Sorry, guys. I know doing a post about Spencer Pratt is pretty lame, being that he’s one of the world’s biggest assclowns, just after Dane Cook and the ESPN lawyers that are keeping you from watching the Erin Andrews peephole video.

And his douchiness just gets that much more intense, since he just announced, in an interview with Spin magazine, that he’s launching a rap career.

How good of a rapper are you?
Incredible. I have the biggest mouth on earth, so why wouldn’t I be the best rapper — you know what I mean?

Can you freestyle right now?
I mean, everybody keeps on asking me to freestyle. But I always say, “Please, I don’t do freestyle, my goal out here is to get paid.” The word “free” does not exist in Spencer Pratt’s vocabulary. [via Spin.com]

Jesus Dead Baby Christ! This dude is completely out of hand. In fact, I’m starting to wonder if this guy isn’t just taking us all for a ride, Andy Kaufman-style.

I know, I know – he seems to barely have enough brain power to maintain basic bodily functions. But there is definitely more than meets the eye with this dude. And I would be ashamed of myself for being fooled by Spencer F’ing Pratt. Then again, he’s probably just learned to say outlandish sh*t in order to stay relevant. Either way, he’s still a douchebag.

In the July ‘09 issue, Spin magazine writer, Brian Raftery has put together an excellent oral history of Prince’s iconic 1984 movie and Top 40s soundtrack, Purple Rain, in honor of its 25th anniversary. With interviews from pretty much everybody with in-the-know insight (besides Prince, unfortunately, but whatever), the 12-page feature gives you a comprehensive behind-the-scenes look at one of the classic music experiences of the modern era.

To top off their Prince-centric edition, Spin produced an excellent Prince tribute album, Purplish Rain, featuring an eclectic variety of musicians, from Of Montreal to the Riverboat Gamblers, which they’re giving away for free on Spin.com. But “free” has one little catch: In order to access the album, readers must first answer a question, the answer to which can only be found by having a physical copy of the magazine* (it’s the last word on page 61).

This is actually a fairly clever ploy to get you to buy the magazine, offering readers a valuable, interactive experience between Spin’s print and online properties. That said, it’s still only a ploy, nothing close to  shutting down the Internet the massive monetary defibrillator needed to zap life back into the print industry. (more…)

As long as people continue to make music, other people will make year end lists chronicling it. Artist of the year? Song of the year? Album of the year? Depending on how much you care about these things, there are literally dozens of different places for you to find out who and what, in very esteemed professionals’ opinions, have taken these top honors (Spin, Rolling Stone and Pitchfork being the most notable).

But have you ever wondered what other people who care lots about music but don’t necessarily make their livings criticizing it think the best music of the year is? Hype Machine, the indispensable music blog aggregation portal, is sure hoping that you have, and they’ve decided to make yet another list of the top 50 artists, songs and albums of 2008. This list, which they’re calling Blog Music Zeitgeist, is compiled by the people, for the people. Instead of lame old professional music critics calling the shots, they’ve reached out to some of the coolest, most prominent music bloggers on the net and asked them to capture the defining musical spirit of ‘08 in list form.

The results are… well, they’re kind of the same as all the other lists. Santogold, Wolf Parade, No Age, Deerhunter, Girl Talk, Hot Chip, Lil Wayne and Coldplay are there, just like every other list. However, their 50 songs of the year, which lists songs in order of release date instead of best-ness, has very little in common with the other lists, and has lots of excellent, easy to download tunes and remixes.

Instead of slapping on suntan lotion, smokin’ a doobie, and heading to Grant Park to watch tons of awesome bands at this year’s Lollapalooza, we’re still at the office like a bunch of frickin’ dumbasses. But we know we’re not alone, so we’ve scoured the Web to find all the best coverage, videos, tidbits and music coming out of Lollapalooza 2008. It’ll seem like you’re actually there, but without all the sweaty people and $25 bottles of water.

Check out the best Lollapalooza-covering Sites on the flip side! (more…)

Instead of slapping on suntan lotion, smokin’ a doobie, and heading to Grant Park to watch tons of awesome bands at this year’s Lollapalooza, we’re still at the office like a bunch of frickin’ dumbasses. But we know we’re not alone, so we’ve scoured the Web to find all the best coverage, videos, tidbits and music coming out of Lollapalooza 2008. It’ll seem like you’re actually there, but without all the sweaty people and $25 bottles of water.

Check out the best Lollapalooza-covering Sites on the flip side! (more…)

Take a spinning stool, a couple beers and a leaf blower and you can create a fun ride in your own back yard. I would like to see this guy attach a couple leaf blowers to his legs, shot gun a beer then get on the stool! That would be entertaining.