Rolling Stone Crowns U2 Number One

As Jann Wenner and Bono mash the gas pedal towards the cliff of irrelevance.

In other words, how can "Rolling Stone" be so tone-deaf? This single-handedly reveals the inanity of the shenanigans behind the "Rock and Roll Hall of Fame," this illustrates how baby boomers have to get out of the way to let the younger generations flourish. If you think U2's album whose name I can no longer remember counts, if you think albums matter, if you think by continuing to polish this turd it will gain traction, you work at "Rolling Stone" or are in U2 or both.

Despite a self-congratulatory phony press, the truth is credibility reigns. With every wart exposed, it's important you show you're in bed with your fans, not the fat cats who run this country who are evidence of everything wrong with it. "Rolling Stone" imitated "Blender" and made all their reviews short, not knowing "Blender" lied about its numbers and was heading for extinction, but this same magazine can't realize its place in the spectrum, can't understand that to be relevant you've got to be honest?

Why don't they just get rid of the music. Why don't they just call it the Matt Taibbi publication. That's right, "Rolling Stone" made Taibbi a star, he's everything the musicians are not. While Bono keeps cozying up to heads of state Taibbi keeps revealing their bad behavior, refusing to apologize all the while.

That's what's wrong with America, all the damn apologizing. It would be one thing if these people really made a mistake, but the truth is they're afraid of being excoriated by the press and public, they're afraid to own their identities. And if they truly say something heinous they should burn in hell for it. Apologizing does not erase behavior, never. We can learn from our mistakes, but it seems like these celebrities never do.

And getting much less attention is "Rolling Stone"'s gigantic victory last week, bringing down the Greek system at UVA. That's right, in one well-researched report about date rape the publication threw light on the situation and caused the university to blink. These damn colleges, they're just factories for the administration to get rich off athletes who don't study while the rest of the students party. Once upon a time, college was about learning, about becoming a better person, now it's all about a job. Let me tell you, you're gonna lose that job. And if you don't know the liberal arts you're never going to be able to pivot, never mind come up with that great idea to begin with.

So "Rolling Stone" still has power. Why did it commit such a faux pas by naming U2's album number one? Does the magazine believe it still lives in the pre-Internet era, where no one can comment upon its decision? Instead, the magazine is now a laughingstock, beaten up online, the younger generation who abhor Bono and his band pushing ever further away from it and refusing to read the good articles that are in the publication.

Let's start with U2. Forget about the album. It's done. Over. History.

You need a hit. And you'd be better off recording a new one than trying to pull one out of that turkey you foisted upon us.

If you're really desperate, do a Christmas song. At least you'll get spins.

And "Rolling Stone," which once came down on the side of file-traders, can you please bury the album, know that no one listens that way anymore and to declare an overlong opus as important is ridiculous? Can you stop giving every album a three star review? Can you stop putting loyalty over the news?

That's right, this elevation of U2's crap smacks of nothing so much as loyalty, old school entertainment business, the same one that got U2 into this mess to begin with. At least Jimmy Iovine produced U2, what exactly is your connection to the band again Jann?

And it will make no difference. Almost no one will check out the album as a result of this endorsement. The negative will outweigh the positive by far. Music is like sports...it's all about the achievement, the work. And U2 did not deliver. Sorry, no amount of spin will change that.

Meanwhile, the musos are trumpeting that which no one can relate to and the youngsters are listening to pop and everybody else has tuned out. "Rolling Stone" has done a disservice to the industry. Doused any flames left.

Music is more ubiquitous than ever before, but everybody involved wants to kill it by playing by the old rules.

Except in the festival world. That's where music lives today. We need even more. Destination events where people can be exposed to music and the ethos it engenders, so they'll partake further.

You can't lie in a live performance. You can't steal it either.

And no one wants to watch it on their computer.

They want to be there.

Why has our nation devolved into self-congratulatory crap when the truth is we're caving from within? Where is Devo when you need them?

"50 Best Albums of 2014": http://rol.st/1B5Rjbw

FURTHERMORE, TO MAKE SPRINGSTEEN NUMBER TWO IS TO MAKE ME PUKE!
The best thing Springsteen did in the past year was cover U2 yesterday. Springsteen is irrelevant to everybody but his fans. His voice is a rasp and he's so caught up in his own echo chamber that he can no longer see reality. He's not a saint, not in the city or New Jersey. He's got to cut something as meaningful about the hard times in America as he did about AIDS in "Streets of Philadelphia," he's got to pull his head out of his ass and realize to be relevant you've got to make something everybody likes, not just your fans. And by making this mediocre album number two Wenner shows that he's in cahoots with Jon Landau, running the R&RHOF as their fiefdom. Yes, Yes can't be inducted and we have to hear again and again how Bruce is still relevant? Come on!

"A Rage on Campus: A Brutal Assault an Struggle for Justice at UVA": http://rol.st/11Cs0z8

This one article is better than both the U2 and Springsteen albums combined. Read it, it'll be more fulfilling. And know that it had more impact, UVA suspended their fraternities in the wake of it.

"UVA suspends fraternities after report on gang rape allegation": http://cnn.it/1pPAxte

But unlike Bono and Bruce, the unheralded writer of the "Rolling Stone" piece, Sabrina Rubin Erdely, was driven by a search for truth as opposed to a desire for success. You can feel her passion for the story when you read it. It's everything music is not. Illustrating once again that a lone outsider with desire and some talent can topple the usual suspects perched atop the pedestal.


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