Posts Tagged ‘Michael Buble’

Hot 100 Roundup—12/31/11

Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012

Tim McGraw—”Better Than I Used To Be”
#81
The lead single from McGraw’s last album for Curb records, with whom he’s been legally wrangling and trying to get out from under for about half his career. It’s still McGraw, so it’s better than some, but it’s still a piece of stereotypical country you can bet McGraw didn’t think about more than twice. Is that title intended as a message to either Curb or McGraw’s fans? Doesn’t matter; chances are you’ll forget this faster than you can say “contractual obligation”.

Glee Cast—”Do They Know It’s Christmas?”
#92

Lee Brice—”A Woman Like You”
#96
In which Brice stretches a two line joke into a three verse song, and succeeds in pandering both to his wife and his audience at the same time. At least his wife has the sense to roll her eyes when he tries to sneak this one past her.

Michael Buble—”All I Want for Christmas Is You”
#99
I have no sentimental attachment to the original, so it doesn’t strike me as a terrible idea to slow it down to a tempo usually reserved for songs about broken hearts or dead puppies. It doesn’t strike me as a good idea, though, either. Especially since Buble sings it with all the intensity he’d apply to buying a present for a distant cousin at the last minute on Christmas Eve in a Walgreens.

Gym Class Heroes featuring Neon Hitch—”Ass Back Home”
#100
In an era of self-absorbed male singers, Travie McCoy is the worst, or at least the most grating, and Neon Hitch does nothing but prove she can stand equal with Dido and Skylar Grey in the great women-who-provide-the-lyrical-hook-on-rap-records contest. Which still leaves her behind Dev and whoever is singing backup for Ghostface Killah these days. Did I mention it’s reggae? Reggae like Jack Johnson, that is.

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Hot 100 Roundup—12/17/11

Tuesday, December 27th, 2011

Glee Cast
“Perfect”, #57
“Girls Just Want To Have Fun”, #59
“I Kissed A Girl”, #66
“I’m the Only One”, #86
“Constant Craving”, #89

Nicki Minaj—”Roman In Moscow”
#64
Not sure what to make of this. It’s so busy you can barely understand the lyrics, and those you do aren’t worth getting excited about. Just over two and a half minutes long, it sounds more like the introduction to something bigger than a standalone single, except the something bigger is a bunch of bonus cuts attached to a “deluxe” edition of Pink Friday. Maybe it’s a commercial.

Grouplove—”Tongue Tied”
#78
Another group of privileged white kids (they met at an art school in Crete) who owe their chart placement to an advertisement for a well-considered, hip product. That being said, I like it. Though it’s about lost teen love, it avoids sentiment; it has a good, early 90′s, pre-Britpop groove, and though cloying in spots it’s never embarrassing. Unless the idea of privileged white kids making bouncy pop music embarrasses you already.

J. Cole featuring Trey Songz—”Can’t Get Enough”
#82
The pseudo-Latin groove is funny, but it’s also stupid, and not in a good way. Cole earned a lot of respect as a promising young rapper in his mix-tape days, but it’s impossible to tell from this which direction that promise pointed, or if it was there at all. As for Trey Songz, I’m not even sure which part is him.

Michael Buble—”It’s Beginning To Look a Lot Like Christmas”
#96
I like Buble, but when he turns on the syrup, except in the service of sarcastic songs like “Hollywood Is Dead”, he can be unbearable. Not only is this treacle, but by subsuming himself in it Buble drowns every trace of his personality. It may as well be karaoke.

Brad Paisley—”Camouflage”
#100
Brad-Paisley-guitar-solo is one of my favorite country sub-genres right now, and this time it comes not only with a good song attached, but allows other members of the band to stretch out over the changes as well. The music is a pleasure, but the lyrics are problematic. For the most part they’re funny and unpretentious, but then you come to this line: “The Stars and Bars offend some folks/and I guess I see why”. Guess? On his last album Paisley called out the KKK and celebrated the election of an African-American President, and now he has to guess why people are offended by the Confederate flag? And just who are these “some folks”, anyway? There are three possible explanations for this misstep: carelessness (a trait Paisley hasn’t demonstrated much of in the past); pandering (ditto); or this is as deep as his thinking has gone on the matter. Not that anything could excuse it. Oh, and those chord changes everyone solos over with such dexterity? “Dixie”. Southern pride is one thing; thoughtlessness is another matter altogether.

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Hot 100 Roundup—9/19/10

Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010

Selena Gomez & the Scene—”A Year Without Rain”
#35
I’m rooting for Gomez, but this doesn’t work. The song is too ordinary, the techno background doesn’t swell and highlight the melody the way it should (possibly because there is no melody), and Gomez’s teenage voice can’t quite negotiate the song’s not-that-subtle sexual metaphors. Her Disney material had more oomph to it, and nothing can disguise the fact that this is an ordinary power ballad dressed up as a dance track.

Waka Flocka Flame featuring Roscoe Dash and Wale—”No Hands”
#45
Essentially a remake of Dash’s “All the Way Turnt Up” with more, and less interesting, rapping. Even if I could take Flame seriously (I can’t type his full name more than once; it gives me the giggles), recycling one of your guest’s hits barely two months after it left the chart doesn’t seems like the best way to launch a career. A real career, at least.

Michael Buble—”Hollywood”
#55
I didn’t think much of Buble’s last record, “Haven’t Met You Yet”, but I may need to give it another listen, because this is catchy, intelligent, subtly sarcastic, and only occasionally sentimental. It’s full of wonderful musical jokes: the intro’s echoes of Glee; Buble’s phrasing, which somehow reminds me of Billy Crystal’s old Fernando character; a guitar part lifted straight from “The Bitch Is Back”; the background vocals on the third verse. The “find the truth in yourself” advice at the end is a bit of a downer, but otherwise this is almost perfect.

Rihanna—”Only Girl (In the World)”
#75
Rihanna has said that her next album will be more straightforward dance music as opposed to the gloomy half-rock of Rated R, but if this single is any indication, all that means is that the beats will be straighter. In its way, this is even darker and more forbidding than her last few singles, possibly because the beat is so straightforward and machine-like. It’s sex as a battlefield, where power means more than passion, and a proposition sounds more like a dare. This dramatic change in direction is fascinating to watch, and this isn’t a bad record, but it isn’t a great one, either. After what happened I can understand her stance, but she’s either overplaying her reaction or her loss of innocence has thrown her for an even greater loop than people realize.

will.i.am & Nicki Minaj—”Check It Out”
#78
I’m sure a lot of people will hate this on principal, so it’s probably useless to point out that this is the best thing will.i.am has done since The E.N.D. Whether Minaj convinced him to hold back or he’s finally figuring it out for himself, this is less overdone than most of his other records, and he’s perfected the art of isolating his hooks for maximum effectiveness (he also finds/steals great hooks). As for Minaj, she may or may not have anything interesting to say, but her vocals, and the way she shifts timbre and rhythm with pinpoint accuracy, are truly amazing.

Sean Kingston—”Dumb Love”
#84
Having spent a couple of years fiddling with brash electro, straight reggae, dancehall, and even a duet with Justin Bieber, Kingston makes the second best record of his career by going back to his “Beautiful Girls” roots and finding an ancient but undeniable hook—courtesy of The Del Vikings’s “Come Go With Me”—to build his adolescent fantasies around. He also makes the smart move of having the Smeezingtons (aka Bruno Mars and friends) put it together for him—or at least asking them if they had any spare hooks lying around. This could never be as much of a surprise as “Beautiful Girls”, but it’s a pleasant little jolt all the same. And here everybody thought he was a one-hit wonder.

Nick Jonas—”Introducing Me”
#92
From Camp Rock 2, where Nick is apparently learning how to be a member of Plain White T’s. I like the jokey tempo shifts and the grammar lesson, but this is essentially a vaudeville turn for sincere singer-songwriter types, and if you’re trying to impress by spitting out a million words at a breakneck tempo, those words need to be witty. 90% of these aren’t

Florence + The Machine—”Dog Days Are Over”
#93
Her voice is impressive (even more impressive live), but I have no idea what this arty loud-soft, loud-soft is about, and I don’t want to know. Of course, since she doesn’t enunciate much—she’s like a mixture of Annie Lennox and Natalie Merchant—I needn’t worry about it.

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New this week

Monday, September 14th, 2009

Breaking Benjamin—”I Will Not Bow”
#40
Music for fans of 300, of which there are many, I suppose. I just wish I knew what it was they think they’re fighting. Death itself is the most likely answer, hence the defeatism. But it’s a generic defeatism, as untouched by reality and as sentimental as any lovey dovey acoustic strumalong. They should just send out black edged Hallmark cards and get it over with.

Trey Songz featuring Gucci Mane & Soulja Boy Tell ‘Em—”LOL :-) ”
#51
The music is charming—which, with a production team named Fisha & Price, is only what you’d expect—but Trey Songz never has anything interesting to say, Gucci Mane adds nothing, and Soulja Boy sounds like he just got up and is stumbling around the kitchen making a cup of coffee while shouting out whatever comes into his head that seems to rhyme (including a plug for his most recent hit). The music might prevent this from become dated too quickly, if it isn’t already, but don’t bet on it.

Michael Buble—”Haven’t Met You Yet”
#65
Unlike a lot of critics, I didn’t think Sara Bareilles “Love Song” was a bad record, but this blatant rip-off makes it sound like a masterpiece. You’d think a star like Buble would make his theft less obvious, but subtlety doesn’t seem to be his strong suit. You also wouldn’t think that a heartthrob like Buble would have a voice as thin as tissue paper, but you’d be wrong about that, too. In it’s way, the dumbest record of the year, and that’s saying something.

Jesse McCartney featuring T-Pain—”Body Language”
#84
Not much of a song, but it does provide an interesting view into the shifting commercial allegiances of hip-hop. The original featured loud “Hey!”s in the mode of T.I., but McCartney must have decided that imitating a guy doing time for Federal weapons charges might not be a good idea in light of the age of most of his audience, so he brings in the more benign, cartoonish T-Pain, whose “Hey”s are softer and, needless to say, prettily autotuned. At the same time, T-Pain seems to embrace McCartney as the heir to the recently convicted Chris Brown, referring to their newly formed partnership as Nappy Boy and Pretty Boy, the same phrase he used to describe himself and Brown on “Kiss Kiss”. Meanwhile, musically, McCartney continues to try to cross the gap between Brown and Justin Timberlake without noticing the big sign that says “You Can’t Get There From Here”. This is starting to become as complicated as a telenovella.

Luke Bryan—”Do I”
#85
What, you mean whine and cry and bore us to tears for four endless minutes? Yes, you do.

Gucci Mane featuring Plies—”Wasted”
#95
Gucci Mane has done so many guest spots in the last couple of months—making up for time lost to incarceration—that you’d be excused for thinking he must be as big a name as T-Pain or Lil Wayne. But I tend to think that most of those guest spots were offered as a welcome home and as a form of charity. He’s contributed nothing of value to any of the records he’s appeared on, and here he teams up with The Worst Rapper On The Planet™ and demonstrates how little we actually missed while he was in the joint.

Sean Kingston—”Face Drop”
#98
The closest thing to a personal touch on this faceless follow-up to the even more faceless “Fire Burning” is a reference to being overweight—which Kingston sings as impersonally as everything else. A couple of years ago I thought he might have some real talent, but obviously I was wrong.

Whitney Houston—”Million Dollar Bill”
#100
A weird one. With all the youthful brassiness missing from Houston’s voice and her upper register apparently gone for good, even her uptempo celebrations are subdued. The opening verse sounds like a Sade record sped up, and though the rest settles into a respectable early ’80s soul groove, it never quite takes off. But it gets better every time I listen to it, and at times Houston conjures a dignity and grace reminiscent of her cousin Dionne Warwick. At this point in her career, I can’t think of a better model.

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