57 Channels and Only This Is On - 9/9/12

Quote of the Week: Ask Osama bin Laden if he is better off than he was four years ago. (John Kerry, The Democratic National Convention)

Song of the Week: Ronan – Taylor Swift (Stand Up 2 Cancer; proceeds of the song go to cancer research)

Big News of the Week: The Democratic National Convention: It is weird to hear every talk about how great a president Bill Clinton was, even may conservative talking heads considering the guy was so toxic back in 2000 Democratic nominee Al Gore treated his boss like, well, like Mitt Romney treated George W. Bush at his convention. Seriously people, if you have forgotten, go Google Monica Lewinski, Paula Jones, Vince Foster, and / or Marc Rich.

I have a longstanding voting strategy to never vote for incumbents because the longer politicians stay in office, the more corrupt they become. But I would have totally voted for Barack Obama had his convention speech just been him walking up to the front of the stage, say, “I shot Osama bin Laden in the face.” Drop the mic and watch off the stage while Bob Marley’s I Shot the Sheriff played in the background.

Preview Picture of the Week:


Switched at Birth: I actually thought they were going to have Bay forgive Emmitt in less than one episode. That should be unforgiveable, especially for a teenage and ABC Family is not known for its eaklthy relationships (*cough*Aria/Ezra*cough*) so thankfully they have Bay a backbone (for at least one episode). But speaking of unhealthy relationship, that cannot possibly have Daphne hook up with her boss (who I swear is the Kennish’s lawyer with a haircut) can they? Ew.

Grimm: The episode featured a zombie virus that makes you horny. Awesome.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Grimm on iTunes.

MTV Video Music Awards: This year has to rival the painfully bad Vegas year (the one where Britney Spears laughably started the show) as the worst VMA’s ever. Really the only thing worth talking about is how the botched the MCA tribute. C’mon, last year Amy Winehouse gets a ten minute tribute including a performance even though she released just one great album and no memorable videos and never received a VMA or even performed on the show. But the Beastie Boys were one of the top five video artists ever (arguable number two behind Michael Jackson), gave one of the most memorable VMA performances ever with Sabotage, and was one of only a handful of artists to win the Video Vanguard Award. But all MCA gets is about five seconds of No Sleep to Brooklyn played over the loud speaker. MTV should be ashamed.


Free Download of the Week: Everything Is Embarrassing – Sky Ferreira (Rcrd Lbl)

Deal of the Week: Big DVD and Blu Ray Sale: The Big Bang Theory, New Jack City, Gremlins 2

New Album Release of the Week: Away From The World (Super Deluxe Limited Edition CD/DVD) - Dave Matthews Band

New DVD Release of the Week: The Big Bang Theory: The Complete Fifth Season

Video of the Week: It seems like every couple months a new movie trailer pops up that makes me go, that has to be a fake Funny or Die trailer because no way anyone would actually make that. When I saw the title Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters I assumed it would be a trailer parody of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, but then Jeremy Renner pops up and I realize this is an actually serious movie. Alrighty.


Next Week Pick of the Week: Parenthood, Tuesday at 10:00: NBC’s staggered start of the fall season with the debut of its Monday and Tuesday lineups (sans Revolution which gets its premiere next week so they can air The New Normal and Go On pilots which are both currently online if you cannot wait; same with Revolution and Animal Practice). And the best show premiering this week is easily Parenthood. If my memory is correct Crosby and Jasmine got married, Julia and Joel got a kid (but sadly they did not adopt the coffee girl and her baby like I hoped), and Adam thankfully did not fire the absurdly hot secretary even though she kissed him. I am most interested in which Friday Night Lights alum pops up this season following in the footsteps of Lyla Garrity and Vince Howard. What is Becky Sproles up to these days?

57 Channels and Only This Is On - 9/3/11

Quote of the Week: Does anybody know what tonight is… Lower your hand if you are going to say the season finale of Glee, I (expletive deleted) hate that show. (Captain Dashall, Death Valley)

Song of the Week: Someone Like You – Adele (Video Music Awards)

Big News of the Week: Video Music Awards Still Make Me Feel Old: I actually missed watching the show live because when I tuned in I thought the MTV feed somehow got mixed up with a local access channel airing the worst community theater version of Streetcar Named Desire ever. So I went ahead and watched Leverage instead. I realized my mistake when I watched a re-air of the show. Oops. Here are some thoughts:

- Best performances of the night in this order: Adele, Kanye West and Jay-Z, Young the Giant, Beyoncé.

- Oddest moment of the night goes to Britney Spears who in lieu of giving an acceptance speech for the Video Vanguard Award just introduced Beyoncé.

- I feel as if we failed as a society if Chris Brown is allowed to perform on a national stage. Dude should be trolling in relative obscurity by now; it is not like the guy has much talent to get away with all the crap he has pulled. And who does he think he’s fooling by wearing the drive thru microphone? A four year old could tell he was not really singing.

- The Amy Winehouse tribute was weird all around considering she never once appeared on the show (she was set to appear with the house band during the disastrous Las Vegas experiment but had her visa rejected) and rarely even appeared on the channel and just released one album anyone cared about. Then Bruno Mars chose to perform an obscure (at least here stateside) Mark Ronson cover of a Zutons song that Winehouse sang on instead of one of her own songs.

- Lastly, and this is for all award shows, not just the VMA’s, stop inviting artists to perform if every third word you are going to bleep out anyway. And if you are an artist who curses every third word, either chose a different song or change your lyrics, because it may seem like artistic integrity to perform your song as is, but it just comes off as a really crappy performance on television.


Leverage: Holy Dr. Abbot sighting! But I am disappointed in myself that I did not realize the chick was Sterling’s daughter, they really beat you over the head with those hints. You can stream recent episodes on TNT.tv. You can also download Leverage on iTunes.

The Lying Game: The dude from Heroes remains to be the most interesting character on the show (how he was not in the Pilot is befuddling), him showing up in Los Angeles was really creepy. And I am beginning to wonder if either of his kids are his, neither of them look much lke him (but that could just be casting directors not caring). You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Lying Game on iTunes.

Pretty Little Liars: I cannot believe I just made my first ever Better Than Ezra joke during my mid-season wrap up of the show (see Two Can Keep a Secret if One of The Is Dead). I rally dropped the pop culture ball on that one. I promise when the show comes back, I will make at least one Better Than Ezra joke for every episode he is in. You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

Rescue Me: I have longed believed that Tommy would not make it to the end of the show and that one other fireman would die this season. But it never crossed my mind that they would kill off the entire crew. You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Rescue Me on iTunes.


Free Download of the Week: Ghost on the Canvas - Glen Campbell (iTunes)

Deal of the Week: 100 Albums for $5: This week you can get albums by Mumford and Sons, Coldplay, Eric Clapton, and Carrie Underwood for five dollars.



New Album Release of the Week: In The Grace Of Your Love - The Rapture

New DVD Release of the Week: Community: The Complete Second Season

Video of the Week: Mel Brookes and Dick Cavett have been chatting it up for four decades and now they are doing it one more time for an HBO special to air this Friday at 9:00. Here is a sneak peak:



Next Week Pick of the Week: Rescue Me, Wednesday at 10:00 on FX: It is an end of an era Wednesday as Rescue Me finishes it run just days before the tenth anniversary of 9/11.

57 Channels and Only This Is On vol. CXLII

Quote of the Week: If you see your balls, pick ‘em up. When I get back I’ll staple them back on you. (Needles, Rescue Me)

Song of the Week: Goodbye – Steve Earl (Friday Night Lights)

Big News of the Week: MTV Video Music Awards Announced: Remember when the VMA’s were a cultural landmark, now, like most people that watch during the MTV heyday, I do not care. I haven’t even seen half nominated videos or even heard the songs. The only nominations of note are Broken Bells up for Best New Artist, though both James Mercer and Danger Mouse put out music for most of last decade, and Tighten Up - The Black Keys for Breakthrough Video, granted I do not remember anything groundbreaking about Tighten Up and both videos are better than anything in the Best Video category, but it is hard to complained because the VMA’s lost credibility about five years ago.

Leverage: Nice light fair after last week’s heavy political episode and Turner was nice enough to give Bill Engvall some work after canceling his show. I wonder if the network is regretting that decision after the daughter on the show has become a much buzzed about actress for her performance in Winter Bone and being cast in the X-Man reboot. You can stream recent episodes on TNT.tv. You can also download Leverage on iTunes.

Rubicon: I am always up for a good conspiracy theory and it is too soon to tell if this is one yet. It is moving a little too slow for my taste so far. You can stream recent episodes on AMC.com. You can also download Rubicon on iTunes.

Rescue Me: There have been some very bizarre moments throughout the history of the show, but handcuffing your daughter in church to baptize her ranks very high near the top. And it is strange that Lou broke out of the hospital and no one there seems to care. I really do not think that storyline is going to end well for him. You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Rescue Me on iTunes.

Covert Affairs: Let me put out my prediction of who I think the leak is: the chick from Invasion. You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Covert Affairs on iTunes.

Also check out my season wrap up of Friday Night Lights.



Free Download of the Week: For The Summer - Ray LaMontagne & The Pariah Dogs (Amazon MP3)

Deal of the Week: Over 1000 Albums for $5 Each (Huey Lewis and the News, A Tribe Called Quest, KT Tunstall, The Like)



Video of the Week: Two years ago there was a Stand Up 2 Cancer special that aired on all the major networks (except Fox who for some reason had something else to air) and there will be another one coming up September 10 at 8:00 on many networks (this time Fox is included). Here is a PSA featuring Kristen Bell (in a bathtub), Zach Levi, Olivia Munn, Clark Duke, Aubrey Plaza, Vanessa Hudgens and more to bring awareeness to the cause..

SU2C: Change The Odds PSA


Next Week Pick of the Week: Pretty Little Liars, Tuesday at 8:00 on ABC Family: Pretty Little Liars really didn’t catch my interest enough to actually write about it that often, but it has intrigued me enough during the summer doldrums to tune to find out who A is. My prediction: Aria (her name does start with A).

57 Channels and Only This Is On vol. XCVIII

Quote of the Week: First the board gave a report. Then they proposed doing an ice cream social with a different flavor for each house which I said was a lame idea. But they said it would be fun. So I told those (expletive deleted) it was a waste of money but those (expletive deleted) wouldn’t listen so that is when I said, uh, “Bite me” and walked out. (Expletive deleted). (Laura – Greek)

Blog Quote of the Week: I LIKE THE LYRICS ABOUT BEING A CHEERLEADER AND SHE’S IN THE BLEACHERS. (Kanye West – Kanye University)

Song of the Week: Ruby Tuesday – Katey Sagel (Sons of Anarchy)

Big News of the Week: Let the Fall Season Begin: How symbolic is it that my Fall season begins with Jeff Probst snuffing out someone’s torch? But what people really care about are the new shows and TV Blips recently asked me and some other bloggers what they were looking forward to so head over there to see my answers.

Coalition Links of the Week:
Need to brush up on what went down in The Office's last season? Take BuzzSugar's Season 5 quiz! (BuzzSugar)

Things got really hot at the So You Think You Can Dance Phoenix auditions but got skintilatingly hot during the Top 14 Group dance on So You Think You Can Dance Canada. (Tapeworthy)

This week, Jace had an exclusive one-on-one interview with True Blood writer/executive producer Alan Ball the morning after the season finale and wrapped up the second season of the HBO vampire drama and took a look ahead to Season Three. (Televisionary)

They're both dreamy, they're both svelte, they're both sharp dressers. But the real question is this: who would win in a dance-off between How I Met Your Mother's Neil Patrick Harris and Glee's Matthew Morrison. (TiFaux)

Sorry, The Office. No offense, 30 Rock. But Community may have replaced you both as the funniest show on TV. (TV Fanatic)


MTV Video Music Awards: A lot of people have given crap to Kanye West for interrupting Taylor Swift, but you one person who wasn’t mad: MTV. Because what would we have talked about had he not stormed the stage? How boring the Michael Jackson tribute was (and just when you thought Madonna couldn’t be any more pretentious, she makes a MJ tribute about herself). How lame Lady Gaga is? Seriously, smearing yourself in fake blood? Considering how Russell Brand questioned her manhood in the opening he would at least man up and use your own real blood like Iggy Pop. Maybe we would be talking about Brand. And just when you thought he could be less funny than last year. At least last year he made jokes. Yeah they bombed but this year he would ramble for five minutes without any resemblance of a punch line. Maybe we would have been talking about the touching tribute Kid Cudi gave DJ AM by dedicating Make Her Say, formally known as I Poke Her Face, to the dead DJ. Hopefully when I die someone dedicates a song about oral sex to me. Or may if I am deserving enough, a song about full on intercourse. So when I pass, please pour out a forty and put on Do Me in my memory and just know when you say “smack it up, flip it, rub it down” I’ll be sing on with you with a smile on my face looking down on you (hopefully).

Greek: It has been going on all season but they just finally reveal all the rules behind the Gotcha game. And know it’s over. Oh well. And the show missed a real opportunity to do a naked mile with an homage to one of the funniest scenes ever to put to film from Austin Powers. Oh well. You can stream current episodes on Hulu.



The Jay Leno Show: You else was happy the Kanye West went all heartless on Taylor Swift? Jay Leno. After getting bagged on everyone for the last four months (except Time magazine) his new talk show instantly became must see television. Naturally the interview was a letdown, but anything short of Swift interrupting Kanye’s performance was going to be.

VH1 Divas Live – When Miley Cyrus started in on her verse of If it Makes You Happy may have been the most painful thing I have heard in a long time. Maybe since the fake Beyoncé performance from the Today show sound board. But that was fake so it doesn’t really count.

You can also check out my First Impressions of Survivor Samoa and my Preview of Community.

Free Download of the Week: Anti Sampler Fall 2009(Amazon MP3): Amazon MP3 has a large stock of samplers for free download and here is one that includes Neko Case, The Swell Season (you may remember as the duo that won the Oscar two years ago) and Booker T’s take on Outkast’s Hey Ya. Please note only the album is free as a whole download, some of the individual songs are not. So make to click the “Get MP3 Album” button. And if there are some songs you do not want, you can just delete them later.

Deal of the Week: Hit Blu-ray as Low as $12.49 (Reservoir Dogs, Dirty Dancing, American Phycho)

Video of the Week: Tomorrow sees the return of the funniest show on television The Big Bang Theory at a new time at 9:30 which separates the show with How I Met Your Mother by an hour of unfunny television. Hurph. On the bright side, the second season of the show just came out on DVD this past Tuesday. Here is the cast and crew talking about the episode Sheldon and Penny went to war.

Big Bang Theory S2 Neighbor Wars


Next Week Pick of the Week: Modern Family, Wednesday at 9:00 on ABC: Go ahead and believe the hype, this is the funniest new show of the season if not the best new show of the fall in any genre. Look for a full review of the show later this week.

57 Channels and Only This Is On vol. XLVI

Quote of the Week: It’s not bad to wear a promise ring because not everybody, guy or girl, wants to be a slut. (Jordin Sparks, MTV Video Music Awards)

Big New of the Week: NBC Back on iTunes: It was almost exactly a year ago when NBC Universal decided not to renew their contract that ended at the end of 2007 with iTunes. I predicted that it would get ironed out by the end of the year but maybe the strike put off those talk. But not only is NBC coming back in style as iTunes is now offering their shows in HD, for an extra dollar of course. Although classic episodes are available for $0.99. You will have to scroll down a little to see if NBC is offering anything for free to mark their return. Even though no free episodes, Friday Night Lights also reappeared even though it does not appear on the NBC page or even the Universal Studios page (there is no DirecTV page). And only the first season is currently available.


Coalition Links of the Week:
What was in the water during 2004-05? Buzz salutes the TV season that brought us Lost, House, and Grey's Anatomy. (BuzzSugar)

To celebrate the season (and series) premieres of Gossip Girl and Privileged, we're giving away several copies of the books that started these shows. (RTVW)

Vance is excited that So You Think You Can Dance Canada has finally started AND starts off in his hometown of Toronto where apparently, Canadians really CAN dance! (Tapeworthy)

This week, Jace interviewed The Office's Amy Ryan and Paul Lieberstein and gave five reasons why he loved the latest episode of Mad Men. (Televisionary)

TiFaux got a slew of new contributors this week! To start off her blogging reign at TiFaux, Marisa did a critical analysis comparing Lost and Fringe, discussing the appearance of crazy animals and mad scientists. (TiFaux)

This week, theTVaddict.com put forth our theory as to who Kelly Taylor's Baby Daddy is! (The TV Addict)

Raoul got all the dirt on the new season of The Sarah Connor Chronicles straight from Lena Headey and exec producer Josh Friedman. (TV Filter)


Greek: Yeah, the whole counting cards thing was a stretch, even with two decks you are not going to get a good hand in a short amount of time to get big winners and certainly in a one hand playoff counting cards isn’t going to work. But it was nice seeing Casey in the bob. And is she really going to go after the RA? You can download episodes of Greek on iTunes.

ABC World News with Charles Gibson: Well that was anticlimactic. The interview wasn’t the home run Sarah Palin cheerleaders wanted not was it the disaster the haters hoped for. The interview itself was a little short and Gibson tried too many “gotcha questions” like the Bush Doctrine. Even Gibson seemed rattled when Palin asked in what respects. Count me as one of the 70% that thinks that semi-automatic riffles should be banned. (Scooter Update: MSNBC posted an article, the Many Versions of 'Bush Doctrine', claiming their are up to seven different versions.)

Free Downloads of the Week: Basically the season premiere from all of NBC’s returning shows of last season is currently free in HD and regular definition including:

30 Rock: Secrets and Lies (link isn't available yet, try the banner at the top of post)
Battlestar Galactica: He That Believeth in Me
Eureka: Bad to the Drone
Heores: Four Months Later
In Plain Sight: Pilot
Life: Pilot
Lipstick Jungle: Pilot (link isn't available yet, try the banner at the top of post)
Monk: Mr. Monk Buys a House
The Office : Fun Run Pt. 1 & 2
Psych: Ghosts
The Rachel Zoe Project: Preview Special
Top Design: Impress the Best


Promo of the Week:

The Big Bang Theory - Season 1 Recap



Pick for Next Week: The Big Bang Theory, Monday at 8:00 on CBS: Slim Pickens a week before the new fall season launches so you can take the time to watch (or re-watch) the season finale of the funniest sitcom of last season where we learn such things as Schrodinger's Cat.

We on Award Tour: 2008 Video Music Awards

What the frak happened to the Video Music Awards? Once the bastion of everything cool has turned into the most unwatchable thing on television. Even in the lean years, they were still able to line up legitimate stars. As much as I complained about last year’s show it still featured Kanye West, Alicia Keys, Linkin Park and Foo Fighters. This year is packed with groups that in past years would not have the resume to land them an opening show spot. Really only Kid Rock has actually sold multimillion albums. Seriously, who the frak is Tokyo Hotel? Danity Kane? Yeah, there was no blatant synergy there at all. MTV obviously knew the star power equaled that of your local public access begging to get Christina Aguilara and Kanye West to perform at the last minute pulling Kanye out of his MTV ban a year after promising never to go on the show again.

And it isn’t just the performers that were low star wattage because, the people handing out the moonmen were pretty sad too: Miley Cyrus, the cast of High School Music, the dude from Gossip Girl? You know what the VMA’s have turned into: the Teen Choice Awards. This may be my swan song for the VMA because they have decided that anyone older than fifteen and with male parts could possibly enjoy anything this crap. Here are other complaints with this year’s show:

- Instead of any music in the pre-show we get random people dancing. Um, yeah, okay. I guess that makes sense because all the pre-show quality artists were sadly invited to play on the big show. Yeah, that was the most worthless pre-show ever.

- Ooo, a new Survivor-style version of the Real World/Road Rules Challenge. Can’t wait. One thing I can wait for: another Paris Hilton reality show.

- Who invited Kobe Bryant? Aren’t there too many teenage white girls around for him to be invited to? If you invite Kobe Bryant, shouldn’t you invite Chris Hansen too?

- “Better luck next year T-Pain, if you’re still relevant,” I not sure who the dude who said that, but no truer words were spoken tonight. I bet less than half the people this year won’t warrant an invite next year.

- Britney Spears opening the VMA’s again. Yawn. Have we not learned from Crossroads that she cannot act.

- Wow, the place where the VMA’s took place looked about the size of the TRL set. This is really sad. The economy is really as bad as they say it is.

- I really dislike that Disturbia song, it is an obvious attempt at trying to recreate Thriller but it is no where near as catchy. But I did like the Seven Nation Army interlude. And can we keep the clippers away from Rihanna. It is like ever single she releases she cuts off even more hair.

- Congratulation Russell Brand, you went from hilarious to humongous tool even faster than Dane Cook. I guess I shouldn’t have expected much from a guy who dressed up like Osama bin Ladin the day after 9/11. If you can get on your knees to get Kanye West back, why can’t you do the same for Chris Rock?

- DJ AM and Travis Barker are the house band? Really? Since when is dating reality stars make you relevant?

- For those lucky enough to avoid the Jonas Brother phenomenon, they are basically Hanson but without legitimately catchy songs. That in no insult to Hanson who actually play all the instruments themselves when they play live.

- Luckily we only have to put with ten seconds of Katy Perry singing.

- Yeah, the Michael Phelps hosted Saturday Night Live isn’t going to be any good.

- Why invite Lil’ Wayne to perform if you are just going to censor every third word out of his mouth? Then you have T-Pain who didn’t bother to lip-sync half his performance.

- Did Lindsay Lohan said she had a dance off with AC/DC. When did this happen? Was Angus wearing his kilt? And is it on YouTube? And wasn’t Fannie Pack the people that did that horrible Camel Toe song from a few years ago.

- Paramore: best made for the pre-show.

- Wow, Russell Brand just got put on blast by Jordin Sparks. You go girl.

- Was T.I. just rapping over his song playing on the CD player? That’s some eighth grade talent show stuff.

- Add to my who are these guys list: Josh and Drake.

- I guess it is apropos that Brittany would win three awards at the biggest train wreck of the year.

- Kanye, don’t sing ever again. Ever.

- So there is another VMA, no big surprises and we are stuck at the watercooler again for the forth year in a row with nothing to talk about except about how bad it was.

We on Award Tour: 2007 MTV Video Music Awards

Remember the catchphrase from what I think was the eighth installment of the Lethal Weapon franchise when Danny Glover (or was it Mel Gibson) said, “I’m getting too old for this (expletive deleted)!” Well that is how I have felt after ever Video Music Awards since, um, when was the last time Chris Rock hosted? But I thought this year was different when the show was announced thanks to scheduled performers Lily Allen and Amy Winehouse. Apparently MTV got word of this and since they have been trying very hard to keep anyone that is actually older than they are, both ended up not being able to make it to the show.

And so went the interest as most anyone who isn’t a fourteen year old white girl that still thinks Fall Out Boy are cool. But in the end I guess it is good that neither made it because they probably would have just been relegated to singing for thirty second with Mark Ronson before MTV cut to commercial. Seriously, if I wanted to hear less than a minute of a song I’d watch TRL. Eighteen different acts were featured but only five get to perform a full song. Why bother? Apparently you can watch all the suite performances at MTV.com but you might as well wait until someone rips the best to mp3. Here are some other thoughts on the show:

- We start off with the fairly worthless pre-show where they roll out John Norris again. Did this guy sign some sort of life-long contract? MTV has a stricter age limit than Menoudo yet he still gets rolled out every year with his boyband circa 1999 haircut. And there is something to say that even though T.I. was in the building, he didn’t bother to show up for the chick from the Pussycat Dolls performance, who relied heavily on guided vocals, even though he appeared on the song.

- The big show started of with the much hyped Britney Spears performance and despite with expectations were so low she could walk over the bar, she still found a way to slither under it. Now I have never watched America’s Got Talent, but her performance is what I would imagine what a Britney impersonator’s that was let on the show just so the Hoff would have something to laugh at would look like. She didn’t bother to lip-sync half the time and was a half to full step behind her back up dancers half the time and looked lost half the time. But I guess it would be hard to remember the steps and to move your lips when you spent three minutes trying to hold in your gut. Note to Britney: fat people don’t walk around in their bra and panties. Yeah you could have pull that look off thirty pounds ago but you now either need to put some clothes on or work in a thousand sit ups a day.

- MTV seriously dropped the ball with the opening. They usher out a train wreck that hasn’t been musically relevant for half a decade for an embarrassing performance when they should have convinced Vanessa Hudgens open the show asking the crowd, “heard any good jokes lately?” (Thanks to everyone who pointed out why people she all the sudden became the most popular search to the 9th Green). Everyone would have talked around the watercooler today how great the opening was instead of how horrible it was. Well actually most of the watercooler talk today was, “wait, the VMA’s were last night?”

- Apparently MTV had a contingency plan in case the Brittney performance died like it did with Sarah Silverman coming out to make fun of her. Granted the best line was, “that’s not nice calling Madonna a python” as well as her backhanded comments to Paris Hilton who once again tried to look upset before breaking out laughing.

- Rihanna wins the Monster Single of the Year as well as the monster cleavage of the year award.

- Jennifer Hundson (as Alicia Keys calls her) comes out to give the most worthless award of the night, the quadruple threat award. Since when is having a clothing line a threat?

- Holy Pat Smear sighting!

- Kanye West and 50 Cent come out to hype their release date. I have said this before and I will say it again, for the love of hip-hop be sure to pick up Graduation this week so 50 retires for coming in second. Anyone find it interesting that no one even mentions Kenny Chesney who has a legitimate chance to outsell either of the rappers. Don’t underestimate the buying power of hillbillies. But any ways. Be sure to look out for my Kanye review tomorrow and 50 on Wednesday.

- Forty-five minutes into the award show and we get our first full performance by Chris Brown who did a much better job lip-syncing that Britney. But that really say much about it. But is does say something that Rihanna stole the show from him.

- Justin Timberlake’s music sucks massively and acts like a complete tool ninety-five percent of the time but I like his blast at MTV and their reality programming while accepting an award from The Hills (but I’d like to state for the record that I would definitely stand underneath the brunette’s umbrella-ella-ella-eh-eh-eh). But then lost points when saying that The Simpsons were part of MTV’s reality programming.

- Seriously, Cee-Lo singing Prince while being backed by the Foo Fighters only gets thirty seconds of airtime?

- I must take this time to apologize to CBS for creating the most appalling reality show ever with Kids Nation. I didn’t realize MTV would counter with A Shot of Love with Tila Tequila (whoever that is), your token Bachelor rip-off but with sixteen lesbians and straight dudes. But there is something to say that both channels are owned by the same company (keep in mind this is also the same company that axed Veronica Mars).

- Are we really supposed to believe Shia LeBeouf didn’t really have express written consent to reveal the new Indiana Jones title (Kingdom of the Crystal Skull). That is just insulting our intelligence.

- Who keeps inviting Pamela Anderson to these things? She and Carmen Electra should be well into their begging to get on the Surreal Life point in their life but somehow they still get on big name events. What’s worst is supposedly she is the reason for the most interesting thing that happened all night (Kid Rock sucker punching Tommy Lee) and MTV didn’t even bother to air it.

- Speaking of overrated chicks, Megan Fox may be one of the few people that rival Anderson in that category. She announces Timbaland who does some weird thing before tossing it to Linkin Park. What was that? Why even bother? Why not just have Fox toss to Linkin Park. Timbaland is just completely worthless.

- During the pre-show Rihanna mentioned she was going to rock out tonight and I thought maybe she would be backed by New Order (Shut Up and Drive samples Blue Monday), but now it is just Fall Out Boy who just took home Best Group. Yawn.

- Alicia Keys adds some class to program even if she was wearing that looked like Olivia Newton-John combined her wardrobe from the final scene from Grease and the Physical video. The new song was decent, but I’m not sure where I come down on Freedom ’90. I was hoping that maybe she would bring out George Michaels but alas no.

- Jamie Foxx comes out to show everyone how much he has had to drink while in Vegas then shuts ups just long enough for Jennifer Garner announce the Best New Award as Gym Class Fallout. Yeah, that seems just about right.

- MTV then rolls out a week old joke that really wasn’t that funny a week ago in the Miss Teen South Carolina who flubs while pretending to flubs. Nice. At least she gave the Wu-Tang Clan a shout out.

- The big surprise guest of the night is Dr. Dre (who is disturbingly showing his age). No he didn’t perform or even receive a Lifetime Achievement Award or anything interesting, no he is just relegated to handing out Video of the Year to Rihanna.

- The show ends with Nelly Furtado, Timberlake and Timbaland each performing a verse from their latest song before getting together as the song they did together start only for the track to stop so abruptly that Timbaland had to inform everyone five seconds later that that’s the end of the show. How apropos of an end.

- I’m really getting too old for this (expletive deleted).

57 Channels and Only This Is On vol. XXXIV

Big News of the Week: You Can See the Latest NBC Shows at Blockbuster but not iTunes: Two big news items from NBC this week and I’ll start with the smaller item. Starting this Tuesday you can rent from Blockbuster stores as well as thru their online service a DVD that includes the first episodes of Chuck, Journeyman, and Life as well as a preview of Bionic Woman. If I am not mistaken, they did a similar thing last year on Netflix for Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and we all know how that turned out. I always found this an odd marketing strategies as it may decrease initial rating which may hurt on the fence viewers who may not turn into the second episode fearing it would be canceled.

The bigger news is that NBC Universal has decided not to renew their contract that ends at the end of this year. And since the contract ends in the middle of the television schedule NBC has decided not to have any more new shows added to the iTunes library. I can’t say I’m too surprised by this because it seemed a little odd that it cost the same, $1.99, to buy three minute music videos, twenty minute sitcoms, and forty minute dramas. But I won’t be at all surprised if Apple unveils a pricing plan before then as Universal Music Group (are they related to NBC), the biggest record company, said they are pulling out also.

But the biggest surprise for me in this news was that NBC accounted for forty percent of all television downloads considering how they are supposedly the fourth network interims of rating. This just goes to show how big a sham the Neilson Ratings are. You are trying to tell me that a network is by far has the biggest segment of downloads, which are based on actual numbers would be all the way down at fourth in a glorified poll that are the Neilson Ratings. Seriously, what is the Neilson’s margin of error, 10%? Actually, that is a good question; does anyone know what the actual margin of error is for the Neilson Ratings? It is pretty shady that they don’t have that listed anywhere.


I have had the 9th Green Reader’s Poll up on my sidebar for album a month so I think I am going to take it down at the end of the month. If you have not taken it yet, please do so in the next week. It should only take a minute or so. And a big thanks to everyone who as already taken. Also this is your last chance to join my fantasy Dillon Panthers Football league. The live draft will take part on Yahoo this Tuesday at 9:00 PM EST. Drop me an e-mail (see sidebar) if you are interested in participating and I will give you the league ID and password.


Greek: I don’t know way, but the line Ashleigh said about needing more sleep because she was growing out her bangs out had me laughing all week. And even though they weren’t as cool as Crucifictorious but Darwin Lied was a pretty ingenious band name for a religious band. Which brings me to the best part of the episode, a new courtship for Casey in Dale. Now I know longer had to decide to root for Tool #1 (Even) or Tool #2 (Cappie) and can now root for a Dale-Casey hook-up. Speaking of hook-ups, what is with all the infidelity? Not really all the infidelity, but how all these characters can look past their partner’s infidelity so quickly? Download the current season of Greek on iTunes.


Rescue Me: You know the sign of a great character is when you start to smile just at the sight of them like with the captain’s daughter. Let’s hope the rest of the season (all two episodes) features more Amy Sedaris and less Gina Gershon.




Pick of the Week: MTV Music Video Awards, Sunday at 9:00 on MTV: I was actually excited when the show was announced, but two reasons why I was excited (Amy Winehouse and Lily Allen, have both dropped out and were replaced by T-Pain and Akon. What’s worse there is a rumor that the big “surprise” opening this year will be Britney Spears. Or as Kevin Federline will call the performance, Exhibit T in his full custody battle case. Expect a much smaller even this year as previous VMA’s had clocked in at five hours between pre, post, and the big show but is down to three hours with the pre-show starting at 8:00.


I had this up last week and I though I would put it in this post again to give something to play with as I’ll be taking tomorrow off. Below is a widget where you can vote for the Most Anticipated New Shows of Fall 2007. You can simply give it up or down votes or go to the UnSpun website and rank them in order or add new shows that aren’t on the list yet.

We on Award Tour - 2006 Video Music Awards

There were high hopes for this year’s MTV Music Video Awards after two years of well below sub-par shows. But in the end this year’s VMA’s were just as bad as the previous one with Jack Black somehow finding a way to be unfunny (and this may be a tipping point for Black after being universally panned for Nacho Libre). What was worse was for a show that has built itself of big stage productions and surprised guest, the performances seemed extremely low-budgets compared to years past and the surprised guests this year were Montel Williams, the little kid from the movie no one but movie snobs saw, and Lou Reed and the dude from ZZ Top who were most likely only there because The Raconteurs invited them. Here are more disappointing moments from the five hours of my life that I’ll never get back:

- Just as worthless as the big show was the hour and a half pre-show this basically was a vehicle for people to promote upcoming albums. Usually they have a world premiere video or exclusive interview, but nothing but two horrible performances.

- The show starts out with the chick from Kids Incorporated performing London Bridge, a song easily a lock for the Worst Songs of 2006 list. Blatant guided vocal track here as she didn’t even bother to even lip-sync half the time.

- Kurt Loder and John Norris must have something on the higher ups at the network because as MTV tries to distance itself from what it used to be (even refusing to even acknowledge it’s 25th anniversary) these two still show up every year at the VMA’s.

- Does the world really need a rock opera from My Chemical Romance? Really the world doesn’t need another album from them let along a concept album. But with the goth Sergeant Pepper garb, the creepy skeleton children’s choir, and the lead singer actually trying to sing with a fake British accent maybe the musical version of Jumping the Shark. Oh as for the premiere of their new song, it is easily a lock for the Worst Songs of 2006 list.

- Can we please end the Diddy era? The dude is now walking around with his own spokesman because he’s too elf important to talk. Really no one has capitalized on the death of someone else. Well except for all the Elvis impersonators.

- We start off the big show with Jay-Z welcoming the show back to New York City from a top of a building. This would have been a lot cooler had they not had the My Chemical Romance performance there earlier.

- Who ever decided the show should start off with a performance of a song that no one has ever heard should be fired. Worst show opening ever. When Justin Timberlake then switched to Worst Song of 2006 nominee SexyBack and brought out Big Head Timberland and a blatant guided vocal track, things didn’t get much better. What’s worse is it seems that the phrase Sexyback is going to overtake the go to phase for the corny old dudes replacing Fiddy (as in Fiddy Cent) after corny old dudes Al Gore and Jared Leto both used it.

- I kept waiting and waiting for the opening Jack Black skit to get funny, but sadly it never did. I think that it may have been the goal with the “everything going wrong” theme, but that’s just too high brow for me. Although I like how the MTV execs were the Douches. And what was with Black kissing everyone’s butt all evening? MTV really need to bring Chris Rock back.

- The first presenter is the straight from jail Lil’ Kim. Seeing her makes me wonder should you lose all the street cred you receive for going to jail but by getting released early for good behavior?

- The first shocker of the night was James Blunt for winning Best Male Video. I have a suspicion that this was a last minute decision to give him the award just to give his girlfriend some airtime.

- The least hip-hop song nominated wins Best Hip-Hop award. And up the irony quotient one of the Black Eyed Peas talked about how there is a place for positive rap as he picks up an award for a song about a woman’s naughty bits.

- Shakira and her Indian themed performance for Hips Don't Lie was probably the best of the night, but that’s not really saying much.

- Can someone please explain the allure of Jackass to me? Am I the moron for not finding naked midgets and dudes hitting each other in the testicles funny?

- Lil’ John is up next and tells everyone to get on the feet, but as the camera scans the place, everyone is as slow to get up as if a hymn started to play at church. But I can’t blame them considering it was just for Ludacris whose set looked like it was on a lower budget than most high school plays. Not a good sign for a song called Moneymaker. And had Ludacris not namedropped them, I would have never known that it was the Pussycat Dolls that came on stage at the end of the song.

- Speaking of the Pussycat Dolls, it’s sad tat we live in a world where they actually won a music award. But it’s nice that they thanked God for winning an award that tells dudes to loosen up their buttons. Classy.

- Jessica Simpson actually used the phrase “Push My Tush” while presenting the awards. I actually can feel my IQ dropping. Oh, and to follow up a story I broke here a couple days ago about her hooking up with John Mayer, just days later, Mayer posted on his blog that he really like the Public Enemy song Don’t Believe the Hype.

- OK Go redid their Here it Goes Again video with the treadmills step for step. What a waste of time. I could see the same exact routine on YouTube whenever I want, why would I want to see it live. The least they could have done was to screw p somewhere to make this performance memorable. Complete waste of time.

- What was on Paris Hilton’s head? But something has to be said that her album has been out more than a week and she has yet to perform a song live once. Even Ashlee Simpson’s people trusted her enough to lip-sync, it’s not a good sign that Paris cannot even be trusted to do that. Luckily she didn’t try doing it tonight instead she was just relegated to present the dude from Smallville and his band.

- Did some backstage dude grab Nicole Richie’s butt as she went onstage? I wonder if Nicole realized that Pink was making fun of her during her acceptance speech. I wonder if Pink realized that no one knew she was trying to be ironic.

- Did anyone else start to feel old when Snoop Dogg was talking about how all the new rappers were in diapers when he started? He then presents the Best Rap Video to Chamillionaire who said the best advice he ever got was to stay humble. Keep in mind this is coming from a guy who then named himself Chamillionaire.

- Guided Vocal Alert! Beyoncé gets no introduction and performs her second single off her new album. It’s never a good sign when a label has to rush out a second single before the album is never a good sign. Maybe we can expect that Destiny’s Child reunion sooner than later.

- T.I. is out next to perform a medley of songs I’ve never heard before and hope to never hear again.

- How funny was it that the dude who won Ringtone of the Year actually brought a list of people to thank? Apparently he didn’t get the memo that’s this was a joke award.

- It’s official, I am now totally sick of Fall Out Boy. And what was with the dude with the cape? The band is out to present Panic! at the Disco, or as I like to call it, a bathroom break. The performance would have been much better had the lead singer would have gotten hit with a bottle early in the song. If you want to see that happen, check out YouTube. Now that was entertaining.

- What's with bringing out the ten-year-old girl to the sounds of Rick James Superfreak. That is just totally wrong.

- I know that people like to make fun of past scandals but when your scandal is that you are horrible parents, it’s not a good idea to parody that sediment like Britney and her baby daddy did. Someone please send that tape to child services.

- Christina Aguilera for some reason to performed a balled. The massive guns she was showing off didn’t help with those drag queen comparisons.

- I thought they took out Michael Jackson from the Video Vangard award. Granted they have been sporatic giving it out lately. Hype Williams wins. It's sad that the rap cliches his videos created over a decade ago are still being used today.

- So AFI wins Best Rock Video and they were the only one all night who brings up the voting. This was something I was really wondering about, in the press release for the nominees, it mentioned that there was voting on the website, but I never heard anything about it after that. Nor did anything mention what the votes meant or if they meant why there was still a Viewer’s Choice Award. This is really bugging me.

- During one of their many mini-songs The Raconteurs changed the lyrics of historic song to “internet killed the video star.” Clever. Although this is about a year after I declared Podcasts Killed the Video Star.

- Worst Dressed of the night goes to Jennifer Lopez and her gypsy outfit. Seriously, who brought her out of obscurity? Can we quickly send her back there before she makes more crappy music? She appropriately presents Video of the Year to Panic! at the Disco, a crappy song to top off the crappy year.

- The night ends with The Killers. As the song ends they go to the nosebleed camera and just when you think they are setting up for something special, they cut back to Jack Black who ends the show.