Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Drygioni]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/8423340.stm

Super-popular TV talent show The X-Factor is cynically timed each year for the newly-crowned winning contestant to release a debut single just in time to win the coveted, and once revered, Christmas No. 1 spot. Despite the single invariably being a tepid, unemotional, ear-offendingly dull piece of shite the mere association with the TV show and public-wants-what-the-public-gets attitude of the braindead masses has resulted in an unerring monopoly for the X-Factor in the past few years.

The numbing inevitability of this year-in year-out means the British public decide to stick two fingers up to 'the man'. Facebook orchestrated campaign to get decidedly un-Christmassy, suitably faux-anarchic and abrasive 'Killing in the Name Of' by Rage Against The Machine to the Christmas No. 1 spot gains momentum.

Against all odds the campaign succeeds. People react with disgust, joy and apathy the whole nation over.

From my point of view, it was quite a good laugh. Will probably never happen again but at least I'll smile every time it's on in the shops whilst I'm buying presents tomorrow and an old dear tuts.

To quote the great Charlie Brooker:

If the Christmas No 1 turns out to be an angry, confrontational rock track that concludes with an explosion of f-words, it'll be precisely the shot in the arm the charts have been sorely lacking the last few years: something that puts a genuine smile on the face of millions of people; sensitive people, thoughtful people; people alienated by the stifling cloud of grinning mechanical pap farted into their faces on a weekly basis by cocky, clattering, calculating talent shows such as X Factor. It would give these people hope. Maybe only in a very small and silly way, but still: a tiny spoonful of hope. And what could be more Christmassy than that?

[linnea]

Ahhh, Zach de la Rocha brings joy to my shriveled, blackened heart. Sticking it to the man. That's hilarious.

At least the X-Factor dude had a good attitude about it, and realized that it wasn't directed at him personally.

[Toaster]

So they replaced someone else's shit with their shit?

[pmcd9]

I can't wait til we find out this was all a scam to sell more records for Sony Records.

[Drygioni]

So they replaced someone else's shit with their shit?

Yes, but this is the shit THAT 'THE MAN' DOES NOT WANT YOU TO HEAR!

For what it's worth I dislike both songs but at least KITNO has some sort of genuine emotion behind it.

I can't wait til we find out this was all a scam to sell more records for Sony Records.

Figures were half a million sold for Rage and slightly less for X Factor Joe. That's a drop in the ocean to them.

[pmcd9]

A half a million downloads of a song recorded nearly 20 years ago is nothing to sneeze at, it's pure profit.  How much did it cost to run this campaign, chickenfeed.  Cha$Ching$

[CortJstr]

A half a million downloads of a song recorded nearly 20 years ago is nothing to sneeze at, it's pure profit.  How much did it cost to run this campaign, chickenfeed.  Cha$Ching$

I think it said Rage is donating all the profits from the campaign to charity. Plus playing a free concert. So this will end up costing them money.

[pmcd9]

I think it said Rage is donating all the profits from the campaign to charity. Plus playing a free concert. So this will end up costing them money.

That's RATM's perogotive, but I doubt Sony is going to give any of their money away.  And in that interview Zack De La Rocha said they were going to give away some of the profit, not all.  And I am assuming that this free concert will coincide with a European tour.  A tour which no doubt will be helped considerably by the fact that they suddenly have a smash hit on their hands.

[Arachno-capitalist]

The irony of refusing to buy a record because you think someone is making you buy a record... and then buying a different record because someone explicitly told you to buy that record was evidently lost here.

[pmcd9]

I bought that rage against the machine record 17 years ago when it first came out.  I haven't even heard of the artist that was knocked out of the top spot nor had I heard of the show which propelled him to the top.

[CortJstr]

What Paul said

[Toaster]

17 years ago my parents bought me a Barney the dinosaur record.

[greenkoolayd]

17 years ago i was 10.5 and  i liked whatever music my mom liked.  i didnt get my own musical identity(that of my friends) until age 12 or so....

[jay-ell]

Mere children, all of you.

[Drygioni]

The irony of refusing to buy a record because you think someone is making you buy a record... and then buying a different record because someone explicitly told you to buy that record was evidently lost here.

You are the first person to point this out. 

It's a fair point though. People have defended it as being a mass, spontaneous movement of the public (and it really did come out of nowhere) buying something in order to counteract something a small group of elite record producers have decided should be the Christmas No.1

I'm ambivalent either way.

At the end of the day it was a laugh.

That's RATM's perogotive, but I doubt Sony is going to give any of their money away.  And in that interview Zack De La Rocha said they were going to give away some of the profit, not all.  And I am assuming that this free concert will coincide with a European tour.  A tour which no doubt will be helped considerably by the fact that they suddenly have a smash hit on their hands.

RATM would easily fill anything Britain has to offer even without this single malarky, they did last time they toured here anyway (after not releasing an album for 7 years) and I doubt this has registered in Europe at all.

I don't know why I'm defensive of them, I don't even like them all that much, I just feel people are being over-cynical over what at the end of the day is thumbing the proverbial nose at an extremely unpleasant talent show. Sony making a bit of money? Publicity for everyone involved, including the record execs? RATM to exploit this? Who cares! A Facebook group started on a whim got a song with swear words to Christmas No.1 ahead of the supposedly nailed on winner! It's childish fun!