The 50 Worst Things Ever To Happen To Music

This is from this month's Blender Magazine.
Some of these are really funny.
I'm just going to post the condensed version, click here for the full article.

50. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Has any record’s influence upon music proved so malignant? Concept albums, progressive rock, Brian Wilson’s nervous breakdown, baby boomers yammering away about the Summer of Love, musicians taking themselves more seriously than cancer surgeons — all the Beatles’ fault. And is there anyone alive who hasn’t suffered a collapse of the will to live during “When I’m Sixty-Four”?

49. That Dude who yells "Freebird" at every rock show

48. Hip-Hop skits

47. Slash quits Guns and Roses

46. Decency

45. Rootkits

44. Rock poets

43. Non-Fake Lesbians

42. Scott Stapp
Although he’s rehabilitated his image in recent years by becoming an incorrigible drunk and trying to beat up 311, there’s no getting around the music. The fourth-generation grunge he’s peddled solo and with Creed might be harmless if it weren’t swathed in quasi-religious pomposity and delivered with an arrogance that — in light of his musical, er, gifts — feels downright delusional.

41. Melisma

40. Parrotheads

39. AIDS

38. Sting

37. Gilbert O'Sullivan

36. Sean Combs is... Puff Daddy is... P Diddy... is Diddy

35. Van Halen fires David Lee Roth

34. Van Halen hires Sammy Hagar

33. Van Halen fires Sammy Hager

32. Van Halen hires Gary Cherone

31. Jazz Fusion

30. Braided Goatees

29. Popera

28. The Disappearence of Independent Record Stores

27. "Jukebox" Musicals

26. Adam Duritz's dreadlocks

25. Tribute Albums

24. Mark David Chapman

23. Woodstock '99

22. Lists That Reduce Rock History To a Series of Glib Soundbites

21. Nearly Every Hip-Hop Video

20. Syn Drums

19. Electric Violin

18. Saprano Sax

17. Fred Durst

16. Replacement Lead Singers

15. CDs

14. Florida

13. Light Aircraft
The first day the music died, it took Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper with it. The next day it took country star Patsy Cline. And then Jim Croce, half of Lynyrd Skynyrd, Stevie Ray Vaughan, John Denver and Aaliyah There is, it seems, a good reason the tour bus is such a popular transportation option.

12. Kevin Federline

11. "You Really Have To See Them Live"

10. "Colonel" Tom Parker
Meet the Slobodan Milosevic of artist management: Before Suge Knight, Lou Pearlman or even Allen Klein came the “Colonel” — inventor of ruinously exploitative rock management. Getting his hooks into Elvis in 1955, the Dutch con man artfully steered the King away from making music (which he had something of a knack for) and towards the likes of Clambake, Kissin’ Cousins, Kid Galahad and the 30-odd other Hollywood forgettables he made instead of recording or touring for most of the next decade.

9. Whitey

8. The Age of 27

7. Finding God

6. Madonna's British Accent

5. Ecstasy

4. Neverland Ranch

3. "The Star-spangled Banner"

2. Suge Knight

1. Kids Today!
Back in our day, we didn’t have any of yer fancy iPods and ringtones and downloads. We didn’t have the luxury and convenience of your scrotum-rings and your World Wide Web logs. When we wanted to steal the new Uriah Heep album, we couldn’t just troll the Internets for it, we had to do it the old-fashioned way — by hiking to the store (uphill, both ways) and shoving 12” of vinyl under our sweaters (which we had to knit ourselves). That’s why you sniveling whipper-snappers don’t appreciate the real value of music. Or Uriah Heep. Now get the hell off our lawn!

Blender Online