Just in awe of the courage shown by the women who testified against him. Also, respect to rock critic Jim DeRogatis, who kept reporting on this story and digging for years while people willfully ignored the evidence.

It’s entirely possible to not state your opinion on this one way or another and wait for more information.

OK, that’s it. No more looking at LinkedIn or Indeed right before bedtime.

Wishing everyone a great weekend, with nothin’ but the sweetest of dreams. Please be careful, take good care of yourselves and each other…

… and good on you all.

I imagine that the women in these guys lives are sick of hearing about The Wrens.

What do you want them to do, somehow find 6 rap albums from the last year BETTER than Donda?? In a year with no Macklemore? Good luck!

Hopefully Brian Warner understands that first hand real soon

“Big Thief is having controversy because a T Shirt had a microscopic image of a faceless purple arms in jail”

Lil Nas X after wiping the devils jizz off his face: what are you even talking about right now?

99.79% of black people: what is a big thief?

Please also don’t shoot people, IMO!

” I haven’t ironed that idea out enough yet to explain it” – Story of her life

JFC. If someone sexualizes an image of a naked baby that’s on them. Also this is a person who has profited from this image for three decades.

Everything else aside, adding Pusha T to a group chat with Drake is objectively funny

Hey all, as I type these words, there are like 38 comments below this one, but I figured I’d jump in here to thank @thiscity and everybody else for the truly kind words shared in the comments so far. This is legitimately the best community on the internet, not that you need me to tell you that. Love you all. (Except for all you snarky troll types who will inevitably roll in at some point past the 38-comment mark! Haha. Jk. Of course I love you, too.) ❤

I mean, if you’re buying a Clapton album, you’re already buying an inferior product.

I think whoever wins we lose

It’s easy to make fun of Bret Michaels, because Bret Michaels is a ridiculous person. The bandanna, the sleeveless Poison shirts, the cowboy hat, the way he says “awwwsome.” Rock of Love. I’ve made fun of him. I’ve watched his band make fun of him. I’ve watched Bret Michaels make fun of being Bret Michaels. I’ve personally heard the story of writing Every Rose in that Laundromat in Dallas Texas on at least four occasions. So I get it.

But I love Bret Michaels. I love Bret Michaels because was I an awkward kid who felt like I didn’t belong anywhere, and for some reason, Bret Michaels decided I was cool.

A year after my first Poison show, Bret announced a solo tour and he was playing a tiny club fifteen minutes from my parents’ house that I had been to a million times. Holy shit. Bret Michaels was going to be in Towson. I could potentially talk to him and tell him how much his band meant to me. I found out he liked The Sweet, so I bought him a copy of Desolation Boulevard. I got there early and his band noticed me and started talking to me and I asked “Could you give this to Bret and tell him it’s just a small way of saying thank you.”

“No problem,” Pete Evick said.

Pete came out ten minutes later and said “Hey John, Bret’s diabetes is acting up today, so he won’t be meeting with fans, but he loved the record and wanted to thank you.”

That was all I wanted.

I got in and I’m front row center, and the band started playing “Look What The Cat Dragged In.” Bret bounds onstage, and made a beeline to where I was, and he recognized me from Pier 6. He shot his hand out, shook my hand and said “Great to see you again!” And then boom. He’s doing Bret things. The set was mostly Poison songs, a few solo numbers and cover or two. He finished up with “Talk Dirty” and took a final bow. I don’t know what compelled me to do this, but I pulled out my copy of Look What The Cat Dragged In, and held it up. Bret smiled, pointed and took it from me.

“Big John, I need a Sharpie.”

He pulled out the booklet, and signed it. He handed it back to me and said, “There you go my friend!”

I started crying. He didn’t have to do that.

I went home and wrote a glowing review on the Poison message board, of which I was a charter member. It got a ton of likes, and one day I got a DM.

“Hi, this is Jana. I work for Bret and the band and Bret was really moved by your review and he wants to meet you. We’re playing Baltimore again in a few months, and we want you to be a VIP.”

Four months later, I’m sitting in a tiny club with a VIP pass. Afterwards, a woman in a Poison baseball jersey came up to me. I knew those jerseys. They were crew jerseys.

“Hi! Are you John?”

“Yes.”

“I’m Jana. Come with me. Bret’s ready for you.”

I followed her into a room, and there was the guy who had been staring at me from posters my entire life.

“THERE’S MY FRIEND!” Bret said, all smiles. “John, I am so excited to finally meet you! How the hell are you?”

Bret Michaels knew my name.

“……..I’m um. I’m good, man.

Do not cry in front of Bret Michaels.

I was wearing a vintage “I Want Action” raglan from the Dragging The Cat Across America Tour and a jean jacket with an enormous back patch of the back cover of Look What The Cat Dragged In that Libby made for me as a surprise one Christmas.

“Wow, I don’t even have one of those!” Bret said, pointing at the shirt. “Pete, when was the last time you saw one of these?”

“I told you, Bret. The kid is devoted!”

That broke the ice.

“I have 45 Poison shirts, Bret. I have a tour jacket too. And my mom made me this. May your first child be a masculine child.”

“So you’re the one who pays my mortgage!”

And then he started asking me questions. Do you go to college? (Yes) What’s your major? (Journalism) What bands do you like? (Motley Crue, The Replacements, Poison) Did you like the set? (Hell yes) What did you think of the new songs? (Bittersweet should be the single.)

It was like we’d known each other forever. I brought records for him to sign and he signed them all. I couldn’t believe this was happening. And then my phone rang.

“It’s Mom, where are you?”

“Um, I’m hanging out with Bret Michaels.” Coolest/weirdest sentence ever.

Bret motioned for me to give him my phone. “What’s your mom’s name?”

“Libby.”

“Hi Libby, this is Bret. Your son is a really cool guy and we’re having a blast, feel free to come on back.”

Bret Michaels called me a cool guy. I’ve won.

And that’s how I said, “Mom, this is my friend Bret.”

Bret charmed the hell out of her.

We chatted for a few more minutes and then Libby was like “We gotta go.”

Before we left, Bret came with an imposing guy behind him.

“John,” he said. “This is Big John. He’s my right hand man. He’s going to give you his card and you give him your email. Whenever we’re in town, shoot an email or give him a call and we’ll hook you up, OK? You never have to pay for another ticket. It was great to hang out with you.” He hugged me.

“It was an honor to meet you, Bret.”

“Dude, please. It was my honor. I’ll see you soon, OK?”

Libby, being the eternal optimist: “You probably won’t hear from them again.”

Six months later:

“Hey John, it’s Big John. We’re playing Baltimore and Bret wants to know if you want to come.”

And that’s how it went for several years. I would show up early, run errands for the band. Bret would sit on the steps of his bus with a Diet Coke and listen with the patience of a saint as I asked him Chris Farley-esque questions about the minutia of Poison. Real hard hitting journalism like “You know that move where you and CC and Bobby step step kick? How did you come up with that?” (I ca The only time he ever got annoyed with me was when I asked him one too many questions about the green mic stand in several of the videos and he just was like “John, I have no idea what happened to that, but I ever find it, you will be the first to know.”

He always made time for me. His crew always looked out for me.

One time we were talking and he asked me if I was dating anyone and I said “It’s just hard for me, man. I don’t have the confidence.”

And he looked at me and said, “You’re going to figure things out. I have no doubt about that. Just be yourself. man.”

It was surprisingly non-toxic advice from the guy who sang I Want Action and hosted Rock of Love.

Once Rock of Love happened we fell out of touch. In 2012, Bret played the Maryland State Fair and I took a girl who was in love with him. She’s married now, but to this day, Bret Michaels is her hall pass.

I really liked this girl so I said, “You know, Bret and I are friends.”

“Sure.” she said.

We were in the front row because being disabled has its perks, and Bret bounded onstage like he always does. I hadn’t seen him in about five years, but he recognized me immediately. He mouthed “JOHN! HI!” Then he saw the drop-dead gorgeous girl next to me and saluted.

The girl looked at me with her jaw on the floor.

He was right. I figured it out.

Bret Michaels is a 10.

Barnable’s Most 80-est Number One Songs of the ‘80s.

Not the brightest. Not the best. But the most-iconic examples of 80s sound, culture, and themes. Songs people immediately identify with the 80s and, perhaps, would never have been hits in any other decade.

Don’t cry, TNOCS, because it is over. Smile because we shared the journey.

1. “Don’t You (Forget About Me” Simple Minds
2. “Don’t You Want Me” The Human League
3. “Take on Me” A-ha
4. “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” Tears for Fears
5. “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)” Eurythmics
6. “Total Eclipse of the Heart” Bonnie Tyler
7. “Karma Chameleon” Culture Club
8. “Come on Eileen” Dexys Midnight Runners
9. “Down Under” Men at Work
10. “Time after Time” Cyndi Lauper
11. “Beat It” Michael Jackson
12. “When Doves Cry” Prince
13. “Careless Whisper” Wham!
14. “The Reflex” Duran Duran
15. “Maneater” Hall and Oates
16. “Like a Virgin” Madonna
17. “With or Without You” U2
18. “Never Gonna Give You Up” Rick Astley
19. “I Wanna Dance with Somebody” Whitney Houston
20. “Walk Like an Egyptian” The Bangles

So, we have come to the end. Our list is finally complete. And what better and ironic way to document the excesses and exuberance of the ‘80s; the ecstasy and the originality; the glam, the hair, the power ballad, the metal, the shoulder pads, the indulgent videos, the soundtrack songs, the sax solos . . . than to end with a song with . . . none of that. A song that lands on the list, not based on its own merits, but because of what was to come.

Tom still has nearly two years left of the ‘80s to cover in this column, yet, by completing the list, I seem to be implying that the ‘80s are over. I know we’ve debated this opinion before, but, to me, the pop music of this time period had become too fabricated, too pre-packaged, too bland, too commercialized especially compared to the burst of originality and creativity spawned by new acts taking advantage of this new medium we now call music videos. Maybe that was because, by this time, I had graduated from college and began “real life,” and music became less and less of an influence on my day-to-day activities.

With respect to the song itself, “Never Gonna Give You Up” is a perfectly serviceable bit of pop escapism. No investment required. Just hum along. Nothing to really see here. What makes it stand out, however, is that voice. That deep baritone coming from someone who looks like Rick Astley. And that is what gives the song its charm. Nice enough, but rather forgettable. And then . . . Rick-rolling. For millennials and Gen Y, NGGYU is probably one of the best-known songs of the ‘80s now.

So, that is it, my friends. No more anticipation. No more late nights for me. No more cheeky hints about the next song. I plan on re-posting this list at the end of the virtual ‘80s, including a list of honorable mentions. Let me know your nominations for what songs to consider, an opportunity for everyone to participate! Just remember my arbitrary rule, only one song per artist, but feel free to let me know if I’ve missed the mark for one of your favorite artists. I do feel, however, that the list does capture the essence of the ‘80s quite well. So, when your kids ask you what the ‘80s were all about, just play them Barnable’s Playlist of the 80-est Number One Songs of the ‘80s!

The new job is working out great, and I’ve been incredibly and happily busy. I apologize for not being around as much, though I promise I have still been reading!

Deeply sexist? Debatable verging on “meh.” Unfunny? Certainly.

The calendar says that its December;
I’m back with my usual refrain,

To pause, reflect, include, remember,
As many of you as I can by name.

Commemorate our fun this year,
For this job, I’ll proudly volunteer,

(And probably get sued…)

…but here’s a Christmas present

… for you.

Per the URL https://www.stereogum.com/2161928/shut-up-dude-this-weeks-best-and-worst-comments-500/columns/shut-up-dude/ this is the 500th Shut Up, Dude. 500 Fridays in a row. 🙂
It’s actually more ’cause sometimes I make a headline typo so the URL was different.
Anyway, thanks for commenting.

This song has taken on a whole new personal meaning for me. My father passed away unexpectedly over Memorial Day weekend. Much like the song, I wasn’t there when he passed, I was in New York visiting my girlfriend. As with most fathers and sons we had our disagreements about everything in our younger days. Unlike the song, I’m thankful he and my mom encouraged my brother and sister and I to have our own opinions and ideas about things. In the end I know he loved us very much. I miss him every day!

Cat’s in the Cradle for the late 80’s crowd is the cheap and easy way to view this song. You could write this off as Baby Boomer guilt but that would be to simplistic. Father/son dynamics have always been complicated and messy, and this song does a good job of encapsulating that. Starting out with a hunting synth line that mimics the main hook, the rhythmic guitar comes in, plugging along giving the song a sense of urgency.

The song picks up stem in the second verse, as the power chords strike hard, building into a more emotional second chorus. It serves as a great set up for the downtempo third verse. Paul Carrack is absolutely amazing at conveying all the conflicting emotions you’d expect to feel, he is simply one of the most under appreciated singers of his day. It gets docked a point for deploying the children’s choir to tug at the heartstrings trick and the production sounds a little to digital for my taste. This song is always a good reminder to to appreciate that you still have your family and friends in your life. 9.

The Army response was over the top. Obviously we knew we would get ratio’d, but it went way beyond that. They launched a DDOS that made the site inaccessible, signed up for our newsletter just to report it to our provider, flagged our tweets as abuse to Twitter, and posted pictures of Tom’s family while accusing him of racism. Plus many emails and tweets telling me to fire him lol. In the past 10 years Tom has written more articles championing K-pop groups than any other rock critic! It’s not BTS’ fault that the chart system is fucked, and their Army are certainly not the first problematic stans — maybe I could’ve edited to make that clearer. But they are still cyberbullies.

Wow! This is definitely something none of us saw coming the entire time!

I just thought it was a play on the term “boy band”. You know the band Gorillaz doesn’t even have one gorilla as a member?

Anyone who voted for “Solar Power” should be exiled to a Greek island that’s on fire

“When relationships would end, I would get sad. I would not like the other person in that moment. I may have said bad things about them to my friends over a beer.” Dude you are putting your band on hiatus at the most pivotal moment in your career?! This is an insane move. Put down your phone and continue with your fucking life.

I can’t say he’s wrong.

The surviving members of Nirvana meet once a year to decide if Spencer is a big enough deal to remain on the cover of Nevermind.

Exactly, female artists can be boring on their own terms goddammit.

I assure you this said something when I submitted it.

“ME TOO!”

First off, I have to thank Scott for allowing me to represent Stereogum at Rocklahoma and write this piece. Thanks to DeVille for editing and staying in touch throughout the process. Thank you to my director of photography for being able to roll solo most of the weekend and of course being at the media tent at the right time when they dropped the additional Slipknot photo credentials a few hours before the show. He’s the real MVP. BIG THANKS to my friend and his family for taking me under their wing and providing extra historical context that I would have never uncovered by myself. He basically transformed my Media wristband into an Ultra VIP wristband simply by being next to him. We seriously had the greatest time at Mastodon.

If there was any small part you liked and wanted more context, ask away (I experienced multiple good quotes from people including a pretty incredible line from a tollbooth attendant at 10pm).The benefit of writing an article and being a commenter is that I can elaborate down here. In the end, I just wanted to throw you a curveball of an article. At the very least, I hope I succeeded in making you feel like you were there with us.

Never thought he’d sell out this hard—his hair has been washed, perhaps even conditioned. Truly shocking.

I’m still waiting for my ex to release a public apology for being a nightmare to deal with

This week I turned in my resignation for a job I’ve been at about 9.5 years, the last 3 being extremely toxic and kind of awful all around. Starting a new position analyzing data 100% from home which is something I never thought would be possible for me as a chemist. Also signed on for a new 2 bed/2 bath apartment that I’m excited about. Life has shat on me the last five years, feels good to have a couple things go my way finally.

Not sure what is more disturbing, the Kanye inclusion of those three artists or that every single article I read about Donda mentions how DaBaby is a pariah for saying something homophobic onstage (which a rapper has NEVER done before as we all know) instead of you know…punching a black woman in the face on camera. Or touring during a pandemic. I guess verbal violence against progressive whites will always matter more to the public and the media than actual, recorded violence against black women. Unless they’re already famous like Rihanna of course.

Oh, and the album is too long.

the dude went on TUCKER CARLSON’s show to play the victim, it’s not bold to assume that he is courting MAGA chuds

I’ll preface my comments with a quick story. I’ve been a huge U2 fan since I got The Joshua Tree. Until the 30th anniversary tour of The Joshua Tree I had never seen them live. The closest I did before then was in 2011 when one of my all time favorite swim families (I still miss them so much!) offered my two free tickets to see U2 in Toronto. I was so excited to go. Unfortunately, years of neglecting my health (blood pressure, poor eating habits, no exercise) caught up with me.

About a month before the show I went into the hospital with congestive heart failure. I was in the hospital for about 10 days while they drained 50 pounds of fluid out of me! I’m doing great now, got my BP under control, love to workout out everyday, my heart function is pretty close to normal. In some weird way it was the best thing to happen to me. Back to the story, the week before the show I went to see my doctor and asked him if I could go. I knew the answer was gonna be no so I made a vow then and there that the next time U2 came anywhere close to Cleveland, come hell or high water I was gonna be there!

Flash forward to 2017 and they played Browns stadium. I snapped up four of the best tickets I could afford and went with three other very close friends. As corny as it sounds it was one of the most amazing nights of my life! It truly felt like a spiritual moment. We meet so many other people we all knew that day, partying before the show, I will always remember it as one of the best days of my life.

I’m not going to hide the fact that I’m a huge U2 fan and it’s gonna be near impossible to be objective about their two number ones. Moody, atmospheric, and understated, this was an interesting choice to be the lead single. It didn’t sound like anything on pop radio at the time in a good way. The intro is instantly recognizable and sets the stage for the slow burn build to the cathartic final.

The synth line perfectly compliments Edge’s eerie guitar. I love how Bono starts in a low register and builds to a falsetto, pushing the band and song to a higher level. His vocal performance here is honest, raw, and passionate. The drums get heavier as Edge’s famous Infinite Guitar chimes in with a simple but memorable riff. The bass line builds in intensity, keeping pace with the drums. Maybe the best part of the whole song is the tastefully restrained guitar on the outro. A master class in how to build a song, from soft to loud, to build and release tension. 10.

And there it is pic.twitter.com/4LYbbpnOel

— uneternal słeep (@uneternal_sleep) August 25, 2021

This is literally the last person I would expect to hear the inside baseball account of the kanye-drake cold from from!

Its just shitty that people are hanging out without masks on and posting photos and having fun and I am hiding in my house because i dont want to be anyway a cause of someone else getting COVID.

Back when right-wing terrorists took over the Michigan Capitol and were later found to have been plotting to kidnap the governor and take over the state legislature, the usual Cletus whisperers were prattling on about “we need to understand how Economic Anxiety™ is driving these people!” My friend the USC public policy prof, who actually grew up working-class (read: hanging on in quiet desperation) in small-town Iowa was having none of it. The ringleader of the Michigan plot had a pickup truck in the driveway that cost almost as much as two years of Ivy League tuition, and that was the tipoff: Actually economically deprived people don’t have the disposable income for AR-pattern rifles and “tactical” clothing, and they sure as shit can’t afford to take off work for days to go fulfill their cumstain vigilante fantasies of shooting BLM rioters. No, it’s your failsons of rural/exurban car dealership and gravel pit owners who are the ones engaging in violent LARPing.

Ariel “Pink” Rosenberg is the failson of one of Los Angeles’ most prominent proctologists. (“Only Son of the Ass Man,” perhaps?) He grew up rich in Beverly Hills. That he’s rejected this life on the surface is irrelevant; his whole bohemian lifestyle was financed by his parents’ money, as has been the case with a depressingly large percentage of bohemians since the term was coined in pre-WWI Paris. It’s pretty obvious that what draws him to fascism is the desire to crush his perceived inferiors and those who call him on his bullshit, and not any legitimate grievance.

Best thing he’s dropped in a long time

I have to say as a queer person, the impact SOPHIE had on the queer music scene cannot be overstated.

Her music spoke so eloquently to queens around the world in harmony, often without using words at all. To have someone from our community producing the visionary work she did, – from the tiniest, sweatiest clubs to the worlds biggest arenas – was an incredible inspiration.

It’s been so heartening to see so much outpouring of love for SOPHIE this morning, she was loved and she will be remembered.

Only very rarely was Prince outdone by someone covering his work. But, nothing compares to Sinead’s version of this song.

MICHAEL NELSON FUCK YES WELCOME BACK

The saddest part of this story is that she has to keep the CD.

As an album cover, hideous. As a statement of intent to impregnate women of every race, effective.

“left of the left of the left.”

if you turn left three times…