Music Project Update: Beastie Boys (Well, it started as that)

"Halo" vs. "Already Gone"

Clarkson later accused Tedder of using the music he had written for "Already Gone" on "Halo",^[4] a song that appears on Knowles' 2008 studio album I Am… Sasha Fierce, and for which Tedder receives a co-writer and producer credit.^[5] Clarkson claimed that by the time she had heard "Halo", I Am… Sasha Fierce had already been released and her own album was being pressed; it was too late to remove "Already Gone" from All I Ever Wanted's tracklisting.^[3] Clarkson was surprised with Tedder for using the same arrangement on two different songs, claiming that people would assume she was stealing it from Knowles:^[3]

"Ryan and I met each other at the record label, before he was working with anyone else ... We wrote about six songs together, four or five of them made the album. It was all fine and dandy. I’d never heard of a song called 'Halo'. Beyoncé's album came out when my album was already being printed. No-one’s gonna be sittin' at home, thinking 'Man, Ryan Tedder gave Beyoncé and Kelly the same track to write to.' No, they’re just gonna be saying I ripped someone off. I called Ryan and said, 'I don’t understand.  Why would you do that?'"^[3]........Clarkson claims she "fought and fought" with her bosses to prevent it from being released as a single, so as to not disrespect Knowles.^[3] 

"Ryan Tedder responded to the allegations with a statement, arguing that the two songs are "entirely different" and that the criticism was "hurtful and absurd":

Survivor-Samoa Preview

It’s Survivor season again, and you know what that means…a ridiculously long-winded analysis of the cast of characters we’ll be seeing in the weeks ahead.  I don't know why I enjoy analyzing everybody so much before the show even starts.  It's probably more fun to me than actually watching the show. 

This time around, there’s a whopping 20 (!) castaways.  I wonder what sort of twist they’ll throw in this year…I mean, they can’t just eliminate 1 person every 3 days, because there’s always 39 days.    For the first time, I’m going to not only watch each person’s preview video, but read their profile on the website.  Hopefully there will be some memorable characters this time; maybe we’ll see the next Willard!  (OK, there will never be another Willard)

Here goes!

Ashley-She seems normal enough.  Smart, but not the smartest.  Nice, but not the nicest.  She’s 22, has watched every season of Survivor, and calls herself a girly girl.  She doesn’t seem to be all that ditzy though.  Her strategy is to always be cautious of everything happening around her.  Which is definitely necessary in Survivor, but there’s a lot more to it.  While she doesn’t seem dumb at all, I’m not sure she’s socially cunning enough to really be a player.  Plus, she said this:  “My biggest personality flaw is speaking my mind”.  Which is a HUGE red flag.  Anyone that ever claims to be blunt and outspoken but “is going to try to bite their tongue” never succeeds in doing so, and ends up rubbing people the wrong way.  I mean, she seems like a nice enough person; it kinda took me by surprise when she said that.  But if you admit you’re outspoken, then you probably are, and the outspoken ones never fare well.  And the other thing is that she’s not used to being outdoors, so if she’s constantly in distress about the starvation and the elements, she won’t be able to devote her full focus to playing the game.

Ben-Sweet!  For the first time, there’s a survivor named Ben…of course, Coach’s real name last season was Ben, but he was a douchebag.  Plus, nobody called him by “Ben” the whole season, so he doesn’t count.  Ben is a self-described “country boy” who grew up hunting, fishing, camping, and he even lived in 3^rd-world Africa.  But he’s not like a JT-from-last-season country boy…he seems way more frat boy-ish.  He’s probably the social center of whatever peer group he’s in, and it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s like that in this game.  Even though he claims in his bio that “he’s never been rejected” (by a girl), he doesn’t come across as a tool.  He says he “always gets what he wants”, but he’s not cocky, he just has this attitude that you just have to work for what you want without complaining about how life isn’t always fair.  He’ll probably get frustrated in camp, because there are inevitably going to be those tribemates whose work ethic isn’t as strong as his.  Besides sharing my name, I can sort of relate to him, because he’s a very go-with-the-flow kind of guy who doesn’t like to worry a lot, just like I am.  Overall, he’s a smart, stable, well-rounded guy who I think can go pretty far.

Betsy-Oh god.  3 people in and we’ve already arrived at the token annoying-middle-aged woman.  Her Boston accent is already grating on my ears.  She’s 48 and has been a cop for 1 year.  (I know, what?)  About being out here on Survivor, she says she’s gonna “Love every single minute of it”.  Um, why don’t you stay out there in the wilderness without food stuck in a camp with annoying people and doing tedious chores for a couple weeks and then get back to me.  She’s also looking forward to “not doing laundry”, as if Survivor is a work-free vacation or something.  Although, the more I watch the less annoyed I become.  I don’t particularly like her, but she says that if she won a million dollars, she just wants some nice sheets for the kids, some new towels, and a Yankee candle.   Just simple stuff for a better life, and I can respect that.  And with her family, she says she’s “already blessed”.  She then talks more about how much she’s appreciating being out there, and now I’m realizing that she’s not even that annoying, it’s more just her accent.  Maybe I will like her, we’ll see.

Brett-One of the first things he says is that he’s “definitely the nice guy”, but then he says his tagline is “I only look sweet and innocent”.  Which is strange, because he doesn’t even look sweet and innocent to me at all, he’s got this huge mischievous grin on his face all the time.  He just looks like he’s up to something.  But he knows that the key to this game is forming alliances and creating strong bonds with people, and I do believe he’ll be good at that.  He’s got a firm plan in place, to play honestly and straightforwardly at first, and then when the merge hits start to feel out all the dynamics and become a little more crafty.  Which I think is exactly the right strategy in Survivor.  But he still seems like a tool to me.  His success in the game will depend on his tribe dynamics:  if his tribe is dominated by youth, he’ll be able to charm them and fit right in.  If it’s dominated by older personalities (older being anything 30 or above, and sometimes even late 20s), then I think it’ll be much harder for him to get into the social center of that group.

Dave-Right away, he seems a little off-beat.  (EDIT:  as you read this paragraph, you’ll realize this initial impression was a HUGE understatement)  He’s 38 years old with long hair.  He was unemployed for a while because, it seems, he just didn’t like to work ‘for the man’.  But I sympathize with him more when he explains himself a little further:  “I think our lives are a gift, and to spend them slaving away 40 hours a week doing something you hate is wrong…just sinful”.  Sinful might be strong, but I like where he’s coming from.  But then he talks about how he hasn’t held jobs for very long because “he made his bosses uncomfortable”.  He shrugs this off saying “I’m weird…what are you gonna do”.  Ouch.  But the quotables just keep on coming:  his next utterance is “The issue of my sanity doesn’t really cross my mind very often”… and then, in the same sentence devolves into something about flora and fauna.  I’m thinking this guy’s hopeless.  Near the end of the video, he says “My people skills are actually pretty good”.  Um…right.  No.  All signs point to him not having enough social skills to survive in this game.  I just don’t see him meshing with his tribe.  Even if, as Jeff Probst says, he has the highest IQ in the whole cast and maybe of all-time.  He’ll be one of the first to go.

Elizabeth-Immediately gives off a don’t-take-no-crap kinda vibe.  Basically because she says it herself.  Self-described as “very opinionated” and “passionate” and says “I always call it like I see it”.  I really don’t need to see anymore…stick a fork in her, she’s done.  Even though Ashley also said that she was sort of blunt and abrasive, I wasn’t really getting that vibe from her.  With Elizabeth, you can tell right away that it’s true.  While this sort of aggressive determination is a quality that can get you far in life (She’s the first in her family to go to college after they moved to America from South Korea when she was two and is now a successful attorney), it rarely works in Survivor.  That said, she doesn’t seem like an outright bitch at all, and she seems to have a good head on her shoulders.  She has a good grasp on how to play the game, and if she can tone down her aggressive personality (unlikely), then she actually has potential to be a very good player.  Plus, Satan herself (Corinne from a couple seasons ago) made it to 5^th or 6^th, so she can too.

Erik-I’m liking this guy right away.  No weirdness, no tool-ishness, just a good solid dude.  Maybe a little edgy.  He’s 28, so he likes that he’ll be able to blend in with the younger crowd but also relate to the older crowd.  From what I’ve seen of his personality, he’ll be able to mix in with both crowds seamlessly.  He seems like the type that will be cool with everybody in camp, but then sort of laugh at them during his confessionals.  And we as the audience will realize how much more in tune with everything he is than his tribemates.  He’s scoped out his competition a little already (from what I gather, before the game you can’t talk to them but you do get to see them and be around them a little) and talks a bit about how his perspective gives him an advantage over some of these naïve whippersnappers that have always had everything handed to them.  This is only the 7^th video out of 20 I’ve seen so far, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s referring to Brett.  Erik says that he learned at a very young age (when he was standing in the principals office at age 8, to be exact) to always think before you do something, and I really believe this quality will help him a lot in the game.  The only negative is that he calls himself a womanizer in his profile, sometimes going after taken women “for the fun of the chase”.  Surprised me when I read that…but I don’t think it has any impact on the game itself. He’s another candidate to go far.

Jaison-First impression: he looks like James from the Fans vs. Favorites season.  (No, not just because he’s black)  Not as buff, but better dressed and much more well-spoken. Which makes sense, because he’s a law student.  He’s got the right plan to get through the early stages-to be a middle-of-the-road player; not too quiet, not too loud, not too strong, not too weak.  But then, and it’s sort of becoming a theme here, he says that he sometimes can “push too hard” when he thinks he knows the best way to do something.  But I don’t think it will get him into trouble that much because there will probably be far more annoying people out there.  He says a lot of the right things, but for whatever reason I’m just not feeling it from him.  I think it’s because his vibe is a little too intellectual and book-smart.  I’m gonna say he’ll be out somewhere in the middle.

John-His very first quote:  “You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to win survivor, but if you needed one, here I am”.  Oh god.  His tone was as pompous as you probably imagined it was when you read that.  After this opening quote he goes on to whine that sometimes “he’s a little too high profile”.  Because often times he’ll walk in a room and (oh no) everyone will notice him.  He tries to say this in an “omg poor me” tone when in reality it’s probably 15% that and 85% brag.  I mean really, who says “Being so popular is hard!!!”?  He calls himself “comfortable in conflict”, which in itself is a good thing in such a social situation.  Not easily rattled, etc.  But from what I’m seeing, he’s not merely “comfortable”; a more appropriate word would be “smug”.  And I think this smugness will ultimately turn people off in such a situation where every personality trait is so exaggerated.  He’s not used to losing, but I think he’s gonna lose this game.

Kelly-She’s a free spirit:  “I like to wake up in the morning and not know what I’m gonna do next”.  Interesting.  I guess that makes her adaptable, which has to be good in a game like this.  But I wonder, being that she’s a hairstylist, how exactly she can “not know what she’s gonna do next” every day when she has a regular job.  Who knows.  I usually get annoyed with these free-spirit types, but then again, self-described free-spirits tend to look more like Courtney the fire-dancer or Flicka from recent seasons, whereas Kelly’s actually pretty hot.  So of course I’ll hear her out.  It definitely threw me off at the beginning because she describes herself like a hippie, but she has this typical blond-bombshell barbie look.  Looking at her, you’d expect her to be prissy and preppy, but she’s way more mellow than that.  Fortunately, as the video plays, she gives off less and less of the hippie vibe that she was giving off at the beginning.  I was worried that we would have another Courtney or Flicka, but Kelly’s pretty normal, actually.  The only thing, quite frankly, is that I’m not really sure how smart she is.  Nothing she says gives off any indication that she plans to (or has the ability to) be cunning and play the social game hard.  So I don’t see her doing that well in the game, but she does seem like a cool person.

Laura-Ehhhh…annoying right off the bat.  She’s a bubbly 39-year old who looks more like she’s 29, and she’s got this weird accent that I can’t really pinpoint.  Then she talks about what she says could be the “downfall in her personality”: she’s a leader, and she always prefers to do things herself because she knows that she can do them right.  God, how many of these bossy I-know-I’m-right women can we have on this show?  I sound like a broken record here, but you’re just not gonna win over your tribemates with this attitude.  Out of everybody that has given off this vibe, I think Laura by far has the least chance to overcome it.  Elizabeth seems much more intelligent, and Ashley, while admitting to having an aggressive side, still seems pretty sweet.  Laura is just…..annoying.  Like, easily the most annoying out of the 10 or 11 so far.  To make matters worse, she describes herself as a “fit version of Sarah Palin”.  Yeah.  I don’t want to watch any version of Sarah Palin, anywhere.  She makes this comparison mostly because she’s been married for more than 20 years and is already a grandmother.  About ¾ of her biography page is about her faith, which is fine and all, but she seems like the type that might throw it in her tribemates’ faces a bit, which can rub people the wrong way.  Plus, she says she won’t do anything to compromise her faith.  If that includes lying or deception (which it probably does), then her chances of winning are worse than the odds of finding a needle in a haystack.  Early casualty.

Marisa-OH MY GOD.  For the first 10 seconds of her video, I literally just sat there staring with my eyes wide open.  Laura, you’re off the hook, because I just paused this video at 14 seconds and I already know Marisa is the most annoying one of all.  She’s talking something about how she has 8 siblings and some are adopted and some are not and none have the same set of parents as her.  Or something.  As a child, her family used to ride around like gypsies in a big van and sing Christmas carols, and apparently this whole childhood experience was “euphoric” for her.  She just seems like a big ditz.  But she is kind of deep, in an out-there way…at one point she says “there’s such a delicate balance of beauty and danger out here”.  She’s obviously not as weird, but she’s giving off a sort of Luna Lovegood vibe, just waaaaay more animated.  I do like one thing she says, though—she’s looking forward to seeing herself and other people as their “primal self”, stripped of all the luxuries and frills of today’s society.  I really do think that this game strips you down to your natural self.  You can’t hide.  Anyways, Marisa is completely annoying, and I’m starting to wonder about the women in general…I haven’t seen one yet that seems like a true contender.  I don’t think she’ll get that far.

Mick-A 33 year old physician who plans to keep his career a secret from his tribemates.  He seems to be the token guy who’s smart and nice and charismatic and everyone loves, a-la Marcus from two seasons ago.  There’s always one of these. I get the sense that he might not want to assume the leader role (it’s usually a bad thing in Survivor), but I wouldn’t be surprised if he does assume it.  He also says he can be opinionated, but he plans on keeping that in check and unlike the others, I fully believe that he can.  These well-rounded types are always good picks to win…Marcus didn’t, but Earl and Yul did in their seasons, and they were both that token golden-boy guy on their season.  Plus, I was completely convinced Marcus was going to win halfway through his season.  I think Mick will go far.  I mean, his full name is Mick Trimming, for God’s sakes.  Just say that aloud.  Mick Trimming.  He has to do well, right?

Mike-The old guy of the season.  He’s 62 year old chef, and he was slated to be on the season before this one, but they bumped him at the last minute because he had sleep apnea.  He fixed that, lost 40 pounds, and is now in “fighting shape”.  He’s got a cool accent, has a braided beard, and bobs his head up and down when he talks, which makes his beard dangle all over the place.  I like him.  When he got bumped from Tocantins, he says he became extremely determined to get his apnea figured out and worked very hard with his trainer to get in shape for the show.  According to him, that whole process changed his life.  Very cool.  He plans to take on sort of a Bob role, providing and cooking for the tribe to win their favor.  He says he’ll “be under the radar at first, but when the time comes…….” And then he pauses, and makes a ‘whoop’ noise and slides his finger across his neck, indicating he’ll cut their throats, all of a sudden turning from affable to malicious on a dime.  My description doesn’t nearly do that part justice; it’s pretty hilarious.  I watched it 3 or 4 times.  I think his tribe will like him, and if he can hold up physically, he could go pretty far as the bigger threats are targeted before him.  His good-naturedness will suit him very well the midst of all these aggressive personalities.  If he can pull his weight physically (always tough to do as the old guy in the midst of all this youth and energy), I think he’ll go far.

Monica-Finally, I think we have a strong female contender.  She just graduated from law school, so she’s smart; and she’s one of the few women I’ve seen so far who hasn’t irritated me.  She comes across as very honest and real.  She reminds me of a less annoying and more attractive version of Erinn from last season. I love her opening quote:  “I’m doing something like Survivor because I can win something like Survivor.”  Damn right, that’s the competitive attitude we like to see.  She’s got a good grasp on the game:  not making unnecessary enemies, while realizing there may be a time when the stakes are high and you have to be cutthroat.  In her bio, she says she perfected her “powers of persuasion” in law school and plans to use them to her advantage.  How can you go against perfect powers of persuasion?  She also plans to endear herself to her tribemates in the same way Parvati and Amanda did in their seasons.  And those are two very good Survivor players, so if she’s modeling her game like theirs, she’s got a good shot to go deep.  If that’s not enough to convince you that she’ll be a good player, read this quote from her bio:  “she has every intention of pulling her own weight around camp while studying their words and actions meticulously to ‘learn about her enemies before she chooses a weapon.’”  Much potential here.

Natalie-They start her video right off with “People’s impressions of me are gonna be that I’m high maintenance and that I don’t belong out here”, which I totally agree with, because she initially does seem like the dumb, pampered southern girl.  Basically, the Kelly of this season. (Not this season’s Kelly, the one from the Marcus/Kenny/Crystal/Bob season)  She then says that those impressions are all totally wrong, and, well, I guess I’ll believe it when I see it.  But she does a good job of convincing me that she’s athletic, and she says she’s always worked hard in her life, so there might indeed be more than meets the eye.  She says she has a quote that she lives by, and I’m wondering…..what is this brilliant, deep, meaningful quote that you base your life upon?  “Work hard, play hard”.  Mmm.  Bravo.  She seems a little too pageant-y, but I guess Amanda was the same way and she made the finals twice.  I guess I do think Natalie will be a lot less useless than Kelly was, but she’s far from being this ultimate Survivor player. 

Russell H-This guy is cracking me up.  He introduces himself as a control freak:  he controls his entire life: his family, his job, he even controls his friends.  And he’s gonna control this game.  But even though you’re looking at his picture and probably imagining him scowling as he says this, it’s far from that: he’s got this eager little grin on his face the whole time, because he just can’t wait to manipulate everyone.  He wants to play the game like no one else has played before:  “I’m gonna control each and every individual out there like a little puppet, matter of fact you can call me the puppet master.  Cuz what ima do, is ima have ‘em all doing whatever I want ‘em to do (at this point he puts his hand out like he’s controlling a marionette), if I tell ‘em to run, they gonna run, if I tell ‘em to stop, they’ll stop, and when I’m finished with ‘em, just throw ‘em in the trash.”  Um…while I absolutely love this whole speech and hope he can somehow pull this off in the actual game, I just don’t see how it’s possible.  But then he talks about how he’s gonna try to control them without letting them know he’s actually in control, pulling the old “make somebody else think they’re the leader”.  Which makes much more sense than what I was picturing earlier…maybe he is pretty smart after all.  But I still think that’s hard to pull off and his tribemates could catch on.  He’s already convinced himself that doing all this will be easy, because it’s all he does at home when he’s running his oil company.  If he can successfully play the game like he wants to, then we’re in for a good show, because Russell definitely has huge entertainment potential.  On his bio, he says “I’m not going out there to make friends. I’m just not doing it. But everybody is going to think I’m their best friend, because I’m just such a lovable character.”  Brilliant.  He hates fake people, so I see him bonding with somebody real like Erik.  I think Russell is completely sink or swim:  either he’ll crash and burn at the beginning, or he’ll dominate the game like he says he will.

Russell S-He has a good air to him…friendly, outgoing, sociable.  He’s been a personal trainer before, but now he’s a lawyer.  Wow…talk about a mixture of brains and brawn!  He talks a lot about his strategy, which is definitely a good sign.  He’s studied Survivor enough to know that he needs to keep his mouth shut, not be the leader, work hard, and make alliances quickly.  His head’s in the right pla

ce.  And he has some ideas on how to bond with people:  he has daughters, so he’ll talk about how much he loves being a dad around the women, but around the guys he’ll talk about all the sports and training he’s done.  It’s just good to see someone who’s thought it through so much, and thought through it well.  I think he has all the ingredients to be a very strong player in this game.  I think we should root for him because if he wins, he’s gonna cut off his dreads!

Shannon-Ok, remember earlier, when I was watching the video of Betsy, and I instantly pegged her as the annoying middle-aged woman, but then she got less annoying as the video went on?  Well, Betsy ain’t got nothing on Shannon.  THIS is the annoying middle-aged woman.  I mean, just look at her picture.  Her very first line is “I think I deserve credit as the inventor of the mullet, because nobody wears it better me.”  And then just this absolutely horrible laugh/cackle.  She’s very gregarious, but in an irritating way.  She seems like she should be teaching PE somewhere.  She starts to win me back juuuust a little when she talks about how she’s set 5 year goals for herself ever since she was 15 and has accomplished them all, but she loses me for good when she talks about the time when Rupert went on Survivor and all her friends called her and said “Oh my god, Rupert is a dude version of you, you need to be on this show!”  Do we really need another Rupert, much less a female one?  She claims to have good people skills, and I halfway believe her, but she also says “I’m like this ball of energy just ready to explode, because I’m putting it out there and I think that rocks.”  Translation:  I’m gonna annoy the crap out of my tribemates, and they’ll vote me off very early.  But she could also get hurt and leave the game, because the last line of the video is “it’s gonna be all good, as long as I don’t get hurt”.  Editing can work that way.

Yasmin-Wow, she’s feisty.  I hate to stereotype, but she’s seriously giving off the “sassy black woman” vibe.  Just the way she says “you need to know who the hell to stay away from” leads me to think that she’ll turn some people off.  She just seems way too headstrong for a game like this.  She’s not gonna compromise what she believes in for anything, which basically means she’s gonna snap at somebody.  About halfway through the video, she directly validates all the things I’d been picking up on:  her friends call her “Sassy Yassy”, and she says she’s a person you either love or hate.  I probably wouldn’t like her in real life, but as a character on the show, I actually think I will like her, just based on how much of a character she really is.  She’s extremely animated, with her direct, rapid-fire style of talking, and absolutely none of it is put-on.  You can just tell, that is who she is.  But while she amuses me, let’s be real:  she has no shot on this show.

All in all, the biggest theme I noticed was that almost all the contestants that seem to be good players are men.  As always, there are a lot of interesting personalities and I’m looking forward to seeing how they come alive on TV.  I’m gonna split these castaways into groups 2 different ways:  one based on how much I like them so far, and the other based on how well I think they’ll play the game.

I’m liking:  Ben, Erik, Kelly, Mike, Monica, Russell H, Russell S

I don’t like: Brett, John, Laura, Marisa, Natalie, Shannon

Undecided/Indifferent: Ashley, Betsy, Dave, Elizabeth, Jaison, Mick, Yasmin

Good players: Ben, Brett, Erik, Mick, Monica, Russell S

Weaker players: Dave, Kelly, Laura, Shannon, Yasmin

Middle-of-the-road:  Ashley, Betsy, Jaison, John, Marisa, Mike, Natalie

Jury’s still out:  Elizabeth, Russell H

It’s pretty much pointless to pick the entire order, because there’s so many variables and it will inevitably make me look stupid, but I’m gonna do it anyways.  Here goes:

20) Yasmin

19) Dave

18) Shannon

17) Laura

16) Marisa

15) Betsy

14) Mike

13) John

12) Natalie

11) Elisabeth

10) Brett

9) Jaison

8) Kelly

7) Russell S

6) Ashley

5) Ben

4) Russell H

3) Mick

2) Monica

1) Erik

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