There’s been at least a little lively discussion in this blog since it’s inception, and thank god we are not entirely aligned on many of the issues brought up so far. We’ve wrangled the merits of Celine Dion (or lack thereof), the joys of live vs. recorded music, heard tales of yore that while clearly entertaining and important, have also been uncomfortably breached with plenty of disclaimer by at least one self-conscious member of our lot, and we have been generally treated to what I consider a reasonably high level of competence on a daily basis. So if I am able to do nothing else in my following post, may I at least be able to toss a wrench into the spokes of the competency wheel.
I have several things bouncing around inside my unreasonably disjointed and convoluted head that I would like to toss out today if you don’t mind. I think it’s important, for the sake of flow, to bind these three ideas into one flatulent mess, because who doesn’t like the smell of their own? So without any further fanfare, let’s get to the idiocy at hand.
Manufactured obsolescence…
I heard a story on NPR this morning about the concept of manufactured obsolescence, which is basically the idea that manufacturers of the products we consume, namely electronic gadgets, deliberately design them to break down within a relatively short period of time. This is done in order to insure that I will spend even more money on the latest version of the electric cock polisher, or whatever you wish, than I did on the two speed, non-vibrating edition that broke after two polishings a week ago. Basically they make shit, we break shit, they make more shit. And instead of making these items repairable (which in fact is the opposite of what they do because they don’t even manufacture parts for these things), they force you to buy another one. And the final result is that you end up with a whole drawer full of electric cock polishers (you know, hypothetically). And all of this wouldn’t even be on my plate if my digital camera hadn’t crapped out on me after about twenty uses, god fucking damn it. It was working fine, and then boom, it doesn’t work at all. Goodbye $299. It ties in to my intense hatred for marketers and marketing in general. Bill Hicks had it right when he invited everyone in the entire world that does now, has ever, or will ever, work in marketing to kill themselves. The wickedness with which product is made sexy, desirable, necessary, and important to the consumers is all-pervasive. News to you? No, but it bears repeating. And it leads us to my second tale.
The First Act VW Shill…
I have a brother. He’s awesome, but we are also very different. And for the sake of the story, I’ll share one way in which we are different. He lives in West University. Houstonians know where that is, but the rest of you need only to know that West U is a somewhat hoity-toity yuppie enclave just off of the Rice campus. You know, pricey. My house? Not so much. And while my brother has been driving a VW that he paid off a while back, I have been driving a Hyundai that I bought from his wife so she could buy a real car. Since my brother’s car is on the verge of having expensive repairs, he just went out and bought a new one. Me, I’m in a similar boat, but I won’t be buying another one anytime soon. Anywho… what you need to know, is that he went and bought another brand new VW (GTI). As he sat with the assbag salesperson in the dealer’s office, he asks the guy about the First Act promotion. What is this you ask? Well, if you buy a new VW, you get a First Act brand guitar for free! You can then plug the thing into your glove box (through an 1/8th inch jack, and rock out through your car stereo). Now I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say: how fucking retarded. The guitar has a VW logo pearl inlay in the 12th fret, VW knobs, the VIN number stamped on the back of the headstock, and best of all, an image of two hands throwing a gang-style hand sign of the VW logo (word). Packaged with his guitar is a little brochure to get one started on their path to rock star righteousness. Included in this bible of pandering idiocy is directions on how to rock out in front of your car in the dark, lit (rock star style) by your headlights. Fortunately, the provided cable is long enough to accomplish this. You also get chord diagrams for six easily fingered chords: D, G, A, E, F, C, as well as tuning directions, and the fingerings to create power chords. Great, now you can join My Chemical Romance. Joy. Can you imagine how hard it is now days to try and usurp Toyota from their prominent place at the top of the car heap? It would appear as though it is so hard, that you must go out and kneel down before the very devil himself so that you may blow his engorged member with reckless abandon. Imagine thinking that the car you are making is so motherfucking cool that you could just go ahead and whore it to people by trumping them up to be manufactured rock stars! Huzzah! Ooh, it makes me think of the idea of commodification of dissent – you know, cool for sale. It’s the fairly recent phenomenon in which marketers take their products and sell them to you by making you think you will be a rebellious hipster in the process. You would never imagine it would ever work, but that’s why you aren’t a marketer. Those bastards know you inside and out. And ever since the trademarked rebellion of the sixties, it has become marketable to be a rebel. Laugh all you want. It works amazingly well, just ask my brother. And speaking of coolness, let’s leap right ahead to our third and final traipse through the dark waters of my juvenile mind.
The noble Saint Phillip of Lynott…
If anything would divide this forum between believers and non-believers, I would hope it’s not the subject of Thin Lizzy’s Phil Lynott. I suppose one might argue that he was a cheesy rock dork, but I am of the firmly established camp that claims Mr. Lynott to be about as cool as a fellow could be. And when I say that, I mean to speak for every afroed, Irish, black, leather pantsed, armadillo in trousered, totally over-the-top inch of the dude. For real. Now, even I was a serious doubter for years on end. Whenever I heard the song “The Boys are Back in Town” on the radio back in the day, I couldn’t turn the channel soon enough. First off, I thought it was Bruce Springsteen, and that was reason enough for me to run away; but even still, I found that song to be a completely vapid example of rock excess gone horribly wrong. That is, until I was semi-living with one of my many poorly chosen ex-girlfriends whose actual roommate had just purchased the new Thin Lizzy greatest hits tape. She handed it over to me one night and said, “I knew you would want to hear this, so enjoy. I’m off to work.” I pretended to be excited about it because I don’t like making waves, but I was terrified of the mustache splayed across the front of the tape cover. Eventually I popped it in and decided to give it a shot just for grins. Damn it if I didn’t find myself liking it, a lot. And now, I love that fucking band – and not in an ironic way either – I actually think that Lynott’s songs are amazing. Why, I was just listening to Thin Lizzy at work the other day, and found myself getting all goofy upon hearing the Cowboy Song, as well as Jailbreak. It just works for me on some base level, and I’m not sure I even care to know why. Okay, the lyrics are a bit silly, but I don’t really care too much about that. And the mere fact that this guy meant it with all his heart doesn’t hurt either. Now I know that this idea dovetails with the prevailing winds of our comments threads of late, and that’s part of the reason why I brought it up. I just wanted to show that though we may all agree for the most part on people like Celine Dion, we may possibly disagree on others, like Lynott. And just for the hell of it, I want to end this tome by linking sir Phil with the original idea of manufactured obsolescence. Lynott died as a result of his drug abuse. He was leading a life that was sure to do him in at an early age. And if there is one surefire way to render oneself obsolete, it is through excessive drug use. Manufactured obsolescence a la science. A stretch, yes, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Oh yeah, and take a look-see below…
This guy, is my brother. Farfegnugen!
John – As you know a part of me would love to thrash your opinion of Philip Lynott but I just can’t. We’ve both covered “Whiskey in the Jar” and that’s enough for me.
I do want to take your “cruddy electronics” theory to task but only because I have a personal story to share. Now is not the time though. But just you wait.
West U brings back not-so-yuppie memories. Nowadays, it is pretty much, but not entirely, the yuppie enclave you describe but when I was in the 5th grade (when my mother moved my brother, sister and me to Texas) we moved to West U. My mom rented a little bungalow- we couldn’t really afford the area but my mom thought it would be safe. We lived a couple of blocks from the Village. In those days there was a Vietnamese gang ridden disco on Kirby and University. The Village had not one but two adult movie theaters. There was a seedy pool hall and a Dairy Queen. JR Delgado will have to tell you about the punk shows in the Village because I was too young for that. Oh and my mom had a VW Rabbit. It was yellow and it was a real lemon.
I heard that story on NPR, too. It surprsed me that they talked about planned obsolescence as if it were a new thing. I mean, Detroit automakers retooled their cars every year just to make your set of wheels look like last year’s set of wheels. Fins this year, no fins the next. That way they could guarantee a consistent revenue stream of suckers. They don’t do this so much these days, it seems. But now I miss some of the gimmicks like chrome. Only trucks get chrome these days.
On the other hand, you can get guitars. I have to think that VW thing is not very serious. They have decided that their target market is people who listen to Eagles of Death Metal and therefore turned the irony up to eleven. You’ll note that they even have Christopher Guest in full Spinal Tap glory in one of the commercials for this guitar. Also, you can find guitar tutorials by Dweezil Zappa on the VW website. I thought the whole thing was really dumb the first time I saw it, but after thinking about it, I’ve changed my mind. It’s so utterly pointless as to be inspired. Here’s my question though, can you play along with music when you plug your guitar in or does the thing only handle one sound source? Also are there effects?
Finally, it sounds like you already have, but if you haven’t, you should read Thomas Frank’s Conquest of Cool. I didn’t think it’s as good as his other books, but still a damn good read. Also, you can watch a Frontline episode on the same topic here.
My dad, the Ravyn, has been opposed to engineered obsolescence (as I have heard it called) since before I was born. In fact, throughout most of high school, I typed papers in Wordperfect2.1, on an old Dyna PC clone. It was the same one my dad typed his dissertation on in about 1978. He kept that sob working until the dawn of the 21st century, just because he couldn’t bear the implications of buying into something as rife with engineered obsolescence as computers. Just one more example of why the Ravyn rocks harder than any of your fathers.
Two important notes to your Lynott spiel: 1 I love the Lizzy. James Mcnew of Yo La Tengo covered Cowboy Song on his 2003 release, A Grown Ass Man, from his side project, Dump. It’s great, and was my gateway drug to Jailbreak! 2. How many people here think that Thin Lizzy sucks on the same order as Celine Dion?
I don’t know why this reminds me, but you guys seem like a good bunch to put this query to. I am compiling the tracklist for my first International Mixtape Project assignment (you should check it out by the way), and would like suggestions. The theme I have chosen, I think I tolk you about this, John, is “Meta-Rock.” For those of you unfamiliar, see
http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/feature/36696/Column_Column_Puritan_Blister_17
Sorry, I am a douchebag, and can’t figure out how to make these damn links work. ctrl – c, ctrl – v it is.
Shit you beat me to to the First Act Blog! Fucker!
: )
It seems they are trying to go beyond the crappy kids guitars they’ve made up until this point and make crappy adult guitars. Hey someone had to pick up the slack when Sears stopped making guitars.
To accompany the big VW push they also have some signature guitars. I’m both amused and frightened:
For the Older Alterna Kids
The Paul Westerburg Model
For the Older New Wave Kids
The Depeche Mode Model
For the Older Classic Rock Kids
The Cheap trick Model
And a model exclusively for Sharks and Sailors:
The Mastadon Model
Disjointed thoughts:
The first guitar I had was a Sears Silvertone…
I think it’s why I became a bass player.
Do I actually need to get buy some thin lizzy?
I’ve never listened.
Dot Dean convinced me to buy that first Montrose album back in the day, and she was right. Is it possible John is right about Thin Lizzy?
Nothing any of you can say will change my mind about Steely Dan or Frank Zappa. They are only occasionally one step above ear darts for me…
I knew I was getting old when I stopped changing the station when Springsteen came on the radio.
Wow! Even I wouldn’t play the Depeche Mode guitar…and I love Depeche Mode.
(although like Pink Floyd with Barret, I prefer the first album, y’know with Vince Clarke…I saw Erasure in concert once. I bought a scarf.)
I have to say that VW’s guitar marketing gimmick sits a hell of a lot better with me than their FEAR ads. What a load of german horsesh*t to associate your cars with random road violence.
Damn it Kilian, you totally had me psyched!! I was pumped to see Lee Ving shilling VWs – “Beef! Beef! Beef! Beef! Beef Baloney!”
: (
Hey they’re not giving away saxophones…which reminds me of their appearance on SNL which reminds me that I never attempt to defend Zappa, who is undefendable…except to point to this (hang with it non-Zappa people, the good stuff is about a minute in).
lookit, that guitar is going to be worth a hell of alot more than that car in 10 years.
am i a thin lizzy fan? let’s just say i check the paper often to see if the Thin Lizzie cover band is playing Fuggedaboutit II out on Hwy 6.
John ~ I subscribe to the theory that electronic companies have conspired to have their products crap out after a year or two of use. Can we say, iPOD!
With regard to First Act, I read on a VW message board recently that the Garagemasters are valued close to $600. You check out the full list of artists who play First Act guitars at http://firstact.com/Artists.aspx.
I’m from Dallas. Looking forward to returning to the motherland over the holidays.
You know, that Cheap Trick model guitar, the one with 6 (!) lipstick pickups and a switch, volume and tone knob for each pickup (!) is kind of cool just for the WTF? factor. Except for the hot pink binding. That’s just ugly.
See, here’s the deal with the First Act guit-fiddle. Speaking from the point of view of a guitarist, they are decent overall. Maple Neck, rosewood fretboard, bolt-on neck, on/off switch (!)… you get the picture. There are worse guitars out there. The E-Bay claim is certainly not proportionate to the guitar’s actual value to someone who really cares about guitars (as it is, I don’t really care that much). It has a built in digital distortion effect, but that’s it on the effects front. It sounds okay actually. I don’t think you can play over the stereo, but you can use the hazards which will send an electirc clicking signal through your stereo giving what the manual calls a “60 beat-per-minute metronome to rock out to!”
Justin: I haven’t read Conquest of Cool, but I’ll check it out. I have seen the Frontline episode though, and I strongly recommend every one of your fuckers find it and watch it, pronto. It’s boss. As far as marketing goes, I’m with you Justin, the idea is sort of clever, but in the scope of goofy-ass marketing schemes, it’s as retarded as any other.
Kilian: My mother also had a VW Rabbit, but hers was orange. Nice.
Ramon: I think First Act actually can do the whole custom thing for anyone, at a reasonably less than the customary custom price. Could be wrong. SNL is releasing the first season on DVD soon, and will follow with more, so hello Fear, Captain Beefheart, and Elvis Costello.
Mike: I am right.
Obsolescences? How about a lesson in stereos? I recently went shopping for a good stereo reciever and I have to admit after twenty long years with the same one I thought it might be time to upgrade and modernize to the present time in technology.
I was wondering to myself if stereos are like cars and computers. Do they really improve technologically with time and is my old system really an inferior relic from the past? Sadly I felt lost and out of time with ignorance as to what I should purchase.
I was beginning to think that I myself was just an old relic clinging to every word of the very young sales rep wearing a nice tie who was showing me the lastest in sound technology.
After about a minute or two, but what seemed to take forever, every word coming out of his mouth sounded like blah,blah,blah!
So after careful thought and much consideration, this is the conclusion I was forced to arrived to:
you might actually get better sound from those old
monsters as long as the less sturdy parts are still in
good shape.
today, all amplifiers in common stereo stores(best
buy, circuit city) are designed and manufactured to
give satisfying sound with as close to the bare
minimum of materials.
decades ago the manufacturers had only one thing to
do: take a small signal and make it bigger.
and they didn’t have modern computer design systems
and simulations and ultra fast calculations to help
them design to the bare minimum of tolerance to get
the basic specs.
They seemed to just throw huge transformers and
capacitors and op amps in a box and try getting
customer interest with hoy they backlit the panel and
positioned the controls.
so i’d bet the 200 watt 1972 yamaha would annihilate
the 700 watt onkyo or JVC of today.
and today it’s mostly specialized features.
23 soundfield presets and custom tunable soundscapes
for your personal hearing environment and shit.
yeah it’s cool as fuk but if all you want to do is
fill a room with sound – it’s a load of bullshit.
so you gotta ask yourself
do i want to watch modern movies in truly impressive
surround sound?(until it fucks up)
or
do i want to power two speakers with background fill or
even sheetrock cracking jams?(going on 20 plus years)
so, what do I want to do?
I decided to keep my sturdy reliable system from the latter half of the last century and ignore all the beautiful flashing lights and numerous abilities of modern components because I know the lights will fade and it too will not only become obsolete, but inoperable.
Wise choice mister A.
New or extended features are a great way to build in future obsolescence. You can’t even find some simple products any more. I looked and looked and looked at Target for a shitty, $10 AM radio so I could listen to the football games while I’m barbecuing outside. Couldn’t find one – best I could do was a Sony AM/FM/Weather with TV channels’ audio too, and it was $29. All the rest had some motherfucker CD player, or digital bullshit tuners or some kind of other useless shit on them, and all I wanted was an AM radio like the kind I had when I was a kid with a tuning knob and volume knob. That one probably is still around my mom’s house, and probably still fucking works.
Home electronics and other appliances just aren’t designed to be serviced; partly because of all the electronic features and other crap they put in them that makes them more complicated. My wife *had* to have a washer/dryer with a goddamn electronic touchpad on it. Well, guess what fritzed out first. And of course cars all have electronic fuel injectors now instead of carburetors.
This reminds me of a discussion that I had a while back about how regulatory agencies and “consumer” groups contribute to the problem. Take the original VW Bug, which was a perfectly safe, serviceable, inexpensive, fuel efficient, lovely little car. But eventually it couldn’t pass any of the regulatory requirements for new vehicles in the US, and ultimately this took away a cheap car option for many families. Those rules were pushed on industry by people like Nader, etc. and the industry fought back at first, but later realized they could just pass the cost on to the consumer and make even more money by financing them. Gee, thanks Ralph. I’m not saying these groups don’t do some good, but the bottom line is that extra “features” and higher cost are partly the handiwork of “consumer crusaders”, not just the work of clever marketers.
Anonymous, when I went to replace my receiver I decided to get the receiver from my youth, because that’s what my ears hear as the best sound. Fortunately, that was a pretty high end receiver from the 70s.
There were plenty of these to choose from on eBay, so I got to pick one that was even cooler looking than the one I remember. Wood cabinet. Awesome. It sounds great and I have been pretty happy with it.
It would be cool to be able to do surround sound, but this is good for now.
When it comes to buying the few electronics that I buy these days, i’ve completely stopped talking to salesmen or going to stores. Here’s an AM radio for you under $10.00. I’ve had the Donald Duck version for about 35 years and it still rocks those AM stations.
Justin, just in case you’re ever in the market for another reciever, I found this website whilst I was Christmas shopping for my brother. I actually found an 8 track player for him! He’s also stuck in a time warp.
http://www.oaktreevintage.com/Stereo_Receivers.htm
John – I also “inherited” my Grandmother’s 1979 VW Rabbit. It’s a diesel and ran forever (50 miles to the gallon). Hell, it may still be running – last I knew it was in the possession of Ms. Elizabeth Jackson de Big Houston.
Oh and just so you don’t think the family’s fickle…I now own a VW Golf.
My dad had a white Rabbit with red vinyl interior when I was a kid. There was a short in the radio, so he would periodically have to pound on the dash to get the tunes to flow again. One day he hit it so hard he put his fist through the dash. The radio started again though, so I guess he won that battle.
AAAGGHHH….innocence lost…remember the days when having a Big Bird with an AM radio in it was like…well, I don’t know, having a gigantic piece of pecan pie with dancing muppets on top of it or something. How far we have fallen as a civilization…that such things are to be discarded for a mere $10.
My wife still believes that having a Snoopy Snow Cone Machine is pretty much the pinnacle of human accomplishment. What the hell? Are we really so weak as to be overcome with emotion by yesteryear’s cheap plastic electronics?
YESSSS….WE ARE!!!
My mother read this blog and got really worked up about it. Its one of her pet peeves. M.O. She then went on to email me this fake advertisement she came up with where some company was trying to sell the cure for ovarian cancer in a pornographic magazine. Then we talked about vaginal rejuvenation and who the beneficiary truly is…. and then she went on to tell me she wanted to invent a male version of the hymen, and call it the hywoman. So thanks for opening up that dialog for us.
That’s one way to erode the vaneer of cool.