2005: The 10 biggest stories in international pop

By Andre Mayer
www.cbc.ca
December 22, 2005

Best intentions
If 2004 was the year pop got political, in 2005, pop stars showed their giving spirit. The hastily assembled Live 8 concerts were proof of Bob Geldof's indomitable will and the music industry's ability to mobilize for a good cause. Ten concerts, an estimated three billion viewers. Live 8 was a success in terms of raising awareness of African poverty and putting the issue on the table at the subsequent G8 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland. Whether all the singing and finger--wagging will make a significant difference in the lives of destitute Africans now lies with the politicians.

Bono vista
Was 2005 good to Bono? Hmmm, let's see: His band, U2, tallies the 2005's top-grossing stadium tour ($260 million). The rocker-slash-activist earns partial credit for his work in organizing Live 8, shares Time's Persons of the Year award (with Bill Gates and his wife, Melinda), scores Q magazine's Man of the Year and is the subject of a fulsome cover story in the New York Times Magazine. Yes, he's everywhere: yes, those sunglasses look ridiculous. But can you name another private citizen who has donated as much of his energy to eliminating human suffering?

Kanye flips the script
The Hurricane Katrina relief effort was likely the second biggest cause of musical solidarity in 2005. But amid the feelings of sadness and good will, rapper Kanye West could not hide his anger at the disparities between blacks and whites in New Orleans. During the NBC telethon on Sept. 2, Kanye deviated from the scripted platitudes to express his outrage with the coverage of the disaster and the government's lackadaisical response. "I hate the way they portray us in the media. You see a black family, it says, 'They're looting.' You see a white family, it says, 'They're looking for food.'" Unprepared for this harangue, NBC was unable to censor Kanye's crowning blow: "George Bush doesn't care about black people!"

Shopping has dropped
In what is becoming an annual ritual, the music industry reported another plunge in album sales; according to Nielsen SoundScan, sales were down more than seven per cent from 2004. Industry watchers don't agree on the reason. Is it downloading (legal or otherwise), the rise of CD burning or mounting competition from DVDs and videogames for consumer dollars? Or is it that there aren't as many massive releases? My prediction: the industry will still be wrestling with the question this time next year.

A star is reborn
Admit it: before 2005, you wrote Mariah Carey off as a past-her-prime pop diva. Short of expunging her film Glitter from our collective memory, you figured there was no way she could ever be relevant again. Well, Mariah made proved us wrong. The Emancipation of Mimi, her 10th album, sold seven million copies worldwide, her single We Belong Together reigned supreme on the Billboard Hot 100 for 14 weeks and she scored a throng of Grammy nominations. In related news, "Rebirth," J-Lo's attempt at career rejuvenation, flopped magnificently.

Hate him or love him
If Kanye flirted with news headlines in 2005, fellow rapper 50 Cent practically dictated them. In March, Fiddy released his sophomore album, The Massacre. In April, he became the first artist since the Beatles to have four songs in the U.S. Top 10. In early November, he starred in Get Rich or Die Tryin' -- a thinly disguised autobio directed by Jim Sheridan. Later that month, a Toronto MP attempted to have the contentious rapper barred from entering Canada, saying 50 Cent's music fetishized the sort of gun violence that has plagued Toronto in 2005. And that sound in the background? Cash registers ringing up The Massacre.

Payola does not pay
In the 1950s and 1960s record companies often bribed radio stations to play their songs. The practice, known as payola, wasn't legal, but it also wasn't unusual. Most people had forgotten this primitive practice until an investigation by New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer determined that payola was still "pervasive." Among his findings was this e-mail by someone at Sony BMG's Epic label, addressed to an employee at radio station WKSS:"WHAT DO I HAVE TO DO TO GET AUDIOSLAVE ON WKSS THIS WEEK?!!? Whatever you can dream up, I can make it happen." The findings were so embarrassing that Sony BMG Music Entertainment agreed to pay a $10-million US settlement and promised to stop bribing radio stations. Spitzer mooted that other major record companies could be next. (In related news, forgotten Canadian band the Payola$ saw no discernible spike in their popularity.)

Diamond mine
In 2001, Neil Diamond was such a kitsch icon that he lampooned himself in the frat comedy Saving Silverman. Who could have predicted he would have enough mojo left to release another album -- much less one of the best-reviewed discs of 2005? Ruminative, heartfelt and 100 per cent kitsch-free, 12 Songs is utterly compelling. Much of the credit goes to producer Rick Rubin. As he did with Johnny Cash's waning career in the 1990s, Rubin saw through the layers of parody to pinpoint the honest songcraft that made the man great in the first place. If you’re looking for another Cracklin' Rosie or Kentucky Woman, you won't find it; what you will find is a great American songwriter, his skills undiminished.

R.I.P.
Another year, another spate of passings. Deaths in 2005 included: guitar god Link Wray; R&B smoothie Luther Vandross ; Ibrahim Ferrer, revered Cuban singer and the wizened face of the Buena Vista Social Club; legendary singer and piano maven Shirley Horn; guitarist Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, a Texas original whose distinctive sound was a searing blend of bluegrass, jazz, Cajun, country and calypso; and jazz great Jimmy Smith, arguably the most famous emissary of the Hammond organ.

Please, please, no more Peas
If a band can over saturate the market, the Black Eyed Peas have done it. In 2005, the California quartet --once a hip-hop outfit, now the worst kind of mongrel pop act -- was everywhere, demonstrating a willingness to appear anywhere, with anyone, for any cause, any time. While that included a fair bit of altruism (e.g. Live 8, an Amnesty International charity album), the Peas were far too voracious to let it end there: award shows, free concerts sponsored by Honda, the Super Bowl, the Grey Cup -- plus the threat of opening the 2006 World Cup of soccer in Germany. To ensure we would be talking about them through the holidays, in November, the BEP's released My Humps, a strong contender for Most Nauseating Single Ever.

Janet and Michael Jackson in top 10 Google search

CBC Arts - www.cbc.ca

Singer Janet Jackson has been named the most popular search on Google for 2005 joining other celebrities in the top 10 including her brother Michael Jackson and movie stars Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt.

The 39-year-old continued to pique the interests of people around the world in 2005, with rumours she had secretly given birth to a daughter 18 years ago and paparazzi video of her sunbathing nude. Back in 2004, Jackson was also a popular search subject mainly because of her "wardrobe malfunction" while performing a half-time show with Justin Timberlake during the SuperBowl.

Jackson topped the list, with Hurricane Katrina, the tsunami in southeast Asia, Xbox and actor Brad Pitt rounding out the top five.

Other top searches include the talent show American Idol and wizard-in-training Harry Potter.

Search results for Canada, with only the first half of the year available, indicate a skewing towards teenagers. Young entertainers such as Hilary Duff, Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan and Chad Michael Murray were perennial top 10 favourites, as was rapper 50 Cent.

Japanese anime cartoon Inuyasha was consistently in the top five between January and June, 2005. Inuyasha is a half-human, half-demon character searching for a gem that would give him great powers.

Canadian actress Rachel McAdams is listed as no. 9 on the search list for Canada. She's appeared in The Wedding Crashers, The Notebook, Red Eye and most recently, The Family Stone.

More evidence of stupid bias against black men -- this time in California's Alameda County

This is from the Oakland Tribune. I wish Alameda County would spend a little money for a 30 second commercial reminding all that housing discrimination is immoral and illegal. As to the pattern of discrimination in the county, it's clear that the farther away from the urban center -- Oakland -- one gets, the more likely they're going to be discriminated against if they're black.

Audit finds blacks face rental bias

Fair-housing group finds some landlords in county treat African Americans differently
By Matt O'Brien, STAFF WRITER

HAYWARD -- Black men seeking to rent apartments in some Alameda County communities face unfair treatment from prejudicial landlords, according to an undercover audit conducted by the Eden Council for Hope and Opportunity.
The Hayward-based fair-housing advocacy group, more commonly known as ECHO, sent four men -- two white, two African-American -- to 53 apartments in Hayward, Livermore, Pleasanton and Union City.

What they found after a seven-month investigation, ECHO counselor Angie Watson-Hajjem said, was that despite identical tenant profiles, prospective tenants who were African Americans faced discriminatory treatment on about 26 percent of the tests.

"We tried to match them up identically, except for the race thing," Watson-Hajjem said. "If the black tester had an appointment at 1 o'clock, the white tester tried to go in at 1:30. We feel the testers should be treated the same."

She said that on many occasions, it was apparent that testers were not treated the same.

And while Hayward property managers fared well on the tests, many Livermore-area property managers and those in Union City fared poorly, she said.

"Discrimination is still out there. It's still illegal," Watson-Hajjem said. "I don't know if I want to say it's a lot, but it's definitely there."

In Hayward, ECHO sent employees pretending to beprospective tenants to 20 apartments and found differential treatment at only one. In that case, a property manager offered the white tester -- but not the black tester -- about $200 off the first month's rent.

Some encounters in other cities were more egregious, the study says. The two black men were less likely to receive follow-up calls and more likely to receive different -- and more discouraging -- information about rental terms and conditions.

Barry Nielsen was killed by the coldness of San Francisco's community; an SF Chronicle story that will anger you -- or it should

I just saw this a few seconds before I posted it. This is an excerpt. Two things angered me: the report of people stepping over -- rather than helping -- this man, and the very slow response of the SF Police Department. It seems San Francisco's finest can spend more time making racist videos than solving crimes. Mr. Nielsen eventually died from what was finally identified as an attack -- but by whom, no one knows to this day.

DEATH ON THE STREET
Barry Nielsen curled on the corner, a head wound oozing blood, as his iPod hissed the soundtrack to a mystery in the foggy night
Mike Weiss, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, December 28, 2005

It began with a man crumpled on a nighttime pavement, his knees pulled protectively under his chin and blood pooling beneath his head. Something bad had just happened to Barry Nielsen. Exactly what remains a mystery.

Moments earlier he had been acting as a greeter outside an open studio at 1890 Bryant St., an industrial-chic home to artists, architects and a wine broker. He was dancing exuberantly. Now his iPod was still playing, but on this Friday night with fog dampening the air, he could no longer hear the music.

But this is San Francisco, where a man curled on a sidewalk means a homeless person. Even though the intersection with Mariposa Street was bathed in light from a Muni yard on the northeast corner, people stepped around him.

It was 7:25 p.m. on Oct. 21, and the neighborhood was well-trafficked. People came and went at KQED; there were clubs and restaurants nearby; and on the southwest corner, Starbucks was crowded, mostly with deaf people at a get-together. Finally a woman out for a smoke saw Nielsen's body and grew alarmed. She ran to Starbucks, where a pair of cops had parked their black and white and were on a coffee break.Officer Angel Lozano inspected Nielsen, saw the blood, and summoned an ambulance. When paramedics arrived, Nielsen no longer showed vital signs, Lozano said, but they revived him with CPR.

"We interviewed a few people," Lozano explained outside the same Starbucks a few weeks later, "and nobody saw what happened."

"The gentleman still had his iPod and his wallet," Lozano said. "It didn't appear there was a crime involved. First impression -- he had fallen down." So the officers did not create a crime scene or begin a thorough canvass of the area or summon detectives.

The building at 1890 Bryant is roughly halfway between San Francisco General Hospital, where Nielsen, 48, was rushed in a wailing ambulance, and the Hall of Justice. Over the days and weeks ahead, conflicting versions of what had befallen the dying painter and puppeteer -- had he fallen or been assaulted? -- would emerge from the two edifices...

By Saturday afternoon, when the police had not contacted Nielsen's friends or family, one friend, Dwight Horn, went to Mission Station and was told, "'What investigation? It was a fall, not a crime."

"We were hearing from every doctor we spoke to" that Barry had been assaulted, Hallquist said, "and the cops were doing nothing."

New Orleans Police Shooting - Why is it that 12 white guys with guns feel they need to shoot one black guy sporting a knife?

I'm watching CNN, and they keep showing a video of 12 -- yeah, 12 -- white New Orleans Police officers with guns drawn and pointing at one black guy who reportedly has a knife.

These idiots -- yep dummies -- killed that man.

I'm looking at this and thinking "Did anyone bother to just shoot the guy in the foot?" Why not? All of those cops and not one had the presence of mind to think outside the box of organized mob-rule that seems to govern New Orleans Police activity, especially after The Katrina Problem. Are they just plain robots?

I'll bet if the person was a blond woman they'd have not fired a single shot. These guys need to be off the force, ASAP.

I'm starting to think the New Orleans police hire emotionally disturbed people or that the job itself makes them that way. There's no -- no good excuse for what they did.

They should all be fired.

New SBS Online Gaming blog

Yep, it's too big to ignore, so I created a blog on online gaming. Click the post to check it out!

Brokeback Mountain hits the Zeitgeist

As a movie buff who's seen The Godfather 27 times, and a good set of movies over 10 times, plus written two screenplays (no, not sold..yet) and recently seen King Kong twice (a terrific work), I feel compelled to see "Brokeback Mountain" because of the buzz around it. Yet, I'm not attracted by the fact the story is of two men in love. What I'm drawn to is that it's directed by Ang Lee, one of my favorites.

I think -- to be frank -- a very large part of me wonders why Hollywood seems to avoid producing movies that feature inter-racial relationships, specifically between white women and black men. In the two examples where such relationships were the focus of the flick (I like that), they were not "normal" relationships. In "Jungle Feaver" the relationship was painted as taboo. In "One Night Stand" both characters were married to other people.

By contrast, it seems that Gay White Male relationships are presented from a more sympathetic perspective. Now there's a huge difference in that we're talking about a lifestyle choice (being Gay) versus a physical type beyond the control of the person. But what is similar is both kinds of people have not been shown in mainstream movies much at all until the last 20 years. America has been presented with a huge set of movies with Straight White Male / Straight White Female romances.

What bothers me about this recent trend is it still seems as if White Female and Black Male parings are not well-considered by some even to this day. A social dynamic I regard as rather sick. It's as if America is saying "You can do anything, even date another man...but White Women and Black men?....Well....

That's stupid.

I suppose the only solution is to establish a well-financed film production company which aims to get movies wtih interracial themes made and distributed.

SBS's new Blog Network

All of our blogs can be accessed from the main SBS site now. Just click on the title post to see the new place at the SBS main website.

SBS' on its Oakland Baseball Simworld

I figured that I had blogs on a number of subjects, but not our simulations! Since I spend much of my time setting up or working on my beloved Oakland Baseball Simworld, I decided to change that. Here's our newest blog on it, and all you have to do is click on the title of this post.

If you've not ran my simulation, give it a go. It's used at many of the major college sport management schools -- high schools too! I swear, you will become addicted to it.

It's just $12.50 per student per class, and for a one year account.

Mike Silver on Tony Dungy

My longtime friend Sports Illustrated Senior Writer Michael Silver wrote a very good and reflective column on Indianpolis Colts' Coach Tony Dungy in the wake of the passing of his son James. Most of his work is here, and the entire column can be read at CNNSI.Com with a click on the title of this post.

Leaning on faith
Dungy will reach deep inside as he mourns for son
Michael Silver

Because Tony Dungy is such an inspirational man, because nearly everyone who meets can't help but admire him, it's tempting to believe that he's capable of overcoming any horrific circumstance, even the most tragic occurrence imaginable.

As Dungy and his tight-knit family cope with the death of his 18-year-old son, James, who died of an apparent suicide early Thursday morning, the pain and grief, undoubtedly, will be overwhelming. That this awful experience will play out publicly makes Dungy's burden seem unfathomable.

Yet if anyone in pro football is capable of carrying on, in the near- and long-term, it's this deeply religious, inherently decent man.

"The thing that will get him through this is the same thing that has gotten him through all of the hard times -- losing his mother, and then his father," said Jets coach Herm Edwards, who grew close to Dungy while working on his staff in Tampa Bay. "His faith is what will get him through, somehow. But it's so, so tough."

I called Edwards on Thursday evening looking, I guess, for some sense of comfort. Ostensibly, as a journalist, I wanted to get his reaction, but every question I asked or considered asking seemed hopelessly forced, trite or inappropriate.

Earlier, I had spoken briefly with one of Dungy's former players in Tampa, Cleveland Browns quarterback Trent Dilfer, who I knew would be taking this news as hard as anyone in the NFL. Two years and eight months ago, at a memorial service for his 5-year-old son, Trevin, Dilfer delivered an amazingly poised, unplanned speech that brought 2,000 attendees to tears. Since then he and his wife, Cass, have displayed strength and grace on a daily basis, but that doesn't mean the pain is gone, or will ever disappear.

Unlike Dilfer, who endured months of soul-searching before deciding to return to football, Dungy's nightmare coincides with the stretch run of what has thus far been a magical season. If he returns to guide the Colts through the playoffs, and possibly the Super Bowl, Dungy will feel the coalesced support of a sports-watching nation.

Yet at some point the insanity of the playoff run will fade, and he and his wife, Lauren, will continue to be tested in ways most of us, thankfully, cannot imagine. That's when he'll draw on 51 years of sincere, principled living and figure out some way to endure.

Understand that Dungy, more than anyone I've met in his profession, has put family and faith above football on the most basic of levels. Not only did he help launch All-Pro Dad, later becoming the nonprofit organization's national spokesman, but he also made a point of interacting with his children, eschewing the sleep-at-the-office madness to which most of his peers have succumbed...

The Return of Martina Hingis - and a new Women's Tennis Blog!

Click on the link of the title post to read about the planned comback of Matina Hingis to Women's Tennis, at SBS Women's Tennis Blog.

Merry Christmas from Zennie's Zeitgeist!

Here's wishing you and yours a very wonderful Christmas and very happy holidays!