Musicians are a truly a breed of their own. They’re all a little bit egotistical, self centered, and whacked out of their minds, but that is what gives them their charm. At some point that charm of musical genius wears off and I can truly say that I’ve only dealt with a handful of musicians that are actually tolerable as human beings.

My very first experience with dealing with the musician persona was when I was 13. I worked for “Tom Claypool and the New Directions,” an old school country band that catered to the blue haired VFW crowd. I can’t write enough horrible things about that band, but the job was great. I learned how to set up PA systems, guitar rigs, drum kits, etc. It also gave me the chance to visit a recording studio. That was the exact point in my life that I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to record music. God, if only I could travel back in time and slap the shit out of my 13 year old self.

Your future sucks Kid!

At any rate, I’ve been involved with music, recording, and production at some rate ever since. I’ve met a ton of musicians, some of them well known, some of them talentless, and some of them amazing. Through the years, I’ve been able to categorize the most annoying hack musicians into 6 finely tuned groups.

The Pickup Artist
Listens to: Goo Goo Dolls-“Better Days”

OMG! It’s like he’s looking into my soul….

The pickup artist is commonly seen on college campuses surrounded by half-wit female groupies while strumming his refined list of acoustically performed “pussy magnet” repertoire. Look ladies, I know it seems as if he is singing about love and peace, but there’s a darker subliminal message commanding you to “let him put it there”. You’ve been warned.

The Big Break
Listens to: Molly Hatchet-“Flirtin with Disaster”

No thank you. No thank you very much.

Any fifty year old musician who has been playing night clubs and bars for 30 plus years will tell you the same story: “Man, I’ve got these labels sniffing around. I think any day all this is gonna finally pay off”. Are you fucking kidding me? Yeah, that’s exactly what modern day record labels are looking for, a 50 year old overweight, hairy, talentless nobody, who regurgitates the same cover tunes for every dive bar in a 20 mile radius. Allow me to start the intervention right now. These people need to know exactly how mediocre and invisible they are. I’m not saying it’s not a nice hobby, but good god, you will never ever, EVER, get a record deal. Comprende?

Blew It
Listens to: Alice Cooper-“Poison”

Will it ever stop? Yo! I don’t know!

Even more annoying than an old geezer who still thinks he has a shot at making it big, is the guy who found some relative level of success, only to completely blow it (or snort it up his nose). The ‘has been rock legend’ will tell you the same 10 stories over and over: “Did I ever tell you about the time I had my first threesome when I was drumming for Whitesnake? I met this pregnant chick and we were shooting heroine….” He’ll tell anyone who will listen that he’s going to get back into music and rise to the top again, right before he passes out in a narcotic induced coma.

The Band with the World’s Most Unique Sound
Listens to: Riff Raff-“In the Deep”

The newest indie-math-folk-rock-jazz fusion band, “The Asshats” drop their new single.

Let’s get one thing straight. There is NO unique music being written. Everything, and I mean everything, has already been done. About 2 minutes after a musician or band tells me their music is so unique it’s hard to classify, I give them about three bands that sound exactly the same. Try me. I fucking dare you. No sir, you are not unique. There might be a point where a band mashes together 2 totally conflicting genres of music, but that’s just stealing the sounds of two genres. That’s as unique as wearing shorts over sweatpants. You didn’t come up with a new way to wear clothes; you just meshed two things that make you look stupid.

The Tortured Artist
Listens to: Nine Inch Nails-“Everyday is the Same”

The tortured artist is more annoying and more offensive than the pickup artist, but they are slightly related. Abandonment issues and childhood trauma seem to manifest themselves into the music and social relationships. Let’s cut through the bullshit here though. Abandonment means mommy forgot to pick me up from soccer practice and childhood trauma means we had to drive a Lexus instead of a Bentley. Give me a fucking break. Plain and simple, the tortured artist is incapable of swooning potential sexual partners with music, so instead they bait them with incredibly elaborate false psychological damage…for pity sex. Believe me, when you deal with real childhood psychological trauma, the last thing you want is to stand out like a sore thumb and expose your abuse to the world through prose.

The Prima Donna
Listens to: Whitney Houston-“Queen of the Night”

Appetite for Destruction was so awesome I forgive Axl for going batshit crazy.

Prima donnas have had their egos fed so much that they have completely lost a grasp of reality. Kevin Smith told a story of how Prince wanted a camel delivered in the middle of the night and simply couldn’t understand why it was impossible. Honestly, this is our fault as fans, media, and promoters. We treat really talented people like they are modern days champions of Olympus. Some one is able to change their singing voice 3 octaves and we relentlessly follow them around for an autograph, shower them with money, and buy their hair on ebay. It’s no wonder they lose their grip on reality, but just because they’ve had their bad behaviors nurtured doesn’t make me want to give them a wedgie any less. So, watch your ass Prince.

At the end of the day, it’s the music we love, not the people playing it. We have to keep that in perspective. That doesn’t mean that we can’t appreciate people when they actually show that they are unique and creative human beings, but we have to stop worshipping people because they can do something we cannot. I’m talking directly to you Beiber fans.