Much of Fox's new battle-of-the-bands, Idol-spinoff talent show, The Next Great American Band, comes across as one giant televised cautionary tale for all you aspiring young musicians out there. Sure, the life of rocker and/or roller seems so decadent and glamorous: macrobiotic-chef-appointed deluxe tour buses with your band's bitchen logo airbrushed on the side, groupies ready to shed their G-strings at the strum of a G-chord, Mount Everest-sized mountains of cocaine, backstage bottomless bowls of green M&M's, trails of trashed hotel suites, multimillion-dollar record contracts signed in virgin's blood, etc. Sounds like something straight out of a David Lee Roth video, huh? Or at least a Sammy Hagar video...
Well, the guys in Next Great American Band reject acts like Sizzling Happy Family and Northmont will paint a different, considerably less hedonistic picture for you. For these rockers in their relatively ancient thirties (keep in mind that rocker years, much like dog years, drastically differ from the normal chronological calendar), this show was their last chance. Sadly, after more than a decade of slogging it out in the nation's most podunky toilet venues--while their neglected wives and children waited at home for Daddy to finally give up his teenage rock dream--it was the end of the road for these could've-been-a-contender bands.
As one failed contestant said, after this final audition they'd all be going back to being "real people with real jobs." But it was even sadder when Northmont's guitarist--who made probably the biggest mistake of his life by leaving his family behind in New Zealand eight years ago to pursue rock stardom in, um, Dayton, Ohio--excused himself from the camera crew after his failed audition, because he had to go call home and tell his family that "Dad blew it...again." Ouch.
Another rocker who's met his own somewhat scary fate is one of the show's judges, the Goo Goo Dolls' Johnny Rzeznik. Or John Rzeznik, as he is appparently now more maturely billed. Now, I don't want to say that John(ny) has had plastic surgery. Because I don't know for sure if he has. I just don't want to say that he hasn't. Because there's just something that looks, well, a little goo-gooey about him. He sort of looks like a Wax Museum replica of his old self. You know, I really don't know which is sadder: Wasting eight years of one's life in Dayton, or wasting away until one resembles a wax mannequin. But, such are the perils of the rock 'n' roll lifestyle.
But there's one group of The Next Great American Band hopefuls with many years ahead of 'em before they have to worry about going under the knife or giving up their own teenage dreams. And that's because they're barely even teenagers yet! That band is Light Of Doom.
Best. Reality TV. Rock Band. Ever.
Yes, even better than Bands On The Run's Flickerstick or Supergroup's Damnocracy! Seriously!
The Hanson of heavy metal, these little headbanging hellions are all 13 years old or younger, can totally play, seem to be allergic to wearing shirts, and have the best influences a rock band could ask for: "Iron Maiden, ninjas, boobs, and explosions."
Hell yeah! Stop the show now, there's no need to air any more episodes--because the next great American band has clearly already been found! (Sorry, Northmont.) Watch Light Of Doom here in all their hairless-chested glory, and you too will see the light. Now please excuse me while I go program Light Of Doom's voting number in my speed-dial...