Sorry for party rocking? Apology not accepted

Mark Matousek
Alterna2 | Flickr Creative Commons

Call me a curmudgeon, but I don’t like mainstream pop. With a few rare exceptions (“Rolling in the Deep,” “Call Me Maybe,” “Crazy in Love”), most pop singles are vapid, overproduced garbage designed for the sole purpose of maximizing financial success. But LMFAO elicits a special kind of hatred reserved for only the most talentless louts. Its recent hiatus has brought me nothing but pure unadulterated joy at the thought that we’ll be given a much-needed break from LMFAO’s crass distillations of an already vacuous genre. While this decidedly un-dynamic duo is singularly incompetent from a musical perspective, what irks me most about the group is its infuriating efforts to portray itself as an oddball outsider. Cutoffs and lensless glasses do not an eccentric make.

And then there’s that song—that grating, hollow atrocity sent by Satan himself to drain the life from anyone who happens to cross its path. You know it as “Party Rock Anthem,” and it sucks. With all the artistry of a sixth grader’s half-finished GarageBand project, the song features Europop synths that are so trashy even Ke$ha would recoil at their sheer sleaze. To make matters worse, Redfoo and SkyBlu contribute absolutely tone-deaf “rapping,” sucking every iota of potential mindless fun from the strikingly unmemorable beat. Despite the hilarity suggested by the duo’s name, LMFAO’s music is so completely devoid of personality that I simply feel nothing while listening to it.

The second single from their most recent release (“Sorry For Party Rocking”), “Sexy and I Know It” is downright puzzling in its pathetic attempts at humor. The chorus shamelessly apes Right Said Fred’s horribly overplayed “I’m Too Sexy” with this atrocious one-liner, “Ah, girl look at that body, ah, I work out.” Oh, I get it, it’s ironic because they don’t actually work out. That’s funny, right? Later in the song, Redfoo ups the ante with this outrageous revelation, “When I’m at the beach, I’m in a speedo trying to tan my cheeks.” To call this juvenile would be an insult to adolescents. It’s objectively unfunny at every level.

LMFAO reminds me of that obnoxious kid in grade school who would make constant, horribly inept jokes despite the fact that no one ever laughed at them. Day after day, you kept hoping he’d learn his lesson, but he never did. Your (just barely) controllable urge to punch him in the face was tempered only by the realization that if you did so, the outpouring of sympathy he’d receive would just encourage him further. And so you were left to wait until the school year ended, the prospect of a three-month reprieve barely preserving your sanity.

When all is said and done, LMFAO will be nothing more than an unfortunate blemish on pop music history, the type of band that will make your kids react with equal parts bewilderment and disgust when you admit that, yes, you did listen to “Party Rock Anthem” without a shred of irony. Sadly, the group has indicated that its hiatus is temporary, and we will most likely be subjected to another dose of their putrid trash-pop sometime in the distant future. Here’s to hoping that next time around, no one will care.

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