I’m not a big fashion guy, but when these three photos turned up in my RSS feed, I couldn’t help but notice. I guess everyone’s feeling a little defensive these days.
Spikey
Spikier
Spikiest
And just as a side note, I’ve finally figured out what Adam Lambert reminds me of: a demented game show host.
“Bad Romance” may be the best song on The Fame Monster, but the hottest jam is one of the few tracks not produced by Redone: “Teeth”.
Teddy Riley, ladies and gentleman, Teddy Riley.
Anya Marina’s cover of T.I.’s “Whatever You Like”, which I reviewed in my last New this week post, is bad enough, but in Billboard—or at least the Hot 100 chart (both in print and on the Billboard.biz site, but only available by subscription)—she’s also credited with writing it. This will no doubt come as a surprise to the four guys who are credited on the original version, including T.I. himself. Did she think he wouldn’t notice while he was in jail? Or did he give the rights to her as part of his community service? If the latter, he should do a little extra time for contempt of court.
Now that it’s been a couple of weeks I would like to go on record just one more time and say that the Maura-less Idolator, now that the new writers are settling in, is even worse than it was at first. It’s bad enough, as many people point out, that all they now cover is pop, but the mindless attempts at humor and above-it-all cynicism are enough to make anyone gag (or want to apply one).
The comments section, however, has become a real hoot.
In all the verbiage about how shocking and controversial Adam Lambert’s performance on last night’s American Music Awards was, nobody I know of has stated the obvious: it was terrible. Worse than terrible. Ridiculous. Performances like that are what turned the word “gay” into a pejorative.
I don’t know if Kelly Clarkson is the best singer of her generation, but she certainly has the best voice. Comparisons to Beyonce are ridiculous—Beyonce can’t touch her. I think her only real competition may be another American Idol winner: Carrie Underwood. Underwood, though, really wants to be a country-pop star and chooses cliched, easy material. After over seven years in the limelight it’s obvious that Clarkson doesn’t much care about pop stardom; she wants to sing, and that’s all. You have to appreciate the fact that she just gets up there and belts. She still oversings at times, and she tends to be melodramatic on record, but I become more impressed with “Already Gone” every time I hear it:
And while I’m at it, a word of praise for Reba McEntire, who has obviously been one hell of a mentor.
Shakira featuring Lil Wayne—”Give It Up To Me”
#58
With Timbaland producing, this starts off sounding like a Nelly Furtado record, but after Lil Wayne’s short, sweet rap, Shakira takes over, and actually manages to reduce both Wayne and Timbaland to the status of sidemen. She’s a force of nature, but with Timbaland repeating his old production tricks in the background, this doesn’t rise anywhere near the giddy heights of “She Wolf”. It’s also depressingly submissive: “…put me in a cage and lock me away and I’ll play the games that you want me to play.” That may be a reference to her record company forcing her to make this after the relative commercial disappointment of “She Wolf”, but that’s not the Shakira anybody wants, and I can’t see this doing any better.
OneRepublic—”Good Life”
#69
Is this what Radiohead would sound like if they were a self-satisfied, self-serious, American pop band? Is that something we even want to think about?
Yo Gotti—”5 Star Chick”
#79
The old-school gangstas’ love of women who have actual jobs—aside from stripping—continues. This one, when she isn’t servicing Gotti sexually or drinking his champagne, is going to real estate school. Or is she a teacher? Or a nurse? Oh, I get it, Gotti’s got a whole harem of women with day jobs. Except he doesn’t, because he says he still has to meet this woman. Or maybe he just means yours. Whatever the case, he certainly covers the theme from all the angles. Gotti having wrapped up this subject (no pun intended), old school gangstas may have to start searching for another type of woman completely. I know, how about ones they legally support? Uh, no, I guess not.
Trey Songz—”Say Aah”
#81
Pleasant enough, but too long, and Trey Songz, for all his obvious skills, always reminds of somebody better. He’s the living definition of a mid-level talent, and this is a mid-level song.
Adam Lambert—”For Your Entertainment”
#84
Straight out of the box, Lambert is easily the oddest of the American Idol alumni to hit the charts, but this record, for all it’s forthright sado-masochistic references, is still pretty tame. It’s like a TV arranger’s idea of the Scissor Sisters, with all the musical brashness smoothed over, and more reminiscent of hair metal than disco. The lyrics are crude, as well, even if they’re intended as a metaphor for Lambert’s coming out after playing nicey-nice on Idol. He sounds like a gigolo for pampered, masochistic housewives.
Anya Marina—”Whatever You Like”
#88
Formula: Sarcastic indie-cover of hip-hop hit, sung in breathy little-girl’s voice, with original gender references retained to achieve maximum irony/kinky suggestiveness. Intended Result: Satiric send-up of rap sexism and self-satisfaction. Actual Result: Pop-porn for pedophiles. Conclusion: Yuck.
Josh Turner—”Why Don’t We Just Dance”
#99
The syrup in Turner’s voice is so thick it almost overwhelms the song, which is clever, charming, just sexy enough, and determinedly lightweight. If this had been released ten years ago it would be just another piece of formulaic country, but coming amidst today’s overwrought barn-burners it’s a pleasant diversion. Turner may not have the easy—sometimes too easy—command of George Strait, but his heart’s in the right place, and he tries harder.
Timbaland featuring The Fray and Esthero—”Undertow”
#100
This is promising for the first two minutes. The song isn’t that strong, but Timbaland’s subdued, pained vocal on the first verse, and the gorgeous warmth of Esthero’s on the second, suggest that maybe it will turn into something worthwhile. In the second half, though, it becomes just another Fray record, albeit one with classier and more restrained production—which only serves to underscore how weak the song is. At least “Apologize”, as awful as it was, had hooks.
I don’t think much of Owl City’s music, but after reading this brief profile in the New York Times I’m beginning to feel sorry for one-man-band Adam Young. He’s about to get royally screwed and he doesn’t seem to realize it. He sounds as naive as his records. Even Avery Lipman, the co-president of his label, Universal Republic, admits as much. This is what he says about their first business meeting:
“It was the most bizarre meeting I’ve ever had,” Mr. Lipman said. “I actually had to discuss and explain the record business 101. I had to explain to him what a record company is, the need for a lawyer, a manager, a booking agent. It was actually kind of tough.”
Which didn’t stop him, of course, from finding Young a manager (a fairly inexperienced one by the sound of it), signing him to a long-term contract, and waging a stealth campaign to make it look like Owl City wasn’t signed to a label at all. I have a feeling that it won’t be long before Young is living in his parent’s basement again.
The idea of 3,000 tweeners and their parents charging an Abercrombie Kids store to get a glimpse of a fifteen-year-old pop star would seem to be either an image from a long-ago past or the stuff of pop-culture satire, except it just happened in Long Island. One seriously hurt, the police called in, the whole event cancelled, and hours afterwards girls will still hanging out in the mall waiting for their object of affection to show up. I haven’t followed Justin Bieber’s YouTube career, just listened to his singles as they came out, but obviously his fan base is more obesessed than the blandness of the records themselves would lead you to believe. Somebody needs to remind me of the last time teenage girls nearly rioted over a pop star. I tell you, it’s beginning to feel more like the mid-fifties every day, and we all know where that led.
This is a subject that has been preying on my mind for a while now, but something about Nathan Rabin’s AV Club piece on the most recent episode of Saturday Night Live has made it difficult to think about anything else (I mean that literally—I find myself waking up in the middle of the night with this going through my head). It isn’t the piece as a whole, but one particular paragraph that bothers me:
But the ultimate mark of desperation was that Lorne Michaels and the gang allowed Black Eyed Peas to perform three fucking songs. Three fucking songs! It’s bad enough that a show that once upon a time exposed audiences to Frank Zappa, Ricky Jay and Loudon Wainwright III had one of the worst, most obnoxious groups in existence as its musical guest. But to let Will.I.Am and his three fashion-victim stooges perform more songs than just about any act in Saturday Night Live’s thirty-five year history is just inexcusable.
I’m not going to spend time defending the Black Eyed Peas (at least not now, though I have a feeling I’m going to get to that sooner or later), but it seems to have become a point of pride among certain writers to not only put BEP down but to do so in the most aggressively vicious terms they can conjure up. This happens in conversation, as well—mention BEP and reactions will usually range from rolling eyes to primal screams. This isn’t a recent phenomenon, either—long before BEP took control of the number one spot on the charts, they were being attacked with a surprisingly intense virulence.
I fully understand people hating a band’s music, or their image, or even their personalities. What I don’t understand is why this band in particular generates such an incredible level of ire. I consider them harmless fun, sometimes good, sometimes bad, almost always interesting. But their detractors seem to consider them more than just bad, they think they’re evil, a symbol of everything that’s wrong with pop music.
So I’d like to put forward a simple question, maybe even a childish one: why? What is it about BEP, the music they make, the image they present, the philosophy they put forward, whatever, that makes them so hateful? Take as much space in the comments as you want, and feel free to vent your spleen in full. But also be prepared to justify you’re opinions. Comments like “Because they suck,” or “Because Fergie is a skank,” aren’t going to cut it. Even if you don’t hate them, but think you have a clue as to why they’re hated, feel free to contribute. Just be nice about it, OK? At least to each other.
