and content. Wal-Mart requires artists to censor their albums before they sell them in their stores, and Green Day has refused to comply with their policy. I am not a Green Day fan, but this move has actually made me want to buy their albums. Who the fuck is Wal-Mart, the most unethical of all retailers, to force art to be censored? Censorship standing on it’s own is enough bullshit, but when Wal-Mart tries to censor it’s almost too much for me to handle.

Minneapolis’s Solid Gold, who we featured here, released their debut video for the song “Bible Thumper” via their Myspace page. The video was directed by John Carlucci. These guys have been doing it up big, recently headlining their first gig at the legendary First Avenue and performing at the upcoming Rock the Garden, all without the backing of a label.

Solid Gold - Bible Thumper

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Comments

Dave, I do not believe you.

DON'T RIDE THE WHITE HORSE!

Posted by: Jay at May 26, 2009 12:10 PM

Hurry up and get well Dave, since I'm considering a DM show.

Posted by: Cindy at May 26, 2009 12:15 PM

Fucking LOVE Solid Gold! I didn't actually read that article about them when it was first posted (sorry), but then I saw them open for Tapes n Tapes, and they blew me away. So great. All this success on their own feet is fantastic.

Posted by: ChristianH at May 26, 2009 12:39 PM

I hate Walmart with a passion, but fuck Green Day in this scenario. You wanna be sold by a POS chain like Walmart, you follow their rules. You wanna be a relevant, hip, cool, with-it, cutting edge (are any of those terms used unironically any more?) act, you don't sell through fucking Walmart.

Walmart can refuse to sell whatever they want, just like I can refuse to ever spend a single cent there, or on Green Day's sad-assed crap.

Posted by: frumpiefox at May 26, 2009 12:50 PM

Always happy to have more ammunition for my Wallmart boycott.

Posted by: tamatha at May 26, 2009 12:55 PM

I don't know about the whole "Stand up to Wal-Mart" thing. I mean, bands (particularly rap artists) for years have 'bowed down' to the conglomerate.

The only difference now is, with a 'whopping' 85,000+ copies being the threshold to a #1 album on Soundscan, Green Day isn't really losing much by not being in Wal-Mart. Sure some sales are lost, but nowadays it's pittance to what it would've been, say, 5 years ago.

Now if they really wanted to make a statement, how about no censoring for radio? You would never see that despite the stranglehold ClearChannel and its monopolistic ways has on the world, because of the size of the market.

Wal-Mart is no longer a consequence when it comes to album sales. If iTunes had said something, you better believe they would've changed things accordingly.

Posted by: misterorange at May 26, 2009 1:00 PM

Dave better a) get the fuck better or b) get off whatever the fuck he's on before July, because I already bought tickets to the fucking show at Nissan, and I will be pi-hi-hissed if they cancel it.

That is all.

Posted by: lizzieborden at May 26, 2009 1:06 PM

I for one, cannot wait for the Employee Free Choice Act to go down just so I can witness WalMart get fucked. It's been a long time coming, and that Karma, she's a bitch.

Posted by: Jez at May 26, 2009 1:43 PM

This is a rare instance where I'm siding with Wal-Mart. I wouldn't sell Green Day's shitty music, either.

They're already neutered. I don't see what they have to gain from "making a stand" when better artists than them have made heavier concessions so their music could get sold to those small town kids who don't have a real honest-to-god record store where they can buy an album that would make a sheltered christian child shit their pants. They're "pop-punk." They're Blink 182 with a different name. They're 40 year old men who wear mascara. They're what some 12 year old is going to listen to because he thinks he's rebelling before he grows a couple of years older and moves on to new territory.

Posted by: Homeless J at May 26, 2009 4:04 PM

radio is censored by the fcc, not companies.
& greenday wouldn't censor their music for anyone-including itunes.
@fox: why f greenday? they don't care whether they're sold by walmart & they're not sad assed crap either.

Posted by: gem at May 26, 2009 4:15 PM

gem, eff 'em because if they're truly the anti-establishment icons they would like us to think they are, they should refuse to be sold at Walmart regardless of profanity. They should totally cut out the big boxes out of principle. They obviously do care, or they wouldn't have tried to sell at Walmart in the first place (and they sure sound like they care in the AP article).

Sad-assed crap, I will admit, is a matter of opinion.

Posted by: frumpiefox at May 26, 2009 4:58 PM

Mmmm, why does Wal-mart make music artists censor their stuff when the store sells RATED R MOVIES?! That makes no sense.
If Walmart is trying to be noble and protect us from bad things, why don't they stop selling shit like Hannah Montana?! That shit has a far worse impact on youth than freakin Green Day. Ugh.

Posted by: beautifulgirl at May 26, 2009 6:11 PM

No "motherfucker" on a cd but they'll sell the unrated version of Sex Drive. Awesomely retarded...Wal-Mart's classically inscrutable and mealy-mouthed "moral" stance strikes again.

Posted by: Venture82 at May 26, 2009 7:20 PM

K Mart sucks!

Posted by: Dristan at May 26, 2009 8:01 PM

Censorship in music is bad. Very bad. There's nothing logical about it. I'll give you an example.

The other day on the radio I heard the censored version of the song Rockstar by Nickelback. There's a lyric which says that "his ass is wearing some expensive jeans" (or something on those lines). The word ass is obviously censored. Other parts of the song say "We've got a drug dealer on speed dial". This is not censored at all. It's individual words which are censored not concepts. As long as you don't say fuck, shit, ass, cunt or similar expletives nothing will get censored! Therefore you have a situation were an expression of love like "I fucking love you" will get censored but encouragement to do drugs don't.

I'm against all kinds of censorship in general but this situation is laughable and makes the whole censorship thing even more stupid.

Posted by: barf at May 26, 2009 8:31 PM

Lol, cut out the big boxes out of principle. Now
that's priceless.

Posted by: Continental Almonds at May 26, 2009 11:40 PM

they're making the stand because they have the luxury of doing so, good for them. Doesn't stop the album from being the audio equivalent of Matrix Reloaded though- a bombastic, overblown retread of a previously successful formula in desperate search of an editor. Middle aged brazillionaires in eyeliner and designer torn jeans have no right to sing about pain.

Posted by: Dave Shepherd at May 27, 2009 1:59 AM

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Enjoy The Silence, WalMart

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