Turns out ROCK is not dead...

Near the end of December 2013 I share my prediction for the music industry in 2014. Lots of people do this every year in Dec, but I rarely see anyone actually following up and sharing if any of their predictions came true or not...so I decided I'd do that. If some of my predictions become true or it becomes fairly obvious that the prediction is not going to come true, I'll blog about it. 

Here's my first one...

First...the prediction. 

The Return Of Rock – This one is more of a hope than a prediction. People have been predicting the death of rock going all the way back to when Elvis first joined the army. The latest ‘cause’ of the unavoidable death of rock was supposed to be the increase in popularity of EDM and DJs, but even though there wasn’t really any ‘big’ rock releases in 2013, Rock was far from being dead and I think in 2014 you might see a bit of a come back. People are tired of the over saturation of pop music, the obvious use of auto tune and the lack of legitimately talent musicians. In 2013 we saw some new pure rock bands grow in popularity. Monster Truck, The Sheepdogs, One Bad Son and others have gone back to playing real rock music and people are getting back into it with them. I anxious to see if this trend continues in 2014. 

Turns out I may have been slightly off on the date...looks like ROCK was alive an well in 2013. According to Neilsen Soundscan (pretty much the authority when it comes to reporting music sales) indicated that the top selling genre in 2013 was ROCK. (Alternative was #3 and Hard Music was #5). So in 2014 we may not see the return of ROCK, but hopefully we will see it continue to rise. 

Music’s Biggest Douchebags: 2013 Edition

Alan Cross posted this earlier this week. Is there anyone you would like to add to this list? 

Music’s Biggest Douchebags: 2013 Edition

This handy list comes courtesy of the Houston Press.  You can read the rationale for the picks here, but this is your top-line summary:

1.  Ian Watkins: Ex-lead singer of Lostprophets and now a convicted pedophile.

2.  Tim Lambesis:  Singer for As I Lay Dying who’s charged with  hiring a hitman to kill his wife.

3.  Greg Ginn:  Black Flag dude who managed to alienated everyone ever associated with this legendary band.

4.  Kanye West:  Do I need to elaborate?

5.  Miley Cyrus:  PUT THE TONGUE AWAY, FER CRISSAKES!

What I Listened To Most In 2013

Every year at this time, I like to look at the play count on my iTunes to see which songs I listened to the most during the year, before reseting the play count and starting over on Jan 1st. 

I've been doing this for about 5 years now. At one point I assumed no one was really paying attention and so I didn't share my Top 10 list on facebook at the end of 2011. Much to my surprise I actually had people messaging me asking where my Top 10 was. This year I even had some people send me messages to remind me to do it. So I guess it's nice to know people are paying attention. 

To enhance my list a bit this year, decided to try and include either a link to the video or somewhere, where you can listen to the track. 

As always, feel free to share your thoughts on my list and the tracks. You are also more than welcome to share/post your Top 10 most listen to songs as well. 

Here's the list:

#10 One Bad Son - Rustbucket

#9 Monster Truck - Sweet Mountain River


#8 Halestorm - Here's To Use


#7 Five Finger Death Punch - Lift Me Up (featuring Rob Halford)


#6 Heaven's Basement - Fire, Fire


#5 Black Label Society (Pride & Glory) - Losin' Your Mind

#4 Shelbi - Downtown

#3 Scorpion Child - Polygon Of Eyes


#2 Pop Evil - Trenches


#1 Drowning Pool - Saturday Night