The Great Debate: Akon vs. T-Pain

Subtitled "Clash Of The Titans"...

I'm surprised that no one else (that I know of) has debated this so far, because the career trajectories of these two weird-voice singers are so similar. Take a look at the current Hot 100 singles right now: these guys have maintained a tag-team lockdown of the radio for a good month. Are these our new pop stars? Two black guys with high-pitched voices and a knack for emoting way too much? I would say that these guys are both flash-in-the-pan hits who will disappear in a few weeks, but I won't for a few reasons. First of all, I've been wrong about that before (props for still being relevant, Sean Paul), and second, I don't really believe it. To me, Akon is this year's Usher/Nelly/50 Cent: the guy who has a million singles being released during the summer, with each one seeming to do well simply because his name is on them. T-Pain hasn't reached that sort of ubiquity quite yet, but he's got a #1 single, a #1 album, and, if you take all of his lyrics to heart, several boatloads of willing women. But who is better, Akon or T-Pain? I'm here to figure it out -- mathematically.

Akon's earlier work reflects an overwhelming amount of emotion that's both endearing and confusing. The song "Locked Up" actually holds up pretty well as a reggae/hip-hop/jailbird song, and by all accounts should have been a bigger hit when it was released. His second single, "Ghetto", is not as appealing, simply because it sounds EXACTLY like "Locked Up". Then came "Lonely", with those Kanye chipmunks assisting another old soul hit that's being revived. Critics hated "Lonely"; that is because "Lonely" sucks. In these three songs, I sort of get the feeling that Akon's taking himself WAY too seriously; stories about prison, the ghetto, and um, being Mr. Lonely are all admirable, but c'mon man, crack a smile once in a while! Show them pearly whites! On the other hand, T-Pain performed beautifully in the Not-Giving-A-Fuck-About-Serious-Issues category with "I'm In Luv (Wit A Stripper)". There's a lot to love here: the downright wacky synth riff that starts it all off, the way T-Pain constantly wants to bring the girl back to his crib to do "his night thang", the fact that this song is actually about being in love with a stripper and is stone-cold sincere. And, after he claims that she can pop it AND lock it, it's not hard to see why he loves that ho.

With all due respect, however, neither one had an illustrious career before this year. That's why, when Akon stormed back onto the charts with the poignant "Smack That" and the heartfelt "I Wanna Fuck You", people with half a brain were disgusted that this guy was allowed another crack at fame. Goddamn, both of those songs are terrible; they don't make much sense, feature unlistenable guest verses (by Eminem and Snoop, respectively), and just sorta repeat their titles a lot. After that, just when you thought Akon had already overexposed himself, "Don't Matter" became a neo-reggae anthem, and "The Sweet Escape" got stolen right away from Gwen and became Akon's excuse to shout things a lot. Meanwhile, T-Pain was saying adorably nutty things on "I'm A Flirt (Remix)". Is this contest an Akon beatdown?

Don't close the books just yet. Akon has recently earned a large amount of props for the hook on "We Takin Over" and for helping Bone Thugs be cool again with "I Tried" (does anybody else feel sorry that that song's not a sequel to Macy Gray's "I Try"?). Both songs are terrific... but hold the phone, T-Pain's got a new song called "Buy You A Drank"!! Just when you thought Akon had this thing locked for being a part of legitimately good songs, T-Pain roars back by doing what he does best: being retarded and knowing it. Seriously, sometimes I think this guy only exists in my dreams. "Buy You A Drank" is hilarious on first listen, terrible on second listen, curiously weird on third listen, outstanding on fourth listen. It can't match the star power of "We Takin Over", but "Buy You A Drank" is the best kind of junk food: easy to see its problems, but much easier to enjoy.

So who wins? "Locked Up" or "I'm In Luv (Wit A Stripper)"? "We Takin' Over" or "Buy You A Drank"? Both have interesting songs, funny voices, and oversized egos. But you have to ask: has T-Pain ever wildly humped a fifteen-year-old girl? Since the answer's probably yes, you then have to ask: has he ever done it on stage in front of thousands of people? The answer is no, and because Akon has unabashedly humped the underage, T-Pain wins! Ladies and gentlemen, the winner, and still a complete nutball... T-PAIN!!!

Overrated: Sheryl Crow

I'm not gonna dance around the main point of this post: Sheryl Crow bothers me, a lot. Okay, she's not as popular as she once was, back in the mid- to late-90's. She seems to be a nice person, I guess. I've seen her name attached to several benefit concerts for various environmental causes, and that's great for her. If I met Sheryl Crow tomorrow on the street, I'd probably smile and say hello.

It's just... her music. In my opinion, Sheryl Crow's musical output stands as the most pitiful collection of songs that has never been properly lambasted or even questioned. How did this woman become universally respected as a singer-songwriter?? There you see her, performing alongside musical legends on Grammy ceremonies, strumming that silly acoustic guitar, thinking to herself, "Goddamn, I've fooled all of them. I can't believe it, but I've fooled all of them!"

It's not outrageous to me that Sheryl Crow received lots of popularity and a bunch of Grammys, because there are dozens of equally mediocre artists maintaining stardom even longer than she has, and the Grammys are completely meaningless. What puzzles me -- shocks me -- is that no one has called a spade a spade, and called out Sheryl Crow for making the same shitty song 18 times. Somehow, Sheryl Crow has used the Lilith Fair/feminist/let's-be-HAPPY! image for over a decade, and now she's regarded as sort of a veteran rock artist no one, except maybe ex-boyfriend Lance Armstrong, has something against. Why hasn't Sheryl Crow been exposed?

Her mid-'90s output, which garnered hit songs such as "All I Wanna Do" and "If It Makes You Happy", basically relied on by-the-numbers pop structures with enough of an edge to concern mothers of young children but not enough to limit its radio play. These are amiable, shoulder-shrug-worthy singles that should have signaled a short career followed by a descent into oblivion. But no. In 1998 Crow released "The Globe Sessions", easily her strongest collection of songs, the best of which is monster single "My Favorite Mistake". It basically sounds like all of her other stuff, except it's better; from the opening guitar lick to the last sorta-strained vocals, "My Favorite Mistake" is a very good chick-rock track that's held up well over time. The rest of "The Globe Sessions" lacks the spark of "Mistake," but it's still an accomplished set of lite-rock songs that make Crow seem likeable.

So maybe my problem isn't with Sheryl Crow's entire career; maybe I should be directing my anger toward her last two albums, 2002's "C'mon C'mon" and 2005's "Wildflower", both of which are unforgivably bad. "C'mon C'mon" is unlistenable to someone with 3 or more brain cells, with songs like "Soak Up The Sun" and "Diamond Road" built around a general feeling of grating happiness. Jesus, I remember when "Soak Up the Sun" was on the radio, and I couldn't turn my dial without hearing mind-blowingly lazy lines like "It's not having what you want/ It's wanting what you got!!"or "I'm gonna soak up the sun/Gonna tell everyone/ To lighten up!!" This album was clearly made to herald a new, sunnier Sheryl Crow, one that had covered up all of her darkness/mystery and had decided to write nice, fun songs. "C'mon C'mon" is a bullshit record, but no one slammed it properly: Entertainment Weekly called Crow a "supreme craftsperson", and Rolling Stone called "Soak Up The Sun" "delightful". 2005's "Wildflower" was simply more of the same, with songs called "Good Is Good" and choruses that go, "You'll be sending a letter to God/ How will it be when you're gone?/ And what if everyone is wrong?" Fuck.

You'd think that it would bother me more that groups like The Black Eyed Peas and Panic! at the Disco are unbelievably popular now when they're clearly just a bunch of jackasses. It doesn't. Sheryl Crow bothers me more because I know that I'm gonna see her in more Grammy ceremonies, in more American Express commercials, and eventually when she gets inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame. I just wish someone other than me would notice that, as a singer/songwriter, she sort of blows. That's all

Things I Like/Dislike About Ron Howard And His Family: "Cocoon"

Welcome to a new segment of the blog! I have a very conflicted view of the Howard family; some things they do I really enjoy, and other things are wastes of time. I will break down what each project is, what Howard member was involved in each project, their role in its overall achievements/failures, and whether I like them more or dislike them more because of such roles. Hey, let's get started!

Project: "Cocoon", a wacky 1985 sci-fi comedy starring perennial old guys Wilford Brimley and Don Ameche.

Howard Involved: Ron, who directed the film

Description of project: After breaking out with "Splash" in '84, Howard returned with "Cocoon", which follows a group of senior citizens who find a group of kindly aliens living in a pool near their retirement home. The pool contains large brown cocoons where other aliens are stored; when the old men swim in the pool, they are filled with youthful vigor. The aliens are kindly folk and invite some of the old dudes to return with them to their planet, and live forever! Can Wilford Brimley and co. make the decision to leave earth and their mortality?

Ron Howard's role in achievements/failures: "Cocoon"'s a nice-enough movie. You got a pretty silly plot, sure, but it's got a big heart and at least tries to ask some tough questions, whatever. Howard's never been an overbearing director, and it's easy to see here that he was trying to let the light-hearted story speak for itself. And yeah, you can classify this as an entertaining-but-not-really-good movie, but there's two things that earn it -- and Howard -- major props. First off, you have to notice the dream-team cast. Wilford Motherfuckin' Brimley absolutely kills it in the lead, and Don Ameche, who won an Oscar in the role, is a solid geriatric wing-man. Old-timey Jack Gilford plays the asshole senior citizen Bernie, who ends up emotionally breaking down in a surprisingly affecting sequence. Brian Dennehy plays the leader of the aliens, which is weird, and Steve Guttenberg (boo-yah!) plays a guy who somehow gets to hang out with the aliens a lot (I think it's because he owns a boat that they use, or something)!! Clint Howard even pops up as a nursing home attendant. Ron really lets Brimley and Ameche run the show, however, and their characters are fairly likeable in the long-run.

The other reason that Howard gets major kudos from me is this: "Cocoon" has, by all accounts, the craziest damn sex scene I have ever seen. Reasons why it is jaw-dropping: it involves Steve Guttenberg and an alien. And they never touch.

Yes, my friends, we all know the old story: Guttenberg meets pretty alien, Guttenberg falls hard, Guttenberg gets hard in a magical pool, and thus the inter-planetary breeding begins. How many times have we seen it? Yet, "Cocoon"'s sex scene is done beautifully: Guttenberg and the alien (named Kitty) go in the pool, and you can feel the sexual tension rising. Magical lights literally start flashing above the pool, and the girl orgasms, presumably from aroused "life-energy". Sweet. It has to be seen to be appreciated, but I will say this: in what could have been treated as another snuff alien/flashing-light porn scene is handled by Howard with a subtle delicacy. Love has never felt so real.

Like/Dislike: C'mon man, who DOESN'T appreciate a movie with this sort of absurdity making enough money to earn a sequel, being critically praised, and winning a great actor an Oscar? "Cocoon" was made with the same sort of whimsy Howard added to "Splash"; this was way before Howard started doing heavy-handed dramas like "Apollo 13" and "Ransom" in the '90s. I guess the general reaction to Howard's involvement with "Cocoon" should be: "Oh really, Ron Howard directed that? Weird. That's pretty cool, I guess." For making "Cocoon" I like Ron Howard a little bit more.

Damn you, Howard family. The war over my opinion of you rages on.

It Is TV. It's HBO: The Last Episode of "The Sopranos"

When I think about "The Sopranos", which I began watching around Season 4, I think about how the overall quality of television has improved over the past decade or so.

No, seriously.

Don't get me wrong, there's a LOT of shit on TV right now. If you don't believe me, watch MTV at any given time for half an hour, and then watch "American Idol" for half an hour. You'll want to cry, and that's okay. If you look closer at network programming, however, you'll see that, over the last decade, the general structure of television shows has been revolutionized. Comedies have evolved out of the tedious three-camera format, ditched the laugh track, and found more relatable ways of making people laugh. Take a show like "The Office": the idea of characters breaking the fourth wall and addressing the camera, mockumentary-style, is an idea that would have never flied as soon as 10 years ago. Meanwhile, dramas have moved away from the starry-eyed soaps of the '80s and focused more on grittiness. Simply put, we are experiencing some of the most captivating, original premises for dramatic television ever; look at the far-reaching ideas behind shows like "Lost", "24", and "Big Love" if you don't believe me.

"The Sopranos" makes me think of all of these general improvements in thematic scope because I feel like it was responsible for starting a lot of these trends. It is a series about mobsters, in theory; in actuality, it is deeply psychoanalytic, unabashedly cold-hearted toward its protagonists, and more concerned with the moments of emotional clarity more than the moments of violence that have defined some of its most memorable moments. It is the anti-mob drama, the one that will always be remembered for being different from anything before it. Oh, and it was probably the best-written television show in history.

It surprises me how outraged I have read/heard people react toward its final episode, which was written and directed by series mastermind David Chase. Everyone expected a big, conclusive bow on the damn thing, either Tony getting killed or flipping or going into witness protection or doing something grandiose. He didn't. People expected a war between Tony's family and that of Phil Leotardo. Didn't happen; Phil got popped, almost predictably, after waving bye-bye to his grandkids at a gas station. People expected AJ to do something important, and to some extent, he did, by accepting the fancy lifestyle he had started to resent in favor of wild cynicism. Whatever. All of this seemed to be a pre-cursor for the final scene.

Fuck, man. That last scene. Tony and the wife and son, eating onion rings at a family restaurant, Journey playing on the jukebox, everything seeming to be FINALLY okay after a season of bickering and shootings and suicide attempts and dead Ukrainian Phil look-alikes. We see a shady man at the counter, looking over at Tony. AJ pops another onion ring in his mouth. Meadow has trouble parking the car. See, all of this is mind-blowingly important because it HAS to be; I have never seen a single unimportant camera shot while watching "The Sopranos", and I know that each one of these shots have been carefully constructed, as if to lead up to something. The man at the counter goes to the bathroom. The door of the restaurant opens, presumably Meadow. Tony looks up. Then -- black.

To those who could have possibly believed that their cable went out: seriously? Is that what you thought? You thought that David Chase gave you a monumental, action-packed ending, and your HBO wouldn't allow you to see it? You're only kidding yourself. This was the perfect ending to the show, in my opinion. Nothing tied up neatly, no one in a body bag, just Tony looking up as a door opens, probably scared out of his mind that THIS is his moment to pay for his sins, and we know he probably always will be. Some people have suggested that the cut-to-black represents Tony's death, the end he never saw coming. Others have suggested that nothing wrong has happened, that life goes on for Tony Soprano. Still others have said that the various people in the restaurant represent Tony's possible fates. To me, both theories are believable, but neither is definite. This series ended on an ambiguous note for a reason. Against all conventions, Tony was not given a Greek tragedy-esque end, nor was he given a damnation to continue walking the earth in suffering. We must take this as it a statement of uncertainty that the entire episode was trying to make clear: no one knows what exactly happened in that last scene, but isn't it so much more meaningful, so much more satisfying, that way? Here are things that the last scene reminded me of: the last sequence of "Broken Flowers", the last 15 minutes of "Mulholland Dr.", the thing Bill Murray whispers to Scarlett Johannson in "Lost In Translation", what the man in the road finally says in Radiohead's video for "Just". All of these are good things.

Admit it, you're still thinking about that ending, late at night when you can't sleep, when you're at work and staring into space, just mulling it over one last time in your mind. That's what a great conclusion to any work of art -- movie, TV series, book -- does. For years, "The Sopranos" left me entranced, and last night, it did so one last time. To all the haters who regard the ending with disgust: tell me specifically how it could have ended more impressively. Because I can't find a better way to close out a show as complex, subtle, and brilliant as this.

Underrated: Rick Ross' Verse in "We Takin' Over"

Unspeakable beauty...



Don't get it twisted: Rick Ross is not a great rapper. He might not even be a good rapper. He is, however, a big rapper. And he knows it.
DJ Khaled's "We Takin' Over" is currently blowing up on radio and MTV, which honestly is great, because I'll support any sort of exposure for a song featuring both T.I. and Lil' Wayne. There's a lot of things about "We Takin Over" that I like, a few of them being Khaled's "We tha BEST!" proclamation, Akon emoting all over the mic like it's underage, and the fact that Birdman's verse is by far the briefest. Yes, Weezy's verse is the best, but we all know that was a given. T.I. name-drops a lot of cities he's been to, which would be mediocre if not for Tip's signature laid-back drawl. Dude could probably rap about Medicare and it would be convincingly cool.
Then there's Rick Ross and Fat Joe -- a duo of large men who have a couple of sorta-respectable hits under their oversized belts. Fat Joe seems like a nice guy, even though he rolls with Terror Squad and will never be as good as his mentor, Big Pun (R.I.P., Punny Pun). I wanna like his verse, but he loses me when he says, "Feelin like 'Pac, all eyez on me," which is a cheap, bullshit line. As for Rick Ross... well, he made the song "Hustlin'", which is an okay banger, and I can understand Khaled's desire to throw a Miami MC a bone, but c'mon, he doesn't deserve to be in this song. Right?
Wrong, motherfucker. Ross drops the second-best verse of the song, and since #1 is Lil' Wayne and #3 is T.I., that's pretty impressive. Some of his rhymes are clumsy, but Richard kills it for two reasons: the grizzly-bear delivery, and the stunning wordplay in the second half of the verse. Rick Ross sounds both really pissed and really confident, and his gravel-throated rhymes crunch even harder after the shiny-smooth flow of T.I. and the ball-less crooning of Akon. The best part? The way Ross constantly slows down and drags out single-syllable words, because even if Ross can't keep up with the shit-hot beat, he at least manipulates his wordplay to make the ebb-and-flow sound downright necessary. Seriously, this dude sounds like he means business; he's clearly the hardest-sounding MC on the cut, even though he really hasn't done much more than drop one successful single and eat some celebratory bacon. Whatever works, man; your mission to sound like you belong is complete.
It's hard to make out every word that Ross drops, but listen closely, because there are pretty some great lines here. As soon as Ross spits out, "Get shot up like Shyne," he's got a hold of me, and it just gets better from there: "I'm B.I.G. like Diddy/ Damn it, I'm wit' it/ Khaled we did it, Biggie of my city/ Please not fitted, fuck it, I'm too pretty/ The rappers can get brain, stupid, I'm silly/ Money that come, runnin like water/ Mommy so hot, damn it, she's gorgeous/ Miami on fire, better be cautious/ Might get shot on the porch of your fortress". Yeah, it's not Def Jux, jaw-dropping brilliance, but these are above-average lyrics for a rap radio anthem. When Ross declares at the end, "I run in 'cause Rick Ross is boss shit," all one can do is shrug their shoulders and admit, "Yeah, I guess Rick Ross IS boss shit".
So next time you listen to "We Takin Over", raise a finger up not just for T.I.P. or Lil' Weezy, but also for Rick Ross, who seems to have hit a home run in an all-star game he never should have been allowed to play in. The biggest rapper of them all has some muscle after all.