“Rock & roll is dying because people became OK with Nickelback being the biggest band in the world… So they became OK with the idea that the biggest rock band in the world is always going to be shit – therefore you should never try to be the biggest rock band in the world. Fuck that! Rock & roll is the music I feel the most passionately about, and I don’t like to see it fucking ruined and spoon-fed down our throats in this watered-down, post-grunge crap, horrendous shit. When people start lumping us into that kind of shit, it’s like, ‘Fuck you,’ honestly.”

– The Black Keys’ Patrick Carney discusses the state of rock and roll (via Rolling Stone).

Here And Now stands nearly identical to Nickelback’s last three albums in terms of track arrangement, though unlike the ’08 perv proponent Dark Horse, hedonism is a little less prevalent at each turn, despite party anthem “Bottoms Up” being a lead-off single. Here And Now predictably falls off the radar by its own third track–single number two, “When We Stand Together”, an “Everyone Cared” copycat left proving that Chickenfoot has more relevance and depth in one recent socio-political outset than vocalist Chad Kroeger and company have had their whole career.

Sharply played “Midnight Queen” feels like a song that AC/DC could have done 10 times better, while future guilty pleasure “Gotta Get Me Some” is a loud and loaded “Bottoms Up, Part II”, without the class to admit it. “Lullaby” gets crippled by voice effects, as “Trying Not To Love You” apes “Someday” as though it totally hasn’t been out of style since 2004. “Kiss It Goodbye”, boasting a “Shit Is Fucked Up” cautionary element and the hardest edge since “Side Of A Bullet”, gets left sequentially, sonically, and proportionally out of place amidst the brand Nickelback has unintentionally become.

Every critic that has ripped into these once-welcomed transients from the north will most likely do so again, here. Pop culture has made that job so damned easy, the challenge becomes whether or not we can salvage anything from Nickelback’s latest releases. The answer is as relative as any music, popular or otherwise: All we ask of you is to understand why a lack of substance, though mildly amusing, is no substitute for wholesome art. Here And Now might prove to be a step above the last effort, but likewise a step high enough to hang its creators on a barn rafter.

Essential Tracks: “Kiss It Goodbye”, “This Means War”.

As one might expect in the era of dwindling CD sales, the top dogs are making money based on other endeavors. This year’s list “[comprises], among other variables, monies earned from CD and digital sales, publishing royalties and all forms of streaming,” according to the article. And of course tours. The top earner last year (it’s not even close, folks) was U2. With a whopping $108,601,283 made, U2′s figures reached almost twice as much as number two guy Bruce Springsteen. Bono and co. can thank — or pat themselves on the back for — the huge 360° tour for making them (and Africa) so wealthy. Other tours bringing in the dough: Madonna’s record-setting “Sticky & Sweet” tour, the Jonas Brothers’ world tour, Kenny Chesney’s tour (1 million tickets sold for seven consecutive years), and Metallica’s arena tour, which drew close to a million fans in 2009 (Guitar Hero: Metallica was good for some loose change, too). Metallica’s only 10th on the list but earned $25.5 million. Major labels may be irrelevant, but you can’t argue with these figures. Sheesh.

Other artists making the list include the late Michael Jackson, who sold truckloads of CD’s and ringtones; dutch violinst Andre Rieu on his 30th-anniversary tour; Trans-Siberian Orchestra, which has found a genius niche that is not likely to abandon the band anytime soon; and Leonard Cohen, who needed the money and apparently chose a reliable way to make it. The list also includes the names you expect to see there: Nickelback, Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, and Beyonce. Not among 2009′s biggest earners: Lady GaGa, Black Eyed Peas, and Kanye West, despite being everywhere all the time.

Check out the full list here.

The live video, which surfaced recently on Fark.com, is taken from a March 2nd performance at the Air Canada Centre. Lead singer Chad Kroger steps aside and lets lead guitarist Ryan Peake take a crack at KoL’s Top 100 hit. What ensues is some overly-wrought hard rock version of the song done by a Poison cover band. It’s not bad per say, but definitely without the emotional strength of the original.

We’re just waiting for The Fray to cover Arctic Monkeys. Wait, that might actually not be so bad…

This album is essentially All The Right Reasons or The Long Road all over again, with reminiscent “This Afternoon” hearkening back to the headache known as “Photograph”, and “Something In Your Mouth” retracing “Because Of You” and “Next Contestant”. I emphasize the backward stepping in lieu of this album’s title attempting to be foreboding while adding some adult atmosphere to it, whereas the closest it gets to such sensibilities is later on with “S.E.X.”, with Kroeger proudly confessing his menage trois fantasy in juvenile detail as though he’s boasting to high school kids.

The problem lies in trying so hard to convert us to perversion–it feels less like Matthew McConaughey hitting on your girlfriend, more like those creepy old men at your local Yahoo! chat room. Chad Kroeger might be blond now, but he still sounds like a pedophilic 40-something with a soft side. Gone are the days of The State, twisted story lines with fucked up characters that even the most ordinary people could relate to; tightly written tunes like “Leader of Men” were replaced with the radio-saturating “How You Remind Me”, when Kroeger was deemed one of VH1′s Fugliest Musicians, and “Gotta Be Somebody” is now making itself the new “If Everyone Cared”. Is it strange that these transitions coincide with changing drummers?

In terms of the genre at play, Dark Horse started off strong with the new stripper theme, “Something In Your Mouth”, where Kroeger can’t seem to contain himself as he spouts off about some “naughty thing” that’s “ripping up the dance floor”, to which he begs her to “shake [her] ass around for everyone.” It’s a strong song in the sea of Nickelback, but lyrically? Let’s hope the feminists turn their shoulder at this one. Shortly after, you get the faux rebel rock stomp “Burn It To The Ground”, and the aforementioned first single, “Gotta Be Somebody”, both generic tunes that warrant a mediocre listen, collected on a sub-par record that’s sure to sell millions.

In closing, if the same regurgitated trash fits your tastes, then by all means Dark Horse is for you. This writer’s only prayer is that maybe, for just a little while, “Rock Star” won’t be all over the damn radio every five minutes.

Essential Tracks: Pick one, they all sound alike.

I know, I know. This sucker was released over a year ago. I’m not trying to pass this off as some new-found, milestone footage in the world of rock criticism, but it raises some very interesting issues concerning musicians and the people who love (or hate) them.

In case you weren’t able to view the clip, the band is playing a live show in Portugal, clunking through the end of one of their sluggish, dinosaur pseudo-ballads when the crowd goes apeshit, booing and throwing assorted concert-tossing paraphernalia. The nail in the coffin comes when, after asking the crowd if they want to continue to hear their music, Ramen Noodle-haired frontman Chad Kroeger actually gets pegged in the head with a rock, prompting the band to swiftly leave the stage.

Funny, right? I thought it was at first. I mean, who doesn’t want to see Chad Kroeger get wailed by a piece of gravel while playing his shitty, shitty music? But as the days grew longer, the image settled in my bones, making me question how laughable this clip truly is. Although many music fans (myself included) may not particularly enjoy Nickelback’s overly generic brand of nu metal, does the band really deserve such heckling while putting on their show? And I know many of you out there are thinking: “Yes! Of course they do!  Nickelback sucks, so fuck them!”  But should something as insignificant as what kind of music they play and something as subjective as whether or not you like it justify them getting pummeled with rocks while they practice their art?

Let’s face it, none of us truly know any of the members in Nickelback (well, maybe you do, and if that’s the case, perhaps you can shed some light on this debate). And who knows, maybe they are sincere dickheads to their core – unabashed bros that resemble the legions of frat guys who listen to them. Then again, maybe they’re just laid back, perfectly nice Canadian dudes who wouldn’t wish harm on anyone, including the good people of Portugal. Or maybe, like most of us, they’re somewhere in between.

Either way, most of us don’t know enough about them as people to decide whether or not they deserve what’s exhibited in the concert clip. And yes, they’re rockstars, they have lots of money, they screw lots of chicks, they have lifestyles that most of us only dream of having, which means they should have to pay the small price for fame. But should that price be getting shit thrown at you while you’re trying to do what you love?

My point is fans often assume that an artist’s music reflects their personality. If they think the band is good, then the members of the band must be cool as hell. If the band sucks, they must be arrogant pricks, and any bad treatment bestowed upon them must be well deserved. If what had happened to Nickelback had happened to, say, Radiohead or Wilco, fans would be up in arms about it rather than laughing at it on YouTube as I did a year ago. As far as I know, none of the members of Nickelback have gotten press coverage for doing anything horrendously awful, but they get publicly stoned. To Kroeger’s credit, he actually handles himself quite pleasantly in the clip. Rather than spout off at the crowd or counteract with violence, he simply asks if they still want to hear music, gets zonked in the head, says goodbye and walks offstage. Many of my favorite artists (I’m looking at you, Ryan Adams) have acted much less rationally in tamer situations of crowd protest.

I’m not saying Adams deserves to get pegged with rocks either. Unless they’re causing harm to someone else while they’re playing, I don’t think any musical artist (or any performer for that matter) should be abused onstage (unless that’s their gimmick). So until the day G.G. Allin gets resurrected, please, fans, start viewing your most loved or hated musicians as human beings instead of cardboard cutouts of their music, however shitty it may be. After all, rock stars are people too.