Rock'N'Roll All Nite, And Putting Evuhreeday

Move over, jai alai! Golf is now the hip sport of choice among musicians, according to a list of music types ranked by their handicaps in the new issue of Golf Digest, the 39,412nd magazine to publish a pointless Top 100 Of Something About Music list this year.

And your No. 1 musical golfer is: Kenny G, which pleases us greatly for some reason. "With the sax, I learned technique well enough so that it feels like part of my body, and I just express myself. That's where I want to get in golf," G told the magazine, in a metaphor we've been unable to understand. Jaded Insider's dad, incidentally, will be irrationally thrilled that his musical idol is also into golf; we wish he knew how to use a computer to read the news.

The intersection of golf and music is nothing new, especially if your CD rack involves some combination of the words "Hootie" and "Blowfish." It's even become the refuge of previously scary rockers like Alice Cooper, who, according to Wikipedia, was some sort of "Shock-Rocker" before you could find him regularly hitting the links on TV. Cooper in crediting the sport with cleaning him up: "Golf is the crack of sports. It absolutely saved my life." Listen to Uncle Alice, kids: Crack saved his life.

The rest of the list is as follows:

1. Kenny G (jazzbo)
2. Vince Gill (prolific country dude)
3. Marty Roe (of Diamond Rio)
4. Steve Azar (country singer, we guess)
5. Adrian Young (No Doubt drummer)
6. Rudy Gatlin (Gatlin)
7. Larry Gatlin (subordinate Gatlin)
8. Steve Gatlin (stop stuffing the ballot-box, guys, it's embarrassing)
9. Josh Kelley (doe-eyed troubadour)
10. Paul Brown (smooth jazzbo)

Elsewhere you'll find Cooper (#11), Justin Timberlake (#15), Roger Waters (#44), Celine Dion (#62), Bob Dylan (#63), Snoop Dogg (#64) and Andre 3000 (#92). We've been trying to think of clever parody titles for these artists for a while, but all we've got is "FuturePar/PuttSounds."

Empire Strikes Back

We bet you're just dying to know what the heck happened to Atari Teenage Riot, aren't you? Really you're not? Oh, but we bet, more importantly, what ATR mastermind Alec Empire has been up to right? Are we right? That you already knew he had another solo album, "Futurist," out on Oct. 10 -- you were just waiting for us to say something about it? Yes?

And you're lamenting the fact you just don't have enough scathing, writhing hard rock in your arsenal? That your life has been empty since "With Teeth" was released and, like, you're just so over Ministry and you can't keep track of all the lost members of Rage... that you want the tips of your hair to be burned off by sonic, twisted industrial punk, sweat bursting from your brow as you lip sync -- yes, lip sync -- to darkness. Utter darkness. And tracks like "Gotta Get Out," "Point of No Return" and "Make Em Bleed."

Or ou just wanted us to talk about cute Kylie being on the cover of Vogue Australia, didn't you? *Sigh* you're so predictable.

The Destroyer Sessions

Outtakes From Billboard.com's Interview With Destroyer's Dan Bejar Re: Swan Lake's Debut Album, "Beast Moans":

You guys have been all very busy over the last several years. How did you find time to write songs together? Or was it a back-and-forth type thing, or did you meet in the studio?

We didn't really write songs together, though there is that one part in that one really pretty Spencer song where Carey busts into some sultry Q-Tip-style shit, something about a "boyfriend"... The core of the songs (lyrics, chord progressions, main vocal melody) usually came from one person beforehand. But the piecing together and blowing up of things... Thanks guys, by the way...

Looking at the lyrics, it seems a bit conceptual. Yes/no?

I'm not that familiar with lyrical concepts, but I won't speak for those other dudes... Actually, I will speak for them... No concepts!

Were there any specific ideas / directions that you all wanted this record to go, sound- or recording-wise?

I think Carey wanted the record to swirl around a lot, lots of musical pratfalls and rugs being pulled out from under you, but melodically really strong, which is one of the best ways to get away with that sort of stuff if you're really going for it in trying to make a "headphones" record.

I think he wanted to bury me in a shitstorm of sound and notes, and I wanted to bury me in a shitstorm of sound and notes cause the vocals and lyrics are always so front and center in Destroyer songs, and he wanted to do the same to himself and I wanted him to do the same to himself, not that you can ever really tell what he's saying in a Frog Eyes song anyway -- it just sounds like some kind of Russian no russian has ever heard of (except for the Frog Eyes album he just finished, which kills by the way!).

Being an actual musician, Spencer's take on it is probably a bit more complicated and effective... I know we wanted to lift the veil on Spence as a first-rate balladeer and writer, and not just some whiz-kid instrumentalist or yelping prog freak-show... Of course, the Sunset Rubdown LP came out and beat us to it...

Anything in the works for a follow up to "Destroyer's Rubies?"

I'm trying to record some songs here in Spain, but my clarinet sucks, my harmonicas are a complete bewilderment, my sax is OK at best and the neighbors are supposedly sensitive. "Rubies" comes out in Europe in six weeks. I might play a solo show some time in the next six months to support it.

An Open Letter To Uncle Bob

To: Bob Dylan
From: All of us

Bob,

OK. We get it. You're screwing with us. You hawk panties because it makes purists crumble, you scramble your songs live just to do it and you occasionally rock a goat beard because you're Bob Dylan, and no one can say a thing, because you'll kick them.

But please, put a stop to "The Times They Are A-Changin'." Now.

If you haven't already -- and we don't know how often you drift around the Internets -- we beg you to endure this motorcycle wreck of a performance from "The View." The singer is one of the Culkin brothers, or possibly Sam Gamgee. The guitar was salvaged from a glitter factory that blew up in Secaucus. But the song is yours. And it needs your help.

I know I'm being harsh. I know I am criticizing what I can't understand. But we need you to step in, Bob. This sort of thing is OK when you do it with Billy Joel music -- hell, it's practically natural there -- but this is ... AAUGH! Good God, I just got to the "Come on, boys!" part. What the HELL is going on here?

So we're sorry. Sorry about whatever it is that made you angry and embittered enough to let this pass. Please, Bob. Use your powers. Gather 'round, wherever you roam, and start cracking skulls.

Love,
Jaded Insider

The Coug De-Clawed

Of late, Jaded Insider has been watching the Major League Baseball postseason action (and pulling for the underdog Cardinals all the way). Is it just us, or are there only four commercials in rotation? The Taco Bell "crun-chew-eesy" is probably the worst of the bunch, but John Mellencamp's Chevy ballad-by-way-of-the-"Team America"-soundtrack "Our Country" is a close second. Featuring the mise-en-scene of a Hallmark after-school special -- replete with heartstring-pulling footage of Vietnam choppers and flooded NOLA homes -- the commercial sadly marks the low point of the Indiana singer's career. At least Jay-Z gets to ride a sweet boat for Budweiser. And Pharrell doesn't even have to show his face for HP.