Another one bites the dust

In the latest incident of many this year involving girl pop stars -- think Courtney Love, Paris Hilton, the Olsen twins -- a popstar named Ashlee Simpson did a a Milli Vanilli last weekend on Saturday Night Live. You know, I always thought the word "live" in the name of the show meant all the acts were performing live too. No, it just means they appear live, and when there's an unfortunate gap in the integrity of the dub-live continuum, there's nothing left to do but slink away. NBC, the network that broadcasts Saturday Night Live, ran this bizarre story in which the performer's father claimed he was the one who urged her to use tapes because of hoarseness due to "acid reflux disease" (is there some product placement coming along here?), and also said that the drummer pushed the wrong button. Meanwhile Salon had a typically scathing piece, though taking down some manufactured teen popstar is not saying much.

By the way -- sorry about those pictures on the right not changing. I finally went to take new ones, and my digital camera is broken. So you'll have to look at the cat a little longer. We do.