Bjorn Posted July 21, 2014 At its root the thing is: if you feel the song is aimed at people who are not able to language good, it's offensive and denigrating. If you feel it's aimed at people who are not willing to typ wel, it's a justifiable put-down. And 10-15 years ago, I would have been willing to draw the line between those two camps. Back then, I'd have loved this song! But the experiences with my family has convinced me that those two camps don't exist, or even if they do, an outside observer is unable to differentiate between them. So any belittling humor at either camp's expense is de facto humor at both camps. And, again, that doesn't even get into the class/race issues that prescriptive grammar humor has baked into it. And again, I think you can make grammar jokes! I think there's a lot of grammar humor that does not put down people who struggle with proper English. Around 1 in 5 people (60+ million people) in the US have a learning disability of some sort, the most common of which is dyslexia. 20+ million people live in deep poverty, and we know how that affects education. I'm no longer comfortable saying that all the people who write poorly online do so because they are lazy or not willing to improve their writing skills. I don't see what you're seeing but also I regret making my post because at its root this fucking argument - is it okay to make jokes?! - is my least favorite argument to ever have. So I'm bailing out. Feel free to be angry with him. I think the song is hilarious. You can leave the discussion if you want, that's always your prerogative. But I'll try to point out what's wrong with a couple of parts: If you can't write in the proper way If you don't know how to conjugate Maybe you flunked that class And maybe now you find That people mock you online That's not making fun of people who write "u r 2 kewl". That's making fun of kids who struggled in school. Those lines are accurate representations of the lives of both my wife and daughter. They failed tests and classes because of their dyslexia and they limit their written online activities because they don't want to be made fun of. I hate these word crimes You really need a Full time proofreader You dumb mouth-breather Well, you should hire Some cunning linguist To help you distinguish What is proper English I am my wife's proofreader. Anytime she needs to send a long email or post anything online that's more than a few sentences long, she asks me to read over it. Because there will be spelling errors. There will be grammar errors. In college, she had to have friends or the English lab read over everything she turned in, just to clean up the routine spelling and grammar errors in her writing. Not because she's dumb, not because she's uneducated. Because her brain does not link sound to symbol in the same way as other people. She was just going into high school when she was finally diagnosed with dyslexia, at a time when schools were still resistant to recognizing dyslexics as just as intelligent as everyone else, they just learned differently. Multiple times they tried to remove her from regular classrooms, "for her own good", which would have resulted in her having a fraction of the education she has now. She went on to earn two degrees from universities, but still remembers a junior high teacher telling her she was dumb and didn't belong in that class because she struggled to read. Her mastery of the written language as an adult would be much better if she hadn't have had teachers and administrators actively sabotaging her education as a kid, because they didn't understand how she learned. The things in that song are accurate representations of what dyslexics deal with, and Weird Al's response to them is that they are dumb, moronic mouthbreathers. The kinds of insults they grew up with, so it's still part of the literal reality of their life (I keep using that word since he made sure the had to get that in there as well). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Erkki Posted July 21, 2014 I tried to listen to the Weird Al album, but to me it is obnoxious -- the music, it's just not my taste, enough outside of my range to not be able to judge the quality even. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
osmosisch Posted July 21, 2014 And 10-15 years ago, I would have been willing to draw the line between those two camps. Back then, I'd have loved this song! But the experiences with my family has convinced me that those two camps don't exist, or even if they do, an outside observer is unable to differentiate between them.This is what makes me lean to your side of the argument to be honest. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Jay Tholen Posted July 21, 2014 I tried to listen to the Weird Al album, but to me it is obnoxious -- the music, it's just not my taste, enough outside of my range to not be able to judge the quality even. I've gotta say, save for Jackson Park Express, I'm not big on it at all. I don't mind songs being parodies, but the writing in most of these seemed a bit weak. For as much as he makes fun of buzzwords and cheap namedropping, he does an awful lot of it on this record. Way too much referential humor this time around. :'( Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Trip Hazard Posted July 22, 2014 A few posts back, I said I really liked Word Crimes. It flows well, the video specifically was well put together, he made some points about grammar which I think some people do intentionally slip up on and which bother me, so I agreed with that. But, yeah, absolutely it could have been done with a lot less venom, and I really don't think it only makes fun of people who deliberately misuse and abuse grammar. Thankfully, I'm pretty good when it comes to writing and my grammar is reasonable, but if I was hearing that song and I wasn't so confident, I would have felt degraded and that any problems I had were all my own fault. I didn't consider that at the time but it's an important perspective to be mindful of. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Nachimir Posted July 22, 2014 Summer! http://soundcloud.com/porter-records/kona-triangle-airlock Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ariskany_evan Posted July 22, 2014 On repeat this morning. The wobbly weirdness in the latter half kills me. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TheLastBaron Posted July 23, 2014 I was worried the new RX Bandits album was going to be bad because I thought they had broken up and then I saw the album art and thought it looked really bad so I was pessimistic. So far I'm digging it though. I still miss when they had horns, but I liked their last album. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
feelthedarkness Posted July 24, 2014 against sensibility, i'm digging this new ICEAGE: they also hold the honor of the band i've seen tune the longest but never actually winding up in tune. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ariskany_evan Posted July 25, 2014 TEXTURE for those of you in need of texture. TGIFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Stuart Posted July 25, 2014 Absolute 100% distilled bliss in musical form. The first song, goddamn...0:14 made me slump back in my chair. http://astronote.bandcamp.com/album/astroblacked Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Erkki Posted July 27, 2014 A colleague put this on while we were playing Mansions of Madness this week: http://mynoise.net/ It's pretty cool, generator for all kinds of ambient sounds. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Twig Posted July 28, 2014 I just learned there's a new Kimbra album coming out next month and I'm in excite mode. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Trip Hazard Posted July 28, 2014 I'm not massively keen on Hideaway as a track (though I do prefer it to quite a lot of recent chart stuff) but that video is fantastic. Just loads of excellent dancing! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Nappi Posted July 28, 2014 Agreed. Fantastic stuff! Reminds me of the Michel Gondry's Kylie Minogue video (which was discussed in the podcast some time ago actually) in that it must have been quite stressful to set up and film. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Nachimir Posted July 28, 2014 If you like the Hotline Miami soundtrack, French electro or 80's pastiche in general, you'll probably like a lot in this enormous Spotify playlist. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
atte Posted July 28, 2014 Continuing the "Camera follows a walking and singing lady" trend - one of the greats: Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Spenny Posted July 30, 2014 I'm not massively keen on Hideaway as a track (though I do prefer it to quite a lot of recent chart stuff) but that video is fantastic. Just loads of excellent dancing! Yeah, I didn't even know this song was getting radio play, had someone show me the video, which is awesome, but i also totally dig that the production sounds like a throwback to 90s pop house. Anyways, here's a Mitch Murder remix of it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Nappi Posted July 30, 2014 I hope Mirel Wagner's (Finnish singer born in Ethiopia) upcoming album will be a success: Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
N1njaSquirrel Posted August 2, 2014 Agreed. Fantastic stuff! Reminds me of the Michel Gondry's Kylie Minogue video (which was discussed in the podcast some time ago actually) in that it must have been quite stressful to set up and film. 1/n Kylies does not pick up all her dry cleaning. I feel sorry for a Kylie. Continuing the "Camera follows a walking and singing lady" trend - one of the greats: This is the British version of that: I was actually going to post something completely different, which was OK GO's new video, which is flippin sweet. I'm constantly amazed that they can think up crazy new things to do. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Trip Hazard Posted August 3, 2014 Slapped my headphones on in bed yesterday, thinking a bit of music would soothe me to sleep. Put this on and was then grooving around restlessly for the next 20 mins. I love this track so much. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nueez9Igtgg Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Twig Posted August 4, 2014 new alestorm, my pirate power metal junkfood, has arrived https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLcO-Ni6m-w Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Erkki Posted August 4, 2014 You might like this: They only have one or two good albums, though. And those are older ones that are not on Spotify or Deezer. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites