Better Off Jed

Thank goodness for Guitar Hero World Tour. Ever since I got that game, my son’s interest in songs with subjects about fruit salad, cold spaghetti, etc. has certainly waned. Barney beget The Wiggles beget Imagination Movers beget The White Stripes. Long car rides are now tolerable, however, making sure my kids only listen to songs that are appropriate for them is an unwelcome, but necessary, challenge.

A few months ago, my son and my daughter were clamoring for iPods. I told them that they’d have to save up their allowance if they wanted it get an iPod knowing that it would take them forever. My in-laws generously offered to pay half. When the kids finally saved up enough money for their iPods, my in-laws also generously bought them iTunes gift cards as well. And the struggle begins.

Their song selections started out innocently enough. Between my daughter and my son, they bought songs from artists you’d find on the Disney Channel (Miley Cyrus, Demi Lovato, Selena Gomez, Jonas Brothers, etc.) or on American Idol (Jordan Sparks, Kris Allen, etc.). They would also hear songs on the radio that they like by artists that for the most part are benign, but I am quickly learning that you have to be careful.For instance, my daughter loves the song Hot and Cold by Katy Perry. Not a bad song, but their is an utterance of the b-word. We let my daughter buy it. She also wanted Katy Perry’s Waking Up In Vegas. We said no to that one.

We let my daughter get Lady Gaga’s Poker Face and Just Dance, although the latter’s subject matter — while not having bad words — is probably not appropriate, since it’s about a girl at a club who’s totally wasted. I don’t think my kids have picked up on that aspect of the song. We definitely will not be letting her get the song where Lady Gaga talks about taking a ride on a guy’s “Disco Stick”. I hope she hasn’t heard that one yet. Ugh.

Enter The Black Eyed Peas. A couple of weeks ago, I bought them I Gotta Feeling and had no problems with the lyrics. Last night, my son decided he wanted Boom Boom Pow. I’ve heard the song on the radio a million times and never heard anything objectionable. I fired up iTunes and found the song. I noticed that there were Explicit and Clean versions of some of their older material and took note that their new album was not marked Explicit. If a song/album is not marked Explicit, wouldn’t you assume that it is “safe”? Guess what? It’s not.

We bought Boom Boom Pow and started listening to it and I heard a few mentions of the “s”-word. I actually started the song over a couple of times to make sure that I heard what I thought I heard. Usually, if a song is released to the radio, there is an option to buy the Radio Edit version of the song. No such luck.

I contacted Apple’s support via online chat and explained my problem. I meant to capture the transcript because it was kind of interesting, but I won’t bore you with the details. To make a long story short, marking a song Explicit and/or providing a Clean copy of the song is solely at the discretion of the record company (Interscope Reconds in this case). It turns out the Radio Edit version of the song is available, but only if you buy the entire album of “Now That’s What I Call Music, Vol. 31″. Uh…no thanks.

I did a quick search of the Amazon MP3 store for a clean version of Boom Boom Pow and came up empty handed. The ironic part is that there were comments on Amazon.com that described the same experience as me: bought it for a young child and were shocked to hear the bad language.I’ll certainly be more careful next time.

In case you were curious, here’s the songs my kids have bought since they’ve gotten their iPod: