Last month Forbes released their list of the 25 highest-earning musicians of 2010, and the list contains several talents Rocks Off is happy to see keeping the lights on. No. 1 on the list, U2, is still a favorite of ours after all these years, and it's always good to see Tom Petty, Jay-Z, and Beyonce doing well.
Even some of the performers we really don't like, we can understand why they're on the list. Justin Bieber, for instance, while not our preferred brand of music, is undeniably an international phenomenon. And although we hate everything Bon Jovi has done except for exactly five songs - go ahead, guess which ones - the guy is a massive success and has enjoyed that success long enough to see pretty much every band on modern country radio start sounding exactly like one song he wrote more than 20 years ago.
We feel like some of the people on that list, however, don't belong, are inconsequential, or could be easily replaced. Here are the five most glaring examples of performers who made way too much money last year.
5. Boyd Tinsley, Dave Matthews Band
We've got nothing against this guy, personally. Yet since 1995, whenever we've been unfortunate enough to be forced to watch lawyer-rock mainstays Dave Matthews Band perform, there he's been, sawing away on his tiny fiddle and grinning like an asshole. Why is he there? Does he add anything to Matthews' notoriously mediocre songs? Is he supposed to add some kind of country flavor to the sound, or maybe some kind of Celtic vibe? Because he doesn't.
If not for his conspicuous appearance and the occasional solo, we wouldn't even realize he was there. Now, couldn't that have been said for any member of the Dave Matthews Band? Of course. But as a fiddle player, and a giant African-American one at that, Tinsley's sound should ideally be as distinctive as his appearance. As it is, every time we're flipping through the channels and come to rest on a DMB performance, we're always somewhat surprised to see him.
"Oh right... that guy," we think to ourselves, before changing the channel.
4. Toby Keith
Toby Keith has done a lot of admirable work performing for and otherwise supporting American troops. Literally everything else he's done has been entirely loathesome. From his terrible music to his thoughtless, un-American attacks on the Dixie Chicks, Keith's work is a parade of macho redneck overcompensation combined with a sense of naked commercialism rivaled only by Gene Simmons.
We were surprised it took Ford as long as it did to stick him in their commercials, considering both are towering icons for fake country-boy bravado with little actual substance beneath. He seems about as authentic as Larry the Cable Guy, and his lyrics are about as clever.
