Posts Tagged ‘Eric Church’

Hot 100 Roundup—10/8/11

Wednesday, October 19th, 2011

Rihanna featuring Calvin Harris—”We Found Love”
#16
It’s not as great, but this may be Rihanna’s most enjoyable single since “Umbrella”. That said, I do worry, though it’s not surprising, that she’s still using her relationship with Chris Brown to fuel her inspiration. This is obvious not just from the recently released video, but also from her choice of collaborator. Harris, who had one of his beats copied wholesale without credit by Brown last year, must have gotten a lot of enjoyment out of putting this together. I bet Rihanna called him as soon as the story broke. It also explains the icy feel of the track: it’s a dish served cold.

Glee Cast
“It’s Not Unusual”, #65
“You Can’t Stop the Beat”, #67
“We Got the Beat”, #83

Birdman featuring Nicki Minaj & Lil Wayne—”Y.U. Mad”
#68
Good beat, the usual goodness from Minaj (hell, I’d listen to an entire Nickelback album if she were featured on every cut), and Birdman, though he spouts nothing but cliches, is at least in good form. As for Wayne, his rap is nothing special (for him), but for the first time since he got out of prison he sounds awake. Maybe he needs to toss out a few dozen guest spots to get back to form. Or maybe Minaj pricked his conscious with her “female Weezy” schtick.

Demi Lovato
“Fix a Heart”, #69
“Unbroken”, #98
It’s a credit to Lovato’s talents as a vocalist that she can glide over lines like “I just ran out of band aids” and ridiculous rhymes like “you can bandage the damage” and still make them sound musical. And it’s a credit to her strength as a human being that she can write a song like “Unbroken”, where she reclaims and swears by the emotional openness that got her into trouble in the first place. So maybe she won’t turn into Connie Francis. She still oversings, though, and she still has to find better material and put it together with more care: the techno backing on “Unbroken” doesn’t fit her voice at all.

Jason Aldean—”Tattoos On This Town”
#81
For Aldean, this cliched nostalgia bomb is actually a step up—better this than another overloud power ballad. He’s still terrible, though. And I really wish he’d found another way to approach the verse about swinging out on a rope over the swimming hole; the way he does it now I always expect him to describe a lynching.

Eric Church—”Drink In My Hand”
#96
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 8/13/11

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Bubbling Under, 8/13/11

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

Big Time Rush featuring Iyaz—”If I Ruled the World”
#106
The line between teen TV soundtrack music and mainstream pop is now so thin that if it wasn’t for the strained actor’s vocals this would be inseparable from any other pop song with Iyaz on it. In other words, don’t write this off just because it’s for tweens, write it off because it’s mediocre—catchy mediocre.

Ronnie Dunn—”Cost of Livin’”
#107
I’ve never much cared for Dunn, either with his ex-partner or on his own, but this is a near masterpiece. For the most part the lyrics avoid sentimentality, and also politics, sticking only to the essential points and details. Meanwhile the music, dry and precise, drives home the emotional point. The bridge is devastating. I wish Dunn had a better voice, or could make it a bit less plaintive, but that’s a minor quibble. I doubt he’ll ever do anything better.

Eric Church—”Drink In My Hand”
#109
I heard a lot of promise in Church’s first few singles, and though I can’t say this fulfills them all, it comes close. This sounds ordinary at first, but it grows on you fast, and Church shows some interesting flashes of where his inspiration comes from: parts of this sound a lot like Dave Edmunds and Rockpile. Which means it’s more like intelligently recycled rock and roll than country. But then who (besides Ashton Shepard) knows what country is anymore?

Kelly Rowland featuring Big Sean—”Lay It On Me”
#114
Big Sean’s rap on the intro, where he fantasizes about Rowland in a schoolgirl porn outfit, is enough to make me reject this record from the start, and Rowland, who seemed to be onto something with “Motivation”, does nothing to improve matters. And then Big Sean comes back.

Swedish House Mafia—”Save the World”
#117
Whose house again? Journey’s?

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Hot 100 Roundup—3/26/11

Friday, March 25th, 2011

Glee Cast
“Landslide”, #23
“Do You Wanna Touch Me (Oh Yeah)”, #57
“Animal”, #62
“Kiss”, #83


Eli Young Band—”Crazy Girl”
#59
I like the sound of this, especially the steel guitars, which go for timbre and intensity rather than the usual sentimental effects, but it isn’t much of a song, and Young isn’t much of a singer. There are times when this reminds me of a male Taylor Swift, oddly enough, but that’s more a matter of melodic construction rather than theme or approach. I’ll be interested in whatever they do next, but I don’t hold out much hope.

Wiz Khalifa—”The Race”
#66
The background here is astounding, with a late 80s/early 90s synth-pop influence like nothiing I’ve heard on a rap record before, and the groove it establishes goes a lot further in justifying this record’s length than anything Khalifa has to say. Though the music suggests emotional depth, the lyrics are pretty much the same as any other rapper you’ll hear. Maybe he’s just mellowinig out a little.

Lupe Fiasco featuring MDMA—”Beautiful Lasers (2 Ways)”
#70
Fiasco has something to say, his anger, intensity, and intelligence shine through, and I’m glad, after all his wrangling with Atlantic Records, that he finally got his album out. Unfortunately, none of that changes the fact that record is both overwrought and derivitave. If he’s going to employ vocal effects, he should find ones that don’t make him sound so much like Kanye West, and the metal guitar solo at the end is just dumb. Which doesn’t mean I won’t give the album a good, hard listen.

Seether—”Country Song”
#74
Since these guys apparently think lyrical vagueness is a sign of intelligence, I can’t quite pin down what this record is about. The title and the country sound are, I assume, ironic, and there are lyrical hints that suggest this is intended as an attack on tea partiers and such. To identify such things with country music as a whole, however, is stupid in all sorts of ways (just ask lifelong democrat Toby Keith), and the fact that the country influences end up making Seether sound smarter than they really are may be the biggest irony of all.

Snoop Dogg featuring T-Pain—”Boom”
#76
Back to bragging about his dope and his women, just like he was born to do. He doesn’t do it with quite the flair he used to, though, and T-Pain, who seems to have lost his talent for hooks, doesn’t help at all.

Eric Church—”Homeboy”
#86
So much for the easygoing dope smoker. Easing back with a joint on a Friday night is one thing, but actual teenage rebellion? Church isn’t putting up with any of that. He isn’t above the crassest emotional manipulation, either, as he assures his little brother that their parents are on their deathbed because their hair is turning grey (why, they may be almost fifty!). The mainstream country audience will no doubt be reassured by this self-superior rant, even if the drums are too loud.

Kenny Chesney—”Live A Little”
#94
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 10/10/10

Keith Urban—”Without You”
#95
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 3/19/11

Jennifer Hudson—”Where You At”
#96
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 2/21/11

Easton Corbin—”I Can’t Love you Back”
#97
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 3/12/11

Avril Lavigne—”Wish You Were Here”
#99
If Lavigne has to make ballads, this is probabaly the way she should do it. At least it’s better than that soundtrack crap she was putting out a couple of years ago. Not that much better, though.

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Hot 100 Roundup—9/26/10

Wednesday, September 29th, 2010

Kings of Leon—Radioactive
#37
The music takes off from the title, the guitars and percussion echoing the sound of Geiger counters, but the lyrics seem to be about something else entirely, something vaguely spiritual. They’re so vague, in fact, that it’s impossible to tell what’s going on or what any of it means. All I can be sure of is that these guys really want to be Pearl Jam. So much so that I can’t help but wonder if this wasn’t inspired by Eddie Vedder’s version of “My City In Ruins”.

Trey Songz—“Can’t Be Friends”
#74
In which Trey regrets the fact that he’s irresistible to women and so good at sexing them up because he finds it impossible to be friends with a woman once he’s had her and can’t have her anymore. There are probably many women in the world who would be flattered by this self-serving horseshit. Until, that is, they realized it was just his way of talking them back into bed. Amazing what a throbbing, sympathetic string arrangement can do to hide your true intentions.

Keith Urban—“Put You In A Song”
#82
Though I’ve heard some evidence that Urban can be better, this time he sounds like a one-man Rascal Flatts. His throwaway exclamations at the ends of lines are particularly irritating. He sounds like he’s already working the crowd in Branson.

Yolanda Be Cool & Dcup—“We No Speak Americano”
#83
Cartoon music which may or may not have some political intent. Already a huge hit in Europe, where this sort of danceable pop candy has always been ridiculously popular. It gets old fast.

Miguel featuring J. Cole—“All I Want Is You”
#91
I like the trip-hop beats and the ethereal quality of the chorus, and until J. Cole steps up to the mike this is a good record. But Cole ruins it for me by indulging in one the stupidest trends in current hip-hop: self-annotated raps. As soon as he says “Trying to celebrate my independence day (Will Smith)” he loses me, and even the good lines about his girlfriend forcing him to apologize twice don’t quite make up for it. Something else we can blame on Kanye, I guess.

Reba —“Turn On Your Radio”
#94
Give her credit: Reba knows how to keep up with the times, and the vocal on this piece of feisty feminism wipes the floor with its inspiration, Carrie Underwood. What it lacks is Underwood’s brassy tastelessness (in country terms, that is), which implies not just youth but true anger. When Reba’s voice turns bitter she sounds like a long-time pro doing her best for the song, but you know she thinks it’s just a good joke and nothing else. Underwood’s lack of depth is part of what makes the basic emotions in her songs believable, but Reba’s too old to be that shallow.

Linkin Park—“Waiting For the End”
#96
Musical craftsmanship matters, and whether it’s the band’s or Rick Rubin’s, it makes this record more listenable than it deserves to be. “This is not what I had planned” from someone who is either dying or expecting to be killed may be one of the dumbest lines to hit the Hot 100 this year, especially the way Mike Shinoda sings it. All that money, all that time and effort and yes, talent, and they still hold the intellectual point of view of a thirteen year-old. Either that or they’re intentionally pandering to thirteen year-olds, which would almost be better.

Eric Church—“Smoke a Little Smoke”
#97
I’ve seen signs that Church doesn’t get much respect from country aficionados, but though the sound of his records is somewhat overblown (but then, in country, whose isn’t?) I like the throwaway quality of his lyrics and melodies, and his sense of proportion—at just over three minutes, compared to his earlier records this is almost an epic. He knows how to sneak ideas into a song, as well; it isn’t until the middle eight that you realize he’s blunting himself out because his girl dumped him. He’s also more blatant about dope than most country singers, at least the ones that get on the radio. There are even psychedelic echo effects. Good stuff.

Wiz Khalifa—“Black and Yellow”
#100
Good hook, but then you expect that from a Stargate produced track. The rapping isn’t bad, either, but it isn’t anything you haven’t heard before, and better.

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New this week—4/4/10

Thursday, April 8th, 2010

Sean Kingston & Justin Bieber—”Eenie Meenie”
#30
This is more Kingston than it is Bieber, and just enough of both to render it meaningless. Peeling back the garishness that has decorated Kingston’s more recent singles only reveals how lacking they are in anything resembling a hook, and mixing in Bieber’s usual pablum provides the final push toward total mediocrity. Any charm Kingston may have possessed is gone; now he’s just another dancehall-pop hack. As for Bieber, he’s never been charming. Being charming requires a personality.

T-Pain—”Reverse Cowgirl”
#75
I can understand why people write T-Pain off, but more and more I’m beginning to think he’s some kind of genius. This isn’t his most insane record (that’s still “Chopped ‘n’ Skrewed”) but it may be his funniest, and it’s at a level of musical sophistication that jokesters like 3Oh!3 and LMFAO can only dream of. All its best jokes are musical rather than lyrical (he was beaten to most of his rodeo metaphors a long time ago, anyway), and without a single swear word it’s dirty as hell. Based on the title alone, I can’t imagine it will get much radio play, but it’s bound to be a ringtone favorite. Yee-hah!

Young Money—”Roger That”
#86
The best Young Money track so far, and the second best hip-hop comedy record of the week, and that’s not a put down. Nicki Minaj does a killer Lil Wayne impersonation, while Wayne himself spends a good deal of his time giggling. The guy in the middle (do I really need to waste my time looking up his name?) is at least tolerable. The beat is insane, the raps as dirty as they want to be, and if the whole isn’t a as great as its parts, at least it doesn’t waste them.

Jaron And The Long Road To Love—”Pray For You”
#87
From the first organ note you can see the joke coming, and though keeping the music country-lovesong straight is probably intended to be satirical, in reality it drags the humor down. It doesn’t help that Jaron didn’t bother to write a third verse, either. Jokes are supposed to build, not just repeat themselves.

Luke Bryan–”Rain Is A Good Thing”
#91
Because it leads to sex, of course. Doesn’t everything in uptempo good ol’ boy country? This is better than most, though; catchy as hell, and doesn’t throw in too many cliches. I could, however, do without the self-satisfied chortle; sounds way too calculated.

Justin Bieber—That Should Be Me”
#92
This awful record makes me wonder if Bieber isn’t, in reality, Usher’s revenge on all the fickle teenage fans who have turned to younger pastures over the last couple of years. But then, those are the fans who have put this record on the chart—it isn’t being promoted as a single, it’s just an album track that the Bieberfreaks (or maybe their mothers) have decided to give extra attention. Maybe I’m just being cynical—but not half as cynical as Usher.

Martina McBride—”Wrong Baby Wrong”
#95
This isn’t bad: nice Stones inspired riff at the beginning, and I like the idea of a mother’s advice song from the mother’s point of view. It gets too tame about halfway through, though, and it goes on too long. McBride should pay more attention to Eric Church or Luke Bryan: for a song like this, three minutes is all you need. The rest is just showing off.

Miranda Lambert—”The House That Built Me”
#98
I’m always wary of this sort of country sentimentality—when country singers talk about “finding” themselves, it almost always means a return to their smalltown, family roots, a confession of their sinful, straying ways, and a nostalgia that’s sure to turn into bathos, usually accompanied by a healthy dollop of strings and some whining steel guitar. But even taking those reservations into account, this is a perfect record. There are no strings or steel guitar to be found, and Lambert’s understated vocal drives home more real emotion than any amount of Nashville oversinging. It helps that the song is the best example of its kind you’ll ever hear: the two-part chorus is stunning in its impact, and if the verse about mama and papa building their house doesn’t bring you close to tears, nothing ever will. Lambert didn’t write this, but it proves that even when she’s not falling back on alt-country standbys (Patti Griffin, John Prine, etc.), she has an unerring ear for good material. Which means she’s going to be a star for a long, long time. Boy, do we need her.

Colbie Caillat—”I Never Told You”
#99
I’ve badmouthed Caillat a lot in the past, and this isn’t a great record, but it’s made me realize who and what she really is: the twenty-something, SoCal version of Taylor Swift. She’s not as lyrically inventive as Swift, too often she falls back on cliches, and despite the title of her first hit, she’s nowhere near as bubbly—but her point of view, her romantic sensibilities, and her sense of taste and (if I can use this term) musical decorum, are almost exactly the same (there’s a reason Swift performed with Stevie Nicks, after all). The main differences are of age and geography. While Swift optimistically negotiates the fresh hell of a Nashville high school with fairy tale visions of romance, Caillat faces the ages-old Southern California disconnect of the messiness of emotional and sexual reality while living in a physical paradise. Both seem almost untouched by the real world, when the truth is that both know it all too well, and are shaping their own version of the perfect escape. Swift is the greater artist of the two, but Caillat may very well surprise us somewhere down the line.

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New this week—3/14/10

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

Justin Bieber—”Never Let You Go”
#21
The most irritating thing about Justin Bieber may be something over which he has no real control: all his records sound the same. He may have talent, but he either possesses such a narrow emotional range that his handlers don’t dare let him express himself, or they have such a narrow idea of what a pop record should be that they can’t take advantage of whatever talent Bieber does possess. The first is a possibility, but I lean toward the second explanation: this is such an obvious retread of Chris Brown’s “Forever” that you wonder if anyone in Bieber’s camp has a single original idea.

Jason DeRulo—”Ridin’ Solo”
#33
Did anybody involved in this record notice how irritating DeRulo’s voice is on the chorus? Did they think it would serve as a kind of hook? Or make up for the fact that nothing else about this record is even vaguely interesting? If so, they were wrong.

Usher featuring Nicki Minaj—”Lil Freak”
#43
Somehow I don’t think Stevie Wonder ever imagined anyone using part of “Livin’ for the City” as background music for an orgy, but I guess we should give Usher a break—he’s got to get over the grief of his divorce somehow.

Avril Lavigne—”Alice”
#71
I long ago resigned myself to the use of Alice in Wonderland as a Rorschach blot for anyone low on ideas who needs a little creative boost, but that only excuses Tim Burton. This is straight cash-in and a terrible record by any standard. The only notable thing about it is that it definitively marks the moment when Lavigne gave up on doing anything new and decided to copy those who have followed in her wake—in this case, Paramore. Even another soppy ballad would be better than this.

Kenny Chesney—”Ain’t Back Yet”
#73
If you define country as music based on the nostalgia of people in their thirties to mid-forties for the pop music of their early teen years, then this is a country record. But even by those standards it isn’t a good country record, just a loud one (with horns, to boot). Gossip hounds, however, will eat up the apparent reference to Renee Zellweger in the last verse.

Godsmack—”Cryin’ Like A Bitch!!”
#74
The exclamation points in the title tell you everything you need to know about this record. Think of them as sudden bursts of guitar and you can pretend you’ve already heard the song without the painful experience of actually listening to it.

Three 6 Mafia Vs Tiesto with Sean Kingston and Flo Rida—”Feel It”
#78
If the artist lineup didn’t tip you off to how desperate these guys are for another hit, the music sure would. Most egregious moment: when Flo Rida comes on, the beat switches to an approximation of “Low”. Even worse, that’s the only part of the record that makes any sense. The rest is a confused mess.

Danny Gokey—”My Best Days Are Ahead of Me”
#78
I never saw Gokey on American Idol, but it’s easy to understand why he was voted off—the only thing thinner than his voice is his material.

La Roux—”Bulletproof”
#92
With all the Eurodisco influence on the charts it’s nice to see the real thing making some headway. Already a number one in the UK, though I doubt it will make it as far here—it’s not brash and straightforward enough for American tastes. I find it a trifle thin and stiff myself, but it’s still better than about 85% of anything else on the charts.

Chris Young—”The Man I Want to Be”
#98
As shameless as self-pitying country gets, this is essentially the male version of Carrie Underwood’s “Jesus Take the Wheel”, only worse, because you can’t help suspecting that all Young really wants is his woman back. What he should really be praying for is better material.

Steel Magnolia—”Keep On Lovin’ You”
#99
Because Lady Antebellum just isn’t enough Sugarland for the country/pop market.

Eric Church—”Hell On the Heart”
#100
Church is the kind of guy who believes old-fashioned things like simple, catchy melodies, short songs (this one clocks in at 2:45, shorter than both his previous singles, only one of which is over three minutes), and strict stereo separation. He also gets better with each record. But he isn’t that good yet. Cliches keep popping up in his lyrics, and thematically there’s nothing that separates him from a few thousand other good ol’ boys. He also has a tendency to sprinkle his interviews with references to how much better he is than everybody else. I like this record, and I hope he gets better, but I’m not holding my breath.

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New this week

Monday, July 6th, 2009

Jay-Z–”D.O.A. (Death of Autotune)”
#24
This is terrible. Not so much for the music as for the insipidness of Jay-Z wasting his talents to attack something as meaningless and ephemeral as a software plugin. He’s isn’t going to convince anybody how tough he is punching bags of feathers.

Demi Lovato–”Here We Go Again”
#51
Lovato’s last couple of singles (“Don’t Forget” and “La La Land”, both written with the Jonas Brothers) had an idiosyncratic quality to them that, flawed as they were, lifted them above the usual Disney fare. This is the usual Disney fare: light, pleasant, totally forgettable.

Green Day–”21 Guns”
#55
Slow, ponderous, packed with musical and lyrical cliches, decorated with the wimpiest drum sound you’ve ever heard–when they reach their social consciousness phase, this is exactly what the Jonas Brothers will sound like.

Eric Church–”Love Your Love the Most”
#90
A country list song. Better than some, if only because Church, in order to avoid charges of blasphemy, leaves out Sunday meetings and Jesus.

Keyshia Cole featuring Monica–”Trust”
#93
Mary J Blige meets Mariah Carey, lightweight division. I wonder which Montovani record they lifted that horrible string arrangement from?

Shinedown–”Sound of Madness”
#95
This makes more sense than “Second Chance” (not that it would take much), but just like that record, it’s basically “Chicken Soup for the Headbangers Soul”. They say they wrote the “book of pain”, but it sounds more like a self-empowerment, daily affirmations calendar for tough guys.

Jack Ingram–”Barefoot and Crazy”
#98
A lot of this is cliche (what country song isn’t?), but it has a strong, steady groove that’s rare in country music (sounds like a real band, though I suppose they’re the usual session pros), and Ingram picks all the right cliches. And that line about kissing at the bottom of the swimming hole doesn’t sound like a cliche at all.

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