Them Crooked Vultures "Them Crooked Vultures" [2009]

This makes it official: Josh Homme clearly must have pushed Dave Grohl out of the way of a speeding bus at some point. It's the only thing that remotely justifies not only Grohl's Jay Leno-like installation of himself into Homme's band Queens of the Stone Age earlier in the decade, but his impetus for cobbling the phony Led Zep tribute band Them Crooked Vultures together -- with himself playing Bonzo, Homme noodling like a cut-rate Jimmy Page (and for some reason crooning like Jack Bruce; somebody was confused what the game was) and John Paul Jones himself, who apparently had never picked up golf as a retirement activity. That they could get this group signed to RCA was a no-brainer, but of course neither it nor the album went anywhere. Led Zeppelin was instrumental in stomping the guts out of prog rock even before the band became a shell of its former self -- and that was 30 fucking years before "Them Crooked Vultures" was released. Jesus Christ, talk about clueless. Maybe Homme needed the money after a decade and a half of busting his ass to become a complete unknown on the contemporary rock scene. Maybe Jones' royalty money finally ran out? Fat fucking chance -- it's entirely possible Them Crooked Vultures owe Zep even more in royalties due to having ripped off their licks at every turn. Ultimately, it's fine if rock stars want to dress up like other rock stars once in awhile, but to expect that anyone would be interested in listening to it means either guys like these don't actually live in the real world or they just don't give a fuck what anyone expects from them.