GUEST SHOT! Part 319: The Musical Crimes of LeBrain (by Mrs. LeBrain)

I really had this coming.  In Part 314 (The Musical Crimes of Mrs. LeBrain) I exposed the somewhat embarrassing contents of Jen’s CD wallet.  I knew retribution would come.  Enjoy this penultimate episode of Record Store Tales, and its final guest shot, courtesy of Mrs. LeBrain.  (Warning:  LOTS of pictures!)

By MRS. LeBRAIN

RECORD STORE TALES Part 319: The Musical Crimes of LeBrain

#10 HIM – And Love Said No.  That deep dark gothic prince Ville Valo makes lonely girls swoon, but he is also hanging out on LeBrain’s shelf.

#9 Soundtrack – SMALL SOLDIERS.  I don’t know how this made it into the LeBrain home.  I understand his need for everything Geddy Lee has ever created, but “Mixed by DJ Z-Trip“??  Is that really worth it?  (Not to mention that you have to rock out to Bone Thugs-N-Harmony to get there.)

#8 ROD STEWART – “If We Fall In Love Tonight” CD single.  Going through my adventure here, I came across this single, designed to get the listener to first base.  YOU’RE MARRIED. THAT SHIT DOESN’T NEED TO STAY.

#7 Soundtrack – THE KARATE KID, Part III.  “Wax on, wax off.”  The case and book for this CD do not meet the demanding criteria that LeBrain enforces on his collection, but neither does the track list.  (I don’t know who most of these people are, but I have heard of the Pointer Sisters.)

#6 WOODSTOCK 99 – Various.  Look at the first six tracks from crap bands, and try not to laugh (a challenging task).  The second CD is just as bad.

#5 Soundtrack – SON IN LAW.  The Pauly Shore franchise was known for making really bad movies.  The soundtracks are not much better and this shouldn’t be taking up valuable shelf space.

#4 ELMOPALOOZA – Various.  If LeBrain were a daddy, this CD might make sense (Steven Tyler has a song about trash).  But LeBrain is childless, and Tickle-Me-Elmo is pretty pointless here!

#3 ZZ TOP: A Tribute From Friends – Various.  Three words:

MIKE OWNS NICKELBACK!

#2 AVRIL LAVIGNE – The Lavigne Collection (see below).  In Part 314, LeBrain threw me under the bus for wanting to marry Joey Mac from New Kids on the Block, 25 years ago.  Payback time!  Just because he wanted to be her “Sk8tr Boi” doesn’t mean he needed to buy her entire repertoire.

And #1! HIT ZONE 4 – Various.  LeBrain’s messiest musical moments have been in his “Various” section, but this one takes the cake.  My husband owns tracks by NSync, the Backstreet Boys and Boyz II Men?  And to top it off this boy band festival, here’s Hanson!  Regardless, I think the most disturbing thing about this CD is cover.  Look at the scratches and scrapes on the case.  This tells me the CD has been well enjoyed.

CONCLUSION:  

LeBrain, with all the mess on YOUR shelves, you really can’t make fun of me.  But no matter what crap you listen to, you’re still mine.

– Mrs. LeBrain

NEXT TIME ON RECORD STORE TALES…

End of the Line!

 

85 comments

  2. Ok, ok, I can’t really abide these choices here Mike, not as a whole. I give you a pass on the Stewart cd, at least you got a Tom Waits track. (not the first, he even covered Downtown Train, a great Rod cover btw, ftw). I can’t wait for Rod’s Waits tribute cd!! The Blonde Rider? haha. You would never catch me dead with those Soundtracks though. Good job Jen!

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  5. That’s awesome! I don’t have any crap CDs but if you dig out what’s left of my cassette tape collection, you might find Gowan’s “Strange animal”. Worst offender, I’m afraid. On another note, I was looking at the Woodstock track listing and found myself marvelling at how terrible that lineup was. What happened to the organizers in the five years date the other one?!

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      1. I dunno. Do I have to include the ones that were merged into my set once my wife and I began cohabiting? If so, I’ve got a couple Alanis Morissette albums and the Titanic soundtrack.

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        1. I have Jagged Little Pill and Supposed Former… here, and both stand up as good albums to this day. No worries there.

          Titanic… I don’t know what’s on it but I remember Celine Dion… that’s an acquired taste. Lots of folks like her, though, or she wouldn’t be where she is.

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        1. To be totally honest, and all deference to your tastes, but I have always thought Oasis was shite. Never liked ’em. And I tried! But I know that Mike’s blog is not the place to say such a thing, so I supposed I should assume the crash position now. [does so].

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        4. I’m partial to their first two but also some of the later stuff on Heathen Chemistry and Don’t believe the truth.

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      1. Hmm. I’ll think about it. Don’t know if I want Kevin on board though. He is a MUSIC SNOB. And what’s worse, I share his tastes in music. Where we deviate is the 80s new wave. He’s not a huge fan of anything that’s out now either.

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        2. Do it!

          I have my preferences…but I am wide open to those with different tastes than my own. Kevin…not so much. I mean, I don’t like Country music, but I will defend your right to listen to it! I am the musical Voltaire! lol

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  7. I gotta be honest here, Dude. This isn’t so bad. If I were to look to my own collection and compare it to this being the worst in yours, I’d say you have it pretty good. It’s one of the downsides to being interested in all types of music, and willing to try just about anything once. Sometimes, the crap washes ashore. Those are usually the discs that get purged first, but at any one time I’m likely to have all sorts of stuff here that some might laugh at.

    But it’s all subjective. As an amateur (read: terrible) musician myself, I can usually find something to appreciate in just about anything. Song structure, clever wordplay, a cool drum fill or two… something. Doesn’t mean I’m going to love it, doesn’t mean I’ll even listen to it more than once, but I might be the most forgiving of the lot, here. I’ll bet if these guys did a tour of my shelves, I’d get laughed outta town because of some of it, And that’s OK. To each their own tastes.

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      1. Oh, right, um… Hahaha Lebrain WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!?!? Oh man that’s some real crap, right there. Seriously. What about collection integrity? And yet you keep that crap around? Hahaha oh man BURN. Good one Mrs. Lebrain!

        ;)

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  10. I own the Small Soldiers cd as well. It should not be on this list. It has a lot of great tunes. I have a lot of crap music as well, and yes, I have some Nickelback. I think most people in Canada do, we just don’t want to admit it.

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    1. Hey BrianZinger, you inspired me to do a survey of my collection. Do I have any Nickelback in my stacks?

      For perspective, my iTunes lists 34,218 songs (92.7 days, 126.03GB).

      Of those 34,218, I have one song that is only Nickelback-related: I own the soundtrack for the first Spider-Man movie, which has the song Hero on it. It features Nickelback’s singer and their bassist, as well as Tyler Connolly (Theory Of A Deadman), Josey Scott (Saliva) and, its saving grace, Matt Cameron (Pearl Jam, Soundgarden) on drums.

      So, I guess 2 Nickelback members, and one ToaD member (which sounds like NB to me) means my collection does contain a small degree of it.

      But that’s still 34,217 songs that aren’t them.

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      1. I hate to admit that I own 2 early Nickelback cd’s.
        I think the sad state of affairs that was post-grunge rock in the late 90’s and early 2000’s allowed mediocre bands like Nickelback to become popular. It wasn’t that they were that good, it was that much of the rest of the music was crap. I must say I don’t listen to them anymore, but back in the day I thought that they had a little promise early on. Now, as the father of a teen girl, their lyrics creep me out
        .

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        1. Oh I totally get that. My daughters only 3, but I can just imagine. Did you ever see Bad Boys II, when they go to the door to meet the boy who’s come to pick up the daughter for a date, and they’re pretending to be drunk and waving their guns around? Haha that’ll be me! ;)

          It is true, rock music hit a real lull, and the electronic elements started their tenacious creep into everything. There were still bands flying the flag, of course, but things got tough for a little while.

          I will admit, back when we lived in Montreal, I found a copy of The State by Nickelback for $1.99 and I bought it because I had never heard of them. I didn’t mind it, at the time. I used to do that a lot, there was a shop on Ste-Catherines called C’Dement (I don’t know if it’s still there) and they had a bin up front of CDs $0.99-$4.99. I used to get all kinds of stuff from there, just to try them out. But yeah, the Nickelback CD would have sold off with the rest of the pile of stuff I wasn’t keeping, all so I could get more new stuff to try!

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  11. Looking at these CDs, I was able to figure out why (nearly) all of them were purchased – for just one track in most cases, to complete your respective collections of specific artists. But I can’t say that for Avril Lavigne. Jesus Christ – that’s WAY worse than Jen liking New Kids WHEN SHE WAS A KID. I give a pass on everything except Mrs. Nickelback.

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    2. I was never a fan of Avril(or Chavril for that matter), but she must have been loved in Canada at least. Her debut album has sold 1 million copies in Canada. The same amount as Back in Black. Not a bad debut, eh. Possibly the same post-grunge, lesser talent effect, but she had the right look and sound to appeal to the young male and female listeners in the day.

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      1. She was rock enough for me at the time. And it’s like you said last time, there was a dull period in rock where it seemed to be dying and you had to find other artists.

        But also I needed rock I could listen to in-store, and some of it I naturally liked enough to buy it, I admit it.

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  12. Also, Mrs. Lebrain: r.e. Karate Kid CD…

    You don’t remember Glen Medeiros? His song Nothing’s Gonna Change My Love For You? Man, that thing was everywhere for a while. Youtube it. You’ll know it. [I won’t link to it here, Mike, thus maintaining rawk integrity on your site. You’re welcome.

    Also, Bill Conti also did the Rocky music. And I’ll bet you know who Winger is, from Mike talking the rawk.

    Does any of that help? :)

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  14. Gotta give you credit for owning everything Geddy Lee. As for the soundtrack for Son in law, Thank God I’m a Country Boy is worth having it. Of course, I have the original John Denver album. Loved his stuff until he got into some weird new age crap in the early 80’s.

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      1. That’s good to hear – newer Adam Sandler movies aren’t always, how do you say, critical darlings – glad to hear that one with Andy Samberg had some laughs!
        Incidentally – Brooklyn 99 (Samberg’s TV show) is terrific

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        1. I was really unfamiliar was Samberg before. I’ll check it out. He was sorta the “straight guy” in this one.

          Also I learned that Susan Sarandon’s daughter is hawt.

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        2. Good to know! I believe you said you’ve invested in Netflix? They’ve only got one season of 9-9 (Sandler, perhaps unsurprisingly, makes a cameo) but it’s 20-odd episodes of brilliance

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        4. Haven’t seen it yet – I attempted the one where he’s his own twin and couldn’t make it beyond the first 20 minutes.
          So hearing that’s my boy was somewhat of a return to form is encouraging!

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  16. Absolutely magic. There’s some stuff in there that has honestly made me laugh so hard the neighbours are banging on the walls. Avril, that Hit Zone thing and Elmopalooza (??). Excellent! You’ll be posting revisionist reviews of each of these I hope …

    …absolutely brilliant post.

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  18. Being quite young and small, my CD collection is thankfully quite devoid of sin worthy crap. I guess the only “crime” I could claim to have in there is that I gave money to Paul Di’Anno, but I couldn’t help it, it was a great disc.

    Outside of my CD collection and into my tastes in general, there is one song I like that is definitely very sin worthy, but not even Holen is going to weasel that one out of me.

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  19. As I stated above, my CD collection is thankfully devoid on sin-worthy stuff, but my hard drive has some…uncharacteristic tunes, shall we say for a metalhead such as me. Mostly holdovers from the dark times before I discovered metal.

    What? Was I inspired to look at this while finishing my work on tonight’s show? No…uh..what gives you that idea?

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