Make it Stop: A Bad Music Podcast

It's Black History Month, which means it's the perfect time for another round of Eviscerating White Nonsense with returning white rapper roundup participant VQ of BLOWW and Boston comedian Izzy Da Rosa. The object of our ire this time is of course the ultimate Great White Embarassment Vanilla Ice and his 1992 follow up to his megahit debut album, the incredibly misinformed and extremely poorly executed "Mind Blowin". Featuring profoundly sad attempts to flex his 'gangsta rap' chops, references to smoking bales of 'hootie mac', and painfully corny sex tomes that dry up our collective vaginas quicker than old roller rink pizza under a heat lamp, this is a truly awful album. However modern day attempts to contextualize the infamous Ice invite us to consider - was Robert Matthew Van Winkle really all that bad, after all? Spoiler alert: yes, yes he was. Part of the Pantheon Podcast Network.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Things get spicy on this week's Make It Stop as Heather and Mike are joined by veritable hardcore legend Kira Roessler (Black Flag, Dos, Awkward) and local up-and-coming musician Sophia Belle (Home Despot) to discuss The Stooges' 35-years-in-the-making fourth album The Weirdness (2007). As Heather, Mike and Sophia do their best to malign Iggy Pop and his history-making and genre-defining band for their iffy production choices, cringe lyrics and uninspiring arrangements, Kira takes them all to task, vehemently defending the band and making us all ask important questions such as: Does our criticism has any value? Why do we have to be such assholes? Is our own music really any better than this? And why exactly do we have such a problem with lyrics about dicks turning into trees? You won't want to miss this one, Stoppies. Part of the Pantheon Podcast network.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

2020 is coming to an end, may it rot and burn in hell, and as expected an unimaginably awful year brought us a slew of unimaginably awful albums. Mike and Heather can barely keep it together as they lament the slow death of culture and the creeping Post Malone-ification of all music. Everything sucks and it's going to suck forever. Genres become meaningless as all music melts into one big endless lo fi hip hop beat to study to Youtube stream. Personal taste becomes homogenized across the board by algorithms. It's a hellscape all around, and now we bring you the 10 worst songs from the 10 worst albums bestowed up on us by this cursed year. Some real heavy hitters here. Stoppie discretion is advised.

Part of the Pantheon Podcast network.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stoppies, we know you know what Christmas is all about - materialist accumulation, wealth hoarding, Judeo-Christian values, heteronormative baking rituals, duck sex, beards. Thank the Christian God that we found an album that perfectly embodies that spirit. This Holiday Season we're talking about Duck Dynasty's 2013 Christmas Cash-in album Duck The Halls, and we're diving right in while our little webbed feet waddle in the air. Heather's music deprived husband Alex and Mike's heathen life partner Liv join in so we can flex our strong family values. It's just what you always wanted to find under the tree - a painful retread of the 2013 Tea Party-style culture wars and an exploration of how Duck Dynasty paved the way for Trump's takeover of the right. O Come All Ye Faithful. Part of the Pantheon Podcast Network.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're riding the honky tonk high speed rail all the way to the bank this week with the be-flannelled, bud' chuggin' y'all boys of Florida Georgia Line and their 2019 bro-country daggum opus "Can't Say I Ain't Country". Actual Country Gal Jeanne "Susie Newsie" Mansfield of BLOWW regales us with badass backwoods tales of burning couches and shooting flaming arrows in rural Missouri while jammin' to the sweet sounds of country music on the terrestrial radio. We learn that country livin' actually sounds pretty daggum fun while being swept away by the extremely goofy country concoctions of Florida and Georgia, and give them way too much credit for being pro-gun control and getting a hysterectomy. Don't worry, there's plenty of godawful trash like country-RnB, country rap, and other horrible hybrids that make this worthy of being Stopped, even though it's a pretty doggone good time. Hop in the Tesla-pickup hybrid and giddy up, because this one's a helluva ride! Part of the Pantheon Podcasts network.

To support Jon Osoff and Raphael Warnock in the Georgia runoff elections you can donate here! https://secure.actblue.com/donate/dscc-warnock-ossoff-runoff-nov2020 #THub4JonOssoff #Georgia4Georgia

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Due to KOVID-19, Heather and Mike won't be getting uncomfortably drunk around their families this Thanksgiving, so instead they've decided to get uncomfortably drunk together over Zoom. To make it a family affair they're joined by Alex Dunn (Mike's Brother), and Brian Melanson (Heather's Pretend Dad). It's time for a tWiSteD Turkey Day 'cause we're feasting on a veritable KORNUKOPIA. The Blackout Power Hour is back. Over 60 songs, over 60 sips, it's enough KoRn to bind up your system for days on end. This episode starts off the rails and plummets off a cliff as we all rapidly become too drunk to podcast. We're sorry about this one. Happy Thanksgiving!

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week our hearts are beating right out of our untrimmed chests as we take a ride on the monorail of monotony. Train drizzled onto the scene in 1998 with their humble hit "Meet Virginia" and followed that up with milquetoast smash "Drops of Jupiter" in 2001, but it wasn't until "Hey Soul Sister" that they truly wormed their way into every human being's hearts and minds as the corniest soft rockers on the planet. Comedian and returning guest Emily Ruskowski and Boston area burlesque performer Jane Doe join Heather and Mike to discuss the album that birthed "Hey Soul Sister", 2009's Save Me, San Francisco. Can they withstand this ultimate test of their aural fortitude against the unending torrent of ukulele riffs, dad jokes and tepid arrangements? Will they reveal the conspiracy that allowed Train to flourish as our mom's flip phone ring tones and made lead singer Pat Monahan run for a Senate seat in New Hampshire? You won't want to miss a single thing we do... tonight.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I was working in the lab late one night

When my ears beheld a dreadful blight

For Bobby "Boris" Pickett began to write

An album which, to no surprise

Was really wack -- he made the monsters wack

The "Monster Mash", it was the only good track

The rest is wack -- the rest is really wack

He made it wack -- just stick to "Monster Mash"

From our laboratory in Everett Mass

We reviewed The Original Monster Mash

Andrew Wiley came from his humble abode

To join us in tearing down this load

Of monster crap -- he made the monsters wack

The "Monster Mash", it was the only good track

The rest is wack -- the rest is really wack

He made it wack -- just stick to "Monster Mash"

This show is part of the Pantheon Podcast Network.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Do you like trying different things? Or do you prefer smoking funny things? This week we're talking about Robbie Ritchie, Bobby Shazam, his name is Kid Rock, that is his name, and if you ask him again, he'll probably call you a slur. He's a conservative flip flopper, a confederate flag loving yankee, a Detroit-repping white rapper who grew up on a princely estate in the 'burbs. In 2007 he recorded an album called Rock N Roll Jesus, with which he purported to be resurrecting the long dormant and nearly forgotten genre of rock. What it is is a bunch of songs where he says racist garbage in the only two notes he can manage while his band does a half hearted Bob Seger impression. It goes on for 57 minutes. Returning guests Squallie Greenthumb and Alli Thresher have to suffer through it all too. It's just a big ol' bummer is what it is. Part of the Pantheon Podcast Network.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After helping mold and define the counter-culture of the late sixties and early 70s, Neil Young pulled an about face in the 80s, throwing his support behind Ronald Reagan, the war on drugs, and welfare reform. Tired of being pigeonholed, he shifted away from the socially conscious folk rock he was known for, releasing a series of headscratching albums that saw him experimenting with rockabilly, banjos and vocoders. Geffen Records became so fed up with his new direction that they sued him for 3.2 million dollars. On the Season 4 premiere of Make It Stop, we discuss the album that came on the heels of that court case's settlement -- 1986's Landing On Water. A bizarre amalgamation of all the worst that the 80s had to offer, the album explodes with ear splitting drums and tinny synths. There is nary a bass player to be found. Neil eschews both the personal and the political in most of his lyrics, instead settling into a banal sort of opacity. Joining the fray to try to make sense of it all are fellow Pantheon podcasters and longtime local legends Mike Hsu and Luke Condon, hosts of deep dive Neil Young podcast Long May You Young. Make It Stop is finally back, dear stoppies. If you missed the bickering and sniping and the endless war between the factions of pro-ska and pro-nu-metal as much as we did, then you're in for quite a treat! Part of the Pantheon Podcast Network.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices