And baby I was raised on Prince, not crack, so I gotta let you hear it

This shitty article in a shitty student newspaper about this band has caused what can only be called a "kerfluffle." It was the talk of the show I was at last Friday (the drummer of one of the evening's bands, who also serves in that other band, took the time at the start and end of the show to take shots at the article's writer from the stage) and was the subject of no less than three letters in this week's edition of said shitty student newspaper.

Now, I'm inclined to defend the author for a couple of reasons. For one, I'm an asshole with a tendency to reflexively hate popular things. For another, I've bitched about the lack of honest criticism of Edmonton's music scene before. Finally, I'm on the record (in my younger, angrier days) as not being a fan of the band in question, though I am acquainted with several of its members and they all seem like good dudes. That said, I just can't get behind Ms. Ash's points.

The main problem is that she premises the whole whiny mess on the idea that SO Ox4's Juno nod was the result of some fluke unrelated to their work ethic. And that's just horseshit. I doubt there's a band in Edmonton, now or ever, that works as hard as they do at playing shows and playing the game. That's what you gotta do to make it, and regardless of your feelings on the band's sound, you can't pretend they haven't paid their dues.

She goes on to blow off their record as "drawn out, thin, unbelievably repetitive and just plain boring." Which is probably true: though I've not heard the record, that pretty much sums up my feelings about the band's output. Ash, however, thinks this disqualifies them from Juno-worthiness, as though the Junos actually award aesthetics. A look at the rest of the field puts that notion to bed with a quickness (Hedley?). Ash must know this: why else would she go on to describe a Juno nomination as "the ultimate handjob?" Because she a shitty writer, that's why.

Now it's readily apparent that I (who is only doing this because he likes to tear other people down) and those who wrote huffy letters have already put far more effort into our takedowns than Ash did in the writing, so I'll sum up the rest bullet-point style.

• "The rest of Edmonton’s music scene" is not, by and large, more talented or harder working than the SO Ox4. They are, for the most part, lazy hacks.
• That Edmontonians "giv(e) bands attention just for the sake of getting Edmonton’s name out there, not because they’re actually worthy of respect." is a fair point, but it comes too late and after too much stupid.
• No one in the band has "emo hair." Only one comes close, and his lack of a bad Loreal "Black Leather" dye-job and unfortunate piercings disqualifies him from such categorization. Do your fuckin' homework. (Thanks, D.)

To sum up: Edmonton does have an unfortunate tendency towards mindless cheerleading. And yeah, the band in question is not everyone's cup of tea, and much of their local following is made up of stupid teenagers whom I would like to lock in cages with man-eating tigers with Ebola. But at the end of the day, one party in our little saga is living the rock'n'roll dream, playing stages from Edmonton to NYC to Berlin, and have been recognized on the national level, something taht can only help the rest of Edmonton's music scene. The other party writes crappy articles for the Gateway. Need I say more?

Speaking of Shout Outs, handjobs and the Gateway (that's a segue, motherfuckers!), Gateway alumni Pleasure Motors gave yours truly a mention in a recent entry over at Covered in Oil. Just another example of the mighty vaunted Edmonton Domino Effect in action. And in a neat little bit of symmetry, the CinO entry in question also references hojos. Thus, the circle closes.