Kid Rock Tells It Like It Is

Kate Richardson | August 25, 2008 3:00 am
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No matter how vile you may find Kid Rock, there’s something endearingly genuine about him. Maybe it’s his penchant for extraordinarily white-trash altercations at Waffle House or his unorthodox rejection of iTunes, but he’s just plain amusing sometimes, like some sort of wayward uncle that’s good for a few laughs at family reunions, but who you’re glad you don’t have to see more than once every few years. In a recent interview with CMT the blustery rap-rocker rattled off his thoughts on music and politics with his familiar colloquial gusto.

At a time when record companies are continuing to bemoan the decline of CD sales, Kid Rock observes, “If people had good albums, they’d be buying albums. But people are buying singles because they only have good songs.”

As evidenced by his latest album, Rock N Roll Jesus, it’s clear he’s not having a problem sustaining his success at retail. Still in the Top 10 of the all-genre Billboard 200 chart, the title has sold more than 1.6 million copies and is currently selling more than 100,000 copies per week after being released almost a year ago. He’s also enjoying a major country hit with “All Summer Long.”

In an interview with CMT Insider, Kid Rock said the music industry is failing in its efforts to create superstar acts.

“The program director at a radio station, by the way, is not the superstar,” he said. “If he was a superstar, he’d be out creating songs, but he’s not. But he wants to act like he has control and power.”

I’m not really sure where this animosity towards radio program directors came from, but what I think Kid Rock means to say is that if the program directors were the superstars they’d be out lazily exploiting the hooks of Lynyrd Skynyrd and Warren Zevon to create catchy singles.

“I truly believe that people like myself, who are in a position of entertainers in the limelight, should keep their mouth shut on politics,” he noted. “Because at the end of the day, let me tell you what I ‘m good at: I’m good at writing songs and singing. What I’m not educated in is the field of political science. And so for me to be sharing my views and influencing people of who I think they should be voting for … I think would be very irresponsible on my part. So I’ll just keep my mouth shut on that.”

Well, at least he’s honest. And if you need further proof beyond his own admission of political ignorance, look no further than the next paragraph of the article:

“I think celebrity endorsements hurt politicians,” he said. “Because as soon as somebody comes out for a politician, especially in Hollywood, when they all go, ‘I’m voting for this guy!’ — I go, ‘That’s not who I’m voting for!’ … As soon as Oprah Winfrey pops up and goes ‘Ha-la-la-la-la,’ I’m like, ‘I love Barrack Obama. I hate Oprah Winfrey.'” He adds, “I don’t hate her. I just don’t believe in her, so I don’t want any part of any of that. I think celebrities hurt politicians.”

I suppose he could still get out and encourage people to vote. His commercial would go something like “Make sure you vote this November…even if it’s just to spite Oprah.”

The crowning glory of this article is not Kid’s sage political wisdom, but rather his thoughts on the Internet:

“There’s a real problem with this Internet thing and everyone thinking they have a voice,” he said. “This is where freedom can get out of hand. Everybody should not have a voice is what we’ve just proven by the Internet. Because I’m convinced that Jesus Christ could come back onto this earth and forgive everybody’s sins, and it’d be the greatest day in mankind ever. Somebody would take a picture of him. They’d put him on a Web site like TMZ, and the first comment would be ‘Jesus is a douche bag.’ You know what I’m sayin’?

“This is what the Internet and bloggers are all about. They’re all little haters. It’s like, ‘Welcome to Haterville. Population: You!'”

All sarcasm aside, he’s got a point. While many bloggers are intelligent, articulate, and thoughtful, some are not, and I think Kid Rock’s hypothetical second coming scenario pretty much sums it up.

Kid Rock Offers Views on Music Industry, Politics … and Oprah [CMT]

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