Coldplay’s forthcoming Viva la Vida, or Death and All His Friends has the Guardian moaning about the curse of the bad album title, raising the spectre of the Smashing Pumpkins’ Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, Fiona Apple’s When The Pawn…, and Public Enemy’s Muse Sick-n-Hour Mess Age to make the case that Vida‘s awkward title will probably sink the album, sales-wise. (Well, at least EMI will have something else to blame for the inevitably disappointing numbers besides “softening market conditions.”) But surely we’ve all bought unfortunately titled albums in an effort to look past awkward syntax and bad puns by musicians whose output we trust? I know I have, so after the jump, I run down five owned-by-me full-lengths that I generally only refer to as “that album by those guys, you know which one I mean.” (For what it’s worth, the best-titled in my collection is Ill Ease’s All Systems A-Go-Go!, but that particular honor can change at any moment.)
After a nearly decade of trying to get America to give a shit about him, British superstar Robbie Williams has started claiming his new ambition is hunting UFOs. While a step down from his plans to build a multi-million dollar observatory and start his own cult, he will get to explore his otherworldly interests in a radio documentary titled Journey To The Other Side. I want to believe.
This is probably the silliest Idolator blind item poll in an illustrious history of silly-ass blind item polls, especially since male beautifying is no longer so verboten as to be shocking. (I’m even shaving more than once a month now. Up next: ironing my shirts.) Nonetheless we must scratch our heads as we wonder: “Which macho crooner secretly loves manicures and pedicures? The ladies’ man pretends he’s off to the gym whenever he’s going to get pampered.” Admittedly it was the “macho” part that initially threw us, as it 86’s about 95 percent of the XY chromosomes currently clogging Billboard, but we think we’ve come up with a few distinct possibilities and a couple of outliers.
Apparently EMI’s recent drastic cost-cutting/money-saving measures now include charitable tax write-offs. Supreme leader Guy Hands is putting striking employee Robbie Williams to work the only way he can: filling in potholes in China as part of a “recycling programme.”
Robbie Williams is planning on engaging in a work stoppage, threatening to withhold his next album from his label, EMI, while having his manager call belt-tightening Terra Firma chair Guy Hands a “plantation owner.” Williams’ forthcoming Mark Ronson-produced album is slated for this fall, but that might not happen until 2009 or so because he’s really not looking forward to watching the label attempt to market it. (Although really, could their marketing result in a failure bigger than the one Williams endured while trying to break the States?)
50 Cent wants to hook up a collaboration with Robbie Williams, thereby giving him the first-time distinction of being the bigger asshole in a duet with Robbie Williams. More »
From the Sun, which will apparently deliver these en masse to the beleaguered pop star once some sort of critical card-mass has been reached. Isn’t there a photo researcher over there who could have picked a somewhat more flattering picture of Williams? More »
– In Australia, Robbie Williams has just enough fame to beat a $117 fine for smoking on stage. Doesn’t Am I Famous Enough To Get Away With This? sound like a late-night reality show waiting to happen? More »
