New Found Glory and us, we go way back. We remember seeing them in '99, when they were playing third-billed sets at Chain Reaction. We actually wrote something nice about them once—”thoroughly enjoyable,” we believe the pull-quote was. But since then, since the MTV rotations and the KROQ airplay, they've been making us wonder what it was we ever saw in them. Were we voracious acid eaters a few years ago and just can't remember anything? Whatever. Anyway, New Found Glory have blown up now, to the point where they're doing “secret” TV shoots, hence the taping of MTV's Jammed at the Vans Skatepark at the Block at Orange on March 6. As we suspected, the crowd picked for the shoot was a makeup of teens who like their fashion sense was fed to them from Big Media: long, straight Avril hair for the girls; cockeyed mesh ballcaps (like the Blink-182 guys!) covering the heads of the spiky-haired boys. (By far, the biggest goofball we spotted was a New Found Glory guitar tech who had laughingly safety-pinned a Minor Threat patch to his ballcap—sorry, son, your sad attempt at cred-building won't fly with us.) This being teevee, the kids squashed themselves silly trying to get on camera, shooting horn signs at the lens with their forefingers and pinkies and screeching themselves hoarse, well, just because they could. On the balcony, we guffawed silently as we watched no-last-name-apparently-necessary VJ “Jim” read his cue cards while sporting a backpack to make him look more “emo,” we'll guess, even though he's probably really old, like 30. Before anything could go down, though, a guy from the Orange Fire Department stepped onstage to point out the room's two exits—”if something happens,” he warned ominously. (Like New Found Glory spontaneously combusting? We could only hope.) The band came out and did some muffed-intro shtick, then the curtain behind them dropped, revealing Tony Hawk and a troupe of skaters and BMX-ers at the top of the skatepark's huge half-pipe, who then performed as New Found Glory farted out their hapless, shrilly wank rock. Hawk and New Found Glory are actually a fitting match: Hawk is to skating what New Found Glory are to punk—safe and non-threatening, pop culture the parents could love right along with the kids. (Where the fuck is Duane Peters when you need him?!?) New Found Glory mostly did their two MTV hits, “My Friends Over You” and “Head On Collision,” several times apiece, the kids getting more disinterested with each take no matter how often the band jumped up and ran around the stage for no good reason—also fitting, as New Found Glory do seem to be the penultimate attention deficit disorder band, and speaking of, how come ADD didn't exist until MTV came along, anyway? Here's a conspiratorial question: What pharmaceutical companies is MTV parent Viacom partnered with? Huh? Huh? Look, kids: there's a fucking war about to break, martial law will be imposed by W. any day now, people with Stinger missiles are poised in rowboats waiting beneath the John Wayne Airport take-off path (well, the LA Times wants you to think so!), and you sedate yourselves by listening to New Found Glory's cutesy-cutesy la-la poo? Sheep! All of you! You'll even go see New Found Glory on their upcoming tour with the equally abominable Good Charlotte—what's easily the worst, most upchuck-worthy double-bill since Bush-Cheney—won't you? WON'T YOU! Oh—Jammed with New Found Glory and Tony Hawk airs on MTV2 on March 23.
COME, ARMAGEDDON, COME!
Thursday night. March 6. 8:15 p.m. During Survivor. The unmistakable voice of Bob Dylan crooning “Love Sick” over the audio feed. The televised image: a sexy young thang suggestively hidden behind white, wispy, gauzy effects, but not so hidden we can't make out her lacy bra. Nearly 30 seconds later, the vision bleeds away and the pitch is made: VICTORIA'S SECRET, in large black lettering. Bob Fucking Dylan. Shilling for Victoria's Fucking Secret. Why don't they just shoot a commercial with Zimmy wearing crotchless undies, fer chrissake?
