#48: He is...therefore I fan.

[ausdon]

Thanks Anna and Muski.

The weird thing is that 60% of my own state is under water with floods and my cyclones expected.

There is one poem I remember from my schooldays about Aus. It has a line about "droughts and flooding rains" - quite apt about now.

The death toll keeps going up- 130 now...

just think of the jealousy if they saw the size of his other leg.

Damned straight! (heh)....but I imagine the price of titanium would...er...rise since every male would rush to coat their own pitiful balls with 'Eau d' Aiken'.....

Oh the images this brings to mind.....

[FearofH2O]

ausdon, saw on the news that they won't know the final toll for a while. People trying to escape the fire in their cars are getting trapped. What a terrible catastrophy.

[wandacleo]

Welcome newbies!!

Fresh blood.

Always a good thing.

[ncgurrl]

OK, Now I know the real reason Clay is not at the Grammy's. It is that old Thom Yorke thing.

10:19 Gwennie is out to introduce Radiohead … and the USC marching band!!! And they’re doing “15 Step.” EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE. This is pretty great — with the band, it sounds like some pepped up version of “The National Anthem” or “Life In A Glass House” — though I’d be lying if I said Thom Yorke’s feathery hair wasn’t distracting me a bit right now. Seriously, he looks like Clay Aiken.

[liney23]

{{{{{{ausdon and claytonic and 3/4ths of Australia}}}}}}

<= CLAY.

<= ME.

Always and forever, bay-bee!

bottle... I LOVE that picture! Your double meaning of the thread title sure works around that picture. Whew!

The air is very ok in here!

During the angst of Clay coming out, I happened across this board, and found the funny, positive people on this board VERY refreshing. Thanks for being who you are.

whata.... You like us, you really like us.

Other newbies and delurkers to you, too! The more the merrieeee'er.... sorry, merrieeee, I couldn't resist. LOL

I, too, think Clay's day will come. He is soooo multi-talented that it has to be recognized one of these days years.

[keepingfaith]

Paul McCartney is always entertaining and is still in a class by himself on that left-handed bass. His most recent Fireman recording with Youth is just amazing to my ears -- hard rocking, trance, industrial, classical genius -- and he played every instrument, and recorded a song a day with extemporaneous lyrics ... and he never learned to read music. He is the gold standard for me. Now Mr. Robert Plant (and I've loved him for years, since he was the Golden God of Rock), can't hit the notes he did with Zeppelin, but Macca can still scream in tune.

My daughter's opinion of Carrie Underwood was that she should go back to the country girl image, and walk back any further attempts to be a bad-girl rocker. She doesn't sell bad girl while prancing around the stage in Fredericks of Hollywood attire. My daughter has always been a fan of Carrie Underwood. I'm not a fan ... nothing against her, she sings well enough, but she's always left me cold. I need to feel something emotional with music, and I get no vibes from her. Anyway, my daughter challenged me to name a rocker chick who wasn't a bad girl. Couldn't think of any, maybe Linda Ronstadt on the margins, but I don't think she ever qualified as a rocker chick. But Janis, Tina, Chrissie Hynde, Annie Lennox -- definitely bad girls.

I thought Jennifer Hudson was awesome. What a voice she has.

During the motown medley, I was putting Clay's voice in that group and in my mind-song he sounded better than everyone else by a mile. I'll say it again, soul music is Clay's destiny. I wish he'd hurry up and get there.

I saw Slumdog Millionaire today and I'm so glad I did.

ETA: Back to the Grammys, I was reading a story today about the irrelevance of winning a Grammy, and to make the point went back 40 years to the Grammys of 1969 and the Record of the Year. The nominees were:

Harper Valley PTA by Jeannie C. Riley

Honey by Bobby Goldsboro

Little Green Apples by OC Smith

Mrs. Robinson by Simon & Garfunkel

Hey Jude by The Beatles

and the winner was .............

..........................................

.........................................

Little Green Apples. Case closed.

[Lotus]

This is a video made by a group that is pro gay marriage in California. It's a plea not to divorce all the married gay couples. I had tears in my eyes by the end of it. It's very nicely done.

Please don't divorce us

[Couch Tomato]

I don't think it's irrelevant - not a guarantee of anything but after having just looked at about every category and every nominee and winner since the awards began, it's an impressive list of talent.

I listened to OTWOL today. Thanks to whoever brought it up. I never did get my ipod all the way back from the crash. I used to have all of this stuff at a fingertip.

[wandacleo]

God, I think I'm getting old.

My favorite songs on the Grammies are the oldies but goodies.

[cha cha trusty]

They can sing in the studio where there are all kinds of gadgets to make them sound oh,so fantastic but put them on a stage and there ain't one good voice between the three of them.However, when you've got great promotion and constantly screaming fans, who knows if they are singing or not. I remember an interview one time with the beatles where they admitted that at one venue they didn't sing one of their songs, just moved their mouths. The screaming was so loud, no one even noticed.( I liked the Beatles, by the way)

But so goes a lot of the music stars of today. The Jonas Brothers together with Stevie Wonder.......ahhh, not sure about that combination....seems off to me. Just my two cents folks. I'm not watching the Grammies for no particular reason but maybe they could have a show sometime with artists actually singing words you can make out with music that doesn't rupture your eardrums.I had read somewhere that this Grammy show was going to be unique because they were doing it differently..........how'd they do?....did they achieve their goal?

By the way

I think what they did differently was there was no host or commentators, and there was a succession of artists and celebrities just walking out and doing the next category. I think it worked well, although I am not an expert because I'm not really sure how they've done it in the past.

And... Honest to God - I didn't know Paul was up foor a Grammy either!! It was a coincidence I even turned on the TV when I did, and saw him in the audience. What a treat!!

Apparently he released an EP this past year with 4 songs on it, called "Amoeba's Secret," it was recorded live. The one he was nominated for was called "That Was Me," in the category of "Best Male Pop Vocal Performance." I would've loved to have seen him win! Just heard the song for the first time tonight. He was also nominated for "I Saw Her Standing There" (hence his singing it on the show) in the "Best Solo Rock Vocal Performance" category.

(I just looked all this up! News to me!)

HERE'S THE YOUTUBE OF "I SAW HERE STANDING THERE"

from Paul's official youtube channel - you can hear part of all four songs on the EP on this. (and a few others.)

It looks like he did what he used to do back in the 70's and just show up some place small and put on a concert. It's AWESOME!

___

As for Clay being on the Grammys sometime, I can totally see it. I hope it comes to pass a few years down the road.

{{{{God Bless Australia and everyone in it.}}}}

[FearofH2O]

Although I didn't watch the grammies, I did read the news and feel bad about Chris Brown. I'm hoping that it was an exaggeration a la "The foot on the airplane seat" rather than a violent guy. He has a very nice voice and is a decent actor, saw him recently in that movie about a family and he was the youngest son. I hope the music business hasn't ruined one more person.

Can I blame Clive Davis? I don't know why other than he does seem to be the scapegoat for all things evil on a lot of Clay boards.

PS. I have no doubts that there are a lot of evil people in the music business and I'm sure CD is one of them.

ETA I'm really not making light of Mr. Brown's situation. It's a pretty serious charge.

[luckiest1]

Thanks for those links, cha cha. I am catching up after spending the weekend saying goodbye to my SIL and niece (ok, and my brother too ) who all got on the plane to Taiwan (via Seoul) last night. It's been a crazy two weeks but it's been great, too. My niece, who couldn't say more than "hi" when she got here, said this to me last night when we were watching my son & daughter play Wii: "If (luckiestdaughter's real name) wins, you and me dance". I thought that was so cute. And dance we did, singing "wa how nee hi" (Mandarin for "I am so great").

Sorry I missed the Grammys and Paul, but hopefully I can catch up with all that stuff last night. To whoever said Clay isn't "cool" enough for a Grammy......give him time. I believe he'll be up there one day. The tide is certainly turning.

Argh, why do I have to go to work????

[aikim]

Good Morning Everyone,

Been reading around this morning and I have seen several posts opining that Clay will be at the Grammy's some day and I am just wondering what makes people think so? I would love to see it happen, but I am just not sure with the music industry the way it is today.

27 Days until Daylight Savings Time!

39 Days until The First Day of Spring!

58 Days until Judge Aiken is holding Court on ANTM!

Everyone have a great day!

Kim

This is for Cindilu from CV:

Reed just posted on his myspace front page that he's home and SO over airports.lol

[claytonic]

The weird thing is that 60% of my own state is under water with floods and my cyclones expected.There is one poem I remember from my schooldays about Aus. It has a line about "

droughts and flooding rains"

- quite apt about now.

The death toll keeps going up- 130 now...

I am also thinking of the irony of this situation; no rain where it is needed and far too much in the extreme opposite direction. It is why I mentioned in a previous post that I didn't understand why there isn't a law that stipulates all new houses have large rainwater-tanks under the house or backyard, so that the collection of rain water might reduce the impact of either drought and flood. Also that solar panels aren't compulsory for new houses when the summer months mean a strain on power resources due to excessive use of air-conditioners; thus causing power failure. We have heat-wave conditions and bush fires every.single.summer; it's not like it's a new thing and we don't know how to reduce the risk of consequences.

I am finding the news very distressing, I can hardly breathe from the images of all that destruction and the devastation on the faces of the victims. And we don't even see the worst of it because they obviously can't physically show the growing numbers of the dead. Then there's scores of those who didn't lose their lives but are in hospital with horrendous burn injuries that have been described as worse than the injuries from the Bali bombing in October 2002.

Under normal circumstances, the floods up north would be considered a disaster too but the impact of the flooding seems insignificant when contrasted against the rolling inferno down south.

[aikim]

This was posted by BFS at the OFC...not sure if everyone saw it, so I thought I would bring it over.

QUOTE

No, I spoke with Admin on Friday, and they were planning on bumping back everyone who has a Feb 10, expiration date. Yes, a renewal announcement is imminent, but to be on the safe side, it is my understanding that accounts are going to be bumped back.

DO NOT RENEW UNTIL IT IS POSTED ON THE OFC

If you get you locked out, and you shouldn't, please email support at clayonlinesupport@sparkart.com

This post may travel.

[djs111]

Last night I watched the BAFTAS - British version of Oscars - on BBCA and switched to CSI Miami and the beginning of the last season of the Sopranos on A&E during most of the acceptance speeches.

I did switch to the Grammies a couple of times but just got commercials. And the end of Jennifer Hudson's song, she was awesome!

Anyway, Mick Jagger presented an award at the BAFTAs. He was, IMO, more polished and sophisticated than most of the movie people, prolly because he is used to performing in front of live audiences.

Anyway, he was pretty funny -

The singer joked that he was the founding member of the movie star – rock star exchange programme saying: “Tonight Sir Ben Kingsley will be singing Brown Sugar at the Grammy’s, and Sir Anthony Hopkins is in the recording studio with Amy Winehouse and Dame Judi Dench is gamely trashing hotel rooms somewhere in New York city, and we are hoping that next week Sir Brad and all the Pitt family will be performing The Sound of Music at the Brit awards.”

Sharon Stone looked incredible, and there are pix of Mick, Robert Downey Jr. and Mickey Rourke partying - what a group of bad boys....Mickey Rourke picked up best actor, that's the second best actor award for him this year. His acceptance speech was a hoot!

I love the BAFTAS - a LOT of celebrities show up from all over the world, and they just keep being funny and presenting awards, no painfully contrived entertainment.

Topic - I don't see Clay being at the Grammies until he has a hit record, and I don't see Clay changing what he likes to sing just to get on the Grammies. I'm more than fine with that!

Besides, I read somewhere else that the real problem is that Clay was stubborn and did not go to Clive's Grammy party years ago, we know this for a FACT, and therefore he will never ever get a Grammy. Blecch and eyeroll here!

A long time ago I read a novel about Australia that described the horrific circumstances of being caught out in the bush during a fire storm, it was really frightening. Dunno if it was Thorn Birds or something else, but I never forgot the description.

[liney23]

Why I think Clay will be at the Grammy's one day...

The music industry HAS to change, just like the rest of the world right now. I'm counting on that change bringing in more chances for Mr. Aiken to show his stuff.

I'm also a big fan of his green-eyed soul and figure one of the days he's gonna figure out that is his thang and make a kick-ass cd that will make many sit up and notice his talent in m.u.s.i.c.

He's just doing in public what many artists do more privately and that is find his place in music. Getting out there on AI when all he'd done is wedding songs and Home Town Connection was great, but it just means he's discovering himself sonically (I like that word) as he goes.

I have also had this vision of him being on (not necessarily head star) a variety show doing a bit where he imitates music stars of the past and present, kinda like he did on JBT and SRHP. It would show everyone his enormous.... talent! (what did you think I was going to say???)

[keepingfaith]

What is "cool" musically? It changes all the time. But what's not cool personally about a gay pop singer parenting a child with his best friend and record producer and announcing it to the world. That's courage and new thinking and extremely cool on so many levels. Musically, "cool" is a moving target. Are Robert Plant and Allison Krauss now cool? It's just a matter of taste.

I can't let the Grammys get away without expressing my shock at Stevie and the Jonas Brothers. I didn't get it. And the two teen girls, Miley Cyrus and Taylor Swift? I've heard both of them sound fine as a solo, but together? That was caterwauling to my ears and I took a channel break for a while.

Regarding Chris Brown, if he put bruises on Rihanna while riding in a car, he should go to jail. And his career should be done for a good while, if not forever. People can excuse a lot of things, but hitting women in the face is a deal-breaker for me.

[djs111]

I do think that Clay does not and will not conduct his entire life in service to a P.R. person's plan for Becoming a Pop Star, which it seems most other singers do.

Heeeee.......it seems to me he is NOT staying in that lane, he is just living his life and watching the chips fall where they may, and likely is happier for it.

This fandom thing is prolly a lot less stressful for me than for some other fans, because I don't project what I want for him onto him, and then get all pissy and declare he is making mistakes when he doesn't do what I think he should do.

I just sit here and watch!

I am going to quite enjoy the last season of The Sopranos, and I see that some people are STILL nattering on about how the end should have been different! Write yer own show, people!

[spikesmom]

This fandom thing is prolly a lot less stressful for me than for some other fans, because I don't project what I want for him onto him, and then get all pissy and declare he is making mistakes when he doesn't do what I think he should do.

I just sit here and watch!

This is me too. I don't mind chatting about some things and reading what others would like, but when the pissy gets started, I have to start scrolling or just go do something else (Lord knows I've got a stack of books to read that would kill me if they fell on top of me!). I just can't muster up that kind of angst for someone I don't know and will likely never know. I know that I constantly read that people's opinions are just their opinions which they are allowed to state and I would completely agree. The difference to me is the tone - how they are saying what they are saying. It often times comes off like "I know best and he's stupid for not listening to meeeeeeeeeeeeeee! And he'll never be Rock!Star!Clay! if he doesn't listen to me too!" whether intended or not. Total turnoff to me and I start to scroll whenever those people post. I mean who are they trying to convince? Really? ETA: To me, the tone comes off angry, furious - like this is a big deal to them and I don't understand why if they aren't part of his family or close friend. What's the point of letting that stuff rile you up so much?

What's that old saying? Blessed are the flexible for they shall not be bent out of shape? Not a bad thing to remember when ultimately you have no control over it anyway...

[smittenwithclay]

To me, the tone comes off angry, furious - like this is a big deal to them and I don't understand why if they aren't part of his family or close friend. What's the point of letting that stuff rile you up so much?

I agree, I have to much drama in my real life to find drama in my fun fandom. I know people say they are just discussing, but it comes across as angry and angsty and I love Clay, but I dont understand that kind of intensity for him..where stuff can make you so upset..I know that if this stopped being fun for me I would walk away, I dont have time for anything that doesnt bring me joy..who knows, maybe when people get so upset they somehow are having fun..I dunno, but it sure seems like a waste of time to be so upset.

I tend to just go with the flow, always hopeful for the future..when he isnt doing something I dont think, wonder, angst to where he is, I just go on with my life...and chat about mundane stuff with my clay friends, and then when he reappears Im happy and thrilled and excited..I dont spend my time wondering where he is, or what this means for his career etc..when he blogs I love it,but I dont think about it, wonder about it, speculate about it, worry about it when he doesnt.

of course everyone is different and perceptions are different..when I see angst I know others can see discussion etc etc etc..but people do seem to get rather stressed.

[jmh123]

I'm right there with y'all.

[Claymatron]

I'm right there with y'all.

Me too, I refuse to sweat the small stuff, or even the big stuff....what will be will be and no amount of angst on my part is gonna make one iota of difference. I'm not worrying about his career at all,

...but I sure miss him, damn it!

[tribeca]

Why I think Clay will be at the Grammy's one day...

The music industry HAS to change, just like the rest of the world right now. I'm counting on that change bringing in more chances for Mr. Aiken to show his stuff.

I'm also a big fan of his green-eyed soul and figure one of the days he's gonna figure out that is his thang and make a kick-ass cd that will make many sit up and notice his talent in m.u.s.i.c.

He's just doing in public what many artists do more privately and that is find his place in music. Getting out there on AI when all he'd done is wedding songs and Home Town Connection was great, but it just means he's discovering himself sonically (I like that word) as he goes.

I have also had this vision of him being on (not necessarily head star) a variety show doing a bit where he imitates music stars of the past and present, kinda like he did on JBT and SRHP. It would show everyone his enormous.... talent! (what did you think I was going to say???)

I love what you wrote here. Makes so much sense

What is "cool" musically? It changes all the time. But what's not cool personally about a gay pop singer parenting a child with his best friend and record producer and announcing it to the world. That's courage and new thinking and extremely cool on so many levels. Musically, "cool" is a moving target. Are Robert Plant and Allison Krauss now cool? It's just a matter of taste.

I can't let the Grammys get away without expressing my shock at Stevie and the Jonas Brothers. I didn't get it. And the two teen girls, Miley Cyrus and Taylor Swift? I've heard both of them sound fine as a solo, but together? That was caterwauling to my ears and I took a channel break for a while.

yes, cool music is sometimes just the in music of the time.

Some pop/rap/rock stars were so popular at one time are now not considered cool anymore and the once were. Sometimes not being cool is not a bad thing.

sometimes making conversation & wondering about what/where/why Clay is singing songs is interesting to me. I tend to be a curious person. I really found it interesting when he was talking about OMWH & how he liked to choose the songs because of the lyrics.

[ldyjocelyn]

But what's not cool personally about a gay pop singer parenting a child with his best friend and record producer and announcing it to the world. That's courage and new thinking and extremely cool on so many levels.

I totally agree with you on this. However, as I've seen in this fandom -- not everyone feels that way. I am positive that some feel that him having a child with Jaymes and coming out as a gay man is the antithesis of cool, not to mention just wrong. I personally find that sad.

Musically, "cool" is a moving target. Are Robert Plant and Allison Krauss now cool? It's just a matter of taste.

Again, totally agree. The thing I have to keep reminding myself of, though, is that because MY taste thinks that Clay Aiken's voice and music are wonderful, there are others that don't. *shrug*

djs, spikesmom and smitten -- loved your posts. spikesmom in particular got something VERY right, IMO, and that's the matter of tone in a post. couchie knows that this is one of my "hot buttons." I've read WAY too many posts on many boards (including this one) that, to me, sound as if the world is going to blow up tomorrow, and it's totally because of the tone of the post. Things can be said critically in a thousand different ways -- but it's a skill to say them in a way that makes people think rather than get angry first. I think it's always going to be that way at message boards though. Written examples of "tone" are especially difficult to see, because of everyone's different filters. Hard to articulate, really...

Blessed are the flexible for they shall not be bent out of shape?

So...after seeing a few pictures of Reed...he's especially blessed? And hey! Clay's feet are flexible! He's blessed too!