All those parents that paid hundreds of dollars to take their kids to see Hannah Montana just confound me. Where do people get off spending all that money on concert tickets and then complaining about $4 gas? Yes-gas prices are ridiculous, but a concert lasts 2 hours. At those prices you should keep yr trap shut until gas hits $50/gallon since they're willing to spend $2.50 a minute for their precious snowflakes to go see some flash in the pan teeny bopper sensation. GRRR!! Gawl darnit!!! My lawn!!! You kids!!! Fid-I would go see the Avetts. I've seen them live and they kick major ass. Also-it's free and that is a huge plus. But you should listen to your heart.

$300 tickets for the Jonas Brothers are probably in the nosebleed section. I actually bought a Jonas Brothers CD yesterday. It's for my best friend's daughter's birthday. I never thought I'd be guilty of contributing to the latest teen craze act. Ha ha.

Were they $300 each or for the pair? If he got a pair for that, he did really well! :) I've seen tickets for some shows selling for up to $10,000 per ticket. It's insane! Granted, the Jonas Brothers aren't in the same league with the big boys of touring, but they are the latest fad.

Yeah, $300 for the pair, so it is a decent price, all thing considered, but still .... it's $300. For the Jonas Brothers. For his 10-year-old. I told him I thought he'd already proved he loved her by taking her to "High School Musical: The Tour" last year.

At $150/each, the Jonas Brothers are officially going for about twice as much as I've paid for either U2 or Paul McCartney or The Who or Coldplay or any other huge, arena concert I've been to in the last couple years.

Sheesh, my boss paid about $250 each for a pair of George Michael tix recently, but fair enough, GM hasn't toured in 17 years, but $150 each for The Jonas Brothers? I guess one would have to be a tween or Perez Hilton to get the thrill of TJB.

Here's my problem with this whole Hannah Montana/Jonas Brothers/High School Musical craze: the people I know that are into that stuff are not tweens. They're 18 years old. Adults, technically. And all this stuff is from The Disney Channel. I repeat, The Disney Channel. I'll never get over Disney, but I definitely was over the channel, by, what, age 12 at the latest? I'm all for being "forever young" and all that, but isn't encouraging this kind of mania amongst older teenagers borderline scary immature? Or did I just grow up too fast? I admit, I had my serious NSYNC phase. I went to two concerts (both in the nosebleed sections), and I never did ask how much they cost. I know it wasn't cheap. I'm sure if they were still together, I'd still be a huge fan. Yes, now I listen to some of their songs and wonder why I thought this was serious music, but I was the target audience for that at the time. I don't understand the point in regressing to one's tween self when it comes to listening to today's music. Listening to the music that came out when you were a "tween"? Yes. Taking a serious interest in your baby sister's music? No.

All that teeny bopper crap-they don't know real music! Why when I was their age we were listening to songs about rape and poverty and death and the eternal emptiness of the soul! And we LIKED it! But seriously-I never quite grasped the whole pre-fab pop music thing. I love the Monkees, they were as pre-fab as they come. They performed some great tunes but by the time I was born a certain segment of the music listening population had accepted them as serious musicians. (This segment is commonly known as "nerds," they also don't understand why people insist on hatin' on Rod Stewart.)

Even as a teenager, I couldn't stand the pre-fab groups. I told my friends who insisted that New Kids would be around forever that there was no way because they didn't write their own songs. I've always been one who read the album credits and if someone wasn't a songwriter, I immediately considered them less of an artist. Because I'm a snob like that. LOL Some people can last forever without ever writing a note (George Strait and his 50-something #1 hits), but most of your enduring artists are writers.

This little bit of news made my day: Todd Snider to go Peace Queer in August "Things happen in this album besides you being told that war is wrong, with a beat. I don't know that war is wrong. I just know that I'm a peace queer, and I'm totally into it when people aren't fighting, in my home, at the bar where I hang out, or in a field a million miles away." He's definitely to the left of things, but he doesn't preach at ya, he's just trying to string a few words together. You know how it is. Todd is the bees knees and not to be missed. If you dig Dylan or John Prine or stuff that is mostly awesome you should totally check him out. He's good. And for bonus fun times: The Devil You Know takes place in my neighborhood. Cuz it's his 'hood too. It's a pretty decent place to live. If you don't mind the occasional helicopter flying over the house and don't get too jumpy at the sound of gun shots. We have a couple of good bars. If you're into that sorta thing. Who isn't into that sorta thing?

Todd Snider is playing at the club where I volunteer on Aug. 4. I'll have to see if I can swing a Monday night show. I typically don't work weeknight shows just because of the whole job issue the next morning, but I work for great shows. Like the one I just returned from: Richard Thompson, solo acoustic. If anyone was in doubt, he's still a god.

Richard Thompson is amazing! "Walking on a Wire" is my go-to song when I'm feeling blue. I've been gravitating towards The Bis-Quits version of late. I still have much love for the original. Do try to work the Todd show, Namaste. It's worth staying out late on a school night. His live shows are experiences not to be missed. He's a great storyteller and really takes the audience with him on fun song and story based journeys.

Okay, so last night I went to see Cheap Trick, Heart, and Journey in concert. It was amazing. Well, Heart and Journey were anyway. Traffic was so bad that we actually missed Cheap Trick's set. :oops: Anyway, the Heart set reinforced my girl-crushes on Ann and Nancy Wilson. I think if this whole college thing doesn't work out, I want to be their keyboardist. And then there was Journey. Their new leader singer sounds more like Steve Perry than Steve Perry. The only downside to their set was that they didn't sing "Lovin' Touchin' Squeezin'." Other than that, fantastic. It is so cool to hear thousands of people belting out "Don't Stop Believing."

Issac Hayes died today :(