a writing contest? That's right!
Crawdaddy! solicited a number of colleges and universities in its first ever search for the next Great Rock Critic in a writing contest in which one lucky writer will have the opportunity to become a published Crawdaddy! rock journalist. From a pool of submissions, we now present the final three to you.
To enter the contest, writers from journalism schools across the US submitted two articles based on actual Crawdaddy! assignments. Crawdaddy! chose the top three finalists and posted their submissions below for an online popular vote. The winning writer will be awarded a coveted place in the Crawdaddy! contributors pool, with opportunity for future publication and a $500.00 cash prize.
Below are snippets from the articles, but you can click "read more" to read the full article. The order in which the articles appear is arbitrary. Make your choice now! The vote will be over on January 7, 2009.
Submission #1:
"Over Several Beers with Ryan Adams and Leonard Cohen" by W. Ross Feeler
... But the apartment that the party was at got the best of me: Destiny’s Child is on the stereo, my friends and girlfriend are playing beer pong, and I’m stuck on the couch, having just soaked my shirt in a daring attempt to buckle my jeans while holding a beer. No one, I thought, has ever given a shit. And that seemed true and I went outside.
I was walking around, kicking the bushes, and it was getting bad. All the sudden, Leonard breaks in: Some girls wonder by mistake / Into the mess that scalpels make. Now I don’t claim to know what that means, but it scared me a little, and then it settled onto my chest like a sack of concrete, and I was angry and breathless.
There was a freshly planted tree standing erect on the lawn in front of the apartments, like a pillar of new life and beauty. Or like a straight-A student. Anyway, it was too much. At first, I just wanted to see it slouch, to show this pompous son-of-a-bitch he was no better than the rest of us with his flowering limbs and natural stoicism. But when I pulled, it gave a little, and before long, I was taking running starts, going this way and that, and eventually the tree was horizontal, and I moved on. (read more...)
Submission #2:
"And the Rockers Red Glare" by Javier Rodriguez
... No, I’m not talking about “yippee I’m flying” power pills. Neither am I trying to vilify the American anthem. What I’m up to now is no less than telling you about a rarity as exotic and cool as you can probably get. I’m talking about communist rock. But fear not, we’ll skip Marx and Gramsci, McCarthy and Fidel, and will go straight to business, focusing on music and music alone; more in a revisionist way of catching up with forgotten “activists” than trying to argue about your ideology or mine. Then, if the guys of Meanwhile, back in communist Russia (not a communist band, by the way) allow it, we can get started.
Ok, some people may actually think that all of those artists involved in the “anti-Bush” campaign are communists, or that the ones in favor of free music downloads hide a copy of “Das Kapital” in their pockets, or that those stinky hippies –who have always looked suspicious anyway– were talking no hip slang but Russian all along. Sorry to prove you wrong, but not even a rabid anti-Bush activist like Eddie Vedder could be labeled a communist, nor Trent Reznor (didn’t he give away his last record for free?) or David Crosby (you can’t get hippier than that!). Real communists are people who loathe private property and fight for a fair way of life, where the state has the power to assign rights and duties to every citizen according to their needs and abilities. And there is just a handful of rockers whom, that I know, think that way. Stereolab, the sophisticated “lounge meets kraut rock” band, has got to be the epitome of them all. (read more...)
Submission #3:
"I Sympathize with a Rousseau" by Nathaniel Roe
... I got as heavily involved in hardcore as a kid can get. My dad drove me to shows and I begged him to let me stay for the headliner. I learned to floorpunch, pick up change, two-step and liked walking on heads after stage diving. I started a hardcore band and handed out demos. I remember the revelatory moment when I realized that no matter how much I practiced playing guitar, I would never fall and bleed like with skateboarding. Not long after that, I got my face all bloodied at a Kill Your Idols show. I jumped on a pile-on and next thing I knew I hit the wall and was spitting blood into the Manville Elks Lodge sink.
Sometimes these days seem Edenic too. Actually, it was a comparatively jaded era of hardcore. Everybody looked to the so-called “spirit of ‘88” wave of hardcore, which basically offered a repackaged edition of early ‘80s originals. While Minor Threat stressed independence to the “out of step with the world”, this second wave stressed a crew mentality with codified dance moves, dress code and ethics. What began as a safe haven for outcasts became a platform for militant conformists. ‘88 was already a classic era for my friends and me, who went to shows where most straight edgers were too jaded to wear Xes on their hands anymore, except for the occasional Youth of Today or Mouthpiece reunion. How could things stay fresh after two decades of the same story? (read more...)
