The Kind-Hearted Smart Aleck

I'll wait to cast my final judgment until I hear the studio version of the song, but in the meantime, I'm finding Muse fans' reactions to their new song "Reapers" to be quite amusing. A couple nights ago, Muse debuted a song from their upcoming album "Drones" live in Belfast, before performing it for a second time last night in Glasgow. The song, "Reapers," was actually the band's closer for the two nights, and upon reading the reactions from fans on the band's homepage, as well as on YouTube, I've had to chuckle a few times. According to these fans, the song "Reapers" shows hints (influences) of the following bands/musicians: 1) AC/DC 2) Van Halen 3) Led Zeppelin 4) Queen 5) Def Leppard 6) Rage Against the Machine 7) Linkin Park 8) Jack White 9) Madonna 10) Prince 11) Lady Gaga 12) Deep Purple 13) Lynyrd Skynyrd 14) George Michael 15) Iron Maiden 16) Nirvana 17) Radiohead 18) Queens o...

It seems like pretty common-sense to me - the more that time moves forward in the world of the arts, the more artists and their works there will be to influence others. This is why when lists are released of the most influential musicians of all time, 98.9% of them were around toward a particular genre's inception. Since I was born in the '80s and grew up in that decade as well as the '90s, I'm prone to liking musicians that were around during those 20 years. While there's nothing wrong with me enjoying groups from those two decades (well, perhaps a couple of them...), I'd be pretty wrong in laying claim that the most influential bands in the history of rock started in the '80s and '90s. There may have been bands whom were influential above all others for a certain style of rock which seemed omnipresent during a stretch of time, however, it'd be ridiculous for me to say they were the most influential bands in the history of rock. Nirvana is said to b...