Posts Tagged ‘Katy Perry’

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Only Sleeping
Hot 100 Roundup—6/9/12

Tuesday, June 5th, 2012

Phillip Phillips
“Home”, #10
“We’ve Got Tonight”, #97
Though it’s nice that American Idol has decided to go with something besides a third-rate Diane Warren imitation for its winner’s first single, a second-rate Mumford and Sons imitation is not an improvement. In fact it’s almost the same thing.

Katy Perry—“Wide Awake”
#35
This starts well, with a surprisingly subdued opening, but soon the bombast sets in, and you’re left to marvel once again at the willingness of pop stars to commercialize their personal lives. The only thing worthy of note is the way Perry uses clichéd biblical images —should a former Christian singer really be tossing off a phrase like “born again” with such apparent disregard for its deeper meaning? And didn’t anyone involved in this figure out that Perry singing the title phrase like an android wouldn’t convince anyone that she was even conscious, much less wide awake?

Lupe Fiasco—“Around My Way (Freedom Ain’t Free)”
#76
Though I understand the beef regarding the “They Reminisce Over You” sample, that’s hardly the most embarrassing thing about this record. That would be the lyric, a “We Didn’t Start the Fire”-style laundry list of celebrity-endorsed liberal causes. Fiasco’s flow is impressive, but his choice of metaphors is staggeringly off base. “Two croissants short of a continental breakfast”? Not exactly the voice of the masses, is it?

Chris Brown—“Don’t Wake Me Up”
#89
Brown sounds as self-satisfied as ever, and, just like Diddy, he even hires a female vocalist to provide a few loving words to him on the intro. This time, though, the music doesn’t save him: the beat provided the Benassis is such a mess you wonder why Brown thought he could make a decent record out of it. But when your ego is that big, you’re bound to fall into it sooner or later.

Jason DeRulo—“Undefeated”
#90
It’s not often that someone makes a comeback after breaking their neck, and I congratulate DeRulo on his recovery. If you listen closely enough, you can hear his joy in being able to make this record at all. But DeRulo remains a minor talent, and this is a very minor song. I like the clean quality of the sound, but it doesn’t go anywhere.

Rita Ora—“How We Do (Party)”
#96
Wait a minute. England is sending us yet another version of Jessie J? Isn’t there some import law we could invoke against this?

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Everybody Dance Now
Hot 100 Roundup—3/3/12

Wednesday, March 14th, 2012

Katy Perry—“Part Of Me”
#1
Straightforward dance music like this does Perry a favor. The more she strays from groove and traditional structure the more irritating she becomes (it does something weird to her voice, for one thing). She also tends to be at her best when she’s telling her man off. She likes fireworks metaphors too much, and this is more an example of craft than inspiration, but it’s still her best single since “Teenage Dream”.

Nicki Minaj—“Starships”
#9
Minaj’s chameleon voice is one of her greatest strengths; she can shift effortlessly from tough hood rat to ethereal angel and a range of roles in between. In some cases, like this record, that versatility is the only thing holding her music together, or that keeps it from falling into cliché. But it also emphasizes her greatest weakness: the lack of connecting tissue between her many ideas. I couldn’t begin to suggest why she starts singing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”, or why parts of this sound like a Rihanna impersonation, except as a distraction from the cliché lyrics and overworked strobe-light synth bursts. I like the line about not paying the rent, but that’s the only sign of personality on the record.

Chris Brown—“Turn Up the Music”
#10
Unless you’re disturbed by the very idea of Brown’s continued career, there’s nothing offensive about this record. Though I have my doubts about the way the music industry, not to mention Rihanna, have reacted to events, it would be foolish to deny that this is decent, journeyman work, uninspired as it may be. I don’t love it, and I don’t hate it; it’s just there. I just wish I could be sure he’ll simply fade away into the mediocre career he deserves.

One Direction—“What Makes You Beautiful”
#28
A boy band almost literally put together on TV (all the members had tried out and failed as solo singers for X Factor, when the producers suggested they work together), One Direction are, in sound and history, essentially the British version of Disney pop. As such I welcome them gladly to our shores. Let’s face it, Disney pop (aside from Miley Cyrus, whose breakthrough was the exception) should have been all over American radio between 2005 and 2010, and if it hadn’t been for radio programmers’ odd belief that the music wasn’t “mature” enough for top forty, it would have been. But immature Brit-kids are different from immature Americans: they have novelty value, and accents. That the music is the same catchy guitar pop that Disney put out only makes the landing of these clean-cut invaders easier. The pump has been primed, so to speak. It’s the same old story, the British selling our own ideas back to us after we’ve failed to appreciate them ourselves. Oh, and the record? Pretty good.

Bruno Mars—“Runaway Baby”
#50
Mars is always best on uptempo material—his excessive energy level makes his ballads overwrought, but it’s perfect for material like this throwaway, which made the chart only because he performed it on the Grammies. All the same, it’s more charming, and more fun, than his last few singles. Also, though this doesn’t seem to rate mention by anyone else, he’s an excellent lyricist: the second verse is hilarious.

Rascal Flatts—“Banjo”
#63
Not terrible, which is a surprise. Maybe even not bad, which could be a sign of upheaval in the natural order. One question, though: if they love banjo so much, why do they drown it out with electric guitars at the end of the song?

Glee Cast
“I Will Always Love You”, #87
“Stereo Hearts”, #92

David Guetta featuring Chris Brown & Lil Wayne—“I Can Only Imagine”
#90
Maybe I’m just feeling forgiving this week, but despite the presence of Chris Brown I think this may be the best thing Guetta’s done. It helps that there’s some variation in the sound—even some surprises—and that there’s a decent structure to the song rather than the usual flailing around. Repeating Lil Wayne’s verse at the end is a mistake, though; Wayne’s phrasing is so distinctive that it’s easy to tell that Guetta ran the same track with only a slightly different background. On a chorus that’s excusable, but on a verse it’s weird and unsettling. It sounds like cheating.

Skrillex featuring Sirah—“Bangarang”
#95
Autotune, pitch-shifting, skittering digital snares, massive explosions of distorted bass, these are all ideas that have come and gone and come again over the last few years, all having their moment in the sun, all eventually derided as overworked and clichéd (and they were). Not to mention dubstep. Skrillex uses them all, and then some, mixes them together, and doesn’t give a shit what you think about it. He’s having fun, and learning a craft, and making art all at the same time. Every single has more packed into it, is more strongly structured and thought out, and is better than the one before. He’s taken a bunch of stuff that the cognoscenti had discarded as played-out and breathed new life into it. Isn’t that the way art is supposed to work? We’re stepping into what promises to be one of the most inventive eras in the history of pop music, and right now, Skrillex is out front.

deadmau5 featuring Greta Svabo Bech—“Raise Your Weapon”
#100
While Skrillex is an artist with a capital F (as in Fun and Fuck you), deadmau5 would like to be known as an artist with a capital A. You can hear his desire to be taken seriously through all eight minutes of this record. It’s an interesting attitude for a guy who performs wearing a giant glowing mouse head. This isn’t a bad record, but its seriousness weighs it down, and the lyrics are more confusing than anything else. It’s pretentious, is what it is. No wonder Dave Grohl likes him.

Listen on Spotify

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Hot 100 Roundup—10/29/11

Wednesday, November 9th, 2011

Snoop Dogg featuring Bruno Mars & Wiz Khalifa—“Young, Wild & Free”
#10
Half good-time dope song, half, thanks to Khalifa, public service message on behalf of marijuana as a mood stabilizer, all charming in its way, but too sleepy and boring in parts. I assume Mars or his pals in The Smeezingtons wrote the hook, though he appears to have buried himself in the mix—a smart move, since Snoop and Khalifa’s rougher, less trained vocals make more sense in this context than Mars’s trademark croon. Hardly a hallmark in any of their careers, but pleasant fluff all the same.

The Fray—“Heartbeat”
#43
It’s a no-brainer that Kings Of Leon would have imitators, but somehow I never expected it to be an already established act. Guess the sloppy vocals and even sloppier ideas seemed like such a perfect fit that The Fray just couldn’t resist. They might have covered their tracks better, though; some of this sounds so much like “Use Somebody” that when it comes up on shuffle I keep thinking it is Kings of Leon. Sometimes I even hit skip before I realize my mistake. Not that I wouldn’t skip it anyway.

Beyonce—“Countdown”
#85
This is as brilliant musically as everyone says it is—even Beyonce’s over-brassiness works in this context—but I’m getting tired of her confusing brand of feminism, which largely consists of the old saw of being a lady in the living room and a whore in the bedroom. Though she would probably phrase it more along the lines of being a powerful woman in public and a skilled lover in private. Whatever the case, her belief in ultimate sublimation to her man, which goes back to her earliest Destiny’s Child days, is unquestioned. She got out from under her father’s domineering hand in her business life, isn’t it time she got out from under his tired old ideas, as well?

Tyga featuring Drake—“Still Got It”
#89
Though he’s more talented as a vocalist, Tyga strikes me as being a lot like Jamie Foxx: whoever he has guesting on his track, that’s who he sounds like. Drake’s hook is far more interesting than anything Tyga has to say, and the track as a whole is mediocre at best.

Roscoe Dash—“Good Good Night”
#91
Dash is basically a second level version of Soulja Boy—less aggressive, less daring, and far less interesting—but every once in a while he comes up with a good hook, and this is one of them. You’ll forget all about it once it’s over, but at least you’ll enjoy it while it’s on.

Britney Spears—“Criminal”
#92
Though it points in a totally different direction, I enjoy this more than anything Spears has released since “Piece Of Me”. It’s very smart to play down the melodramatic cliché of loving a bad boy with music that sounds not just peaceful, but almost blissful. As “physical” as her love may be (a word that, in this song, covers a lot of emotional ground), it isn’t the rough and tumble that you’d expect, but something more like a day at the spa: both fulfilling and refreshing. Spears may not be the brightest singer in the world, but she does understand sex, which is more than most pop stars can claim.

Katy Perry—“The One That Got Away”
#94
Six singles in, Perry is starting to scrape the ordinary, at least musically. The lyrics, though, are something else. Everyone’s least favorite pop maven presents us with what is essentially an indie-rock romance: they make out to Radiohead and think of themselves as a modern June Carter and Johnny Cash. As it happens, though, she’s the one who’s more forward thinking, which turns her into a pop star while he ends up busking the blues on downtown street corners. Any regrets are nothing more than the usual lip service (Perry is nothing if not a master of formula), but in its way this is more honest than most indie-rock love songs, even if she doesn’t mean a word of it.

Jessie J—“Domino”
#96
A lot of people have been comparing Jessie J to Katy Perry, and not in a good way, but this is the first time the comparison has seemed totally apt. The sound and sensibility is a straight rip-off, but J doesn’t have nearly as much charm as Perry, or as much sense. She doesn’t seem to understand, for example, that being a domino just makes her one of the many women who are lined up to be used by this guy. You have to think about metaphors and similes; you can’t just toss them off because they sound good.

Drake featuring Nicki Minaj—“Make Me Proud”
#97
This isn’t nearly as sexist and condescending as some people have suggested it is, but it is something of a borderline case. The big problem is the title: saying that somebody makes you proud is much more self-directed and self-absorbed than saying that you’re proud of them, which can be a simple compliment. The former suggests that you had something to do with what makes the person so wonderful. But that isn’t the case here. Drake never utters the title line, and instead says “I’m so proud of you”. I’m assuming he changed the title to avoid confusion with The Impressions’ “I’m So Proud” (nobody with any sense dares comparison with Curtis Mayfield). Still, he does go overboard in his praise, to the point where he sounds condescending, and since Minaj is playing it safe—her rap is good but not particularly memorable—he comes off looking something of an ass (what else is new?). I’d be much more forgiving if she had smoked him. But he means well, I’m sure. Also, the music is great, which makes up for a lot.

Evanescence—“Lost In Paradise”
#99
“What You Want” made me hope that Amy Lee was stepping away from the melodramatic bombast that has been her stock in trade from the beginning, but this songs dashes those hopes in grandiose style. It’s all so obvious: from the first notes of the piano you wait for the crash of guitars and orchestra, and though it gets held off longer than usual, it’s exactly like you imagine it, overwrought and dull. And then it goes on for another three minutes.

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Hot 100 Roundup—7/9/11

Wednesday, August 10th, 2011

Maroon 5 featuring Christina Aguilera—”Moves Like Jagger”, #8
Javier Colon—”Fix You”, #52
Dia Frampton, “Losing My Religion”, #54
Vicci Martinez—”Dog Days Are Over”, #68
Xenia—”The Man Who Can’t Be Moved”, #92

Pitbull featuring T-Pain & Sean Paul—”Shake Senora”
#69
This record doesn’t sound like a good fit for anyone involved—too brazen and obvious for T-Pain, but, if anything, too subtle for Pitbull, who’s better at leering and lustful growling than the lightness of touch that would be required to make this work. As for Sean Paul, only his biggest fans would notice that he’s here. It doesn’t even work as parody. All they’ve done is overemphasize what the song is already about, and not in a way that points out anything interesting. I do like Pitbull comparing booty, which reminds me of “My Gal Is Red Hot”, but the rest is a disaster.

Selena Gomez & the Scene—”Love You Like a Love Song”
#72
One of the things I love about the production team Rockmafia is their belief in traditional pop form and structure. They’re well aware of the possibilities of emotional tension and release inherent in verse-chorus-verse form, and they do their best to take advantage of it while keeping the music itself as simple and catchy as possible. Sometimes the results sound too simple and automatic, as they do on the chorus here. But it also helps them to create classic pop moments like the first verse, as perfect a melding of music, mood, lyric, and performance as you’ll ever hear. If the rest of the song came close to it, this would be a great record. As it is, it’s only a very good one. Not that that isn’t achievement enough.

Bella Thorne & Zendaya—”Watch Me”
#95
What’s most fascinating about this Disney-pop variation on Ke$ha is how well it works. It isn’t as brash as Ke$ha—the music is more bass heavy, and of course the “sleazy” is removed—but otherwise it would be difficult to tell the two apart. It isn’t that Ke$ha’s music is easy to imitate, but that it’s tapped into a generation’s universal mood of directionless, hyped-up energy and restlessness that, oddly enough, Disney has helped to promote and capitalize on, and maybe even helped to create. The Disney tweens of five years ago are the Ke$ha, Katy Perry, and GaGa and Glee fans of today, and it’s a sign of Disney’s marketing savvy that they’re trying to keep up with them. I don’t think they are, quite, since it’s all out of their control now, but this is a good record nonetheless, and they deserve credit for trying.

Jill Scott featuring Anthony Hamilton—”So in Love”
#97
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 5/14/11

Train—”Save Me, San Francisco”
#98
The Loggins and Messina of their era, and if they’re not as irritating as, say, Rascal Flatts, it’s only because their tunes are catchier and clever self-deprecation is a part of their act. They’re just as clueless, though. They can’t even get a song about their hometown right. Except for a few obvious lyrical references, nothing about this record sounds like San Francisco. What it sounds like, instead, is an above average Rolling Stones cover band, and considering the Stone’s history in the bay area, is that really the vibe you want to go for?

Brantley Gilbert—”Country Must Be Country Wide”
#100
True enough, but does that mean it has to be heavy metal, too?

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What renaissance?

Tuesday, June 7th, 2011

David Hajdu at The New Republic continues to demonstrate his own mixture of research-rich, understanding-poor column writing, this time taking on what he call the “Renaissance of Pop Collaboration”. Hajdu, it seems, has just discovered the mix of mini-inspiration and profit-driven collaboration used to create most pop records (I call it mini-inspiration because it generally consists of writers and/or performers creating one section of a song, and counting on another writer/performer’s mini-inspiration to complete the rest). Hajdu gets all his facts right, but doesn’t seem to realize that this is something that’s been going on for a long time and has been one of the distinguishing characteristics of pop music for a decade or more. He also makes the somewhat bizarre assertion that Katy Perry is “coat-tailing” Kanye West on “E.T.” Or is it West who’s coat-tailing Perry? Is coat-tailing even a word? Whatever the case, Hajdu seems to operate under the impression that one or the other needs help from a bigger name to get a hit, even though Perry has just become the first performer ever to spend an entire year in the top ten, and West is probably the most important rapper of the last decade (he also fails to mention, or doesn’t realize, that the original album version of “E.T.” doesn’t include West’s rap).

I wonder what makes Hajdu consider this a renaissance, though, as opposed to an entirely new way of making records. Songwriting collaboration is nothing new, of course, but the classic songwriting partners whom Hajdu seems to be evoking by the term renaissance didn’t work in anything like the manner most pop songwriters do today. Though many songwriters and producers work together on a regular basis, and there are production/songwriting teams such as The Neptunes, Stargate, and The Smeezingtons, true songwriting partnerships are rare. Add to that the fact that many performers, once they attach themselves to a track, often bring in their own writers, or song doctors for hire, to help create their parts. And don’t forget those classic writing teams of the past worked face to face, whereas today many tracks are created by email or on shared servers, without the various contributors ever coming into physical contact with one another (B.o.B. and Hayley Williams of Paramore, who had a huge collaborative hit with “Airplanes”, first met when they performed the song on an awards show several months after it was released).

In the last paragraph, Hajdu seems to imply that this form of collaboration is a good thing, or at least that it fits the party music that currently dominates the charts. He doesn’t seem to consider the opposite possibility, that this simplistic music is a direct result of the logistics of modern record production. It’s much easier, after all, to write a party anthem from a distance than it would be to write something more involved and serious in intent. The difficulties of long distance songwriting may help expand and diversify songwriting in some ways, but it may also hamper the creation of more sustained, organic work, the kind that results from a writer sitting down and creating an entire song herself. As opposed, that is, to creating a hook to be attached to someone else’s bridge to connect to someone else’s verse to be laid over a beat that’s been sitting on a producer’s hard drive for six months, that closes with a coda another producer conceived on his laptop during a cross country flight two years ago, based on a sample from a record first released in 1973. There are advantages to both techniques, and certainly the more modern method results in records that are full of fresh and often startling musical ideas. I’m just not sure they’re filled with much thought, and without thought there’s no such thing as a renaissance.

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Hot 100 Roundup—5/21/11

Wednesday, May 25th, 2011

Lady Antebellum—”Just A Kiss”
#7
Definite proof that the near-great “Need You Now” was a fluke. This one, which is both mellow and overwrought in equal measure, concerns grown-up abstinence, and should relieve those who were worried by the drunken booty call of their biggest hit. Never fear; this record contains no sexual tension whatsoever. I’m surprised they can work up enough libido for even a goodnight kiss.

David Guetta featuring Flo Rida & Nicki Minaj—”Where Them Girls At”
#14
What makes Guetta and DJs like him different from his predecessors isn’t just the music, but the culture. Guetta’s followers aren’t blissed out on love and Ecstasy, they’re hard partying drunks, and the music Guetta makes isn’t designed to harmonize with chemically stimulated synapses but to deliver a final, convulsive jolt to dying brain cells, a death rattle with a beat. It’s the techno version of “Boogie Til You Puke”, minus the knowing sense of humor. This is Guetta’s most relentless record yet, and also his lamest. Flo Rida, who has never sounded duller, borrows his vocal flow from Pitbull and his hooks from…well, nowhere, because there aren’t any. But dammit it if Nicki Minaj doesn’t almost save things anyway. It’s worth suffering the rest at least once to hear her go “dee dee dee dee” in a voice that parodies every record Guetta has ever made, his entire aesthetic encapsulated in a few nonsense syllables. I wonder if he noticed.

Bad Meets Evil—”Fast Lane”
#32
I’m not sure which is more impressive, the fact that Royce Da 5’9″ keeps up with Eminem, or that Eminem keeps up with himself. Whatever the case, though this isn’t much beatwise, it’s an amazing display of vocal technique and wordcraft on both sides. Half the time I can’t tell what either one of them is saying, but it all rhymes, and on a record like this that’s all that matters.

Glee Cast
“Go Your Own Way”, #45
“Songbird”, #68
“Don’t Stop”, #79
“Never Going Back Again”, #81
“Dreams”, #92

New Boyz featuring Chris Brown—”Better With the Lights Off”
#61
The New Boyz continue to look for a style, and what I once took for corruption, as they moved further away from their jerkin’ roots, is now beginning to look like constant experimentation. Even with both Chris Brown and Cataracs on board, this is neither jerkin’ nor hip-hop; sounds more like rock run through some sort of techno-rap filter. There are only the slightest hints of the New Boyz’ teen cleverness on display, but the record is good enough it isn’t missed much, and there’s a pleasant shock of recognition when it does appear. I’m not sure if this is a great record, but it’s growing on me.

Avenged Sevenfold—”Not Ready To Die”
#70
More metal bombast, with extra arty touches, so that it goes on for more than seven over-baked minutes. The only interesting part is the intro, which is a direct, uncredited lift from Elton John’s “Funeral For A Friend”. They may not be ready to die, but are they ready to be sued?

Jennifer Lopez featuring Lil Wayne—”I’m Into You”
#72
Pleasant enough for fluff, but that’s all. I continue to be amazed, though, at how Lil Wayne can get off the dirtiest lines and still sound charming and innocent. Who does he think he is, Katy Perry?

Don Omar & Lucenzo—”Danza Kuduro”
#82
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 11/21/10

Dierks Bentley—”Am I the Only One”
#89
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 4/16/11

Thirty Seconds to Mars—”Closer To the Edge”
#99
I’m sorry, what did you say? I couldn’t hear you you above your ego.

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Hot 100 Roundup—5/7/11

Monday, May 16th, 2011

Luke Bryan—”Country Girl (Shake It For Me)”
#22
The intro, especially that throbbing guitar line, shakes pretty well, but after that it’s all by rote. If Bryan actually demonstrated some honest lust, his sexism might be forgivable, but instead he goes on automatic and gets progressively duller.

Beyonce—”Run the World (Girls)”
#33
Based on a Major Lazer sample (aka Diplo and Switch), this is essentially an M.I.A. track with all the third-world references and atmosphere removed, and that loss of texture makes a huge difference. The bare bones sound is as bald and uninteresting as Beyonce’s well-meant lecture on sexual politics. Since this song makes explicit what has been implicit in almost every record she’s made as a solo artist, I assume Beyonce is either running out of patience or running out of ideas, probably both. Either way she’s beating us over the head with a message that was more powerful when it was partially hidden and presented in dramatic terms. “Irreplaceable” is a far greater feminist work than this preachy bore.

Adele—”Turning Tables”
#63
This woman knows how to sing (though not this time), but she doesn’t know how to write a song (or arrange one). When the strings come in you realize her real stock in trade is melodrama, not emotion.

Glee Cast
“Turning Tables” (featuring Gwyneth Paltrow), #66
“All By Myself”, #87

Bridget Mendler
“Breakthrough”, #88
“Somebody”, #89
Two more songs from the Lemonade Mouth soundtrack, and though neither is as good as “Determinate” (which is quickly turning into my favorite pop song of the year), both are far better than one would expect from Disney. It would be easy to say that this is simply Disney doing a better job of keeping up with pop trends than they have in the past, but the fact is that in the last few years it’s pop that has been moving closer to Disney rather than the opposite. Now that Glee has taken over the High School Musical audience (who are, after all, five years older) and Nickelodeon is chasing the latest tweeners, Disney moves on to high school pop-rock, tracking close behind Kelly Clarkson, Katy Perry, and Avril Lavigne, and downplaying the showtune cheeriness that spoiled so much of their earlier music. It’s still derivative as hell, but it’s also right on track with the times. And catchy. Don’t forget catchy.

Jennifer Lopez—”Papi”
#99
Though there’s nothing to indicate it on the credits, this sounds like something Lady GaGa may have cooked up for a b-side and then decided to give away instead. With GaGa singing, this might stand a chance to be both sexy and defiant. Lopez, instead, sounds cheerfully submissive to her man—which is her idea of being sexy—and invites every other woman in the world to join her in her self-degradation. She should ask Luke Bryan to appear in the video—he’d feel right at home.

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Bubbling Under 4/30/11

Monday, May 9th, 2011

Rihanna—”California King Bed”
#113
Ever wondered what Colbie Caillat would sound like if she sang for Guns ‘n Roses? Me neither.

The Ready Set—”Young Forever”
#115
Better than “Love Like Woe”, but what wouldn’t be? This is much tougher, and some of it is almost clever. But I have an inborn distrust of any song with a title that contains the words “young” and “forever”, no matter what order they’re in or whatever other words come along with them. And I certainly don’t trust a fallacious message of hope from anyone who doesn’t know the difference between “woe” and “whoa”. Young is one thing, ignorant is something else altogether.

Aubrey O’Day—”Automatic”
#108
A record that lives up to its title in every way.

Jessie J—”You Are You”
#112
Ever wondered what someone would sound like if they tried to sing like Rihanna, Katy Perry, and P!nk all at the same time? Me neither.

The Beastie Boys—”Make Some Noise”
#115
The great lyrical turn around—from “fight for your right to party” to “party for your right to fight”—isn’t just a clever word game, it’s a demonstration that not only hasn’t age dulled their wits, it’s sharpened them. This may be a party record, but the sound is dense and filled with a wary sensibility, full of confidence but also a sense of mortality. It’s party music laced with age and understanding. It’s fascinating to think that the brattiest of all the ’80′s rap groups should be the one to age the most gracefully and energetically.

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Hot 100 Roundup—4/16/11

Monday, April 18th, 2011

Wiz Khalifa—”When I’m Gone”
#57
In which Khalifa proudly explains why he doesn’t really give a shit. It’s not “When I’m Gone” as in “I know you’ll miss me but you’ll get by”; it’s “By the time I die I’ll have spent all my money and you guys won’t get jack.” Why? Because he can, that’s why. You don’t honestly believe he thinks about this stuff, do you?

Pitbull featuring Ne-Yo, Afrojack & Nayer—”Give Me Everything”
#60
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 4/9/11

Sara Ramirez—”The Story”
#69
Having pioneered the commercial endorsement of music in prime time, Grey’s Anatomy finds itself behind the curve and goes Glee on us and lets one of its cast members throw a record together over a weekend and release it for purchase. For all you Katy Perry haters who wonder what she’d sound like without the assistance of Dr. Luke and Max Martin, here’s your answer. I don’t think even Perry would be this off-key on the loud parts, though.

Britney Spears—”I Wanna Go”
#73
I suppose it’s healthy on a personal level that Spears is now making jokes on the same subject she sang so passionately about just a few years ago. It’s good she’s over it, but the loss in both intensity and musical value is obvious. Besides, whenever Spears tries to be funny it always sounds forced. “Lably, lably, lably”, indeed.

Victorious Cast featuring Victoria Justice—”Beggin’ On Your Knees”
#83
Nickelodeon’s campaign to wrest the teenpop crown away from the wounded Disney is so intense that it’s almost fascinating in its own right. It must be expensive, too, bringing in producers like Dr. Luke, Max Martin, and, in this case, Shellback, to boost your chosen teen idols. Too bad those first rate producers are only bringing their second rate material. I mean, did Katy Perry and Kelly Clarkson already reject this, or did Shellback not even bother offering it to them?

YC featuring Future—”Racks”
#86
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 4/2/11

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Hot 100 Update—2/28/11

Monday, February 28th, 2011

Katy Perry featuring Kanye West—”E.T.”
#28
Perry is justifiably famous—or infamous, depending on how you look at it—for working all sorts of sexual innuendo into her music without ever sounding lewd or crude. Her double entendres always sound innocent, if such a thing is possible, and squeaky clean. Apparently, Kanye West thought something should be done about this, because his rap is as crude as it could possibly be, and will only throw fuel on the growing argument over his apparent misogyny. We’ve always known that he knew how to make a record; now we know how easily he can spoil one, too.


New Boyz featuring The Cataracs & Dev—”Backseat”
#37
This goes a long way towards rehabilitating New Boyz, who I worried had been completely corrupted by the industry on their last single. Their raps are bouncy and energetic again, and their youth gives them an edge over the competition. All the same, this record belongs to The Cataracs, and though it’s good it’s not as good as they’ve been in the past. It’s fresher than most of the other rap on the charts, though. I’ve been loving the stuff coming out of Los Angeles lately, and this is another one.

Glee Cast
“Baby”, #47
“Sing”, #49
“Take Me Or Leave Me”, #51
“Somebody To Love”, #62
I know, I swore I wasn’t going to review anymore of this stuff, but I did say that I would make an exception if they ever did anything interesting, and since putting out decent music qualifies, as far as Glee is concerned, as doing something interesting, I felt it was only fair to mention it. Especially since it’s not just one decent recording, but all four. None of these are great, and all the usual flaws—weak singing, simplistic arrangements, a tendency towards show tune coyness—still apply, but somehow they seem to be less glaring in this week’s batch. In fact, this is easily the best week Glee has ever had. On the Justin Bieber numbers the usual weaknesses are actually an advantage—the songs seem more human, less fine-tuned and calculated, and hence more emotional. If anything, these versions help to point out the biggest problem with Bieber: that his singing conveys no feeling whatsoever, not even innocence or naivete, just a blank nothingness. And for those Bieber haters who still found themselves being sucked in by “Baby”, now you know why: it’s a great song. As for “Sing”, even My Chemical Romance fans would have to admit that the chorus makes a lot more sense sung by a choir, even if the lead vocals are weak.

Justin Bieber—”Born To Be Somebody”
#74
Since he recently changed his hairstyle, I’m hoping this will be the last gasp of the old, mid-adolescence Bieber, and that after this he’ll at least move on to high school. In the meantime, see above.

Chris Young—”Tomorrow”
#86
Some country critics think that Young has a lot of promise, but I can’t see it. His voice is fine, but this is the third single in a row that has demonstrated a smarm and manipulative shamelessness that strikes me as glaringly obvious. This time, he goes back for one last booty call before dumping his girlfriend (his wife?). Apparently in country you can get away with this sort of sexist hypocrisy as long as you sound unhappy while you do it.

Tinie Tempah featuring Eric Turner—”Written In the Stars”
#91
Reviewed in Bubbling Under, 2/13/11

The Black Eyed Peas—”Just Can’t Get Enough”
#92
I appreciate their attempt to mix the ’80s pop they grew up on with the “future” they created on their last album, but so far the results have been disappointing. This song doesn’t build at all, it just shifts gears two-thirds of the way through, and not in an appealing way. That electric DJ voice is getting truly irritating and, unlike many others, this is not a band I’m easily irritated by.

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