Holy crap.

Anybody ever hear of Hinder? I hadn't either, until I turned on the TV this morning and VH1 was showing a video by them. Such are the dangers of watching "I Love the '90s" late at night (it was '98 last night--remember the dancing baby?).

The only reason I even bring it up is that they suck. And I mean suck in ways I can't even conceive of, and it made me think: I'm not a very critical writer, in the sense that I don't spend a lot of time talking about what I don't like. I tend to like this, because I feel like my job isn't to hand down judgements on what's good and what isn't, but rather to find the things that I think are really unique, special and worth listening to and give 'em a little nudge or just talk about why I think they're important in the hopes that people might get motivated to go get some great new music.

Hinder reminded me that there's a truly gigantic swath of absolute trash clogging the airwaves and record stores of America. I'm not going to give it any more time than just to say please. Please step away from the piles of pseudo-heavy sentimental bullshit that get stuffed down your craw by MTV and VH1 and Clear Channel and check out something that's worth something. Like, maybe something from the post below.

All right. Done. Sorry to get all Tom Hallett on you there.