Which, on the one hand, makes some sense: Poison is still touring with all its original members—a feat in hard rock right now, as we've chronicled here—and they're still on a major, another feat. On the other hand, $42.50 seems a little steep for a band that's a) playing shows behind a covers album and b) touring with Ratt, who aren't even in the top 50 of VH1's "100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock." Considering that Poison's clip for "Nothin' But A Good Time" has them as the savior of dish-washers around America, you'd think that ticket prices wouldn't be so steep—or at least would have kept pace with inflation. In 1990 I spent $21.50 (before service charges) to see Poison with Warrant (which then had all its official members); that would equal $33.72 in 2006 dollars, according to Westegg's inflation calendar, and we haven't even gotten into the "pay $3 for the privilege of printing your ticket at home while using ink and paper that you paid for" lunacy yet.

Poison and Ratt, Vains of Jenna [Live Nation]

Early October 2006 - "Take Control" leaks
Late October 2006 - Amerie releases the mixtape Because I Love It Vol. 1
December 2006 - Blow Up-inspired "Take Control" video is released
March 23 - Amerie releases "Gotta Work" via MySpace
May 5 - Because I Love It leaks
Mid-May - Album is released in the UK, Germany, Japan, and pretty much anywhere else that isn't the US
August 21 - Album is released in the US. Maybe.

Did Amerie lose a video game tournament with her labelmate Kelly Rowland, whose own long-delayed album, Ms. Kelly, is finally coming out next month? The delays are somewhat boggling to us, if only because Because I Love It will have, for all intents and purposes, been out for three months by the time it gets an official release in the United States—that is, if the Aug. 21 release date stands, and the album isn't be pushed back to sometime after the first anniversary of "Take Control"'s debut.

We know we've been beating the Amerie drum around these parts for a long while, but watching an album that has commercial potential (thanks to Amerie's name recognition, at least) get the short shrift from its label is an aggravating experience, especially when that album is available on import via methods both legal and illegal, which has to cannibalize sales the longer the album is delayed. "Take Control" and "Gotta Work" have been released by Sony/BMG as digital singles over here—neither got much of a push domestically, and they didn't crack the Billboard Hot 100, either; there's apparently a video for "Gotta Work" in the works, but we have to wonder whether or not that'll see the light of day Stateside. Maybe all of this is leading up to her eventually parting ways with her label? After all, her mixtape-making prowess has shown us that she can go it alone, and tweak the noses of Ludacris and Pharrell while doing so.

Because I Love It [Amazon]

Dear Pitchfork...

What does a band need to do to get reviewed by you guys? Yes, yes... we all know you are the current fantasy... the big bull goose on the block... the cheese, if you will, right now and for who knows how long. I'm not convinced a bad review hurts a band but we all know what a good one can do. Ok. None of this is what concerns me... what irks me is that by refusing to review our three albums so far you are suggesting we play NO PART in the mass tapestry that is modern music. Now... if you only reviewed acts like, say, Springsteen, I would shrug my shoulders and eschew my lips and move on.... but we all know you don't. There are thousands of reviews on yr site but none of The High Strung. Really... what does a band need to do?

Is it timing? I hear your review process works something like a round table with a pile of CDs in the center and someone has to say YES I'LL DO IT for it to "pass" into review. Is it timing then? Have our albums crossed the eyes of your brass at the same time that dozens of "bigger" (hate this word) bands? Hmmmm. I don't buy it. What I think it is is that you guys are simply not aware of what we've been up to. It's ok. We all have gaps. I still haven't seen Fast Times At Ridgemont High and you don't know much about the High Strung. We'll call it even. But I'm also gonna tell you a little about us... maybe show you that we are (on some level) a part of this tapestry you refuse to grant us:
1.) 300 shows a year for 4 years. that's 1200 shows.
2.) toured with Bob Pollard and Son Volt and Ok Go and the Capitol Years (all bands you review on the spot)
3.) forever entwined with the Rock N' Roll Hall Of Fame for "donating" our first tour bus to them (leaving it on their doorstep at 2 AM... if that isn't rock n' roll then you guys are not doing yr job)
4.) albums have been reviewed by other landmarks: Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, Spin, Playboy, Blender, Stuff. If it's validation yr after... can't some of it be found there?
5.) A song of ours was named runner up for SONG OF THE YEAR in The Washington Post. NPR named our first album one of the top ten of the year. Even if you totally didn't agree with this... shouldn't it warrant a review?
6.) NPR's THIS AMERICAN LIFE did a feature on us... that's right boys... for doing a library tour before that Potters band... a band you highlighted as a "show of the year" for how inovative they are a full year after we were standing on our amps and singing about over-acheivers and gravediggers to an all ages crowd.
7.) Our rhythm section is the best rhythm section in the country.
8.) What other band writes about devious museum curators? Neighborhood gentlemen? John Rambo? Look... fellas... we've done the work... we've sold out some good sized venues... we've put enough work into this that Harp prediciting we'd burn out (this was 2 years ago HA!). But the fact that they predicted it must mean we're at least in the musical map, right? Well. Do us both a favor... the next time the High Strung album lands on the royal round table in Pitchfork Media's golden meeting room... remember these few credentials (I can right 100 of them if it's heart and spirituality you're looking for) and review a band that a lot of other people already know about. Dig?
Until then... I'll write another... and another...

JOSH MALERMAN

The High Strung

Dear Pitchfork... [The High Strung's MySpace Blog]

Here's the lengthy missive in full, which was posted on the message board on Stewartcopeland.net in reference to one of the group's recent Vancouver gigs:

"Whenever you're ready Mr. Copeland" says Charlie, the production manager, as two crew members hold aside the giant gong, creating just enough space for me to slither onto my percussion stage, which is still down in its pit. I leap on board but my foot catches something and I sprawl into the arena in a jumble as the little stage starts to rise into view. Never mind. The audience is screaming with anticipation as I collect myself in the dark and start to warm, up the gong with a few gentle taps. But I'm overdoing it. It's resonating and reaching it's crescendo before the stage has fully reached its position. Sort of like a premature ejaculation. There's nothing for it so I take a big swing for the big hit. Problem is, I'm just fractionally too far away and the beater misses the sweet spot and the big pompous opening to the show is a damp squib. Never mind.

I stride manfully to my drums. Andy has started the opening guitar riff to MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE and the crowd is going nuts. Problem is, I missed hearing him start. Is he on the first time around or the second? I look over at Sting and he's not much help, his cue is me - and I'm lost. Never mind. "Crack!" on the snare and I'm in, so Sting starts singing. Problem is, he heard my crack as two in the bar, but it was actually four - so we are half a bar out of sync with each other. Andy is in Idaho.

Well we are professionals so we soon get sorted, but the groove is eluding us. We crash through MESSAGE and then go strait into SYNCHRONICITY. But there is just something wrong. We just can't get on the good foot. We shamble through the song and hit the big ending. Last night Sting did a big leap for the cut-off hit, and he makes the same move tonight, but he gets the footwork just a little bit wrong and doesn't quite achieve lift-off. The mighty Sting momentarily looks like a petulant pansy instead of the god of rock. Never Mind. Next song is going to be great...

But it isn't. We get to the end of the first verse and I snap into the chorus groove - and Sting doesn't. He's still in the verse. We'll have to listen to the tapes tomorrow to see who screwed up, but we are so off kilter that Sting counts us in to begin the song again. This is ubeLIEVably lame. We are the mighty Police and we are totally at sea.

And so it goes, for song after song. All I can think about is how Dietmar is going to string us up. In rehearsal this afternoon we changed the keys of EVERY LITTLE THING and DON'T STAND SO CLOSE so needless to say Andy and Sting are now on-stage in front of twenty thousand fans playing avant-garde twelve-tone hodgepodges of both tunes. Lost, lost, lost. I also changed my part for DON'T STAND and it's actually working quite well but there is a dissonant noise coming from my two colleagues. In WALKING/FOOTSTEPS, I worked out a cool rhythm change for the rock-a-billy guitar solo, but now I make a complete hash of it - by playing it in the wrong part of the song. It's not sounding so cool.

It usually takes about four or five shows in a tour before you get to the disaster gig. But we're The Police so we are a little ahead of schedule. It's only the second show (not counting the fan gig - 4,000 people doesn't count as a gig in the Police scale of things).

When we meet up back-stage for the first time after the set and before the encores, we fall into each other's arms laughing hysterically. Above our heads, the crowd is making so much noise that we can't talk. We just shake our heads ruefully and head back up the stairs to the stage. Funny thing is, we are enjoying ourselves anyway. Screw it, it's only music. What are you gonna do? But maybe it's time to get out of Vancouver...

Expect Sting's pissy rebuttal on luteawakening.com by mid-day.

OUR FIRST DISASTER GIG! [Stewartcopeland.net]

It's a holiday commercial for the Gap, featuring rapper Common and a bunch of breakdancers. Even for those of you who skip through ads nowadays, it's been hard to miss; not only is it on just about every three seconds, but it features Common clumsily equating "the hood" with Gap's hooded sweatshirt. Painful stuff, to be sure.

But whenever we see it, we don't just roll our eyes and shrug it off. We get a little fired up—the same way we get fired up when we see those Nintendo Wii ads featuring Hawthorne Heights, or Daniel Powter pimping a Chevy truck in Rolling Stone. These are all artists about which we could not care less, and yet they each prompted us to utter something we haven't said since 1995:

"What a sellout."

You read that right—we said sellout. For our younger readers, "selling out" is the charmingly antiquated notion that a musician diminishes his or her work by aligning themselves with a commercial entity. It's an idea most hotly debated during the alt-rock supermarket-sweep of the early '90s, when the indie scene was cherry-picked by the major labels. Back then, artists thought hard and long over whether they should endorse a sneaker, or lend a song to a soundtrack, or even appear in Time. Such navel-gazing may have been a little self-important, but at least the gazers cared about maintaining a modicum of credibility.

And then the '90s ended, and a whole bunch of bands got dropped without making a dime. Suddenly, the profit-scorching machinations of the biz became clear, and we all became a little more forgiving of a cheesy advertorial or a song being used in the Happy Gilmore trailer. Everyone's gotta eat, we thought, and we saw enough bands break up over money problems to know that credibility is a bank-breaking burden. Sometimes, a little sponsorship keeps the overhead down.

But somehow, in the last few years, this casual acceptance became less of a slippery slope, and more of a Wile E. Coyote-sized perch, one in which we've all been too willing to jump off. No one's going to deny that Internet piracy and label mergers have made ancillary sources of income more important than ever, but we've become way too forgiving: Jay-Z starts hawking Budweiser Select and NASCAR, and we turn a blind eye. 3 Doors Down take a two-page spread for Verizon Wireless, and we forget we ever saw it (for numerous reasons). These aren't little indie acts trying to clear next month's rent; they're big-name acts that like to cover up their greed by talking up their "branding" and "cross-synergy platforms." And even the ones that aren't commanding big mechanical-royalty checks should at least do a little soul-searching: Hey, Common—you know what? If you really need a cringe-inducing Gap spot to sustain your career, maybe you shouldn't have a career at all.

Look, we're not suggesting that everyone go live in a cave with Ian MacKaye, holding ten-hour debates on whether or not to appear on the fifth stage at the Warped Tour. We're just asking for a little less complacency on the part of the fans, and a little more outrage. Sure, everyone's gotta eat—but do they have to be so goddamn gluttonous?