Some Ads.

Friday, December 22, 2006

Lyrics Advisory

Ok, this is a rant post. In the midst of it being Dec 23rd, Psycho Christmas Joy and Drive The Other Guy Off The Road Day I made my way and spent my lunchtime at Best Buy earlier. The store was packed with all the kids that have the day off school and it was pretty busy. Not to the point people were pushing me over to get a PS3 or anything, but pretty busy. I checked over the new album releases and saw Ghostface Killah (member or w/e of the WuTang Clan)'s new album. I picked it up off the shelf and headed to get Castlevania for Nintendo DS. Made my way thru checkout lines, you know, the ones that always contain some tough guy that is standing well within my alloted "personal space" most humans recognize. His wife seemed to not be as close to him as this guy was to me. I gave him a quick look of general dissaproval by the way, but refrained from asking him if he was gay and stating that I wasn't, and to move the hell back because yer too close, cowboy. But thats not enough to make me fire up the ol blog.

No? Well then, what is enough for you to fire up the blog? Well I found out when I put the CD into my PC's CD drive and Media Player told me:

LOLZ NOOB U BOUGHT A CLEAN VERSION OF GHOSTFACE KILLAH!

Now my thoughts go like this:
Crap!
Shit!
..God Damn....
....F'n clean version... (Yes, my mind says "f'n", the irony, I know)
Maybe I can take it back...
...Aww they didn't let me exchange it the last time this happened to me...
...I'm stuck with this copy....
...Why didn't I notice this, being this is the 2nd time this has happened to me?....

I don't even want to listen to this CD now. I know my initial impressions of the album will consist of a bunch of blanks spots or worse yet a dog bark or a car screech everytime theres a dirty word. Now I can sooooorta see value in a slow rock song with one or two words blurred out, I'll still likely get the impression the artist was going for anyhow. But not with rap. And especially not Ghostface's. The rap lyrics I'll argue are 100million% more important to not censor because theres a FLOW that must be maintained and a dog barking does not rhyme with "rich." It really really makes the whole experience worthless.

The other thing is I bought this at Best Buy because I know going to Walmart, K-Mart, K-FedMart is going to get me the censored version. Thats why I go to a store known for having the "real" albums. I go to new releases, I don't expect there to be clean versions mixed in with all the ones labeled with the Parental Advisory sticker. Maybe thats a foolish expectation. But its one I have.

Here's what I need to happen....
Don't sell rap albums that are [CLEAN]. At all. If you must, send it to Walmart and leave it the hell out of Best Buy.
Or if I missed something and Best Buy is required by law to have [CLEAN] versions of all their CD's then I propose we put in big bright happy dayglo colors something like [CLEAN] or [BUY THIS ONE FOR CHURCH] or [LYRICS ADVISORY: MESSED UP FLOW] on the CD. Just like the Parental Advisory, but make it stand out so I'll damn well know I'm picking up the 10 year old schoolgirl version of GHOSTFACE KILLAH's latest album.

Really tho, we need a sticker warning us that we are about to buy an album WITHOUT censorship. Now you know what I'm going to have to do? I'm going to have to get on the file sharing internets and illegally download the album I wanted because Best Buy won't take back an opened CD. Or maybe someone I know picked up the non-censored version and I can copy theirs. In my mind that seems fair, but I'm sure its technically illegal.

I need them to know that their [CLEAN] crap is invading my [EXPLICIT] space, and move the hell back, because yer too close, censor.

Wednesday, December 20, 2006