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10. Throwing The TV Out Of The Window

Coked off her tits, eyeing up the window of Travel Inn

 Thankfully this old staple has had it’s day. Due to the ever more slimline design of the present day picture-lantern, throwing a television set out of a window has lost some of it’s charm. It loses some of it’s spontaneity when you have to carry around a few tools just so you can dislodge it from it’s wall mount.  They are now so sleek that if you were so inclined to hoke it out the window of a premier travel inn it’d probably ride the sweet summer breeze and descend gently like a leaf onto the welcoming pavement below. Yer man from American Beauty will record the whole thing on his camera, proclaim it to be one of the most beautiful things he’s ever seen and Mena Suvari will take off all her clothes. Rejoice.

9. Groupies

She'll only break your heart, on an internet forum

 The Holy Grail. A woman who, despite your greasy hair, questionable odour and the fact your amp weighs more than you , will still want to you to defile her simply because you’ve barely mastered the C – D – Eminor chord progression and penned a cult anthem ‘The Smell of Your Dreams’. THE WHORE IS NO MORE! At least not as we’ve come to know and lust anyway. The internet has created a paradigm shift within the realm of rock n’ roll – discussion forums have been specifically set up for the groupie, were they can boast of their sexual achievements to their brethren. The groupie/musician relationship has been subverted to the extent that the musician is now the trophy. Which can only be a good thing, monogamy is underrated you decadent heathens. There is a lot of post-match analysis on these boards (so I’m told, I swear), so if you plan on letting your testicles make some important decisions in the future, make sure you bring your best game.

8. What Goes On The Road, Stays On The Road

"I was so wasted on our tour"

 Bollocks. If what goes on the road stays on the road, why do we know so much about what goes on the road? Someone in administration needs to step back and question whether they are adhering to the business ethos. The only thing that stays on the road is the scrabble marathons, because apparently they don’t  make for good stories. ‘Oh man I was so wasted, I thought my hands were my feet and I woke up with my shoes on them. But I can’t tell you about it. What goes on the road stays on the road and all that. I’ve got that motto tattooed on my back, got it done when I was on the road in France, but I can’t talk about it, what goes on the road stays on the road’. Pfft!

7. Encores

The Ultimate Encore

 This is the rock n’ roll equivalent of refusing tea at a wake:

‘Ach no, I couldn’t possibly, sure I just had a glass of milk before I left the house. Ach sure maybe a wee one, where are the sandwiches? Oh never mind, here they are, left of the cadaver…’

This roughly* translates into the band’s flourish and stage exeunt followed by their inevitable return. This is a cliché I am willing to indulge though. It’s familiarity is comforting in these unsure times.**

*very roughly, so rough that it doesn’t at all.

**for further reading, see my views on monogamy in ‘Groupies’.

 

6. The Crazy Drummer

Mad as a bag of spiders

This slightly unhinged yet undeniably charming creature has been causing havoc for the best part of a century now, but as delineated in ‘10. Throwing the tv out of the window’, their natural habits have been found to be somewhat less indulged as of late. The precarious state of the music industry has rendered the former wildman a polite, straight 4/4 to the floor sort of fella. Hotel room cleaners the world over rejoice and in the end that’s what we want, don’t we? Because they are usually foreign, and if you don’t want them happy that makes you a xenophobe. So there.

5. The ‘Man’  

The Man

 STICK IT TO THE MAN! YEAH STICK IT! LOOK AT HIM THERE WITH HIS SUIT AND TIE HE PROBABLY EARNED THROUGH HARD WORK – CONFORMIST! Rage Against The Machine stuck it to the man once, inadvertently of course, being the shy types. They became the horse in which the internet cavalry trampled down the man (the man being affable Joe McElderry off thon X-Factor). The pleasant young chap was denied his Christmas number 1 by the RATM’s ‘Killing In The Name Off’. Take that, the man! GRRR.

4. Dying Aged 27 

Club 27 drinks are free...

‘Forever 27‘ or ‘The  27 club‘ makes it sound like an 18-30′s holiday rep drinking game, and in a way it is. Everyone ends up the same – in a pool covered in vomit and other fluidly unmentionables, just like that fondly remembered weekend in Ibiza. Notable patrons of the club left behind by the rep’s after a mad night hard trancin’ are: Robert Johnson, Brian Jones, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison and Kurt Cobain. Richey Edwards of Manic Street Preachers is presumed dead 1st February 1995 which would make him forever 27, although according to one of the reps he was last seen wearing a lady’s dress and heading towards Amnesia completely wiped out. Could’ve been Nicky Wire though.

3. Defining A Generation

Hilarious caption

Webster’s dictionary defines a generation as ‘coevals: all the people living at the same time or of approximately the same age’. As simple as that, they didn’t even have to release the difficult second album, the mainstream friendly third and the cocaine fuelled fourth to define a generation either. I bet the Webster’s are still happily married too.

2. The Guitarist/Singer Relationship   

World's worst hen party

 As sexually ambiguous as an adrogynous man giving Desperate Houswives a lukewarm review, this relationship is often pivotal to the dynamic of the band. There ambivalence towards eachother is heightened more by the innate power struggle betwixt them. Keith is thinking- ‘Why does he get the attention of all the ladies? he looks like Leslie Ash.’ Mick is thinking- ‘I can’t help feel the phallic nature of Keith’s guitar is a double edged sword. It’s sexual imagery must certainly divert the attention from me. On the other hand, it’s distracted people from noticing the whole Leslie Ash thing.’ So as you can see, it is entirely essential.

  1.The Tortured Artist

You couldn't rely on him to fix your car

Because we just don’t see the world as clear they do. They know, man. THEY KNOW. as poet Alison Monet Megan Fox’s abdomen recently preached-  ‘Those who danced were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.’ Shine on you crazy diamonds and all that, but don’t fall into to the trap of thinking that it’s a necessity to be tortured to be an artist. Bruce Springsteen isn’t, and he is simply swell. He’s so in touch with the common man he’s probably washing your windows as you read this, recognizing the quiet yet noble heroism of such an everyday task. He is class, so he is.

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