Bits of spanking new music - Bit Theory

Now this is the DMX I've been waiting for. Despite the rousingly powerful sounds DMX has proven himself capable of in the past, the Ruff Rider camp seems content on the energetic rapper releasing only "party songs." With his new album The Great Depression, I had hoped that DMX would choose a different route and explore his soulful/spiritual side in the mainstream, but regretfully the first release "We Right Here," disappointed. DMX's new song "Who We Be" is more suitable to his unique sound - a raspy screamer's voice with a preacher's tone. DMX, if you're going to use your punchy lyrical beats, you need to use them for good. Don't aspire to please the frat houses, just be the best screamer you can be.

There's a new video out for the all-star tribute song "What's Goin' On" and Fred Durst still insists on pronouncing the damn phrase, "We gaut huuman beeeins using huumans for a baum." If it wasn't for Nelly, Ja Rule, and Ms. Furtado's colorful parts and the shock you get from watching the audacity ol' Freddie Durst exhibits by insisting to take his "coolness" seriously, this song would have never been anything more than the AIDS awareness song it was intended to be.

This week is "Spanking New Week" on MTV and MTV2 has November wrapped up as "Spanking New Month." What does this all mean for the viewer? Since most songs on MTV already have the "spanking new" tag, I figured that M2 would simply resemble MTV for the next month. But it'll be hard to tell until MTV moves past this first week. I suppose this could be good step for the network as it forces them to stop advertising songs that are anymore than three weeks old as "new music." For the first time in my life, I'm hearing songs on the radio weeks before they ever hit MTV. That's scary. So why did all this happen now? Here's my guess. The terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 virtually shut MTV down for a little more than two weeks. Videos like Ben Folds' "Rockin' the Suburbs," that were just beginning to hit their stride, got pushed aside in favor of a heavy rotation of adult contemporary. When we finally began to return to normal, MTV had a complete playlist of redemption songs like P.O.D.'s "Alive," red, white and blue songs like Fabulous' "Can't Deny It" and sensitive rocker songs like Nickelback's "You Remind Me." I still think that guy looks like a makeup-less clown. They ran each of those songs five times an hour, eliminating the need to show new videos. But in the meantime, there was the regular number of premiers that had had no outlet for airtime. What better plan than to package all of them together and prove to music fans that MTV is still cutting edge? If Kittie, Sevendust and New Found Glory can now get their videos on the air, who am I to complain? At least this campaign offers more variety for listeners than M2's "Hip Hop Month" did in October. Perhaps the approval of seeing new videos everyday from a variety of different artists will force MTV out of their heavy rotations enough to have positive influences in the future.

Is that Joe Perry playing guitar in Nelly's new video? The association confused me at first too, but come to think of it, Aerosmith and Nelly did share the same stage at last year's Super Bowl half-time show. Now if Aerosmith decides to re-market their Get a Grip image by putting out a string of videos where Britney Spears replaces Alicia Silverstone as the rebellious teen, I'll vomit.

Bush AGAIN?!? Yes, Bush again. Just when you begin to think you've moved out the early '90s, bands like this are back - and so is Live, featuring hair on the head of the previously bald lead singer. Listen, there's no other way to put it - I'm sick of Gavin's voice. Despite this fact, the video is visually stimulating with its use of colorful 3D pipes and Flying Through Space screensavers and I'm pleased that Bush decided to try the screensaver format that I described last month in my column. Too bad they didn't have the foresight to do this for an old song and release it exclusively to VH1. If they had done that, they wouldn't have even had to come out with a new album. And if you're hoping for a duet between Gavin and his duet-loving, genre-mixing girl Gwen, don't get too excited. Gavin is too vain to ever let it happen. Can you honestly see him being comfortable sharing the stage with someone else?

Alright, I've changed my mind. As if we all needed another reason not to take these guys seriously, I think the lead singer from Puddle of Mudd looks more like David Spade. I give up and you should too.