Great Job, David Garrick

You might have read that title and asked yourself: “Who the hell is David Garrick?” Exactly. Who the hell is David Garrick?

The David Garrick of consequence was an actor and playwright from the 18th century. The David Garrick I’m writing about is some goofball who reviews music, despite barely being able to write, and seemingly not understanding how reviews are supposed to work.

I chanced upon this fellow because I got nostalgic for the sweet tunes of late-90’s Turbonegro, after listening to a Ramones song that reminded me of a Turbonegro song, because Turbonegro often referenced their influences on their albums, including the Ramones, whom they were influenced by. Nice.

It was then that I decided to do a good old Google™ search to see what Turbonegro has been up to these last few years. Imagine my shock when the 4th result that showed up on Google™ was an article titled “Is Turbonegro Racist or Completely Clueless” on a website called Houston Press. The article is from 2018, but I’m perfectly fine writing a critique 2 years after the fact.

Mr Garrick evidently writes music “reviews” for this site, but literally nothing he writes even remotely passes as a review.

He wrote a “review” for a band called Grand Old Grizzly that is 215 words long, consists of 4 paragraphs, and just throws out a few adjectives to describe a few songs. This post is already 241 words long as of here, and this is just some bullshit I’m writing to entertain myself and perhaps anyone else who happens to chance across it. I’m not getting paid to write this, nor do I have the gall to declare myself a “music writer”, despite the fact that I’m currently writing about music with this very post.

The Turbonegro “review” also doesn’t quite meet the requirements to be considered a review. Though to be fair, maybe he doesn’t consider his aimless ramblings reviews, so much as a loose assortment of words meant to meet some sort of word count quota.

Here is his third paragraph:

When it was announced that the band had a new record called ROCKNROLL MACHINE coming via Burger Records, I thought, who cares?  I mean, the band is on singer number four and their sound is typically for people who live in the past. When was the last time you heard someone under 30 talk about Turbonegro?  Not having relevance in the music world has seemed to be this band’s forte.

Phenomenal way to start off a review of an album.

“Hey guys, who even cares about this band? Only losers listen to this type of music. I really couldn’t care less about this band, yet for some reason I’ve decided to spend the time and effort on writing a review about their latest album.” -David

This is really doing a great job of qualifying yourself as an objective voice for the ensuing review.

He then proceeds to spend the next five paragraphs complaining about a single line from a single song, before ending the review. Yes, he literally reviews one line from one song on an album of eleven tracks, then calls it a day. Great work. Very informative. Quality writing.

In the offending track, the line “I’m cheaper than a Mexican” is used, which had the following effect on our intrepid reviewer:

…which threw me for a loop. I listened and re-listened to make sure I was hearing it correctly, because as a journalist, you don’t wanna’ call out anyone and be incorrect.

Evidently he’s a “journalist” now, and doesn’t wanna “call out anyone and be incorrect”, despite the fact that he wrote an entire article about a band he doesn’t even care for, predicated solely on the premise that the band is racist because of one line from one song. Even then, he got that part wrong.

The band released a statement clarifying that the album is about a reactionary, bigoted cyborg “bragging about how he is going to take over the world and destroy the job market”. Kind of a goofy premise for an album, but the lyric in question suddenly makes more sense in that context. Seems like someone reviewing an album would have been a little better at actually listening to the lyrics before writing a screed condemning the band.

Perhaps David didn’t even care to listen to the whole album. Perhaps he stopped after hearing the word “Mexican” three songs in, so he could devise the best way to go on a self-righteous crusade to smear the band and feel a sense of superiority. Based on the following lines from his “review”, I feel that perhaps this is the case:

…how does this type of trash find a label to release their records?

The truth is, it’s not funny. No matter who you are, or who you’re trying to reach, the lyrics are racist, especially when sung by a white man.

There’s zero excuse for these lyrics being out in the world

As it stands, this kind of racist garbage needs to exit music sooner than later, or bands like this can exist on the websites of White nationalist groups, but not on any streaming site or digital storefront.

In this time, with this president who seems hell bent on dividing us, maybe this kind of garbage has a home, somewhere.

Yes, a grown-ass adult human man wrote all this in an article “reviewing” an album he seemingly didn’t even bother listening to all the way through. This article is from 2018, but in 2020, this gentleman would appropriately be referred to as a “Karen”. He even asked to speak to the band’s “manager” as it were:

We reached out to Burger Records as to why they’d release an album with such blatantly racist lyrics..

What an embarrassing man.