Posts Tagged ‘Jimmy Buffet’

Hot 100 Roundup—10/15/11

Thursday, October 27th, 2011

B.o.B. featuring Lil Wayne—”Strange Clouds”
#7
B.o.B. has been putting so much energy into the pop side of his career that I’d swear this is the first time I’ve heard him rap. That can’t be true, but that’s the way it feels. He isn’t bad—good flow, some nice twists and turns both in the rhythm and the words—though more derivative of T.I. than I’d expect him to be. Wayne, meanwhile, sounds more alive all the time. His rap feels like it came off the top of his head for once, and while it isn’t brilliant, he seems to be regathering his strengths. Not a moment too soon, either.

Bruno Mars—”It Will Rain”
#28
Somewhere under the overkill of fuzzy synths and staggered beats you’ll find a very good song with sharp lyrics and a distinct Motown feel. I’d love to hear a slightly more uptempo, sparsely arranged version. In the meantime, we’ll just need to listen past an arrangement dictated more by it’s place on the latest Twilight soundtrack than the song itself.

Nickelback—”When We Stand Together”
#48
Of course it’s awful, it’s Nickelback. But consider this for a moment: these guys are so slow at what they do—their new album will be only their third since 2003—that this song must have been written long before the Occupy protests or maybe even the Arab Spring. Yet here it is, right on time. Putting its laughable aesthetics aside, it’s exactly what it should be for this moment in time. If these lumbering Canadians could feel this coming, possibly months ago, and sympathize, it may be a lot bigger than anybody thinks. A hell of a lot bigger.

T-Pain featuring Wiz Khalifa and Lily Allen—”5 O’Clock”
#62
Adding soul raps to a Lily Allen track is a brilliant idea, but this goes on too long, and except for the organ that weaves it’s way through the track like T-Pain’s conscience, doesn’t add much. It also, of course, places the emphasis of the song on Allen’s physical, rather than emotional needs, and turns her into a nagging, if sexy, bitch. I’m not saying it does total disservice to Allen’s song, but it puts the weight on the least interesting aspect. And Wiz Khalifa only makes it worse.

Glee Cast—”Somewhere”
#75

Lloyd featuring Andre 3000 & Lil Wayne—”Dedication To My Ex (Miss That)”
#81
I wish this wasn’t such an obvious take off from Cee Lo’s “Fuck You”, not just in terms of lyrical content but in sound, as well. It’s very good, and Andre 3000 is great, but the imitative quality and the shallowness of it can’t be avoided. “Fuck You” was great because Bruno Mars and Cee Lo live and breath retro soul; Lloyd is just following in their footsteps, not forging a path of his own. That may be his whole problem: as much as I’ve enjoyed his music, I still have no idea who Lloyd is.

Jason DeRulo—”Fight For You”
#83
I thought retro-sampling had hit bottom with Gym Class Heroes’ borrowings from Supertramp, but it’s impossible to underestimate the crassness of pop culture. Just when I thought DeRulo might be worth listening to, he comes up with this. I realize that sampling the African chants from “Wanna Be Starting Something” is cliche, but Toto is not an adequate replacement. Not at all. What could possibly be next and/or worse? Pablo Cruise?

Blink 182—”After Midnight”
#88
These guys have matured enough that they don’t ruin their mediocre song with meaningless histrionics, and Travis Barker is a damn good drummer. It’s still a mediocre song, though, sung by very mediocre singers.

Luke Bryan—”I Don’t Want This Night to End”
#90
I really enjoy the way the melody of this flows and changes pace as it goes along, creating a romantic atmosphere all on its own. Which is good, because the arrangement, the vocals, and the lyrics do nothing to add to the feeling.

Zac Brown Band—”Keep Me In Mind”
#99
Brown is a one-man 70′s retro movement. So far he’s focused on the laid back sound of Jimmy Buffet and the somnambulist crooning of James Taylor, but here he ups the tempo and the tension by recreating the muzak-americana of the pre-Michael McDonald Doobie Brothers. All he has to do now is tour with Fleet Foxes and take over the world by putting it to sleep.

China Anne McClain—”Calling All the Monsters”
#100
Leave it to Disney to turn Britney’s Spear’s current sound into family-safe Halloween music. They do it very well, too. This is brighter and snappier than Spear’s has been in a while, and though the voices are young, this is never corny or cheesy. It’s a good, catchy, electro-influenced dance track. Not to mention that it cuts Lady Gaga off at the pass, keeping her from releasing a seasonal record along the same lines.

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Hot 100 Roundup—10/3/10

Thursday, October 7th, 2010

Glee Cast
“Empire State of Mind”, #21
“Telephone”, #23
“Billionaire”, #28
“Listen”, #38
“What I Did For Love”, #51

Akon—”Angel”
#62
Yet another “I Gotta Feeling” rip, only this time not from someone directly associated with the original record, which is a relief. Akon’s voice may have changed, but his gift for hooks remains, and here he strings enough together to make for a bearable dance record. My only question is whether this is intended as a tribute to Lady GaGa, who has guaranteed Akon a comfortable living even if he never has another hit. Maybe he should just go into promotion and forget this whole making records business. He wouldn’t be the first.

Update: Whoops, there I go forgetting to check the credits again. This was produced by David Guetta, so just ignore that first sentence.

Maroon 5—”Stutter”
#84
Catchier than their previous records off the new album, but in its own way just as stiff and claustrophobia inducing. Their clockwork groove is like a wall they build between the music and whatever emotion is supposedly generating it. Which means they’re either trying too hard or are too tasteful to get really funky. Working with a producer other than the tireless careerist Robert John Lange might help.

Jesse McCartney—”Shake”
#90
A few years ago, Jesse McCartney was the equivalent of Justin Bieber, only with a little more funk and without the hordes of screaming girls. Now he seems to be in limbo. His voice has matured, but his material still has a teenage quality to it (doesn’t everybody’s?) that doesn’t quite match with his voice. I like the telephone gimmick leading into the chorus, and this is catchy and almost funky enough to get by, but the song’s slightly Bieberish quality throws me off. He’s like a solo version of Maroon 5: his heart is in the right place, but his music is too stiff to catch up.

Diddy – Dirty Money featuring Drake—”Loving You No More”
#91
This goes down smooth and easy in the background, but like most muzak, once you get up close you notice how barren it is. And that’s even before Drake clears his throat and starts to rap.

Mike Posner—”Please Don’t Go”
#94
Pleasant but forgettable, which is a step up from his last record, which was brainless (often mistaken for pleasant) and irritating. I like the random electronics on the last verse, but the rest of it is sap. With guys like Posner and Owl City on the scene, the hipness quotient of electronic music is going to nosedive fast, if it hasn’t already.

Bubbling Under:

Zac Brown Band featuring Jimmy Buffett—”Knee Deep”
#101
When Zac Brown sings by himself, he sounds like James Taylor. When he sings with Alan Jackson, he sounds like Alan Jackson. Guess who he sounds like now? And no, despite the presence of the original inspiration, this is not as good as “Toes”.

Bon Jovi—”What Do You Got?”
#102
Ann Powers swears that Bon Jovi is a great arena band, and though I’ve never thought of that as a distinct genre, I’m willing to take her word on it. All the same, should I ever find myself in an arena with Bon Jovi, this song is when I would seize the opportunity to find a bathroom.

Maroon 5 with Lady Antebellum—”Out of Goodbyes”
#103
Apparently anyone who comes in contact with Lady Antebellum turns immediately into another version of Fleetwood Mac, and though the voices don’t blend as magically as Buckingham’s and McVie’s, this has its moments (the line about the “storm brewing in his eyes” is perfectly set). But moments is all it has, and though the playing is as precise as you’d expect, Fleetwood Mac was both precise and passionate, and that makes all the difference.

David Guetta featuring Kid Cudi—”Memories”
#104
Never, ever listen to a song called “Memories”. It’s guaranteed to be sentimental, even when it comes on with garish, hard-edged dance beats and features a vocalist who sounds like he’s coked himself hoarse. In fact, that might be even worse.

Bruno Mars featuring Damian Marley—”Liquor Store Blues”
#105
This doesn’t work, largely because Mars’s overdeveloped pop instinct undercuts whatever sense of “the blues” he may possess, but I’m fascinated by his attempts to show a serious side, or at least some sort of social conscious (this, “Billionaire”, maybe even “Fuck You”). It’s not the sort of thing you find in most masters of lighthearted melodic hooks, and it suggest that if he can ever manage to balance the two, he could become a major artist, instead of just a highly successful one.

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New this week—1/24/10

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

Sade—”Soldier of Love”
#58
Sonically this is stunning, especially the drums, which switch seamlessly in sound from a military tattoo to distant artillery to nearby gunfire—it’s enough to make you believe that they spent the entire eight years between albums getting the sound right. The lyrics are banal, though, no matter how gorgeously sung or perfectly set they may be. Their/her attention to musical detail is so complete that they seem to have completely missed the oxymoron in the title, or considered the possibility that they’ve never found real love because they think of it as a battlefield to begin with. That’s the trouble with perfectionism: once it latches onto an idea, it can’t abide contradictions.

Lady Antebellum–”Ready To Love Again”
#72
The ever-more-questionable single-a-week campaign continues, and sure enough, here comes the dreck. This sounds like the closing credits music for some Lifetime Channel original movie. Should you really issue four singles to preview your new LP if it’s only two singles deep?

Jay-Z + Swizz Beats—”On To the Next One”
#78
Jay-Z sounds fine (though a bit defensive—when has anyone actually accused him of being a virgin?), but the real star is Swizz Beats, who seems to have decided to take up where Timbaland left off (or gave up). His productions have always been fun, but this one has just enough added seriousness and menace to take it up another level.

Snow Patrol featuring Martha Wainwright—”Set the Fire To the Third Bar”
#86
As far as I’m concerned, any guy who writes a line like “the laughter penetrates my silence” doesn’t deserve to be reunited with his girlfriend, no matter how many lonely bars he mutely wanders through. He certainly doesn’t deserve Martha Wainwright, who nonetheless almost succeeds in saving the song, if only because her sweet, simple harmonies distract you from the relentless downtrodden wallow of the lead vocal.

Miley Cyrus—”When I Look At You”
#88
Is this what we have to look forward to when Cyrus gives up pop and “matures”? Me, I prefer the Disney stuff, even the cutesy nonsense, to preening power ballads like this. And I’ll bet you whatever you like that the last Hannah Montana soundtrack album will be better than anything Cyrus releases after she leaves Disney.

Keith Urban—”‘Til Summer Comes Around”
#92
The music is so portentous and the images so dismal—wintry silence, deserted carnival rides, etc.—that this could almost be taken for one of Bruce Springsteen’s post-industrial wasteland songs. Except Springsteen’s songs are about the death of community, the decline of the nation’s principals and ideals, spiritual devastation at both a personal and societal level. Urban’s song is about missing a girl he made out with on a Ferris Wheel once. The imagery is so overwhelming compared to the subject that after awhile it becomes the subject, which—and I would hope that it’s needless to point this out—isn’t the way songs are supposed to work.

Zac Brown Band—”Highway 20 Ride”
#98
A standard country divorce weeper, with extra dollops of self-pity. Brown spends most of the song feeling so sorry for himself he barely addresses the son he’s supposedly talking to. Maybe he should stick to Jimmy Buffett rip-offs and leave the real emotions to people who have some.

Pearl Jam—”Just Breathe”
#99
Let’s face it, if it weren’t for the first Doors LP, Ten would probably be the worst “classic” album ever to grace the rock canon. Now, twenty years later, they’re still making the same mistakes: taking sentiment for real emotion, sincerity for real ideas, and vocal and instrumental texture for interesting music. They mean well, and they’ve gotten better, but too often that’s the only good thing that can be said about them. In this case, I wouldn’t even say they’ve gotten better.

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New this week

Sunday, August 2nd, 2009

Mary J Blige featuring Drake—”The One”
#63
As good as it was to know that Blige had found marital happiness, her odes to her man and their relationship didn’t sell very well, so here she toughens up, brings in a ringer, and delivers a rip off of “A Milli” that, if nowhere as good as the original, is still a lot better than Beyonce’s. Drake, whose part seems to have been stuck in as an afterthought, adds nothing but sales power.

Michael Franti & Spearhead—”Say Hey (I Love You)”
#82
Despite the lyrical references to dancehall and production by reggae legends Sly and Robbie, this sounds more New Orleans than Jamaica to me, not that that ‘s a bad thing. It also sounds more Jack Johnson than Franti, which is. There’s something frustratingly automatic about this record in it’s sunny brightness, something a little too perfect, as if everybody were being careful to only color within the lines.

Demi Lovato—”Catch Me”
#89
Lovato’s vocal affectations—the short sharp breaths at the end of phrases, the cracking teen falsetto that at times makes her sound like a 12-year-old—can be so irritating that it’s easy to forget how well they fit the song’s subject: romantic confusion and barely tempered longing. Needless to say, that irritant also acts as a hook, and Lovato oozes innocent charm even as she’s overtaken by lust (though she would never call it that).  She’s no Taylor Swift, but she’s not quite your run of the mill Disney pop princess, either. Of course, that might just be a part of the Mouse’s marketing plan.

Beastie Boys featuring Nas—”Too Many Rappers”
#93
“Grandpa been rapping since ’83.” They’ve lost a few steps over the years, of course, and the clever rhymes and disses don’t flow as freely as they used to, but the beats still thunder, and they’re still smarter and wiser than most. But aging rappers are no less of a conundrum than aging rock stars, and I’m not sure they should waste their time dissing the Black Eyed Peas, no matter how cleverly they manage it. Once they start yelling at kids to get off their lawn, it’s over.

Zac Brown Band—”Toes”
#95
This is the first Jimmy Buffet rip-off (or homage I guess you could call it) I’ve heard that captures Buffet’s laid-back smarts at their best, catchy tunes, silly rhymes, and all. Unfortunately, the silliest rhyme (“care-o” and “dinero”) draws on a feeling of good ol’ boy privilege in a foreign land that comes across as just short of racism.  Perhaps I’m being too sensitive, but this sense of rural superiority (rural meaning good old American values, of course, whatever they are), even, or especially, when drunk or stoned, is one of the things that’s most irritating about current country music, and this song, despite all its charms, strikes me as stepping over the line.

Jeremih—”Imma Star (Everywhere We Are)”
#96
I’m still not sold on “Birthday Sex” except as camp, but building a cut as artful as this one based on nothing but variations on the hook from Kanye West’s “Flashing Lights” demonstrates real talent on the make. His phrasing and timing are near-perfect, and there are lyrical moments that suggest he may have more brains than “Birthday Sex” let on. But on only his second single he’s already rapping about how famous he is. Not a good sign.

Beyonce—“Sweet Dreams”
#97
Not bad, but underneath the drums and the low warbling synth is one hell of a corny song. Whenever I hear the male backup singers going “Ho!” in the background I have visions of a dream sequence from some big Hollywood musical from the fifties, full of garish Technicolor and energetic dancers seen only in silhouette, a no-expenses-spared mixture of conspicuous class and pure hokum. That’s entertainment, I guess.

Mat Kearney—“Closer To Love”
#100
I usually try to avoid the “Artist 1 + Artist 2 = Artist 3” formulation when I’m reviewing records, but “Closer To Love” is so lacking in any distinguishing characteristics of its own that it’s unavoidable. So, The Fray + Leona Lewis = Mat Kearney. Sometimes pop really is just formula.

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