The logical stuff, first. Among the nominees are three Uncensored Interview-heralded acts: City and Colour, nominated for Artist of the Year and Songwriter of the Year; Plants and Animals and The Stills, pitted against each other for New Group of the Year; and once again, Plants and Animals and The Stills for Alternative Album of the Year. Parc Avenue vs. Oceans Will Rise! Healthy competition! If the Stills triumph, no doubt they’ll treat themselves to some of that fancy American alcohol they like so much.

But really, we wish all three outfits could take home shiny trophies covered in glitter, magical snow that never melts and a never-ending supply of poutine. (Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it. This heart-attack on the plate may well be the secret to the Montreal music scene. Wonder if they serve it at any of the places Plants and Animals recommend above?) What we don’t understand, or perhaps want to understand, is why Nickelback has gotten the nod in no less than five different categories. Everyone loves to pick on Nickelback. We get that. We’re happy they’re around, doing their thing, and that they have fans who appreciate them. But Canada, seriously? You genuinely like these guys?

We can count on Dallas Green, at least, to direct polite, congratulatory remarks at Chad Kroeger if the latter somehow manages to wins it all.

Everyone says that radio sucks these days. In fact, people have been saying it for at least a decade. I had fond memories of listening to the radio growing up, but I was also listening to one of the coolest commercial radio stations at the time, WFNX in Boston. But even that holy grail of radio seemed dim on my last visit to the Bay State. This weekend I had the opportunity to travel down the east coast to check out some local radio, and I thought I’d share some lessons I have learned.

Someone covered “Lollipop.”
Yes, a “modern rock” band called Framing Hanley band covered a Lil Wayne song. You can listen to it over at their MySpace page–actually watch the Youtube video there for the “full version.”

311 is now “Classic Rock.”
Yep, I heard “Down” back to back with the Rolling Stones. Apparently, the Toadies are also in that genre now as well.

M.I.A. gets no props for T.I.’s “Swagga.”
Before the title came up on the radio dial, I actually thought this was T.I.’s bizarre M.I.A. remix. The song is officially titled “Swagga Like Us (feat. Jay-Z, Kanye West and Lil’ Wayne)” with no mention of M.I.A.

Casey Kasem is still alive!
And apparently when the holidays roll around, he counts down the top Christmas songs…still! Though I don’t think the “top” songs on the list have changed since I was a kid. Quite sad as they do need to sneak “Christmas in Hollis” somewhere onto the list.

Everything is filtered through Auto-Tune.
Not just the obvious stuff like Kanye West and Lil Wayne, but even listening to rock radio you can hear the weird noise that often happens when Auto-Tune is used. It’s not nearly as obvious, but it’s there.

Oh, yeah, and…
People DO, in fact, like Nickelback.

My friend Josh only eats potato chips and cereal. Occasionally he’ll eat a burger or a sandwich but mostly he has the diet of an 11-year-old latch key kid. Until six months ago he’d never eaten sushi. Though Josh does indeed love potato chips and cereal, his love of these things aren’t the sole reason he eats them.
When I was a kid my best friend’s little brother would only eat peanut butter. That was all he wanted to eat. When his parents tried to cure him of this socially awkward nut butter fancy by putting a giant bowl of it in front of him and forcing him to eat it, he ate it all and asked for more.

With Josh it’s different. He carb-loads out of laziness. Chips and cereal are easy. They’re portable, tasty, they’ll quickly remove the pangs of hunger without all of those pesky nutrients, and they’re available virtually everywhere. Josh would eat other things, unlike the peanut-butter hound, but he’s just got other priorities and a culinary deficiency. He’s surviving fine the way things are and doesn’t feel that the added bonus of eating healthier, tastier food will be worth the extra effort it will take to figure out how to cook his own vegetables.

As much as I know Josh would be less tired and have a better quality of life if he ate better, it is not my place to get angry at him for eating crap. The only thing I can do is set a good example by leaving him voicemail of me eating salad, make puking noises while he is eating chips and sprinkle green beans on his computer keyboard.  ”Oh, you haven’t eaten green beans? Oh my god, they’re sooo good. I totally discovered green beans and they’re amaaaazing, you would really love them.”
Getting angry at people who have a terrible music diet isn’t going to make anyone want to listen to “better” music. Neither is the elitist attitude surrounding much of the music scene, which is something that always bothered me and was a real turn-off the same way that some judgmental vegans make vegetarianism seem like a real drag. The truth is, most people are lazy when it comes to music and they ingest what is easy for them to access and what tastes (sounds) good. I know it’s hard to believe but to many people music isn’t their lifeblood and is really just a little icing on the debt-filled, stressed out, lives they lead.

People don’t listen to crap music because the music industry forces it on them. The music industry provides people with the easy to package, sugary highs they are asking for. A Lil’ Wayne song featuring T-pain and Chris Brown is the musical equivalent of Cookie Crunch cereal. When that crap first came out I couldn’t believe that anyone in their right mind would eat that shit–let alone feed it to their kids–but they do. Thankfully nobody is ever going to get an impacted bowel or Type 2 diabetes from Nickelback.

Let’s face it, indie music is the farmer’s market of the music industry. It’s not ever going to have mass appeal, but let’s just appreciate it for what it is and make sure that it’s always available when people come to their senses.

That’s okay though, because you know who will be on board with my newfound Nickelback love? Awesome UI-Approved, Must-See CMJ Marathon Artist Juliana Hatfield! Check it out. Nickelback’s her guilty pleasure!

Once our ears were finally cleansed of the shitfest, my friend (let’s call him Joe The Plumber) looked at me and said “God I just wish Nickelback would die.” Any sane, patriotic, God-fearing person’s first instinct would be to nod their head and agree, but right then and there I had an epiphany of sorts–music NEEDS Nickelback.

Jeremy from Project Jenny Project Jan might rightfully have a beef with major labels throwing craploads of money at crap bands, but one needs to look at the BIG picture here–if it weren’t for those crap bands, we’d have no basis to judge actual GOOD music against. Remember, good cannot be defined without evil, existence without nothingness–you get the idea.

So how could anyone make a subjective judgment about the quality of music without having the absolute extreme opposite to contrast against? Yes, Nickelback sucks giant steaming shit balls through a pea-sized vacuum–their music is obnoxiously commercial, bland, and derivative of itself–but if it didn’t exist, how would we truly know what the lowest end of the spectrum sounded like?

Fair readers, I give you my own personal tool to help you judge music for yourself, The Nickelback Shitmus Test

Hey, hate bad music all you want, but at the very least, respect it for allowing you to draw a distinct parallel between music of value and disposable trash. Thank you, Nickelback, for existing.

Ask any hipster what they think about a very popular band and they will get visibly angry at worst, or laugh and pretend to like them ironically. No self respecting hipster can say they earnestly like the Pussycat Dolls unless they can construe their work as “societal commentary.” Just say the word Nickelback and see indie rockers become visibly angry. No, really! Look here, here, and here:

Sorry, Project Jenny, Project Jan, but this is elitist and unreasonable. I am sure most indie bands today would not think Michael Jackson, U2, Elvis or the Beatles were “a bunch of bullshit” pandering to “the lowest common denominator.” Those are former top 40 acts that pretty much everyone likes, or at least respects. They are musicians who have changed the world and are famous in most countries. You’d never say someone was stupid and uncultured for liking the Beatles. Any serious musician who dismissed the Beatles out of hand just because of their popularity would be laughed offstage. So why in indie circles is it so commonplace to jump to the defensive whenever a popular band is mentioned? What makes Bruce Springsteen (a top 40 icon) have cred despite his popularity, but Britney Spears be ridiculed based on it? Jealous, much?

I am not saying every top 40 song is a work of art just because it’s popular. But likewise, popularity doesn’t make it worthless either. Bands that can sustain top 40 status over decades tend to be those we deem “classic,” not “lowest common denominator.” The more appealing a song is to such a broad range of people, the more it is usually considered well written. If you don’t like Three Doors Down, that’s fine. But dislike them because of their music, not because they are popular. You’re not a better musician just because no one’s heard of your band, and you’re not a worse one just because you’re on the radio.

Now let’s underline that I am not a Nickelback fan. Previous to reading their Wikipedia entry five minutes ago, I could not name one song by them. I assume I have heard them but I couldn’t tell you anything about their music. So this defense is not out of a fanboy love of Nickelback.

Let’s say you’re in an awesome band. You make amazing music and the world loves you (basically, what happens when you play Guitar Hero). You get so much money and power, you call the shots. If you care about music, wouldn’t you support the indie movement (not to mention your profits) by going indie? As a person who supports indie musicians, how can you vilify any band that tries to take profits away from corporations, and increase the popularity of the indie movement in terms of money and people? Go Nickelback, I say!

And if the point of being in a band is to reach the largest number of people with your awesome music, why not take every opportunity to make that possible? And if you can, with your money and power, help other bands do the same, how can I argue?

Now you may say that the music of Nickelback could not be called awesome. Fine. But their bringing the issue of independently producing music controlled by and benefiting the artist to a large group of people who wouldn’t normally care about the issue IS awesome. And for those about to rock independently, I salute you, Nickelback.

But it’s not just me! Bands love selling out if it gets more people to their music. And so why shouldn’t the reverse be true? Man in Gray discussed the difference between having an indie versus major label in terms of how it can benefit your music, not your cred. And isn’t that ultimately what it’s about? Music? Not cred?

With a video title like “Go Ahead, Sell Out!” you can imagine they aren’t crying over Nickelback ruining indie

That’s right folks, Nickelback are going indie. Well, sort of. I still don’t buy these Live Nation 360 bullshit deals as “going indie,” but a lot of people for some reason or another do. So basically the most corporately bland, musically untalented, tear-your-fucking-ears-off-annoying band in the world (they’re from Canada to boot!) will now be considered by most of the music business and fans as “indie.” If you’ll excuse me for one second, there seems to be something stuck in the barrel of my hair-trigger sensitive shotgun, let me have a good look inside.

Indie artists aren’t supposed to be corporate tools with bad fashion sense, terrible haircuts, and one three-chord-riff in their entire musical repertoire. They’re supposed to be intriguing, anti-establishment, musically experimental, and multitalented like Joseph Arthur:

So please excuse me if I seem a little bitter today. A little part of me kind of died inside.