The Top 10 90s Pop Rock Bands of All Time (Or At Least Some of the Time)

Most of the posts I will write over the next couple weeks are completely inspired by my one trip to the giant Half-Priced Books sale at the Indiana State Fairgrounds last weekend.  At that sale, I left with 23 records, 10 CDs, a DVD, and a book for $16.37.  That is pretty incredible.  

At the big sale, most of the CDs I bought were 90s throwback discs which of course are just nearing the end of their return to trendiness.  In 2004/05 I kept another blog that I rarely wrote on, but one of the big things I wrote was a Top 10 list of pop rock bands from the 90s.  I realize now that I was way ahead of my time, as some of these bands are going back on tour, making new records, making news for officially breaking up, or just getting more play on the radio.  

I am reposting this colossal waste of my last college summer mostly unchanged.  Any changes I have made will be written in italics.  The only other thing I would do differently is change the ranking a little bit.  The change of ranking is slightly influenced by which bands have gained the most from the popular 90s nostalgia.  I have put the re-rankings in italics below for your viewing pleasure.  Enjoy, and please comment below if you agree or disagree.

Let’s get right down to it. This is a completely confusing genre. My friends and I have been arguing about what makes a pop/rock band all weekend. Is it a sound? Is it record sales? Is it lack of a sound or record sales? But I think one thing to remember is the slash between pop and rock. These bands fuse two different genres without making one new and definable sound. Thus the genre is more open to different types of bands. Through the process of figuring out who the best bands of this genre are I have realized that this alternative adult pop/rock has several brothers including: alternative, alternative pop/rock, post grunge, roots rock, mainstream rock, and adult contemporary.

If I were to give a rough definition of pop/rock it would be music that uses catchy, mainstream, radio friendly melodies blended with a generic (or unique sometimes) mainstream rock sound.

So once I figured out the basic style of music I was going for, I began struggling a lot with how to rate these bands: Are these the 10 bands that define most precisely what pop/ rock is? Or are these the bands that emerged from the genre with the greatest contributions to popular music?

I decided on the latter for two reasons. One is that I read an article by Chuck Klosterman talking about Nine Inch Nails and how Trent Reznor began the industrial music genre and became the most famous band of the genre. Because of the popularity a lot of industrial rock fans said that NIN was not industrial rock at all. But Chuck basically said that’s dumb because without NIN the genre wouldn’t exist. The rest are just bad photocopies. The second reason is based upon the first in that I really did not want to dedicate blog space to writing about Vertical Horizon. I know I am open-minded about music, but I have my limits.

Here are the rules:

1. To be on the list the band must have at least two certifiable Billboard hits.

2. The band’s popularity and appeal must have only come from being part of the “pop/rock movement" (there will be one exception).  For instance, there are several great 90s bands that fit much more snuggly into other genres such as alternative (Smashing Pumpkins) or grunge (every band from Seattle ever).  Also The Foo Fighters are timeless, so don't go there.  They belong to all eras-- past, present, and future.

3. The bands must be BANDS (no Sheryl Crow or Shawn Mullins).

4. These bands must be from the United States (one exception). There are too many new genres that get introduced if you throw British bands into the mix.

5. The top 10 bands must NOT include any of these (Vertical Horizon, The Calling, Lifehouse).  Train was originally in that parenthetical, but their current success helps gives their other songs a new traction.  Memory does improve from success folks.  "Drops of Jupiter" is a better song than it was seven years ago.  However, Vertical Horizon still sucks.

Without further a do:

(10) 10. Collective Soul: The Hard Rocking, Well Groomed Priests

Hits: “Shine", “December", “The World I Know", “Listen", “Heavy", “Run"

When this article was originally going to be a Top 5 list with some honorable mentions, these guys from Georgia weren’t even mentioned. But after looking into it I realized that we needed a hard rocker. History tells us these guys faded because they tried to change their sound. But I gotta be honest. I think it was because their sound wasn’t all that good in the first place. They rocked hard—but with no raw aggression or obvious pain (they might be an unknown influence on Creed). And their lyrics are hauntingly spiritual for a band that lost its following because they decided to shave. However, big props for their contribution of “Run" to the Varsity Blues soundtrack. That tugs at my heart strings. And I miss James VanderBeek (is that how you spell his name?).  Upon further viewing Varsity Blues is the worst sports movie ever and possibly one of the worst movies ever period.

(9) 9. Barenaked Ladies: The Postmodern Comedians

Hits: “One Week", “If I Had a 1,000,000", “The Old Apartment", “It’s All Been Done", “Pinch Me"

The Barenaked Ladies are quietly one of the more respected bands in pop/rock for one big reason: they just don’t give a crap. In fact, when I was first thinking of this list and being very picky about the style of band, they didn’t make the list because they aren’t serious enough. During their biggest record release, Stunt, the band’s keyboardist Kevin Hearn was getting a bone marrow transplant. But the Barenaked Ladies never made a fuss about it, and Kevin recovered. Plus I give these guys huge props for making us realize why men are really watching Saturday morning Japanime cartoons.  Oh, and their Canadian. 

(4) 8. The Wallflowers: The Blood on the Tracks

Hits: “6th Avenue Heartache", “One Headlight","Three Marlenas", “The Difference", “Heroes"

Most people would say that the reason The Wallflowers didn’t make it is that they could not deal with their lead singer Jakob Dylan’s dad Bob. Though I agree that this might be part of the problem, I don’t think it is the only problem or even the main problem. The main problem was the band sat on the success of Bringing Down the Horse for four years and pretty much waited away their mainstream fan base. Plus that album is one of the better albums of the 90s and certainly one of the best if not the best represented by this list. It was just too much of an event to not do anything with. Jakob and the gang would be battling for No. 1 if they had just put out one more successful and respectable record (by the way their other albums are solid, they just didn’t take off).

On another front, I know most of you are keeping a tally of this by now, but for those who aren’t, all of the bands so far have had a hit song on a TV show or movie. “Run" on Varsity Blues, “The Old Apartment" on Beverly Hills 90210, and “Heroes" on Godzilla. Hey we didn’t say the movies had to be hits too.

(7) 7. Third Eye Blind: The Suicidal, Girl Chasing, Semi-Charmed, Meth Junkies (and your daughters listen to them)

Hits: “Semi-Charmed Life", “Graduate", “How’s It Gonna Be", “Jumper", “Losing a Whole Year", “Never Let You Go"

The amazing thing about Third Eye Blind is that they might be the dirtiest lyricists on mainstream pop/rock radio. Their biggest hit, “Semi-Charmed Life", is pretty much about doing drugs and doing girls. In fact, the version released as a single is missing two parts of the original song and many of the lyrics that remained were edited on the radio (such as “doin’ crystal meth will lift you up until you break"). And yet these guys were pop princes in the late 90s. That’s because they can flat out write a catchy melody. I can sing every single one of their hits fairly easily including the lesser-knowns such as “Losing a Whole Year."

There’s one more thing. These guys suck live. Just plain suck. It is mostly due to the fact that Stephen Jenkins’ songwriting and production talents (he was in charge of producing new bands at Elektra before their self-titled debut was released) are way beyond his singing ability. The parallels to Everclear are haunting…haunting.

(6) 6. R.E.M.: The Stepfathers of Pop/Rock

Hits: “It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)", “The One I Love", “Orange Crush", “Man on the Moon", “Stand", “Losing My Religion", “Shiny Happy People", “Drive", “Everybody Hurts", “What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?"

I know I will get arguments for this placement, and I hope I do. To tell you the truth I am on the fence about it. The fact is R.E.M. is so important to the genre that they were either going to be No. 1 or not even in the Top 5. Here’s why. They have more hits than anyone on the Top 10; in fact they have more hits than most combinations of two bands put together. Michael Stipe and his mates have created material that helped to inspire almost every pop/rock band in the industry, even if they don’t know it. But the reason that they are The Stepfathers and not just The Fathers of Pop/Rock is they were conceiving several genres, some at the same time (those dogs).

R.E.M.’s greatest achievement was not in terms of hits and pop but with their influence on the American indie/underground scene. The band was instrumental in developing the whole “you don’t have to have a unique sound or any great innovations to have an identity" vibe. They became unbelievably creative for not being creative. Beautiful yet cryptic lyrics don’t hurt either. But in the end they do lose points for creating too much media attention to find out if Michael Stipe is gay. I mean that went on for a decade. Well guess what—he is (maybe).

(8) 5. Gin Blossoms: The Depressed Earth Toned Balladeers

Hits: “Till I Hear It from You", “Hey Jealousy", “Found Out About You", "Follow You Down"

If you don’t remember any of these songs, I suggest that you download them or whatever you kids do. These are just great songs period. I confess I have not listened to a full album of the Gin Blossoms, but if I did I would like it. Perfect blend of all the genre relatives of pop/rock, and it makes you think about driving on a sunny day with no really bright colors. Yep you heard right. These guys are depressed and depressing. The principal songwriter was guitarist Doug Hopkins who killed himself in December of 1993 right when the Gin Blossoms were at the top of their success. This was truly tragic for a band that really could have gone places.

Of course that didn’t stop the band from putting a single on the movie soundtrack for Empire Records. Maybe I should do a blog on pop/rock songs in movies. This is beginning to bug me.  Also, does anyone think The Gin Blossoms sound a whole lot like Blue Oyster Cult (the real band, not the Christopher Walken skit version)?

(2) 4. Hootie & the Blowfish: The Wannabe Jam Band That Pulls the Race Card

Hits: “I Only Wanna Be With You", “Hold My Hand", “Let Her Cry", “Time", “I Go Blind"

If you were to only listen to the singles that Darius Rucker and his band put out, you would think that this band defined 90s pop/rock more than any other band out there. But you would be wrong. You could be right, but the Blowfish won’t let you.

Hootie & the Blowfish were part of a small cult of 90s blues/jam rock bands that flirted with the mainstream (Spin Doctors, Blues Traveler, and Dave Matthews Band), but the Blowfish didn’t just flirt with the mainstream. They dominated. One could almost make the argument that of the group of jam bands Hootie sold out the fastest. That is simply not true because the other groups had radio friendly tunes (“Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong", “Run Around", and “Crash" respectively). Rucker and the gang could just flat out write a better pop song than any of these other bands ever could. The problem is not that they sold out, but that they won a huge hand and then cashed their chips and left without playing some more.

The band does a lot of great things for rock bands trying to make it today, including a battle of bands on a cruise ship, but they simply could not reproduce or add to their great success (later to be proven wrong when Darius Rucker successfully invaded the country market). Parallels to The Wallflowers seem in order.

Oh and one other thing. Hootie is a friend of the band’s—not lead singer Darius Rucker. But don’t you find it interesting that the band never tried to shake Darius’s identity as Hootie as much as it could have? I think these guys used the race card to put some steam into their street cred engines. It is possible that this is simply not true and the statement itself is racist, but it is worth thinking about. Plus there is the haunting reality that, as far as general appearance and even musical style is concerned, Hootie & The Blowfish are the bizarro Dave Matthews Band. Very interesting.

(3) 3. Matchbox Twenty: The Nameless Faces and Mr. Smooth

Hits: “Push", “3am", “Real World", “Back 2 Good", “Bent", “If Your Gone", “Mad Season", *"Smooth"

The fact that Matchbox Twenty went from misogynists to girlfriend-less sissies that are up way too late in only two moves is inconsequential (“Push" to “3am"). The most important fact is that this band is the best representation of “the band with a famous lead singer and a bunch of musicians no one knows" on the market. That’s not to say that the other Top 10 bands don’t represent that because almost all of them do to a certain extent. It’s just the matchbox guys have the most evidence to back their claim to the crown.

That evidence is in “their" biggest hit—the Santana smash, “Smooth", co-written and sung by one Rob Thomas. The Latin pop hit got around 10 Grammys for Mr. Santana and more Grammys for Rob than he would ever get as leader of Matchbox Twenty. And yet they don’t seem to have lost or added any players. It’s still the same quintet, which is amazing considering drummer Paul Doucette has been known to complain about the lack of hard rocking songs in Rob’s songbook. It’s alright though Paul—you will always have “Push".

A small update on these guys is they put out a greatest hits record that had one new song that was a hit ("Let's See How Far We Go") and they are releasing a new album!  Also their rhythm guitarist quit and they got a new drummer, so I guess those members changed.

(5) 2. The Goo Goo Dolls: The Broken and Dizzy Hair Gods

Hits: “Name", “Long Way Down", “Iris", “Slide", “Black Balloon", “Broadway", “Here is Gone", "Better Days"

The three gentlemen known as the Goo Goo Dolls were a Replacements rip off band before their acoustic tune “Name" became a smash on rock radio. Fast forward to yet another soundtrack song (“Iris" from City of Angels), and the dolls of goo finally realized that they are too emotional and too wimpy to let bass player Robby Takac keep screaming about whatever he was screaming about. After they tightened their sound, the hits rolled in. Despite the fact that everyone who knows me realizes that I am not a huge Goo Goo Dolls guy I really have no complaints. The group is making a splash right now with some new pop songs, and no one on this Top 10 list can say that except them.  This ended up being totally false.

Ok one complaint. I hear through rumor that they aren’t very good live. Would it be such a travesty to add another permanent member or two to the band? I really don’t see how such a move would hurt everything, especially since it didn’t hurt our No. 1 band…

The Goos get demoted in my re-ranking because their songs (with exception to "Iris") just don't hold up.  They don't get me all jazzed for 90s references (except for "Iris") or remind me of the melancholy of the 90s (except for "Iris").

(1) 1. The Counting Crows: The Greatest and Most Hopeless Pop/Rock Band of All Time

Hits: “Mr. Jones", “Einstein on the Beach (For an Eggman)", “Round Here", "Daylight Fading", “Long December", “Hangin’ Around", Mrs. Potter’s Lullaby", "Color Blind", “Big Yellow Taxi", “Accidentally in Love"

Yeah that’s right. I gave the No.1 spot to a band that has more depressing songs than good ones and a frontman competing for the worst hair of all time. Why? Well first because I can. And second…

John Mayer once said that he didn’t want to do pop music anymore because the only thing you can get from it is nostalgia (he is currently getting ready to release a new pop album—I love celebrities). If that is true, no other pop/rock band brings me back to my lonely and overemotional high school days like The Counting Crows. They are unashamed to be completely wasted in agony. But here is something that is so pop/rock about them. Their most famous song has little or nothing to do with the rest of their tunes. These guys have the craftiness (or Adam Duritz saves his happy material for a rainy day) to churn out a blockbuster happy song every few years (“Mr. Jones" kind of, “Hangin’ Around", “Accidentally in Love") while keeping true to form with every other track a tribute to melancholy.

These guys complain about girls more than emo bands do, but they do it with an open sound that doesn’t necessarily cross genre boundaries yet gets very close. And they have a song on Shrek II. And they put on a good live show. And they currently have seven members!

In the end these guys beat out Matchbox Twenty, The Goo Goo Dolls, and R.E.M because I simply can’t deny the impact their songs have had on me. That is enough reason for them to be the best band. They are definitely a pop/rock band, and they matter.

Bonnaroo 2012: Two Layers of Dirt+Food Poisoning+3 Days of Great Tunes= One Memorable Weekend

The last time I wrote on this blog, liberals still respected President Obama and his attempts to change the country.  The last time I wrote a blog, I was a student,  The last time I wrote a blog, I was single.  Well now I'm married (in this blog, my wife will officially be known as Dr. Burkhart or Dr. B.).  I graduated with a Master's Degree, and have accepted a job as a middle school band director (some people don't like hyper kids-- I am not one of those people).  And our man B.O. hasn't changed much except to have an oddly large influence on the educational system (and not in a way teachers were anticipating).  But none of things will be discussed here because they are either too boring (graduating), too personal (marriage), or I don't know jack about them so I don't deserve to have an opinion (Obama and marriage).

Well Bonnaroo to you my friends.  When I first starting jotting notes down for this column I was sitting in one of the only cities in the United States that only exists for a weekend a year.  A small community of 80,000 people are living next to their cars or in big tents and finding creative ways to define the word "shower."  There are several FAQs that future hopefuls of the Bonnaroo experience have.  So I thought I would take a cue from one of my favorite Internet writers  (Bill Simmons) and one of the worst writers I have ever had to read (some book on sex and marriage I had to read for marriage counseling) by doing a question and answer session where I ask myself questions and answer them as if they were asked by someone else.  Enjoy:

So what acts did you see at Bonnaroo?
The lame answer to this question is "What acts didn't I see?" but that is stupid.  There was a TON I didn't see (more on why later), but Dr. Burkhart and I definitely did our best to see as much as we could.  The groups we officially saw were groups where we actually stayed and listened to at least two tunes.  So here is the list in chronological order of when we saw them:

The Applebutter Express, Rollin' In The Hay, The Dirty Guv'nahs, Rubblebucket, Mariachi El Bronx, Danny Brown, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr., Yelawolf, Alabama Shakes, The Soul Rebels, Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings, Hey Rosetta! (twice), The Avett Brothers, Fitz & The Tantrums, Feist, Ludacris, St. Vincent, Sara Watkins, Rodrigo y Gabriela and C.U.B.A., Radiohead, Black Star, The Main Squeeze, The Devil Makes Three, Blind Pilot, Das Racist, Bad Brains, Flogging Molly, Battles, Khaira Arby and Her Band, Punch Brothers, Gary Clark Jr., Art Vs. Science, Red Baraat, The Roots, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Superjam w/Questlove and Special Guests (oh you just wait), Alice Cooper, Skrillex.

That's the list.  38 acts in three days.  You will notice some major absences.

So when I saw the lineup for this year's Bonnaroo and found out you were going, I knew who you were gonna see: Radiohead, The Roots, Sharon Jones, The Beach Boys, Bon Iver, and The Shins.  Also, I thought it was a four day festival.  So... what happened?


Food Poisoning.  Or a GI Tract infection.  Either way I think Skrillex literally hit the brown note sometime during his 1:30am set Sunday morning because I woke up and actually wanted to go to the porta potty.  A couple hours and a couple naps later, Dr. B. and I decided I wouldn't be able to make it through the 2 miles both ways walk and multiples hours of standing that the day required.  This was a worthy compromise because there will be other opportunities for those other three acts.  Bon Iver is already covered because I have seen them in concert with Dr. B. and they did pretty much the same show.  The Shins will hopefully come to the area again soon.  The real loss here is the Beach Boys, and trust me when I say that they were a major motivation for us taking so long to make our decision to leave.  I have no regrets about my Bonnaroo experience, but I would be lying if I said I don't have a shade or melancholy about being able to listen to The Beach Boys run through their droopy summer anthem tunes.

OK, give me the honest truth.  How easy is it to get drugs at Bonnaroo?

To quote a recent article from Billboard.com , " marijuana deals were made in broad daylight."  I was offered weed twice that I can remember; Dr. B. remembers more. Das Racist dedicated a song to anyone taking ketamine and got a very enthusiastic response.  One man was looking for his friends Sunday night because he heard they were freaking out on mushrooms.  When we moved up closer for The Roots show we ended up in a section where every single group of people were smoking weed.  We felt a bit too white bread, but the music kept us focused, and there was certainly plenty to do for those who didn't want to do that.

Don't take this commentary for a commentary on marijuana use.  It's just something I don't do.  Now don't take that statement for me condoning any kind of drug use, but that is not the point of Bonnaroo-- to condone or not to condone.  The point is for everything to be cool (whether moral or legal) and for you to treat your neighbor with respect and a dash of hippy love.

So did you have trouble getting along with your neighbors considering you and your wife were dorky teetotalers and didn't even bring a tent?


First off, how did you know we didn't bring a tent?  The xBox (my Scion) is a superior machine in many ways (including keeping the Indy Tire mechanics in business) and one of those ways is room.  We slept in there just fine with the windows cracked.

Anyway, here is a fact.  The people at Bonnaroo were nothing but friendly.  The vendors weren't pushy (like in Rome-- oh yeah I need to talk about Rome sometime); our neighbors were friendly and generous as we were to them; the guys who offered drugs were totally cool with us turning them down; a lot of people picked up their trash; the volunteers and safety people were completely easy going; even the artists were cool with the audience (except for some of the hard rockers-- Danzig and Bad Brains were not completely sociable).  We also felt some home love when we went to support Bloomington funk/rock/soul/jam group The Main Squeeze and found some friends and several fellow Hoosiers.  We also figured out the kids next to us at our campsite were from Depaw University in Greenecastle, IN, and a dude we stood in line with was in high school band with my sis-in-law.  By the way if you want to get recognized by people from your state just wear team gear from that state.  Don't worry it's totally cool.

What was the strangest thing about Bonnaroo?  Something you weren't expecting.


It's a four-way tie:

1.  People outside of Indiana LOVE the NBA right now.  It's amazing (joke intended).  NBA throwback jerseys and hats were everywhere (the Bryant "Big Country" Reeves Vancouver Grizzlies jersey was a highlight).  Bonnaroo showed both Game 6 and Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals somewhere on the grounds.  Sometimes I forget that the NBA totally matters right now because my proud home state still seems to think that our team is no good.  Yeah we sold out the playoffs, but we need more support than that.  All of the players from that Malice team are gone Pacer fans.  Come on back to the Fieldhouse.

On a related note, we met one guy who claimed to know LeBron's mom and said she is kind of a nut job.  Yet another layer ripped away from the onion that is LeBron James.

2.  You never know how wonderful a good hair washing can be until you have to wait three days and seven hours to get one.  There was a Garnier Fructis building that offered air conditioning and a free hair washing and that was pretty much awesome.  The only drawback was missing Santigold's set to wait in line, but I think it was well worth the wait.  That's how crazy Bonnaroo was.  A hair wash was easily worth more than seeing Santigold rock one of my favorite songs ever, "Creator", live.

3.  How easy it was to spot people I knew or fellow Hoosiers.  Not much to say other than it's nice to know that other Hoosiers enjoy sacrificing good hygiene for great music.

4.  I think almost every band except Radiohead introduced all the members.  I tried to immerse myself in the Bloomington indie scene for the past four or five years where it was massively uncool to do that. But every single band whether indie or jam, hip-hop or pop, was introducing their bandmates.  Did you hear that B-town?  Get on it.

What were some of the lowlights of the Fest?


You mean other than getting food poisoning the morning of the last day????  Three things:

1.  The Other Tent (Bonnaroo has some cute little names for their main venues including What Stage, Which Stage, This Tent, That Tent, and The Other Tent along with some more sponsored/normalish names for the small stages) was host to some "world music" acts on Saturday night.  By the way there is an interesting argument for the term "world music" being completely racist if not also nationalist or at least Western Culture-elitist.  But we can get into that another time.  The reason that I put Saturday at The Other Tent as a lowlight is not because the acts weren't any good.  On the contrary, Khaira Arby and Her Band as well as Red Baraat were absolutely fantastic, but hardly anybody was there to see them.  Earlier in the week I mentioned to Dr. Burkhart that no matter who you were, you were gonna get a solid audience.  But that just didn't seem to be the case by the end of the week.  I'm not saying the tent was empty.  There were probably between 100-250 people watching at each.  But these two bands deserved more, and they didn't get it because their fan base was across the ocean and they played during a big main stage act respectively.

2.  My back.  It turns out that walking multiple hours a day and standing during all the other hours can be bad on your back, especially if you trained for a marathon and ran 1,000 miles the previous year and don't have access to normal chairs and sleep in the back of a car for three days and don't have access to a good shower and are in the hot sun all afternoon.  We got smarter as the weekend rolled on and made sure to lie down periodically in the grass, but it was always an issue to fight.  I will get my weight back down for next year and make sure I don't have an injury from my running-- only great fitness.

3.  Dr. Burkhart and I are not campers.  I like air-conditioning and beds and warm breakfast and computers and buildings.  Don't get my wrong.  The camping is half the point of Bonnaroo and is totally worth it, but all the dirt that gets kicked up over the course of four days is enough to sometimes make you wish Bonnaroo was held on a college campus with dorms.

What were the highlights?


There were many.  Let's start with Non-musical:

1.  Hangin' out with the lady on a turf that I think we both equally liked for the same reasons.  Maybe I had the more nerdy knowledge of what we were saying, but we both dug it the same.

2.  The ferris wheel.  The last time I rode one I was 8 years old and scared s***less.  Well this time I mastered it at Bonnaroo and felt like a king.  It didn't hurt that I got a Psycho T shoutout from the ferris wheel guy cause of my Pacers shirt.

3.  The aforementioned Garnier Fructis shindig.

4.  The food.  Some classic southern food.  I ate alligator (a definite nominee for the food poisoning and something that is making me queasy right now).  Wait a minute.  The food might not have been a highlight.  Scratch that.  I've gotta go to the bathroom-- the one with the flushing toilet.

5.  The mushrooms.  No note those mushrooms.  The wonderful people at Bonnaroo created a super-meta-situation where what you needed to stay alive was contained within a group of giant blue mushrooms.  The water was fresh and good always.  It was one sanitary thing you could always count on.

And the musical:

1.  None of the bands were bad.  None Of Them.  Ok maybe the Dirty Guv'nahs.  And maybe Luda's set was a little weird with the interlude of pop hits that aren't his songs.  But that's it.  But some particular bands get a special shout out for just being ridiculous when we saw them.  This list of bands are ones we could catch only a portion of:

--Hey Rosetta! (great depressed white boy rock with a little bit of anger to them)
--Danny Brown (he is dirty and foul and is missing teeth and Dr. Burkhart would never listen to him except for this performance, but his rhymes are crazy creative, and his flow great.  He may never have
--The Soul Rebels (brass bands always do covers, but they always sound like brass bands--not these guys)
-- St. Vincent and Sara Watkins (put here together because they both were hauntingly beautiful in completely different ways)
--Battles (totally noisy, totally entrancing)
--Khaira Arby and Her Band (these guys wailed, seriously, look them up)
--Punch Brothers (Nickelcreek was in full attendance at Bonnaroo which made me hope for a reunion, but it didn't happen.  However Chris Thile has a knack for picking cool covers, The Punch Brothers cover of "Kid A" was gorgeous)
--Superjam (I have been drinking the Kool-Aid of D'Angelo over the past year.  I loved his stuff along with Lauryn Hill and Maxwell in the '90s.  Well guess who showed up at Bonnaroo with an All-Star cast of funk musicians.  That's right.  Friggin' D'Angelo!  They just did covers, but they were cool outside-the-box covers and he killed it.  When ?uestlove announced "I've been waiting 12 years to say this..."I grabbed the doc and screamed "Oh my God it's D'Angelo and that is exactly who it was.  He sounded great, but the bigger part to me was that I witnessed a musically significant moment.  I can say I was there when D'Angelo returned.  Awesome.)
--Alice Cooper (We only saw a couple tunes cause of D'Angelo, but how many of you can say you have seen Alice Cooper play "School's Out" live with monsters and whips?  Also, he staged a fake fight between Barack Obama and random Republican white guy Mitt Romney during "Election" and danced with a giant Lady Gaga doll in an awesome hard rock cover of "Born This Way."
-- Skrillex (I have not taken the dive into the dance music thing but I now totally understand why Skrillex is hot.  His show was crazy high-energy and the beats he put together are absolutely intoxicating.  And he definitely is the master of the dub-step thing.  Did I mention that he did his show inside a spaceship with moving tentacles?)

These cats were on a whole other level and we caught their full shows:

-- Rubblebucket (Very few bands can get these words in the same review: Blondie-like vocals, funky horn section that could kill any genre, giant robots)
-- The Main Squeeze (Probably most of the enjoyment came from having all the fellow Hoosiers there, but these guys really went nuts.  The keytar needs to exist more often.  How is it possible that I have seen these guys only once before and barely remember that even though I am from the same town as them?  Plus I got a shout out in the IU student newspaper article that covered the band.)
-- Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings (Everything you would think it is and more.  High-powered soul and Sharon Jones is a great showman[wo].  They stayed completely within their '60s time bubble and yet felt completely fresh and new the whole time)
-- Radiohead (Gorgeous with hypnotic beats.  No other band or act can pull that off right now and that's saying something.  They played some great tunes from Kid A, which is one of my top five favorite albums, and they never disappointed even on new stuff.  Each member of the band brings something to the table.  They were the band I was listening to most when I came back.  They are my stand-out band of the festival even though some other Bonnaroovians wished they played more hits.)

It looks like you basically tried to catch as much as humanly possible.  Would you suggest that mode of experiencing Bonnaroo, or do you wish you just focused more on a smaller set of acts?


Dr. Burkhart and I talked about this.  Didn't we do both?  We saw full sets from Rubblebucket, Sharon Jones, Main Squeeze, The Roots, Radiohead, and RHCP.  And had I not been doing Our Fathers in the Porta-John for a half-hour straight we would have certainly seen the Beach Boys and Ben Folds Five full sets (maybe I should have done more Our Fathers).

Look if you love music as much as I do, there is no way you will leave Bonnaroo without wishing you had seen more.  I saw 38 bands out of what I think was 150 and we were really booking it at times.  Somehow we got to see multiple bands cover sweet dreams but missed three tributes to MCA of The Beastie Boys.  We obviously missed all the Sunday stuff, but even if we stayed we would still probably have missed The Civil Wars, fun., and Kenny Rogers jam with Lionel Richie.  We missed what was supposedly a great set from 2011's Band Killed By The Radio that included horns from favorite little band Rubblebucket.  But those are the choices you make, and I am completely happy with how we handled it.  I don't feel like we made a bad choice or that we didn't get enough out of it by doing too much.  We did good.

So all and all it worked out.  Would you do it again?


You're damn right I would.  And I have learned from this one.  Next year I will be more prepared; though, I already forgot what I needed to learn for next time.  Don't eat alligator nuggets?  Yeah we'll start there.  Oh and bring an umbrella.  Take more naps.  Don't stress myself out too much and just enjoy what's in front of me.  There was some great music.  And it'll be great next year too.  Also bring a  generator and a fan.

How did you enjoy this question/answer style of writing?


I don't know.  It seemed like a good idea at the time but we'll see how it comes out tomorrow...

Kinda like the alligator nuggets.

My Unapologetically Subjective March Madness Bracket

It would be silly for me to tell you that I know stats and figures and match-up problems and all the other stuff that Jay Bilas gets paid to know (even though it ends up meaning jack squat). So here is my favorite bracket to dissect and look over. I made these picks because I truly believe that all of these teams will win-- along with a couple of other loyalty factors that we will talk about in a minute.

Of course, if you are a red-blooded American, you not only should have a bracket filled out ready for today's excitement but several filled out. The one you will view here is my 6th and final bracket before the games begin (Wait, we are done with the first round already? That was so exciting when Vermont and Western Kentucky won the right to lose by 23 to North Carolina and Kentucky, respectively). Here is the link to my bracket of choice:

Aaron's Best Bracket

With any tournament bracket, the reason you fill out multiple brackets is so you can show loyalty to your school and at the same time face reality. With that said, here are some of the rules to go by and how I interpreted them.

1. Take your home team as long as you can conceivably take them.

This is an interesting issue for Indiana fans this year because we have beaten the best team in basketball. That means that if IU fans are doing their bracket with pure loyalty then the Hoosiers are cutting down the nets in April. I am not so sure about that, but I certainly have them going pretty deep (Elite 8 versus Baylor--probably a little too hopeful, but I cheer for the home team).

2. Stick with your conference.

This is a really tough thing to do, but it's the right thing. If you come from a smaller conference (like the Horizon League), you need to cheer for Detroit-- even if you don't have them winning in your bracket. This is even tougher in the Big 10 because I really hate Ohio St. So what I do is cheer for the teams I don't have too much beef with (Michigan, Michigan St, Wisconsin) and then continue to hate Ohio St. (I have them out of the Sweet 16 from Florida St.) I feel this is a good compromise.

3. Stick with your state.

I feel very strongly about this, and I get a lot of flack for it. I cheer for Purdue in the tournament. I get that they are our arch rivals and all, but they are a part of the state of Indiana. And Indiana should always represent well in The Big Dance. This applies to every Indiana school, no matter how small (I was putting Butler in the Sweet 16 of my brackets long before they belonged there and well before I met Mrs. Messy Shelves-- a Butler grad). So whether it's Notre Dame, E-ville, Indiana State, Valpo, IUPUI, Butler, Ball State (ha, yeah right), Purdue, or IU; I cheer for Indiana. In 49 states it's just basketball. So get over it and show Notre Dame some support as they get upset by Xavier.

By the way I have Notre Dame and Purdue both escaping their 7-10 match-ups and then losing to some of the bigwigs. I feel I could have taken a Notre Dame upset over Duke, but I need to keep that kind of mojo to get IU into the Elite 8 or beyond. Sorry Notre Dame, but I will be rooting for you.

4. Never cheer for Kentucky or Duke EVER and get them out of the tourney as soon possible.

Duke sucks. I have a couple of people close to me who went to Duke, and it's a fine school. But I don't think they should even cheer for the Blue Devils. That's how much I don't like them. IU beat Duke in the Sweet 16 of 2002 on their way to the final game. They won two other games against Kent State and Oklahoma, but no game was as sweet as the Duke game. Indiana fans uprooted trees that night. I was a freshman and it was crazy. One guy electrocuted himself because he grabbed a power line and then hit the ground with it. The next year IU was voted biggest party school. Do you think that was a coincidence? No, we beat Duke and loved it. I love it every year when they lose. I still feel bad that I didn't have Notre Dame upsetting them.

As far as the Kentucky issue, if you don't understand the Indiana/Kentucky rivalry just watch ESPN for the highlights from this season. I was actually upset when Vandy beat Kentucky for the SEC title because it felt so good that the Hoosiers were the only team to beat Kentucky. I can't wait to see them again in the Sweet 16.

5. Never trust the pundits (especially Jay Bilas).

Really Jay, you think it's all Number One seeds in the Final Four. Man how does that guy get paid? He's worse than the weather man. But really when you fill out your bracket you need to have a flair for the dramatic or random. It should be an informed randomness (Southern Mississippi is probably not going to the Final Four), but randomness none the less. Every year, some team throws everybody's bracket under duress (Valpo, Davidson, George Mason, VCU, Butler TWICE) and that's the way it will always be. Your little sister will probably get more picks right because of the pretty team jersey color than you if you simply put down what Andy Katz, Jay Bilas, or Barack Obama puts down(an impressively informed basketball fan-- what is he doing in that White House anyway?).

Who is my "Random Team That Really Has No Business Going This Far"? I have two. Harvard and Belmont. There are some logical reasons why (Harvard has had a remarkable season on several levels and want to take it further; Belmont's playing perennial failures Georgetown), but I really just had a gut feeling and went with. You should always do that once, so you're welcome Harvard and Belmont. I did it twice. One of you is screwed.

If you fallow these 5 rules you will not have success in the tourney, but you will have peace of mind when you are cheering on Colorado State guiltlessly towards the upset. Never pick all number one seeds. With that said, go Florida State and Baylor. Make me a genius. Watch the games everybody. Nobody knows this, but the games are secretly the best part. Go team.

Special Valentines Day Blog: Top 25 Things/People/Places I Love

I'll be honest. I am really cheesed right now because the Pacers are trying to set a record for worst defense in the history of the NBA. But I am gonna soldier on and knock off this top 25 list.

I know some people think Valentine's Day is the worst day ever. They say that it's just a marketing and media holiday. Well so is Singles Awareness Day. It was probably invented by people on the Internet trying to get other people to go to their random event (probably not true). So I know I've said this in other blogs before, but quit drinking the Haterade. Enjoy being single or enjoy having someone to be with. Either way here is a list of things/people/places/entities I love that may help you find something or someone to love on Valentine's Day without the hassle of snipping a flower's manhood or killing cocoa beans or realizing your eternal loneliness (just kidding, too soon?)...

1. God-- Nearly 90 percent of humanity believes God played some role in the creation of the universe, which seems important. We can save deeper more spiritual thoughts for another blog. On another note, based upon percentages of belief I guess I also love some strange version of the Big Bang in tandem.

2. Nora-- My fiancee's idea of a great Valentine's Day is ordering Mother Bear's Pizza and watching basketball. Is it destiny that we are supposed to be together? Yeah I think so.

3. Family-- I have a great family. I love 'em all including Mom, Dad, Chris, Emily, and the extended family. Even those future in-laws of mine. (don't worry people, this won't be a cuteness fest for much longer. Except for...)

4. Brumby-- Nora's dog is a little goofy, can kind of get in the way sometimes, when he is not being annoying and in your face he doesn't really want to talk to anybody, he farts a lot, and he is always hungry. In other words, that dog is exactly like me.

5. Basketball-- It's been a decent return to respectability for the Hoosiers and Pace...wait. Cancel that. The Pacers just played worse than Emily Daly's 2003 6th grade basketball team. And they didn't have a 7'2" kid.

6. Music--This is just stupidly generic, so let me take the time to specifically thank Madonna....the one from 13 years ago. So not the Madonna album entitled Music.

7. Kyle Glaser's consistent quotes of SNL skits-- If you don't know Kyle Glaser, then he is probably mad at you because he expects you to know him.

8. Roommate Kyle and Other Kyle consistently referencing Star Trek and 30 Rock-- I have two friends named Kyle who have the exact same TV interests, but other than that share no similarities whatsoever (except they are both reasonably successful white males working on graduate degrees).

9. Ping pong against Chris-- I have never beat my brother in a 3 game series. The day I do, I will quit. "I choose not to run."

10. The people of Eastern Greene-- Great memories of that place. This sounds like stereotyping but I now support dear hunting and modern country thanks to this wonderful community. I DO NOT support camouflage tuxes however.

11. The fact that there are toys in my house and I am in a successful relationship with a smart and attractive female-- Seriously: toys! We have at least three Captain Picards and I have on display more than one Batman Beyond-era Batman action figure. Did I mention the pez dispenser brass quintet?!

12. Logos-- I don't know why but I love a good logo. It's half the reason I love sports.

13. Long car rides-- as long as I have my DMD and some good music I am good to go. Speaking of which...

14. Diet Mountain Dew-- It's an obsession. I've had three today.

15. Pizza-- My top local is Mother Bears. My top standard is Pizza Hut. And my top chain that doesn't get enough attention is Donato's

16. My Pbone-- Buy one. You don't even have to know how to play the trombone. Just trust me.

17. Those G.I. Joe youtubes-- I've never been less ashamed to listen to such awful language in public.

18. Bon Iver, Bon Iver-- I have listened to this album every night for the past 3 weeks. Not an exaggeration.

19. Anything Chuck Klosterman writes-- I really like two Van Halen songs (make it three), but I don't really dig the band. But if Chuck writes it I will read it. He once said that time travel is impossible, and even though I am a giant sci-fi nerd, I now believe he is right based off his argument.

20. This Thing

21. Lost-- It was the best show on television and I refuse to hear otherwise. I am now watching Alkatraz just because it is kinda like Lost even though it isn't AT ALL.

22. Getting infuriated at dumb political statements made on facebook-- Look people: Just keep a blog. It's what I do, and I still don't pretend that all the people that read this think the exact same thing as me. With that said I do like reading those cause they keep me riled up.

23. Knowing stuff-- It's the best when you have prior knowledge. You can prove people wrong and engage in conversation with other members of the human race.

24. The Fact that people are still reading this-- I mean, seriously. Read a book people! (copyright Kyle Glaser)

25. Running half and full marathons-- It's great. It's good. It's ok. It's last because it really isn't all that much fun. I mean, sometimes I kind of hate it. It's terrible. It's the worst! Boo.

Grammy Awards 2012 Retro Diary

My return to blogging will undoubtedly please 10s of people who miss the old days of C- research coupled with thoughtful yet unoriginal thoughts and feelings. But the reason we are returning to the Messy Shelves is to cover the greatest awards show ever-- The Grammys. Why is it the greatest awards show? Because I simultaneously love it genuinely and ironically. There are great moments in the Grammy performances that I still remember (Aretha Franklin subbing for a sick Pavarotti and totally killing it). There are also laughable moments in Grammy history (EVERY SINGLE TIME THE PRESIDENT OF THE ASSOCIATION SPEAKS), and it's all rolled into one super show. Plus, LL Cool J is the host! (The biggest surprise in my blog tonight is the record number of exclamation points that I use. I am usually morally against using too many exclamation points, but there were just too many fun moments. I apologize to anyone offended by the overusage or the hypocrisy of the overusage.)

This particular awards show has a lot of weight to it. It is the legit year of the diva. Etta James recently passed. Whitney Houston very suddenly passed away last night. Adele rules the universe using that old hand held thing we call a compact disc. There will be exciting performances and terrible performances. Justin Vernon may be really sarcastic. It's all fun and games. Here is my retro diary following the event.

Full disclosure. I missed the first hour and a half (because the best time to play 60s wind band compositions is on a Sunday night from 8 to 9), so I taped that and watched the rest of the show live. Because of that, this retro diary might seem a little disjointed.

8:00: There is only one good way to start The Grammys. Find someone old who still rocks hard and let them do their thing. Today we get this show started with Bruce Springsteen who wants to make sure that everyone is conscious and breathing before he starts his catchy riffs with introspective Americana lyrics. This performance is pretty good, but just like Paul McCartney, I don't get why The Boss is here right now. It's Diva night for goodness sakes. How did he get Little Steven out of his garage? "We Take Care of Our Own" seems to be the name of the song. I dig. Bruce always helps me dig being an American. He is a man of the people (with expensive earrings). I am a sucker for simple shouts like "Hey! Hey!" They're fun, I don't care who you are. The dramatic bow from the whole band was interesting.

8:05: Ok LL let's see what you've got. A strong and honest start with a touching prayer to Whitney. I dig that he isn't hiding talking to God on this. Definitely something different. Unfortunately he would be pretty annoying for the rest of the show. I don't hate LL at all. And it ends up working out that he hosted the show where they had to confront Whitney's death. Billy Crystal or David Letterman might have come off a little sarcastic or silly for this. But LL comes off genuine. Unfortunately, he is simply not very funny.

8:13: Bruno Mars brought a horn section! Ok these Grammys are gonna be just fine. I seriously do wish that LL Cool J was funny though. Bruno looks like Little Richard but without the creepiness. This is meant to be a compliment to both. Will this song Bruno is playing be a new single, because it should be. "Get off your rich asses and have some fun." That seems to be a bold thing to say Bruno, because I would bet the royalties from your hit single "Just the Way You Are" that you're rich. Bruno needs to put away the slacker dude mentality that some of his hits have given him and go with this classic funky approach because it's just plain fun. And considering everything on the radio sounds pretty watered down right now, this new tune would be very refreshing.

8:22: Bonnie Raitt is on. Just Vernon is drooling right now. Alicia Keys and Bonnie are doing a tribute to Etta James. This is very nice. Two great voices that probably haven't worked together before. "Sunday Kinda Love" is also a great tune. Man these two need to do something else together because this sounds great. I wished they would have harmonized a little together. That would have been an interesting sound.

--And now we'll pass out an award even though the real award is that we got to listen to Alicia and Bonnie sing for 2 minutes.

--And Adele wins the first award of the night. Something tells me it won't be her last (see this is funny because I've watched most of the show already). Adele is awkward in a great way. Has anyone ever said they need to take their shoes off at the Grammys due to height issues? Someone look into this.

8:27: Chris Brown is gonna show off how good of a dancer he is and how averageish a singer he is. He does both of these things without a hitch. He will show up again later and walk around for a while. Is Chris Brown good enough that we can see him twice in this show? Paul McCartney, The Boss, The Foo Fighters, and a couple others are. But I'm not so sure that Chris Brown is worth that much camera time. Oops he just gave up on lip syncing. I'm ok with this. He is here to dance. His singing just helps him sell iTunes downloads, so he can show up on awards shows and get more camera time than other better artists.

--While we are on this subject, why are there so many artists tonight showing up twice? Did the Grammys get turned down by anyone other than Bon Iver? Come on people get some variety out there. Where's Bob Dylan? More old guys!

8:37: Fergie mentions that LL is a rap icon hosting the Grammys. This is only partially true. He is a rap icon who is paid by CBS to be on a cop show, so he owes them for keeping him in the entertainment industry. The dude is under contract, so calm down. "Otis" wins. Jay and Ye are no-shows! Dude they are snubbing the Grammys for snubbing them. There is no other explanation. Kanye is too aware of award shows to accidentally schedule something. Maybe the whole fam (Beyonce, baby, Jay and Ye) is watching at home making fun of Taylor Swift for trying to be angry.

--Ok Kelly is doing her thing with Jason Aldean. This is something that Kelly needs to embrace more. She has the chops to be a great country singer and it would extend her career longer than if she kept trying to recreate "Since You've Been Gone." I trust her to make the right choice for her, but it requires further thought. Hey how old is "Don't You Wanna Stay?" anyway? Worst part of the Grammys is how completely strange their timing for awards recognition is. I'm not completely convinced that Jason's mic didn't accidentally turned off at the end there.

8:48: Jack Black is legally required to keep rock and roll popular and fun. He had a pretty funny Bon Iver joke at least (now the sole representative of the indie rock scene, which everyone seems to forget to Album of the Year last year thanks to the Arcade Fire). Do your hard rocking thing Foo Fighters. It sounds good, but slightly predictable. If I were there I would be mashing though. Is it possible that the Foo Fighters matter right now because they are just doing traditional hard rock? Is it original to be unoriginal?

8:58: I forgot that Rihanna is from Barbados. I don't think that helps me appreciate her more. I like how the Grammys is advertising this performance with Coldplay as unique even though it is from a Coldplay record. The unique part is that Coldplay is jamming with Rihanna on one of her previous hits (maybe they are, it might just be someone else). Rihanna is doing her typical move acting like a cheap sex kitten while still sounding good. The only problem with that vibe is it's being done by at least one or two other people in tonight's performance.

--I actually like the Coldplay/Rihanna collaboration song "Princess of China." It still sounds like Coldplay yet still sounds like Rihanna. But the melody and song structure itself seem a little underdeveloped. "Paradise" is unfortunately the worst song on the album which means we get to hear it a whole bunch because it is the most immediately catchy on first listen. Chris Martin is very polite. Not much else interesting to say about this.

9:13: I just realized LL has been wearing a hat this whole time. Come on man, get over that. We know you're bald and there is nothing wrong with it. On another note, the Giants being here seems dumb. Thank goodness Victor can dance. And introducing the rock award seems just as weird too. I am glad the Foo Fighters won because it's possible the players have heard of them. Foo Fighters won by not spending any money and using a tape machine. How many other people in the room can say that (the answer is none but some of them are better)? Oh the Foo Fighters just got silenced. Sorry gentlemen. Guys who used computers gotta take over.

--Ok, they couldn't get Bob Dylan again, but we will have a jam session with Maroon 5, Foster the People, and fresh off the release of The Smile Sessions, The Beach Boys. Maroon 5 sounds great. Respectable while not trying to master the falsetto parts. Foster the People are also going to totally do this respectful. Well done modern rock people. Great harmonies all around. The Beach Boys have gotten a great set up; let's see if they can take it and run with it. The Beach Boys can still put on a good show. Brian Wilson even had some fun with the theremin part and yes, I did just say Brian Wilson and fun in the same sentence. A prize tonight to Foster the People for their period outfits and tight harmonies.

9:30: We are now enjoying the Trustee Awards which are awesome cause no one knows anything about them. Except Steve Jobs just won one! But why?

-- Stevie Wonder is now on, and the fact of the matter is he never goes wrong on the Grammys. He is the only presenter who can randomly sing during his introduction (or play the harmonica?!), and it doesn't seem all that weird or stupid. The fact that he is introducing Paul McCartney helps out. Two old guys that please fans on a wide variety of levels.

-- I don't get into much Paul McCartney other than the Beatles stuff, but that doesn't mean it isn't good. How long has this guy been writing songs that matter? And at what point did he approach the songwriting 10,000 hours? I think it was recently, because this performance seems like it should be corny with a full orchestra and Diana Krall (thanks for just holding down the keys and not taking over even though you are the best singer up there) and Joe Walsh. But it was really pleasant. I think Paul McCartney's staying power has to do with his sense of humor. He doesn't take himself too seriously.

9:35: Gil-Scott Heron just got a shout out which was the right move. Not enough people realize how key he was for hip-hop. When I taught a hip-hop unit at Eastern Greene, I barely mentioned Heron even though he is so important to the genre. Common demands respect, but he is giving the Best R&B award which no one cares about except Chris Brown, who should really care about how much of a jerk he is. Button up your shirt punk.

9:40: Hey Civil Wars, don't tell jokes. Just jam because you sound good, really good. This is a strange intro to Taylor Swift, but I will happily take it. This duo has got some grit, but is also very catchy. They also have the blues, which is something not enough popular music acknowledges these days. Now they have to stop early because they told too many jokes and Taylor Swift has to go pitch-hunting.

-- Did Taylor have a similar backdrop last year? Also, I question her banjo chops, though country choreography is kind of funny. This song is good and has some heart to it, but as my roommate Kyle says, "ok Kanye, where are you?..." Taylor is now going into the center of the ring which always seems forced and how she seems to be doing a hard rocker stance with a song that is very old school bluegrass meets contemporary pop. She is awful cute though.

9:50: Neal Patrick Harris is a hot little number. He decides to tell no jokes for the Song of the Year intro. This is, of course, funny. Adele wins. Her speaking voice is borderline hideous, which is perfect. Adele is everything that matters.

--"She can even shoot fireworks out of her boobs." That's right it's Katy Perry time! As you can imagine she is wearing something extremely strange that is somehow also very sexy. This smells like a medley which is easily one of the worst parts of the Grammys. Wait a minute, everything messed up and went black. Was that on purpose? It seems so. Goodbye alien song. I am not sure what single they are doing now, but it is probably about ex-husband Russell Brand. Do you realize that Katy Perry has 6 number one hits from one album, which is more than Michael Jackson had for Thriller? If you hate Katy Perry, you hate popularity. It seems strange that they only did two songs in the medley, none of them being the most popular.

10:00: It's best country album time. Dirks Bentley and Miranda Lambert just forgot to announce the names, so now I barely know any of the songs they are announcing. Oh! Lady Antebellum just upset Taylor Swift. If you saw that comin' than you're a Mayan. Somewhere, Kanye is laughing.

One thing I appreciate about the Grammys is that they try and do a lot for music education. When I was teaching music at Eastern Greene, I looked into signing up for some grant money. Unfortunately, somehow we weren't poor enough to qualify. The Grammys really concentrate on the inner city and even some super rural places. The rules are tight, but it's still nice to see that they are doing something on a public stage for music education. Hopefully public education still exists for the Grammys to send their money towards.

10:05: It's Adele time! Of course they chose the prettiest woman in the room to introduce a chubby British genius (that Gwyneth just won't go away). You know what, Adele still looks great. Adele shows her chops early by starting a capella. In your face Taylor! This also looks like it won't be a medley. Ten points for Adele. She sounds like she doesn't have the full range of the voice, but she is definitely matching that with the soul of the song. Just laying it down. "Rolling in the Deep" is a great song for several reasons, but one of them has to be an isolated clapping solo for the background singers. Bam. In your face. Adele just brought down the house. She stays in her vocal range and puts subtle inflections that only the people who know the song forward and backward (which is everyone) would get. That was a performance that was probably downright inspiring live. The standing ovation lasted at least one extra minute than would seem normal. Adele should have gone offstage and come back on for a bow like conductors do, but that might seem forced. Huge stage+giant high heals=stand there and soak in your awesomeness. This was definitely a highlight Grammy moment (for all those pitch nerds out there, don't worry about how in tune it was, just enjoy it).

10:16: A tribute to Glenn Campbell (The Rhinestone Cowboy). The Band Perry is gonna kick us off. I kind of know these songs and like them, but I really don't know much about Glenn Campbell. I do know that The Band Perry sounds great and is one of many reasons that I have enjoyed becoming a country music fan. Now Blake Shelton will help us out with a classic-rendition of a song that I really wish I knew more about ("Southern Night"). I really should have done more research before I did this. Just stop reading now. No really. Stop. Ok. Just kidding. Please keep reading. Here comes Glenn Campbell with "Rhinestone Cowboy." This is one of those songs that we all know and would sing at a karaoke bar but probably not too much otherwise. Still a nice performance. So is Glenn Campbell doing a tribute to himself? That takes stones....rhinestones (feel free to boo me now). Campbell seems to really love his choir in the background. He keeps mentioning it during the song, along with his gender-equality ending.

-- A very nice Lifetime Achievement Awards list including Glenn Campbell, The Memphis Horns, George Jones, the Allman Brothers Band, Antonio Carlos Jobim, and Diana Ross. That is one heck of a list. It is slightly unfortunate that Glen Campbell was the only one they could get to come in.

10:27: It seems that Super Bowl commercials that didn't get a lot of play last week are getting another run tonight. Good to see you again Flava Flave. Please take care of Sir Elton.

10:30: Carry Underwood is cute. I am only three degrees away from her too (my hairdresser's husband hunts with her dad). Tony and Carry are going for it. Carry needs to stay simple because that's what Tony does. My roommate tells Carry hello. She doesn't respond. Amy Winehouse obviously sounded better with Tony, but Carry is doing a great job here. She held her own in fine style. And she is cute (many apologies to Nora for all the female appreciation here). What this has to do with the New Artist category I don't know. Bon Iver with the win! Watch out people. He doesn't really like the Grammys. He is being very respectful and making a good point about all the quality bands that will never even approach this stage even though they make great music. He also shouts out his hometown of Eau Claire (great college to study jazz) and his parents. Other dudes would have been sarcastic, but Justin Vernon played it cool and didn't bring down the vibe while still seeming genuine. Good for you, Justin. Bad for the gossip columnists.

10:35: Time for the douche bag. There will probably be some jazz coming up here, which is unfortunate that the only way they can get jazz is to follow the dorky white guy. But the stuff he is saying about music education is important. We will take the douche part off his title. He is just a bag. 12 million dollars for music is a lot of money. Now lets hear from cool people about MusicCares. It seems that they help keep musicians afloat. Hey people pay your musicians (notice I didn't say publishers-- they matter, but not as much as they get payed for). Either way please buy music or if you get it for free do it with permission. There ya go, I said this speech in under a minute. Oh no, no jazz today. Thank goodness Diana Krall was here. Time for the people who passed away-- Amy Winehouse, Jerry Leiber, Heavy D, Steve Jobs, Nate Dogg, a whole bunch of other people that were important but their names are rolling around too fast,

Etta James, Camilla Williams, Milton Babbit (he matters a lot to 20th century composition), Clarence Clemons, and Whitney Houston.

-- Jennifer Hudson showing props to Whitney Houston. This is really touching. Goosebumps-style. You need to google this or youtube this performance of "I Will Always Love You" ASAP. That was amazing. A positive tribute to yet another tumultuous life of a diva.

-- When Amy Winehouse died, I was just getting back into Back to Black. The news of her death got to me because I was digging inside her music and finding out that she was truly great and had more music to make. I even said at the time that Adele was great, but Amy Winehouse would have caught up with her if she got sober. But that didn't happen, and we won't hear any new music from Amy. But what about Whitney? Most of her music was made, so does that mean her sudden death is less tragic? Certainly not, but what we take from it might be a bit different.

10:50: ?uestlove makes things cooler, which this strange dance tribute may desperately need. A good dance party always starts by watching Chris Brown walk towards something. The beat is definitely hip though. By the way David Guetta is a total dork. Please don't disagree. It's cool that a dork makes good dance music, but look at him. He probably got kicked out of the band Garbage at one point and bought some DJ gear. More power to him.

-- Welcome back from jail Weezy! Weezy stop singing. Or yelling. Whatever that was.

-- Alright Foo Fighters, fight that foo. They are rocking they're funkyish tune "Rope" which is a pretty dance-esque song, but I'm interested in how it belongs here during this tribute to dance. Deadmou5 is gonna try to justify it but wearing a mask and using strange colors. Unfortunately it makes the song a little flatter. Deadmou5 rocking by himself is cooler if not as partyrocking than trying to get help from Foo's worst enemy.

FACT: Deadmou5 is strange. This is fine at Bonneroo or the club with drugs involved (I am probably gonna get a couple tracks on iTunes because he intrigues me that much). But this is the Grammys dagnabbit. Water it down a little bit buddy (I realize now how hypocritcal this comment is compared to my Nicki Minaj opinion. Sorry about that Deadmou5). Remember, your target audience is genuinely excited that Paul McCartney wrote a Valentine's Day song. Be yourself, but do what Bon Iver did and demand to be by yourself instead of trying the strange collaboration. I still give the whole thing a B though.

11:04: LL Cool J probably shouldn't talk during the commercial break. Alright everybody hush up. It's Nicki time.

--Quote roommate Kyle: "What the hell?!" Music videos shouting out The Exorcism. It looks like Minaj's version of Sasha Fierce has a few more personal issues. Now most people will probably talk about how dumb and weird this is tomorrow morning (actually they talked about it the night of; facebook blew up after that performance and that is exactly what Nicki wanted), but "The Exorcism of Roman" is exactly what artists have been hoping Nicki would do. She is a really weird cat and definitely seemed crappy from the outset, but songs like "Super Bass" just seemed like copies of Katy Perry songs with a hint of weirdness in her rap style. This is a full out emergence of what I like about Nicki Minaj, but unfortunately might not be very popular. Keep at it Nicki. A lot of us love it.

(It turns out not very many of us. I have seen some of the most hateful dumb things said about this performance on the facebook. I'm telling you guys, this was a weird thing and you may not have liked it, but it was original and interesting. And most of the people complaining about music today are saying how unoriginal it is. Well guess what, yo' fault. Here is original and you didn't roll with it.)

11:12: Adele wins record of the year. I would have thrown something at the TV if she didn't, even though I dig Bon Iver more. Also, I know I've mentioned this already, but Adele really has a different speaking voice. "The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain." Seriously, she sounds like Eliza Doolittle from "My Fair Lady." I think that only helps the case that she is one of the best singers in the business today. That, and she is winning all these awards that say she is the best.

11:18: More important than being a diva icon, Diana Ross put LL Cool J on tv. That, I guess is important. Thanks LL. Go away. Ladies and gentlemen, Adele wins Album of the Year for 21. The academy decided not to screw over the people who deserved it most this year. Good for Adele. Good for them. I hope she keeps making great music. And I love that she is freaking out right now. Its good that this matters to her. This is quite lovely. Oh no, snot! Get it out! 10 points to Rick Rubin who supposedly has influenced every popular music icon ever.

11:23: Is Paul your homey LL? He is a friggin' knight dude. He was in the Beatles for crying out loud. He is singing songs right now that are iconic and they are from his slightly deeper catalogue. He is not your homey even if he really is. This performance is great, but I don't totally get it. Why is Paul McCartney the man tonight? Is he just flexing his immortal muscles? If so, I am happy to enjoy it. Thanks Paul for playing some great music that doesn't necessarily apply to the rest of the night. These Grammys could have gone the somber road but now we are rocking some fairly awkward guitar solos trading fours. For the record Dave Grohl is kicking everyone else's tail with only two different licks. Also I think The Boss's guitar is plugged in weird. "And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make..." I don't get why Dave Grohl can do this but can't fly to Seattle to help do a Nirvana tribute, but that's probably an unnecessary quip here. This was a fun send off that had nothing to do with anything, which is good. Well done Grammys. You made my blog crazy long so no one will read it. I blame Chris Brown.

An Incomplete Accomplishment: The road to and through 26.2 Miles

In June of 2008 I weighed 280 pounds. Nary a pound of that was muscle. I tried to put on an XL button-down shirt (of the loose variety) and couldn't fasten most of the buttons. I appeared in a friend's wedding that summer, and today I try not to look at those photos (even though my hair looked amazing). The concept of exercise was to put down the remote and walk all the way down the two flights of stairs from my apartment just so I could drive to Taco Bell, dump 11 bucks, and run back up the stairs again to watch Lost episodes until I passed out.

Now I know what you're thinking: "Aaron, that sounds like pretty much the best life ever. What time can I come over to borrow those DVDs?" Calm down people. It wasn't the best life ever. Not even top 15. The only problem with sitting at home and eating while watching good looking people on TV is that eventually you have to be seen by real people. And watching good looking or athletic people doesn't necessarily make you good looking or athletic. It just makes you realize that you are none of the above. In my Matrix I looked like a cross between Josh Holloway and Steve Nash, but as soon as I went to a wedding or hung out with friends that ideal self-image disintegrated into Hurley and C.C. Sabathia (I am not quite certain why my poor self-image resembled two Hispanic men, but please don't read into that racially-- it's simply a fat joke).

So I did something about it. If any of you know me, than you know this story and have probably scoured through my facebook photos to find some big boy pictures. Long story short-- I lost about 12 pounds during the rest of that summer and another 58 in a two and a half month span from January to March of 2009. I even forced myself down 181 pounds at one point, but I have kept steady at around 210.

I was asked for a long time how I did it. Despite the obvious answer that I was secretly wearing a fat suit for six or seven years, I also dieted and exercised. And when I exercised and started losing weight, I fell in love with running. I had always liked the idea of running but wasn't healthy enough to do it regularly. After the weight loss I maintained the running with the dream (it sounds trite but it's legit) of doing a half-marathon. I achieved that goal in April of 2009 and have run four more half marathons since then.

This post is not meant to be a motivational tool for losing weight (though if someone uses it as such I won't prosecute), and it is not meant to try to convert people to running. But I love running. I find it extremely therapeutic and simple. I suck at stuff that takes a lot of preparation just to try it (this will be funny when we talk about my training schedule). But running is simple. You put some shoes on and move forward. There's really nothing else to it. I can run anywhere if I really want to without anything more than shoes. Can't do that with swimming (need a pool); can't do that with biking (need a bike); can't do that with weights (hmmm...). Running works perfectly for me because I am just too unorganized to do anything else.

The great part about running is that there are personal goals to achieve. After running several half-marathons and improving on each one I convinced myself that I could do a full marathon. The full marathon distance is 26.2 miles and has been that way since 1908 when the path to the end of a race was remapped to make the finish more entertaining for the Royal Family in Britain. 26.2 is more than a mile above the approximate distance of the original legend. The origin of the marathon comes from the legend of Pheidippides, a Greek messenger sent from the Battle of Marathon (that he had just fought in) to Athens to tell the Athenians that they had defeated the Persians. After running that distance (approximately 25 miles) without stopping he conveyed the message then died.

Yeah that's right. I wanted to do this.

So I began training. The program I used was very methodical and smart, incorporating days of rest and other exercise into the running routine. I didn't concern myself with going too fast because the point was simply to cover the distance. I ran an average of 25 miles a week for 18 weeks; the peak week was a grand total of 40 miles over four days. After that peak week I injured my back and sat out for a while but got healthy in time for race day.

Did you read that last paragraph? Do you know who is writing this? I never prepare that far in advance for anything-- ever. I invested a lot of time into this one thing-- sometimes getting up 5:30 in the morning to run in the dark or staying well past midnight to hit the treadmill in the gym. It would be beyond craptastic if I could not finish this race that I took over four months to prepare for.

Finish the race. Either I have low standards or that is just how difficult this activity is. My hopeful race pace was a 10 minute mile. I had done four of my five half-marathons slightly over or decently under that pace. It seemed practical. But I also kept telling people whenever they would ask me that finishing was my first goal. I made up some crap about my back to justify that goal, but the truth was I really did not think I could finish.

On race day morning I was filled with anxiety. It didn't help that the morning temperature was in the 40s and the wind speed was at least 20 miles per hour, or that I could hardly sleep the night before. But there I was at the starting line. They let us loose and I set off on my pace. I was in good shape for the first half because I had done that before. I knew I was just a little above a 10 minute pace which was more than justifiable in my eyes. Maybe I would have enough in me at the end to push it and finish under 4 hours and 20 minutes.

Then people started to pass. People of all shapes and sizes (losing 70 pounds is great and all, but getting passed by a guy who weighs 30 pounds more and/or is at least 30 years older is a deflating feeling). Every mile got tougher from 13 to 19. Once I got through mile 19 I could feel the end coming. Yes I was slower but could still finish under 5 hours (40 minutes off target and I am looking at this positively). Miles 20 and 21 felt great. My brother was there for support, and I got that feeling that people get when they know they are at the end of something and momentum takes over.

But in a marathon, the last part is still a large part. Think about this statement: Only 5 miles to go. That's nothing. That's what I was telling myself, until I reached mile 23. My legs shut down. They had had enough. I forced them along as much as I could, but my mental state was deteriorating. My mind had decided to join my legs in the giant wining fest. And it became an emotional roller coster. I couldn't think rationally, let alone focus my mind on finishing the race.

We have all heard of the walk of shame. It comes up in a myriad of different scenarios. My walk of shame was mile 24. I was defeated (there are a friggin' large amount of depressing "d" words), but I had to keep moving forward because that was my only logical choice. I finished the race because anything else would have been that much more demoralizing (another one!) and embarrassing. I felt like I was disappointing all the people close to me and even people not that close to me, even though this had nothing to do with them.

Did I cross the finish line? Yes. Was my final pace faster than an average walking speed? Absolutely. Did family and friends stress how proud they were that I finished no matter what the time? Of course they did, they're not jerks. But I am not satisfied. I could have gone faster; I could have trained better; I could have paced smarter; I could have remained emotionally and mentally cool. But I didn't do those things. Did I fail in my goal?

In my head I am battling Disney Channel ethics verses Old School Band Director ethics. Disney tells me that I tried and put forth the effort and finished and that is a success. Old School Band Director tells me it wasn't perfect, so it wasn't good enough. I am not sure which side is truly correct, but I think maybe it's both (copyright Forrest Gump). Sitting completely satisfied can't be right, but feeling like a failure sure isn't the way to go either.

In June of 2008 I weighed 280 pounds. In October of 2011 I finished my first marathon and I'm pissed that I didn't finish faster. I'd say that's a step in the right direction.

The Top Five Star Trek Series of All Time (As In All of Them)

It seems laughable to do a top five list for something that only has five options to rank. But that is where you are flat wrong baby. Star Trek has existed in some form or another (either with new episodes, movies, or syndication) since 1966. Dear old dad was not driving when this phenomenon started. And since then there have been six series. Bam.

I was a huge Trekkie as a kid and am still a fan of the genre (I wouldn't even call myself a Sci-Fi fan because Star Trek is completely in it's own genre). I have already discussed how I collected tons of things and obsessed over the world of Trek. I even attempted to write a few short stories based in the Star Trek universe (the only thing they suffered from is being very bad stories-- other than that they weren't bad). I have involved myself on almost every level of the Star Trek universe and have finally caught up with all of the series by watching Star Trek: Enterprise with my roommate Kyle. We are nearly done with the show (you can watch most of the episodes for free here), so I figured now is as good a time as any to rank each Star Trek TV series exactly where they belong. I'll even throw in a few bits of information in there before I explain why I put which series where (including how many seasons, highlights, lowlights, and 2 episodes you should definitely watch including a thinker/heartstrings episode and an action fest two-parter [no series finales]).

Honorable Mention: Star Trek: The Animated Series

I thought it would be fun to at least acknowledge that there was a Saturday morning cartoon. To those of you who don't know (the 7 people I know will read this probably already know the info here) most of the original cast was back for this animated series. All of the characters were even voiced by the original actors from the live action series. The Animated Series also won an Emmy, which is one more than The Original Series received. The show lasted for one full season and is not really considered part of the Star Trek canon. But it was an official production from the makers of Star Trek, so it counts.

And now for the official Messy Shelves rankings of the Star Trek series.

No. 5: Star Trek: Voyager

Seasons: 7 (1995-2001)

Highlights: Anything to do with the Borg/ The Doctor's character arc/Lt. Barclay coming back

Lowlights: The existence of Chakotay/ The Phage lasting as long as it did/Ensign Kim being good on the clarinet without ever seeming to practice

2 Killer Episodes: "Think Tank", "Scorpion Parts 1 and 2"

Already I think I am in trouble with some of you. You thought certain that this would predictably start with another series produced during this millennium, but you were wrong. The simple and undeniable truth is that Voyager is good Star Trek, but it is far from always being good TV. The show is easily the biggest winner in overuse of technobabble, which is without question the most annoying thing about Star Trek. It also took them 3 seasons to realize that they were in the same quadrant as The Borg (the same alien race that gets ratings no matter what series they go to even though their trying to assimilate us all). Also it should be mentioned that no one represented multiple cultures (both real and fictitious) more poorly than Chakotay. My roommate and I have a goal before the end of the year to watch the worst episodes of Star Trek ever. We could probably just make them all Chakotay episodes and it would work. He just sucks (sorry Seven of Nine). And quit with the friggin' Holodeck!

The show was of course far from bad. It carried UPN throughout it's entire tenure. Star Trek struck gold again by creating a non-human character (The Holographic Doctor) that ended up having the most humanity on the show. Captain Janeway was a strong character even though her voice made me want to claw a chalkboard with a dead person's fingernails. And I was always a fan of new alien cultures, which Voyager had in spades. The only reason Voyager falls short to the next show is because the show ended when the engaging serial action series concept (Alias, Lost) was really starting to get some legs. It also doesn't hurt that the special effects would advance in the years following Voyager. Just watch the show, it's fine.

No. 4: Star Trek: Enterprise

Seasons: 4 (2001-2005)

Highlights: All of Season 3 /Trip being the inspiration for Sawyer on Lost/ Dr. Phlox's pleasant demeanor

Lowlights: Anytime Lt. Malcolm was in a dire situation/ Captain Archer always being pissed off/The premature cancellation of the show.

2 Killer Episodes: "Similitude", "In a Mirror, Darkly Parts 1 and 2"

The original impetus to write this blog was to make the insane stance that Enterprise was the best or second best Star Trek. But unfortunately this is simply not true. One of the reasons it's not true is because not enough people watched the show. The series moved to Friday night for it's 4th season which is pretty much the network saying, "I don't like your show, so I am going to banish it to the Rura Penthe of time slots." But while I have been quoted as saying "Enterprise would be awesome if it had good characters and good stories," I think there are a lot of good aspects to the show.

For one thing, Enterprise was more high drama than the other series simply because humanity had not evolved quite far enough. The best shows on television are the ones that acknowledge how much human beings can really suck. I'm not saying they are hopeless; the programs that have the highest drama produce heroes that succeed in their tasks despite their flaws (pretty much the plot of most epic movies such as Harry Potter, Star Wars, and Blazing Saddles). The other Star Trek series suffered from their characters being a little too perfect an altruistic sometimes. But Enterprise didn't have that problem. Captain Archer was pretty much a jack ass. Even T'Pol was kind of a sub-par Vulcan in terms of her emotional discipline. It seemed like every time the Enterprise would encounter a new culture they would get into serious big time trouble, and the endings were not always happy ones. This made for compelling and edge-of-your-seat style drama, especially during the Xindi arc of Season 3 (the first time a Star Trek series flirted with being serial by tying every single episode of the season into one story arc). In Season 4, things started to get more Trekkie, which hurts my "it's cool because it isn't like Star Trek" vibe, but the episodes were really cool. And then UPN cut it (you know, cause they knew what they're doing; hey how is that network doing these days anyway.).

The show isn't all roses, however. Ironically the viewership shrank when it got good. Season 1 and 2 meandered just a little bit (the first two seasons of a Star Trek series always seem a little off except for in The Original Series). Lt. Malcolm had to be the most oversensitive, whiny tactical officer in the history of time. In addition, Captain Archer is easily the worst of the 5 captains. He is head strong and constantly ticked off to the point that you just kind of get used to it. But the series really is exciting (and technologically very solid with much of the show in HD), and for the true Trekkie it riles up a lot of interesting historical canon issues that can keep you occupied for days. Highly flawed people=great TV.

No. 3: Star Trek: The Original Series

Seasons: 3 (1966-1969)

Highlights: Twilight Zone-style mysteries/ great interplay between the main cast/ grand introduction to a 45 year franchise

Lowlights: Too many mysterious aliens that look like your hot aunt/some blatantly awful Season 3 episodes/ very underdeveloped supporting cast (Sulu, Scotty, Uhura, Chekov)

2 Killer Episodes: "The City On the Edge of Forever", "The Menagerie"

Now it's time for the excommunication (it's OK I can make that joke-- RCIA baby). When talking to truly dedicated Star Trek fans (the kind that would say I am not one of them), they would say that The Original Series is, at the very least, the second best incarnation if not the first simply because it is the first show. I completely disagree. This is the same broken logic that people would use to claim George Washington was our greatest president. He wasn't. He was probably good, but he wasn't better than Lincoln, FDR, Teddy, Jefferson, or Benny Franklin (that last one is a joke in reference to The Office-- don't judge). TOS has to be judged on the same level.

The good news is, of course, that it is really flippin' good. TOS's best episodes are some of the best episodes in the history of Star Trek and worth viewing even if you aren't a Star Trek fan. There are dozens of episodes you could check out and be pleased with, just based on the fact that these episodes are iconic in terms of dealing with social issues of the time in a futuristic sci-fi show. "The City On the Edge of Forever" is one of the most intense, fascinating, and creepy episodes of TV I have ever seen in my life. When I was a kid I owned it on VHS and would watch it time and again. It is really a piece of art beyond the world of Star Trek.

Despite a lot of great things about TOS (some of the more comedic episodes are hilarious, and some of the more serious episodes can leave you thinking for days), the show had a lot of flaws. Because it didn't have a lot of support due to the network's nervousness about how popular it would be and how gung-ho and passionate Gene Roddenberry was on controversial topics, the show had some rough moments. It was essentially canceled before Season 3, but the fans protested and the network renewed it without too much of a fuss. This was pretty much a mistake because Season 3 is just not very good ("Spock's Brain"!!!!!-- an episode so bad that it caused me to set a record for how many !s I used in a single article). The show also focuses so much on the three main protagonists (McCoy, Spock, Kirk) that you aren't really sure why the other cast members are there.

All that being said, if you watch seasons 1 and 2 you will actually become smarter. I'm not even kidding. That's how good some parts of this show can be (when I read over this section I am somehow reminded of Bob Dylan in terms of inconsistent awesomeness)

No. 2: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

Seasons: 7 (1993-1999)

Highlights: The overall darker tone (this show had some stones)/ Captain Ben Sisko is BA/ The best attempt to find a good villain that wasn't Borg (The Dominion)/ Quark and Odo interactions

Lowlights: Jadzia Dax leaving early for a dumb Ted Danson show/ Most of Season 2 (all Season 2s suck for every Trek except TOS)/ the overuse of the line, "the fate of the entire Alpha Quadrant"

4 Killer Episodes: "The Visitor", "The Search Parts 1 and 2", "The Way of the Warrior Parts 1 and 2", "Far Beyond the Stars

This is a mistake. I don't think that DS9 is the second best show in Star Trek. I think it's the best. But frankly there are two things keeping me from putting it at No. 1. And they are these:

1. Every character in DS9 is somewhere between good and incredible. But if you were to list the five greatest characters in Star Trek history, I don't think any of the DS9 folks should be on there except for one-- and he is borrowed from another show (my list would be Picard, Data, Spock, Kirk, and Worf with shout outs to McCoy, Sisko, Janeway, Odo, and The Holographic Doctor). Now most of the DS9 characters would get into the top 30 rather easily. But the fact is that Odo loses points for being a (great) re-tred of the Spock/Data humanity concept, and Sisko is also kind of a new spin on the "diplomatic but doesn't take crap" concept of Picard.

2. DS9's lack of solo time has to be taken into account. Of course that is the producers' fault and not the characters', but the fact that the show always had a partner on the air to make it seem more unique, darker, and better developed gives it an unfair advantage. Many people claim that DS9 suffered because it was never on the air by itself (always sharing time with TNG and Voyager), but I think it was an advantage. Kind of like Scottie Pippen. He was praised for doing all the things that Jordan didn't, and that is what made him great. But put Pippen on a team by himself and he is just a really awesome basketball player without the legend of being the held back, brooding, smarter sidekick (consult the 1994 Bulls or 2000 Blazers). Scottie Pippen matters as much as he does because of Michael Jordan. DS9 matters as much as it does because of The Next Generation.

With all of that being said, this show is just killer. It does all the things (serial TV, large story arcs, war, interpersonal conflict) that Enterprise does but with great writing and great acting. I felt an emotional connection to most of the characters on the show-- including a very large list of guest stars that were sometimes better than the main people (I'm looking at you Garak). In addition to being darker and more brooding it also explores a lot of emotional drama and even lets some of the characters have committed relationships (Worf can't keep his hands off anybody). There were episodes that had me on the edge of my seat and episodes that made me really tear up. That's good TV. Bonus points for being the only Star Trek show bold enough to (spoiler alert!) kill their main protagonist. When the show ended, it ended for good. None of the other series can say that. DS9 is my favorite, which means No. 1 must be awful good.

No. 1: Star Trek: The Next Generation

Seasons: 7 (1987-1994)

Highlights: Picard and Data (and the incredible acting done to portray them)/ the new spin on Klingons/ introducing the Borg/ Q/ poker/ basis of the best Star Trek movie (you heard me right) Star Trek: First Contact

Lowlights: Deanna Troi's feelings/ Dr. Pulaski/ the obsession with the Holodeck/ "Masks"

4 Killer Episodes: "The Inner Light", "The Best of Both Worlds Parts 1 and 2", "Tapestry", "Chain of Command Parts 1 and 2"

TNG is not just the best Star Trek. It is one of the best shows in the history of television. You won't see it on any of the most current best of lists because it isn't serial at all, and it's hard to put a sequel to something else on one of those lists (it also doesn't have any grutuites scenes in it-- you need that to have critical acclaim since critics stab people in the back and commit adultary all the time). But the ratings were monstrous as was the critical acclaim of the time and the unique way it was broadcast (full on first time syndication). The show also featured some incredible actors (Patrick Stewart, Brent Spiner) just acting the pants off stuff. The show had everything any of the other series had along with Gene Roddenberry's original vision still in tact. The emotional depth it reached was completely unparallel for a sci-fi show of it's time. The show presented humanity in a way that we could all look to the future with hope. The guest stars were amazing (Whoopi Goldberg as a 24th Century bartender? More please!). TNG is just plain good.

Sure it had it's drawbacks. It got predictable. Riker didn't really take off as a character the way he could have. The characters were a little too peaceful and understanding at times. And Deanna Troi's accent kind of freaked me out. But most of TNG's deficincies became endearing eventually. Kind of like a long healthy marriage. It isn't healthy because everything about it is perfect; it's healthy because you grow to enjoy the flaws of the other. That is how TNG is. None of the flaws made people stop watching, and that is why the show will be on TV for as long as TV still exists (so about 7 more years) and then it will casually move on to whatever is next. TNG made me love Star Trek, and it still makes me feel at home. I get geeked out just thinking about it. In fact, I might watch a couple of episodes tonight to recover from the dark world of Breaking Bad. Now there's a TV show.