IN THE MIX: too much tv edition

Okay, I admit it. I watch at least three hours of TV a day. I’ll even watch the Geena Davis show. But some things are too scary to even channel-flip through. Consider this headline regarding the next edition of VH1’s “Divas Live”: “Kid Rock, Backstreet Boys To Join In Salute To Aretha Franklin.”

PRESCIENCE

On Spring Break I finally got to watch cable (“Behind the Music: Meat Loaf!”) and catch up on videos. Ah, mindless TV. Besides learning that the insanely catchy “Oochie Wally” (by Queensbridge’s Finest) has the raunchiest video ever, I also learnt that Shea Seger’s “Last Time” has just been added to MTV2’s “Artists to Watch” show. Which makes it about three months since I wrote about her in this column. Remember, you read it here first.

As for other performers that deserve attention: I can’t get the chorus of Moochie Mack’s “Ghetto Bounce” (“If you’re ghetto and you know it bounce bounce”) out of my head. What’s up with nursery rhyme in hip-hop choruses? Nelly’s “Country Grammar (Hot Shit).” “That’s Cool,” the new single by Silkk the Shocker and Trina, reminds me of a raunchier version of Positive K’s “I Got A Man”—I think it’s just the male-female call/response format.

DRESSED FOR SUCCESS

I just discovered that clips from the ultimate bad-TV guilty-pleasure show, “MTV Undressed,” are available on the Net. I’ll redeem myself by saying that “Undressed” actually features decent indie music, increasingly a rarity for an MTV show. Where else on that now dumbed-down channel would you get to hear the New Duncan Imperials or Shivaree? Of course, they also play Ricky Martin and other unfortunate musical mistakes. So really I have no excuse.

MUSIC

Names of groups formed by various national editions of “Popstars”: Eden’s Crush (U.S.), Bardot (Australia), Hear’Say (Britain), Sugar Jones (Canada), True Bliss (New Zealand). The fact that none of these groups have been particularly successful outside their home countries as of yet might imply that without the drama of TV they are, how do you say, crap?

BOSTON STRANGLER

Why is it everytime I watch “Ally McBeal” Vonda Shepherd is butchering yet another great Motown song?

YOURS FAITHFULLY

A big thank you to all those who wrote in with examples of epistolary songs. Here’s the full list: “One  Love” by Nas, “The Light” by Common, and the ever-classic “Hello Mudda Hello Fadda” (all suggested by James E. Carmichael ’01), “Dear Elpee” by Sole (Ryan J. Kuo ’04), “Anchored Down in Anchorage” by Michelle Shocked (Mary E. Bridges ’01), “Unsent” by Alanis Morisette (Jon M. Vatner ’01), “Ballad of Chasey Lain” by the Bloodhound Gang (Alex J. Kauffmann ’02), and “Pen Pals” by Sloan (Thalia S.Field ’03, our eminent music editor).

MTV Makes You Want To Smoke Crack?

E-mail dsng@fas.harvard.edu or visit www.dsng.net.