The (b)Low Anthem

I heard a band called The Low Anthem doing an in-studio performance on 1690 AM yesterday. Of all of the miserable, boring, sissy folk crap that is so popular today, this might be the band who takes the cake as the most miserable, most boring, and the biggest bunch of sissies. Maybe the sissy bit is unfair, because one of the members is a girl, but it's still pretty limp. Singer Ben Knox Miller has a voice that can only be described as rohypnol for your ears. And that's not only when he's singing. While he was talking to the DJ, I thought I was going to fall asleep in traffic. Then they played another song, and I started hoping I would fall asleep at the wheel and get in a fatal wreck just to put me out of my misery.

I don't want to delve too much deeper into this, because I'm starting to get mad. Here is the point that I think needs to be made. Folk music isn't hard rock. That's obvious. But if you look at its roots, it is rugged music. It's a music about struggle, about being beaten down and hoping or trying to overcome. So authentic folk, even when it's just a guy finger-picking on an acoustic guitar, has an edge to it, when it's done right. Unfortunately, the current wave of this shit is made by a bunch of people who wouldn't even know how to change their own tire if they had a blowout. That's not so rugged now, is it? Nope. Low Anthem falls into the category of American'ta.

Now all that needs to happen is for these douchebags to sign with Sub Pop, because that is clearly where they belong. Why do assholes like these guys insist on taking the fun out of it?

If nothing else, it is making me further anticipate Son Volt's show at the 40 Watt on 11/19. Roots music with balls didn't seem like that foreign of a concept a few years ago, but Jay Farrar appears to be one of the last of a dying breed.