Once the beans have been counted, the votes cast, and the losing tickets torn and scattered to the winds, which is the worst band ever? The Red Hot Chilies, obviously. But who’s in second place? It’s a difficult question. International commissions composed of scientists, physicians, casino owners, philosophers, music critics, statisticians, psychiatrists, bookies, seeing eye dogs, and necromancers have failed to come up with an answer.
But I’ve succeeded where the others failed. The second worst band in the world is Starship, which in case you’re keeping score started life as Jefferson Airplane, changed its name to Jefferson Starship, briefly changed its name yet again to Jefferson Starship, and finally settled on just plain Starship. Should the trend continue they’ll drop the Starship altogether and we won’t even know they’re there.
I came to my conclusion through the use of a carefully considered set of variables including annoyance factor, uselessness, stench, former greatness and “We Built This City.” In the end the stench factor prevailed; Starship may have entitled its 1985 debut Knee Deep in the Hoopla, but a better title would have been Knee Deep in Pig Shit.
Knee Deep in the Hoopla marked Starships’s stab at commercial success, and God help us all they pulled it off. The quintet of Jeff Airplane ringers expanded its core audience of aging hippie holdovers to include to a younger crowd weaned on the MOR likes of of Journey, Foreigner, Warrant, and Asia, and made a bundle in the process. It was a smart move on Starship’s part–there’s nothing in the rock rule book that says a band that’s artistically bankrupt need be financially bankrupt as well.
The album’s biggest takeaway, of course, is “We Built This City.” It’s a hilarious amalgamation of hubris and self-delusion, from the part where they accuse others of playing corporate games as if they weren’t personification of corporate rock to the part where they wonder “Who rides the wrecking ball into our guitars?’(The correct answer? Me!) But dumb as it is,“We Built This City” is the only track on Knee Deep in the Hoopla that shows the slightest spark of originality. My biggest takeaway from my sole visit to SXSW was a guy in a bunny suit singing “We Built this City” wandering minstrel style. The 85 other bands I saw didn’t stand a chance.
The LP’s other hit is the inconceivably bland “Jane. It’s the perfect slow dance song for your 34th high school reunion, as if looking at the wrecks your classmates have made of themselves weren’t reason enough already. The remaining songs on Knee Deep in the Hoopla you’ve probably never heard, and if you’re lucky never will.
But let’s run them down. The ballad “Love Rusts” is badly in need of protective coating and doesn’t make a lick of sense–the chorus goes “love rusts when it rains on romance,” but shouldn’t it be the romance that’s doing the rusting? “Rock Myself to Sleep” is hard rock for soft brains. “Private Room” gives the lap dance a bad name. “Hearts of the World (Will Understand)” is exsanguinated Madonna. “Tomorrow Doesn’t Matter Tonight” is Phil Collins + Asia = Please Make It Stop. “Desperate Heart” was co-written by Michael Bolton and sounds exactly like Journey, and how it failed to top the pop charts I’ll never know.
I spare Knee Deep in the Hoopla an F only because “We Built This City” is a work of unintentional rock genius. As for the rest of its songs they make me wish Starship would slip the surly bonds of Earth and sail off to a galaxy far, far away, where they’d be out of earshot. But Knee Deep in the Hoopla never achieves lift-off, sparing Starship the indignity of being the pop equivalent of the Challenger disaster. And if you think that’s scary, their other albums are worse.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
D-
