St Marco

For those interested. Here is the video footage from the interview/performance. Considering they split up and just got back together to do that interview i think it was pretty awesome. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/8418929.stm

I don't think you do I think a few of you think you do, think your clever by trying to make it into things it really is not. It is not as complicated as all that. You have taken it way too seriously. Thought about it way too deeply. Just a group of people feeling its time for some change in the norm that we are used to having. It is not a small group, it is a pretty big group. I think that attitude reflects most peoples current view. The song is not important, the band are not important, what im saying is not important. What is important is that people have come together and actually done something about it. Had some fun, raised a **** load of cash for a good cause etc and made the xmas number 1 race interesting again, rather then a full gone conclusion like every other year. You might not agree with what they are doing, might think its pointless, might think the people don't get it etc.. Fair enough, mad props to you. Lots of others are the opposite, they respect what is happening, they see it in a positive light, they want change, they choose rather then ***** and moan about it to be pro active, attempt to do something nobody has been able to do, break the reality tv monopoly on the top spot of the chart. So give the same respect back to those people that they give you. As some famous guy who is dead once said "The true failure in life is to do nothing".

Of course, the 50's are a great example of that. I think with the reality tv phenomenon we have developed a new one though. They will always coexist. Even the TV element will. If a show is succesful then obviously there are ways to cash in on that. Like releasing the theme tune to a show i.e Happy Days etc.. But todays manafactured music is different to say The Monkees. You would get the show after the song. Today it is the other way around.

That is totally different..... As i said time and time again, if someone likes the reality type music then that is their music taste. I have not said those people were wrong for liking that type of music. It is not ironic at all. What is ironic is someone would say they would not buy music based on what is in the charts since 1992 based on if the band/group/singer is known or not when in 1992 that was really the only way to hear about new music. Today you have lots and lots of different ways of finding new bands, obviously the internet now being the main way. Me personally i got nothing against the mainstream. I would of never heard bands like Stones,Doors,Rage,Guns N Roses etc etc if it was not for them being on the radio. I think it was John Peel who said something like "Talented bands will always break out into the mainstream". Because more and more people will want to hear them. So a band working their way up from ****ty bars to getting success is very different from the guy who gets a number 1 with his 1st single on the back of making his/her name from a reality show. Very different. As it say's in the paper today. Think about the format. You get picked out of the group for having an image they want for you. If that was how music was then you would have had no classic records like The Pogues or most of these classic xmas hits. As i said, if people prefer that then that is great, they will feel they are being catered for. Your musical taste does not make you any worse then me Pancake. Just as if you listened to what the people including Rage themselves have been saying you would of seen that simply a lot of people don't feel catered for anymore, they want an alternative, that song was chosen as the alternative. No politics, no label conspiracies, no pr stunts etc etc. People simply wanting to choose a different song that represents their mood right now.

You know thats ******** really. I would like to think i have a very varied taste in music. My fav band is a band called Dishwalla. Not many people have heard of them, at least here in UK. If you only buy music based on what is not in the mainstream then you would of missed some ****ing classic albums. Which unlike Pancake doesnt need respecting, it needs asking why? I.e why would you only buy things not on radio/tv etc? I would of thought people who like music buy what their ears like? But of course that is just my opinion. Also Rage have always been a bit mainstream.... Feck they won 2 Grammys and have been nominated for 7. Have been on the radio/tv for years. Didn't Bulls on Parade get to number one over here?

And here is the interview. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuIa5NoPH9c Think it pretty much covers anything the haters want answered

Cheers for that, i will give it a listen! The Mirror have a pretty good piece up about what i was trying to say before http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2009/12/17/rage-against-the-x-factor-machine-115875-21903388/ On an interesting note, nearly 50% of the music albums in the chart have a connection to reality tv... As said before, if you like that kind of thing then your obviously be pretty happy with the music scene.

Some awesome news if you don't give a crap about all this but are a Rage fan. At 8.50am on bbc radio 5 Rage will be re-forming to do a live performance and an interview. Should be interesting.

http://www.williamhillmedia.com/index_template.asp?file=13639 William Hill Suspend Xmas One Betting! Bookies William Hill have suspended the betting on the Christmas number one after the biggest gamble in the thirty year history of the market. "98% of the bets we have taken on the Xmas one today have been for 'Rage', we are running scared and have suspended the betting for the next twelve hours," said Hill's spokesman Rupert Adams." classic

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1236415/X-Factor-winner-Joe-McElderry-second-place-bookies-suspend-betting-Christmas-number-1.html

Word around the campfire is that William Hill have suspended betting on the xmas number 1 due to the biggest bet in 30 years being placed on Rage to win. Guess that would be Simon then?

Love this game. Anyone who was around in NES era and played and loved the orgional should like this game. It is so fecking hard though.

As i said Stain, that is just my take on it. No doubt others have very different interprutations of the reasoning then me. All of which are neither right nor wrong. As i tried to imply i think those opposed are thinking way to complex about it. There is no conspiracy, no stunts etc. Just a lot of people sick to death of the same thing every year. As the bettingpress call it "The Karaoke King" vs "The Musicians". A lot of people don't want to see another x factor song being number 1 at xmas again. It is nothing personel about the guy who won. It is not even really personel about Cowell. But his comments ****ed off a lot of people when really he should of said nothing. What will be will be. I would love a return to the music industry before the reality boom, im sure most people would. I dunno, Prodigy do come across a bit "**** em and their law" to me

The point is mate and i mean this in the greatest of respects. It is about having a choice. If you read the full interview with Tom which i think will be up soon he makes many good comments about how the reality tv show industry has made it harder for musicians. People think by going on a show like that is their only chance of making it. Do you not find that quite tradgic? As Tom points out the UK is known around the world throughout history as being one of the main places for talented musicians. Not only this but you have a country once known for its anti establishment beliefs. You look through the years at the legends such as The Clash, Sex Pistols, Stones, Prodigy, The Who etc etc, you could go on for days. But look at us now. Our "talents" are Susan Boyle, Leona Lewis, and soon to be Joe something. Should we be putting these people up on that pedastool? Do they represent the real music of the country? No they do not. The only reason they are were they are is down to the control of the media by certain companies. For example if there was no X Factor would there be this Joe guy? If there was no Britain has talent show then would there be a Susan Boyle? No there would not. But those shows exist with the one and only goal, to make **** loads of money. You talk about Tom making money from the back of the campaign when he will. The question is how much? He has already stated that the band will donate the profits to various charities around the world. With Tom himself choosing to put his share into a charity to help young musicians in the UK. I'm not sure if it is just me but i don't see a problem with that? The guy is already very rich, and being so has not changed his attitude towards money at all. Still the same level headed guy who in my opinion is very smart. So with the proceeds from the x factor song where do you think that money goes? Does it go to the actual singer of the song? No. Does it go to itv? No. Does it get distributed out to charities? No. They have a chosen charity, which it is reported less then 1% will go to. To put that into perspective for you. If they say make £1m they will put just £10,000 into a charity. Why? Because they have already done a chairty record a few weeks ago. Remember the Michael Jackson cover? To put that into further perspective the RATM campaign has already raised almost £40,000. That is before the proceeds from the song are added to it. So in a money sense where does all that money go from the X Factor song? To Simon Cowell and his company SimCo. If you think that is fair enough then that is fine, but don't beat the whole financial comparisons out like they are the same because they are not. A group of people from this country have basically raised more money for charity then a song by someone who had months of exposure on both tv and newspapers. Simon Cowell is not a good businessmen, he just took someone elses idea (Simon Fuller) and expanded it. He was brought into the music industry by his dad at A&R. How ironic that he talks about how poor novelty records are but yet he was the one who gave us the songs by the Teletubbies/Zig and Zag and the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers ....Is that not hypocritical? Simon Cowell does not do anything with awful terrible records. He gave us those legends of the music industry Robson and Jerome, Five, Westlife, Ultimate Kaos! Then after creating his reality shows all the people that were on that. Indeed when the era of reality is over, he will be known as a musical genius! I think not. He will be remembered for what people already remember him for. Exploiting everyone he can to make more money. Once the money is gone, your on your own. As Tom says the reason this year is different is because a lot of people have thought "hang on a sec, im a bit tired of this whole same old same old every year". Before they just accepted it. It is much easier to sit there and do nothing right? But by doing that will not change anything, were continue on the same course we have been on basically since the decade started. With that decade about to end do you want to really start the new one the same way? If it is not singers on a reality tv show, it is dancing, acting, building, living in a house together, trying to get a job, trying to cook, trying to play football, living in a jungle etc etc The list really is endless. If you like those things then that is great. But should those shows impact other areas? Me personally i think winning the show should be the prize. The lad done well to beat all those other people. Winning it is a great achievement. But is then getting a number 1 off the back of all that exposure for months an achievment? Or is it more a "the past few months have built up and built up into this one momment were 1 person can cash in their cheque"? Nobody should be entitled to be number 1. As Tom says "That top spot doesn't belong to anybody - any TV show or any 90s political rock band. Let the people decide." So the point is as i said choice. A lot of you adopt the view "i can't be arsed" or "it is silly", "it is hypocritical where you tell people to buy a song which is saying to not do what people tell you". And in your own ways you are all 100% right. But in a lot of other peoples views enough is enough. These people are not asking you to do what they tell them, they are giving you another choice. One which obviously did not have the backing of a tv show for months, one that did not have the headlines of the papers etc etc. A bigtime underdog that should not stand a chance. As Tom says "My hope is that young people are smart enough to figure it out which for this year at least it's subject to debate like it hasn't in the past. There are different options to becoming a musician than lining up and auditioning for a panel." So the point is choice. You have one. Either do nothing and continue as we are. Buy the x factor song and rejoice in the fun that brings or join the anti establishment group who like others before simply just want something else. There is no right or wrong, just a preference.

Some more comments then, if you needed them. "I think we all have this belief that the Christmas number one was just amazing, a real special occasion, but actually when you look at them over recent years, it was Bob the Builder one year, Mr Blobby…there's a tradition of quite horrible songs. "I think I've done everyone a favour. Shows like Britain's Got Talent and The X Factor have actually got people more interested in music again, and are sending more people into record stores" Make sure you send a xmas card to Simon Cowell this year then, he did us a favour and he saved the music industry! Plus if this guy had talent, maybe he should earn it like everyone else used to? Singing someone elses songs once every week to me is more like Karaoke singer then someone with talent. I got nothing against x factor or the show, just the format and the way it thinks it is entitled to be number 1 simply because. The prize of winning thw show is a number 1 hit. Tom Morello (the guy who wrote and performed the song) said this about it today http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/8415750.stm "Morello told BBC 6 Music the support for his song was "heart warming, "The one thing about the X Factor show, much like our own American Idol, is if you're a viewer of the show you get to vote for one contestant or the other, but you don't really get to vote against the show itself until now." He added: "It's this machinery that puts forward a particular type of music which represents a particular kind of listener. "There are a lot of people who don't feel represented by it and this Christmas in the UK they're having their say." The guitarist said the single's position as a Christmas number one contender was an "unexpected windfall" and he plans to donate some of the proceeds to a charity which helps children progress their musical careers in the UK". So like he says if your the particular type of person who feels represented by that type of music then fair enough. Go buy your x factor song every year and play it at your new years party etc.. But if your not into that type of thing, and your sick to death of whole reality machine, and think "feck it" then buy the song. Right now they have sold 175,000 copies while the x factor guy has sold 110,000 copies. It will be a close race. If they win then great, the monopoly and attitude of people like Simon Cowell will be broken for a year. He will still make a lot of money, but it is not about how much money he makes.

Simon Cowell just released a new statement to a paper http://www.gigwise.com/news/53899/Simon-Cowell- "We've got 500,000 singles going out on Wednesday and Joe will be number one. "Why not let the kid have his moment? It's all very Scrooge. It's miserable to put down young talent. We should celebrate it." knobhead

If you asked me 11 games ago if i would take 1 loss from the next 11 league games i would of bit your hand off for it.

In the donations bit someone wanted to donate a tenner but forgot the decimal so ended up donating £1000....

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/tv_and_radio/article6957324.ece Got to love the times

I think what they mean is Rage are number 1 and Joe is number 2. If not then maybe they mean for last week were Lady Gaga was number 1.

bah, yeah good thinking

Yeah but you got to go out xmas shopping sometime. And on West Quay's speaker system will be "The greatest xmas hits ever 2010" compilation. While doing my shopping would much rather listen to something like Rage then the winner of X Factor! That would be quite funny.

http://www.nme.com/news/rage-against-the-machine/48877

Apparently MLT is coming out of retirement as he thinks his goal record could be under threat from our current number 7! Actually that is a good question. Does MLT hold the record for the most goals scored in the number 7 shirt?

The truth comes out