Music Banter - The Torture Chamber

Let's do this.

Kenny G - Miracles: The Holiday Album

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1. Winter Wonderland - Oh dear god. This sounds like the crap that restaurants play when they want to seem "classy" during the holidays. Seriously, this is the kind of music that boring old people probably play while trying to get through foreplay without falling asleep.

2. White Christmas - After I clicked on a youtube video featuring this song, I had to sit through one of those annoying advertisements featuring vapid peppy music, and for the first time I actually wished the ad was longer. I savored it. I felt like a kid stuffing his face with painfully sweet candy, trying desperately to dull the senses of his taste buds in preparation for the shit sandwich his psychotic parents were making for him in the kitchen.

3. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas - You know, the rules say that I'm supposed to give details about the music to prove that I'm actually listening to it. I can't. It's so bland, with so few distinguishing characteristics, that nothing I could say could actually prove anything. A traveler in a foreign land could prove that they went somewhere by talking about their experiences and the landmarks they saw, but you would accuse them of bullshiting if all they had to say was "I saw a McDonalds and a Starbucks." It seems like it'd be impossible for there to exist a land so generic that that would actually be an accurate description of everything the land had to offer. But there is such a land, and it seduces wayward travelers into crossing it's borders with a sign that promises Miracles. Well, I guess the name isn't completely a lie, as it is a miracle that I haven't blown my brains out.

4. The Christmas Song - You want a description of this song? It's a christmas classic, as played by a saxophone, a piano, some strings, sleigh bells, with some other goofy shit in the background. If you read that description, I can guarantee that what you're imagining in your head is exactly what the song actually sounds like. This album is an unholy spawn of generic titans colliding. It's Christmas songs, the most predictable and boring songs ever fashioned, fused with smooth jazz, the stuff that cardboard cut outs listen to when they want to pretend that they have emotions, without being bothered to listen to music that would actually evoke them. "Kenny G" is probably just a pseudonym for the devil's asshole, spewing unholy wind through the reed of a saxophone (I assume that Kenny G is the saxophonist, partly because that is the instrument that the album seems to focus on, but also because Kenny G is an asshole, and assholes always play the sax).

5. Silent Night - Every time I see a picture of Kenny G in these videos, I want to use his hair to strangle myself. This song is driven by a saxophone (shocker!), and has some strings in the background. Later on, there is what sounds like drumming. However that might just be the sound of my heart, beating faster as I come to realize that life is transient and all hope is futile.

6. Brahms Lullaby - A lullaby? What the fuck does that have to do with Christmas? I think that Kenny's music has become self-aware, realizing that it's sole purpose is to put people to sleep, and now it's thrown off it's festive garb, deciding to at least have the decency to be honest about itself as it rends my soul. Saxophones and strings again. It's always saxophones and strings. The person who made the video filled it with cutesy pictures of babies. I was envious of their innocence, having not yet been tainted by the evils of the world, evils that I never truly knew until I met Kenny G.

7. Greensleeves - Boring jazz cover with some drums and piano in the back. This song made me hate jazz so much that I flew into a rage, throwing a cymbal with enough power that it broke through the fibers of reality and traveled back in time, eventually hitting Charlie Bird Parker in the face. At least this is more exciting than that lullaby, which put my sanity into a permanent rest, leaving me as a man that knows only rage.

8. Miracles - I'll believe that miracles can happen when this album finally ends. Saxophone, piano, and some strings, all played in a fashion as limp and somber as the devil when he sees someone that doesn't listen to heavy metal.

9. Away in a Manger - This song evokes vivid imagery. It's like I'm actually there in the manger, surrounded by the smell of animal shit... or maybe it's because this whole album is shit. Boring jazz. If you want me to describe it further, just look at the descriptions of every other song.

10. The Chanukah Song - Kenny G is an equal opportunity asshole, ruining both Christmas and Chanukah. Perhaps his music is a blessing in disguise... in time, as he continues to violate every human tradition and holiday, the various cultures of the world will have a common ground from which they can finally stand united; a hatred for Kenny G.

11. Little Drummer Boy - You know what? Maybe this album is in the spirit of Christmas and togetherness. After all, hearing this song makes me want to get together with others... to form a mob, hellbent on finding and destroying all copies of this album. Sax and piano, with some strings and drumming here and there. Now that I think about it, I think some of these songs may have had a clarinet or oboe instead of a sax, but I don't even remotely give enough of a damn to go back and find out for sure. Just know that it's some instrument that is reedy and feasts on the souls of the unwary. I'm so close to being a-rum-pum-done with this shit...

12. Silver Bells - This one has more of a rock feeling to it than the other songs. I had to keep pausing it, because every time I started playing it, the world shook from the collective turning of every rock 'n roll musician to have ever been put in a grave.

13. Spring Breeze - More limp sax wankery. Honestly, I'm not even gonna waste time writing something snarky. I'm so close to the end...

Made it. You know how they say that violent situations can trigger someone to have war flashbacks? Well, this album made me flash back to every time in my life I've been bored to tears. It's as powerful as a soggy cracker, and as memorable as an unsatisfying fart. I will, however, cut it a break since it's hard for a Christmas album to not be generic. And in all seriousness, it's pretty solid if you're a fan of smooth jazz. Which I am not. Anyway, I made it through to the end.