I think we can agree that "supergroups" have a history of underperforming in the superness department. (I think we can also agree that I'm the first critic with the balls to criticize supergroups, which have long been the sacred cows of the music industry.) This is all set to change with the announcement of a new supergroup so super that it threatens to shake the very foundations of super-iority. TINTED WINDOWS offer an all-star line-up of industry legends: BUN E. CARLOS, drummer for Cheap Trick; JAMES IHA, the Pumpkin so Smashing that Billy Corgan even let him play on the albums, occasionally, perhaps; ADAM SCHLESINGER, bassist of two-and-a-half-hit wonders Fountains of Wayne; and TAYLOR HANSON, former child.
Heck, yes. I've been fantasizing about an Iha/Hanson face-off since 1998, when "MMMBop" changed the landscape of American radio and James Iha's powerhouse solo album revolutionized middling wispiness for a new era. To add the power-pop prowess of Schlesinger — think of how, after all these years, we still relish the prospect of getting "Stacy's Mom" or the soundtrack hit "That Thing You Do" stuck in our heads — and you've got a volatile recipe for crystallized rock dynamite that's ready to EXPLODE when you add the hard-pounding Cheap Trick wild-card element.
I was shocked to hear a new track from purple-clad hip-hop dandy fop CAM'RON after all these years of silence and ill-advised beefing. I was even more shocked to discover that he seems to have put some thought into it — something that at this stage in a rapper's career is pretty much unprecedented. In "I Hate My Job," he raps as characters who are not him, he switches perspectives from a working woman trying to make it through the day in a thankless bullshit vocation to an ex-con trying to find work in a society that's given up on him, and the whole thing kind of works. Who does he think he is, Mickey Rourke?
In a brilliant parody of the extreme gradation of recent deluxe album releases — you may recall NINE INCH NAILS' bounty of bonus options — former NIN drummer JOSH FREESE is offering almost a dozen bizarre deluxe options for purchasing his new album, from a $7 download up through $50 for a personal thank-you call and all the way to $75,000 for Freese to join your band and tour with you for a month. (Plus, you get to take shrooms and cruise in a lambo with Danny Carey.) I have no interest in your album, Mr. Freese, but I do applaud your genius.
J.D. FORTUNE, the dude who won the televised contest to become the singer of INXS, is now reported to be living in his car, and if this brings you no joy, you're a soulless husk of a human being. He's working on a solo album, however, and I'm sure he's totally gonna be on his feet again after that barn burner comes out. Don't waste all your energy beating back those lovestruck major labels with a big stick, J.D. — you're gonna need it for popping cans of Whiskas with your teeth.
