NEW JAMZ: Evan Taubenfeld, Jew tween idol

If you ever wondered what happened to those anonymous people who play in the backing bands for solo artists, I have some answers for you. In the case of Evan Taubenfeld, former touring guitarist for Avril Lavigne (wonder if his guitar was even plugged in), he's become a tween idol-- think of him as the Jew version of Never Shout Never with a dash of Justin Bieber. From Wikipedia:

When intending to study at Berklee College of Music, he received a phone call from Josh Sarubin, inviting him to audition for a new talent he just signed, a young Canadian named Avril Lavigne. Taubenfeld remained in Lavigne's band until September 2004; when he left to focus on his own music.^[5]

I like how he was "intending to study at Berklee." I know how that goes, because I "intended" to become a fabulously wealthy socialite, trendsetting fashion icon, and live on a desert island surrounded by my entourage. Instead, I ended up working in windowless basement print shops 12-14 hours a day for $9 an hour when I was 15-23.

In any case, Evan has some pretty catchy tunes, and he does fill a certain void in the marketplace-- Jews need tween idols, too. Not quite on the level of Cody Simpson, but not half bad.

I thought chicks threw themselves at you when you were in a band? Sucks that this poor schmuck even gets shut down by the girl he stalks at Starbucks. Also, he pronounces it "BARE-iss-tah" lol.

Life on the road must be rough; the poor guy looks like an AIDS patient in his mid 40s (aka the poor man's version of Kyle Burns from FTSK)

This song is about some girl he is flirting with on Twitter who ends up breaking his heart. On the bright side, he is wearing a cool $200 Aviator Nation hoodie that I covet.

Since all of his songs are apparently about girls dissing him, it seems like this dude needs to find himself a nice Jewess- those shiksas can't be trusted. It's also likely that he's just looking for mercy fucks from his tween groupies who will surely fall for his transparent "I'm such a sweetheart, why can't I get a date??" gambit hook, line, and sinker.

What do u think about this nice Jewish boy?? After 6 years as a solo artist, will he ever find the right gimmick to get his career going? Which song is more likely to make tween girls feel sorry for him/buy more merch? Do you think he ever asks Avril if he can 'borrow a few bucks until he goes on tour next month'?

Extremely creepy Cody Simpson CGI video

My current favorite pop song is "iYiyi" by Cody Simpson, aka the Aussie Justin Bieber. It's definitely the jam of the summer and the video is perfect ("I'm a one bike kind of guy"), but I can't say the same for the follow up, "Summertime."



I feel like I am breaking some kind of law by watching this-- and yes, it's official content. Will Sims machinima become the next big thing for tween idols??

Some 40 year-old Mexican dad reviews Fight Fair

I just thought of a hilarious idea: Let's have some 40 year-old father of two review the latest punk records! Surely anybody that old and uncool will have tons of hilariously clueless things to say, right? That's what I would have said when I was 19, but now I am closer to 40 than I am 20, and that 40 year-old dad is my bro Jose Galvan, and he has been going to hardcore shows longer than many SYWH readers have been alive. Gulp.

A California native and veteran of legendary venues like Gilman, Chain Reaction, and the Showcase Theater Jose moshed to Civ and Orange 9mm at the first Warped Tour (back in 1995) and is confused by new music, but not opposed to a good time. Please follow him on Twitter for tips on moshing, child care, and debate on which Earth Crisis album is the best.

Jose was gracious enough to review the debut LP from the popular pop band Fight Fair, out now on Triple Crown.




California Girls - The kick off to this beach party is chock full of "bops" and an awesome (though unrealistic) chorus. Full disclosure: I've got a big preference for brunettes over blondes. The middle call out will make some of you cringe and after repeated listens I gotta admit in a live setting I'd prolly use the opportunity to grab an overpriced soda + french fries combination.

My, oh my, yeah girl you're fly
Crushin' on you and I can not lie
Take you on a date to get pinkberry swirl
Then we go watch that Gossip Girl
You and I were meant for each other
Trust me girl, there is no other
With an at reply you caught my eye
The twitter feed girl, let's not be shy
Word

I've Got A Secret - Infectiously catchy tune, the 'rap' interlude is hilarious and will invariably piss people off, but how can you hate references to twitter?

Sexyfancymoney - This song - sounds like, what's that band Fergie led? Black Eyes or whatever? A bit too rappy for my tastes, but once that part is over the chorus is great. The female vocals rule, much better that girl who raps on the new Set Your Goals.

Diner Date = Top serious mixtape material. (mix cd? mix mediafire? crap I'm so dating myself! #Old ) this song is so over the top, he's either completely 100% serious or a total player. Singing about getting his date home before curfew, buying dinner, etc. I'm almost inclined to let him take ME out! (no mo)

Johnny Craig of the dreadful band Dance Gavin Dance reps Fight Fair's GTL shirt

WayoBeach - I'm going to date myself again, but this song is annoying because it reminds me of mxpx's worst song, 'chick magnet' but the carribean dude in the middle of the song is an LOL. "the dreenks are freeee!"



California Kicks - THIS is the party song of the 2k10 summer. Hands down. No argument. I don't care that I am 100 miles inland from the nearest beach, nor that I don't like the in and out urge. This song references del taco, the che cafe and record trade lists. Happy riffs and the beach boys-ish vocals help make this thing required road trip listening. If you only hear one Fight Fair in your life, make it this one!

Party Girl - This song came in 2nd to California Kicks but it's no slouch. Fast pop punk with a bonus: At the 2:05 mark, they slip in a tiny dose of heavy mosh! A soon to be easycore classic.

Livin' For the Summer - This is the best song Third Eye Blind never recorded. A slow, almost acoustic mellow, yet posi ditty about being grateful for the small things in life. I like this song because I can play it around my kids. Rated G for good times!

The only thing that this fatty likes more than bacon is Fight Fair's Evan Henkel

Backseat Bingo - Over the top surftastic tune, funny for one listen, unbearable for repeated attempts. I've had an aversion to most surf stuff ever since Sacred Reich's "Surf Nicaragua" and the horrible MOD album with the shark on the cover. Those of you with children might want to cover their ears when the formerly romantic guy who sang Diner Date urges his date to remove her blouse. Pig!

Going Nowhere - If you have been to warped tour you've heard a song similar to this. If you like these type of tunes, you will be stoked, if not you won't! I like that this song doesn't have any gimmicks or shticks in it though.

I love this song-- could definitely imagine this being a 311 B-side

Love - The closing tune to this sun drenched album is suitable for slow dancing or hand holding attempts in the Forever 21 parking lot.

All told I give this album a solid 3.5 out of 5 stars for being the feel good party album of the summer.

Owl City is a gay

Via Yahoo Answers:

There you have it, that pretty much summons it up indeed.

MOTHER_______ COOL TOUR™ 2010

The title of this post is an attempt to make amends to the parents of the tweens that were at the Cool Tour™ last Friday in Columbus, Ohio. Truth is I felt kind of uncomfortable that Acacia Strain, the only band on the bill that seemed awkward on stage the whole night, was cursing up a storm in front of a gaggle of hot-topic clad twilighters. Metalcore is a family event now right? Those guys should take their potty-mouthed epithets back to basement shows, or act more like upstanding christians Bless †he Fall. Seeing as how it was 100 degrees outside and maybe hotter inside, feeling uncomfortable would be a recurring theme of the show.

Median age-please note racial diversity

I got to the venue early in order to figure out a way in free. Because Stuff You Will Hate is such a renowned media powerhouse, I simply flashed my press credentials and site traffic statistics to the woman at the ticket window and was instantly granted all access.
I didn't take this, but it's pretty accurate

Outside the venue was a grim scene of black scalpers, the white owners of the venue telling them to get off their property, and a stacked line of trashers presumably from the southside there to see As I Lay Dying. My approximation was that 90% of the girls in the crowd were either strippers or well on their way, all of which I never want to see naked. It was a real Fox Racing Gear type of crowd, you know the type of dudes that are condemned to community college and like to "vent" their aggression in a mosh pit with their "brothers in metal". This provided endless entertainment, as I watched some total noobs out-of-bounds kickboxing during hard rock band War of Ages. I was up on the second tier, which is clearly for oldz and a strict no mosh zone, you darn posers! WOA were a great mix of P.O.D., Disturbed, and Blood for Blood, perfectly poised for a US Marine Corps commercial.


This is where I see War of Ages contributing to society.

I'd say the best thing about big package stuff like Cool Tour™ is that bands are only allowed to play about 5- 4 and a half minute snore-inducing songs, and the whole thing is over by 10 pm. Cancer Bats played next and seemed out of place. They sounded kind of weak in a big venue, and kept drawing attention to the fact that nobody was there to see them. Stage banter that includes "I know you guys have never heard of us, but lets all party and circle pit" with no reaction from the crowd was just a bit sad. It was smart of them to cover Beastie Boys Sabotage, because it won over some of the crowd, who sang along and threw up some wiggerish arm movements.


The closest some white trash dudes will ever get to jewish culture.

At this point I was shvitzing like crazy, wishing there was a next button somewhere. UK's Architects came on next and played a decent sounding but uninspiring gig. I like these guys on record, just really didn't get much out of the set, and people probably used it as an opportunity to refill on $7.00 beer. Then the aforementioned Acacia Strain came on, and really sounded heavy. Banter centered around the fact that the band was balding, overweight, and negative about life in general. This really spoke to the over-aggressive bros down in the pit, who showed their respect for the unkempt bunch with flailing windmills and other less coordinated acrobatics. The band closed their set with JFC or "Jesus Fucking Christ", told the crowd "this music was invented by ugly dudes, and in the end ugly dudes will keep it alive" then gave shout outs to Bless The Fall who were "pretty dudes playing pretty music up next". A bit all over the place, but I guess you have to appeal to a variety of people on these tours, and the Strain layed down some respectable deathcore jams.

Hard to be negative when you're at the beach rocking these AS flops

So then Bless The fall came on, who I am borderline ashamed to say had one of the best albums of last year. I feel like their witness-era songs are extremely well written and was impressed in the way they pulled it off live. The singer kept fiddling with his hair in a ghey manner and replaced the word mosh with "party", but I definitely enjoyed the set. Let me tell you that shit SLAPPED HARD, and that means there were multiple bass drops per song.


If you don't know what I mean by live drops

The dudes sounded tight, and in the end the christian underagers were happy. I noticed a girl fixing her hair as I was leaving the club and saw the line forming to take a photo with the singer of BTF. He had changed out of his minor threat cutoff and skinny jeans into wigger mesh shorts and flops, but again I don't blame him cause it was way too hot to look scene.



Sorry to the folks who wanted to read about the "real metal bands" on the tour, but I don't understand the appeal of Between the Buried and Me. I watched about half a song, and remembered that I saw Dillinger in their prime about 10 years ago and didn't feel the need to stick around. Kinda bummed I missed As I Lay Dying, but judging from the popularity of their ugly t-shirts amongst hundreds of misguided teens at the show, they'll be back in town soon enough. Hopefully on a cooler day, and a tour with about 5 less bands on the bill.

Click for more photos from the show on my personal blog.

Owl City screamo covers = the universe imploding in on itself??

The phenomenon of top 40 screamo covers is old news (I participated in Decibel's "Screamo Covers Tournament" over a year ago), but I am not quite sure what to make of the zillions of Owl City screamo covers. Are they ironic? Are any screamo covers even ironic anymore?? Isn't that kind of like Lady Gaga covering Kelly Clarkson, or Earth Crisis covering Strife?

Notorious German shit merchants Bionic Ghost Kids manage to do the best version I could find (but to be fair, I only put about 3 minutes of work into my search)

This 14 year old girl's version is somehow less effeminate than the original

The guitars sound like they were recorded with a Radio Shack microphone inside a cardboard box half full of oily rags-- I thought all the kids these days came out of the womb with expert knowledge of how to run pirated versions of ProTools on their Macbook Pros? And the drums, jesus christ... sounds like someone dumping a bunch of tennis balls on that same cardboard box- and I'm honestly not exaggerating with that description.

An Open Ended Sky have a horrible name, but their cover sucks a little less than the others

What do you think? Is it cheating to do screamo covers of emo songs?? Should bands start doing screamo covers of themselves???

Asking Alexandria groupie gets pranked

For any oldz/clueless-teens-who-act-like-oldz, Asking Alexandria is a very popular metalcore/screamo band from England who are currently on the Sumerian "Thrash And Burn" tour-- the latest zillion-band package tour sweeping the nation, hordes of tweens in tow. I interviewed the singer a while ago, he actually seems like a real cool, smart, fun dude, so I feel a little bad posting this.But fuck it, when there is gold it has to be shared.



If you've been to any screamo/metalcore/ghey powerpop shows recently, you know that the vast majority of the crowd is made up of teenage girls, and Asking Alexandria's show last night at Soma in San Diego was no exception. There's nothing young girls like more than acting like sluts around dudes who are in bands, just like they've been doing for the past 50 years or so. Apparently they've even brought back the age-old tradition of throwing underwear at the band, as evidenced by this bra that was found onstage at the show, complete with phone numbers. Unfortunately for the groupies who threw the bra, an enterprising Viva La Vinyl poster found it, and hilarity ensued. I wish I had something to do with this, but sadly I cannot take credit for it :(

"Call/text anytime- we can get Chinese food and vodka!"

The girl, Tricia

Kind of reminds of me this one girl I knew in college who was a groupie for gross Ed Banger electro shit like Fake Blood and Designer Drugs. One of those bands/DJs/whatever the fuck you call them played in our city, and I guess she effed one of them. Apparently she had effed another guy earlier that guy and was worried that the DJ she effed would see the other guy's cum leaking out of her pussy and get upset. She said that he didn't notice, but I feel like it's equally likely that he did indeed notice, but didn't say anything bc he didn't want to piss her off before he got his chance to eff her. Such is the life of a groupie :(

In any case, this is some srsly advanced-level trolling, approaching Something Awful/4chan territory, and I salute the genius responsible for it!

Are u a groupie?? Did u ever embarrass yourself by 'acting slutty to some random shitbag in a band'? Why do girls go crazy for band dudes?? What do u think of Asking Alexandria's screamo jams?? Would u eff the singer for AA???