QOTD 9: Which makes them poetic…

Lester Bangs: The Doors? Jim Morrison? He’s a drunken buffoon posing as a poet.
Alice Wisdom: I like The Doors.
Lester Bangs: Give me The Guess Who. They got the courage to be drunken buffoons, which makes them poetic.

The above is one of my favorite sentiments in all of history. Own who you are, and good things will come to you – hypothetically, at least. We’ve seen this countless times in movies, tv, music, and pro wrestling. Heck, how many times have wrestlers said the best gimmicks are just themselves ‘turned up to 11’?

So:

Name a movie, TV show, wrestler, artist, or writer you enjoy that lives happily in their own niche, and is better for it.

I’m reminded of this because I recently got my hands on Bowling For Soup’s newest album, Lunch.Drunk.Love, and it is of the quality I’ve come to expect from them since 2004 when I heard them on the ‘Backyard Wrestling’ (featuring ICP) soundtrack and enjoyed their not-very-serious send up of the TRL generation in ‘Punk Rock 101’. And somehow they’ve managed to put out more quality records than every other band I’ve ever called my ‘favorite’

They’re sophomoric, drunks, unabashedly nerdy, not lyrically complex, like to party, evoke a positive attitude, and most importantly, mean well. While there’s always going to be a place for bands who lean more toward the tortured artist side of things, I find that personally I tend to most enjoy bands that come at this thing with a sense of genuine energy an unabashed enthusiasm, which then makes them artists.

For the four of you that care, and the six of you that are going to make fun of me, my favorite bands of all time are Barenaked Ladies, Jimmy Eat World, Counting Crows, Kid Rock, Eminem, Bowling for Soup, Fountains of Wayne, and then a smattering of popular and deep tracks from Noah and The Whale, Counting Crows, Toby Keith, Big and Rich, Ben Folds, and Jason Mraz. But despite most of those musicians probably having more talent than Bowling for Soup, I *like* Bowling for Soup the most. I’ve bought every single one of their albums because I know exactly what I’m getting every time, and I can’t say that about any of those other bands.

As far as drunken buffoons go, they’re the best.

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Blog Otter Award: Mike Mears for suggesting the next 5 QOTDs as I’ll be too busy playing GTA V to think of anything worthwhile. Get your dictionaries ready, kids.

1. Poker Night of Champions is, alas, a no-go as we had only 4 signups. I’d suggest an E-fed but I think I’d have to give my virginity back, first.

2. I can’t help but feel Santino Marella is the answer to this question, wrestling wise.

3. I really don’t understand all the Kid Rock hate, by-the-by. I guess my question would be *how much* Kid Rock have you listened to before saying he sucks / is a shitty artist, etc?

Homework Assignment: Get your ‘Cowboy’ on and listen to the lyrics, sounds, and musical complexity of this song, and tell me it’s not at least creative, if not 100 percent your cup of tea.

I don’t mean to go on a Rant here, but literally every time I bring up Mr. Rock, I get very similar responses from folks and it completely baffles me. I’m reminded of Jay-Z from “Renegade” – Do you fools listen to music, or ya’ll just skim through it? Because I can tell you regardless of whether or not you ENJOY his music, you have to appreciate his style, compassion, and ability to kind of re-invent himself over and over again, going from Rap, to Rock, to Country, to a combo of all three.

Also I’m probably in the minority here, but I actually sort of dig the way he samples other songs for his beats. We give rappers a pass when they do it, so why does Kid Rock get the flack?

So a secondary, personal vendetta-y question here: Why do you hate Kid Rock? What makes him objectively bad, versus being an artist who doesn’t fit in with your tastes?