Jessie J - Price Tag

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Jessie J produces the world's lamest Flaming Lips cover

Jessie J
Price Tag
Feel Good
#99 (Low)
Feb 24, 2011
Jessica Cornish
Lukasz Gottwald
Claude Kelly
Bobby Ray Simmons Jr
Dr. Luke

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It starts like an eye-roller, the kind of tepid radio pop designed for stuffy offices and commutes to grocery stores, but half way through the first verse, something stuck me and wouldn't let me go. As I started to sing along with “Her name is Yoshimi...” I realized that, hey-- this is actually a Flaming Lips song.

I've got a pretty good ear for that sort of thing, and “Price Tag” isn't just using the same chords as “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots,” but the same rhythm feel and beat, too. “Price Tag” even borrows the tape slow-down effect.

I never do this, but to prove a point, I've mashed up these two songs (mashed these two songs up?) here. Actually, calling it a mash-up is disrespectful to everyone who makes interesting music this way: I just played the two songs together, because Jessie J is borrowing tracks from 2002.

Well, sort of-- I'm not a huge Flaming Lips fan (Yoshimi is the only record I have of theirs), but they are awfully creative, sonically. Jessie J is not (or, her songwriters and producer aren't): I'm sure she's never heard the song she's ripping off; I'm sure the production team thought no one would notice. It's a borrowed track, but it's also as flat and lifeless as any radio fluff you'll find. It's a couple snatches of guitar put into a sampler and looped endlessly, a tepid sounding beat (yes, Jessie, the original version of the beat you're using is crunchier and actually has more stomp. You've been out-funked by The Flaming Lips), and Standard Pop Bass Sound #3.

And then there's the message: while I'm down with anti-consumerist themes, it's a little hard to stomach a pop star's declaration that “It's not all about the money” when her concert tickets sell for well over $100 (do the conversion from pounds to dollars if you want more context)... and that's middle-of-the-pack between general admission in front of the stage and nosebleed (cheap seats start at £49.50).  Jessie J's idea of not being money obsessed is deriding people who wear sunglasses and high heels in clubs. Wow. Preach it.

Why is everybody so obsessed
Money can't buy us happiness
Can we all slow down and enjoy right now
Guarantee we'll be feeling all right.

It's not about the money
We don't need your money
We just wanna make the world dance
Forget about the Price Tag
Ain't about the cha-ching cha-ching
Aint about the ba-bling ba-bling
Wanna make the world dance
Forget about the Price Tag

Ian McKaye and Ani DiFranco can sing about not obsessing over money (and their lyrics will invariably trump “It's not about the ba-bling, ba-bling”) because they're the musical equivalent of sustainable growers. If we want to keep the farming metaphor, Jessie J (a Universal product) is subsidized by the corn industry, selling high-fructose infused junk food that (lucky you!) has a coupon for more of the same on the wrapper.

I wouldn't even mind that so much if the song really was about what it pretended to be about... it has designs on an “All You Need Is Love” kind of sentiment, but ends up more like a sales pitch: sure, tickets to her show are expensive, but don't worry about the price tag, because once you're in the door it'll be worth it (with all the love and camaraderie and whatnot in the room).  What's a couple hundred bucks for a starlet who's first record has yet to be released? Don't worry about the price tag, give your money to the singer who sings about not needing your money.

Well, keep the price tag
and take the cash back
Just give me six strings
and a half stack.
And you can keep the cars
Leave me the garage
Yes all I need
are keys and guitars

The less said about a mainstream rapper telling us all he needs in life is a half stack and a guitar, the better. Has B.O.B. heard his own music? Has he heard this song? It's like listening to The Sneaker Pimps compare an uninspiring life to playing with a click track in a song that was obviously played to a click track. Some pop songs are effective, some are fun, some are entertaining, and some are genuinely good... very seldom do they sound like a guy making time with his Les Paul through a JCM.

Especially in such a lazy song... so, we'll loop the chorus and then have the singer just sort of "solo" over it (the vocal over the pre-recorded chorus is also noticeably auto-tuned) and just call it done.  Kay?  Cool.  We don't need to do any more work on this one. Remember, though we took the music from elsewhere (shhh... don't tell Wayne Coyne), produced the laziest sounding backing track possible, and made something indistinguishable from every other stamped-out pop product, it's totally not about the money. Pick up your paycheck at the front desk and we'll mail you royalty statements quarterly.

RUN!

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

Train - Shake up Christmas

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And you even put "Ho Ho Ho" in the chorus.

Train
Shake Up Christmas
Christmas
#99 (Low)
Dec 30, 2010
Train
Butch Walker

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Oh shit, don't tell me Sugar Ray's back.

No... okay... it's just Train. I'm not sure it's less painful, really-- it's always hard to listen to white guys who developed their idea of “soulful” vocals from years of intense Sublime fandom. It takes a very special band to marry a song that missed the cut from a 1996 Jock Rock compilation to Christmas lyrics, I suppose.

Writing Christmas songs, in general, is a bad idea for any modern musician-- most, like “Shake Up Christmas,” will hit cut-out bins on December 26^th and never be heard from again. In the rare instance a modern pop star's Christmas song sticks, it's usually a tragic event for the world of music... I'm pretty sure when George Carlin said “The wrong two Beatles died first,” he'd just listened to McCartney's “Wonderful Christmas Time,” a song that can be counted as a crime against humanity.

It sounds like the band's hedging its bets, too, because there's almost nothing Christmasy in the lyrics-- the verses mention Santa a couple times, but the main theme of the song is that little children wish everything would be nice. That's fine, as far as it goes, but it's such a dim bulb sentiment, and we have the world's cheesiest chorus to wash it down.

Shake it up
Shake up the happiness
Wake it up
Wake up the happiness
Come on, ya'll
It's Christmas time
Ho ho ho
Ho ho ho
It's Christmas time

Since the song starts with our narrator saying he's going to tell us a story that he can't quite remember, the chorus makes sense in perspective: this guy has no idea what he's talking about. There were children, once upon a time, who prayed and hoped for... um... shaking up the happiness? Sure. All over the world.

They pray to Santa, of course... Jesus has no place on secular radio. I sort of assumed Christmas songs would get the kind of pass that's universally applied to country music, but if Train doesn't want to sing about Christ in their Christmas song, so be it. There could be a whole discussion about how the holiday existed long before Christians (where'd that pine tree come from?), but that would take up too much space... what's important is: plenty of non-Christians are pro-Christmas.

What's more important within the context of this song is: Train doesn't know any of that (or if they do, they're not trying to communicate it in this song). This is a thirdhand tale by a guy who's pretty sure he heard about some little girl wishing that the world would be full of happiness, and that she'd be on “Santa's magic list.” Santa's list is magic? Since when? Is that why it needs to be checked twice?

Another problem I have here: I don't think of myself as racist, but can we ban white guys from singing “come on, ya'll” ever again? Also, turning the already weak pop laziness of “oh oh”s into “ho ho ho”s is a pretty tacky way to Christmasize your maddeningly awful chorus.

I suppose the mid-90's hey-isn't-this-Sugar-Ray?ness of this song proves that some things never go out of style. This song isn't one of them... but Columbia Records doesn't know that, and they're devoted to proving a moronic song excavated in a time capsule, with a big enough advertising budget and plenty of payola to radio stations, can hit #99 on the charts on the week of Christmas. Good job, guys.

RUN!

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

PS: Extra nausea factor: I just found out that this song is also a Coke commercial. Trying desperately to find Writer/Producer credits, I kept coming up with business articles about Coca-Cola's marketing strategy.

Sean Kingston - Letting Go

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And now, a four minute meditation on the duttiness of love

Sean Kingston
Letting Go (Dutty Love)
Club Anthem
#98 (Low)
Dec 23, 2010
Ester Dean
Tor Hermansen
Mikkel Eriksen
Sean Kingston
Onika Maraj
Stargate

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At the onset, I just don't get the refrain. What the hell does “Dutty dutty dutty dum dum” mean? “Dutty” is just not in my vocabulary. I'm not sure if the love is dutty or not, but I get the feeling that the chorus could be “do do do do do do da da” without any real impact on the song (losing the duttiness isn't going to change the meaning) and though I'm almost never a fan of do do dos, they aren't measurably worse than dutty dutty dutty.

Kingston has basically Caribbean'd me out of this song (so... “dutty” is “dirty,” then?), and I really can't make out any of the words; between the accent and the egregious use of autotune, I can't get much out of the verses but the rhythm. This is the worst autotune I've heard: there are digital jumps and skips in the middle of syllables. The words sound like they've been thrown into a blender.

While we're stuck with those annoying raver synths and autotune abuse, at least they're not using that stock house beat. I guess if the whole thing is a happy, sunny dance track, it's all about the rhythm anyway, so I've got to be thankful that at least the rhythm was done with some skill.

Also, I can't figure Nicki Minaj out-- she's obviously talented; her part in “Monster” was too good to be coincidence or blind luck. Usually when she pops up in a song, though, it's just not that interesting (leaning towards “annoying,”) and this is another tune where she doesn't really offer much.

Content-wise, I think the song is mostly about loosening up and having fun... I'm still having a tough time figuring out how that meshes with dutty (dirty?) love, but then again, if the refrain is “dutty dutty dutty dum dum,” maybe I shouldn't worry too much about it making sense.

Walk

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

Bruno Mars - Marry You

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I'm saying "No no no no no"

Bruno Mars
Marry You
Marriage Porn
#98 (Low)
Dec 16, 2010
Bruno Mars
Plilip Lawrence
Ari Levine
The Smeezingtons

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It just gets worse and worse! If this song had balls, it would be receiving quick, repeated kicks until it crawled, whimpering, back into whatever kind of hole spews this annoying junk forth. I know I usually wait until discussing the song a little bit before digging into lyrics, but when the refrain is “Don't say no no no no no, just say yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah, and we'll go go go go go, if you're ready,” you don't want to bury the lead: that's precisely how stupid this song is.

I'm sure proposals scored by this thing are conducted by people who would look down their nose at Rascal Flats, but “Marry You” is even more frustrating because it's so smug and cutesy. It's no less Marriage Porn for it, either, complete with churchbells (which I think are playing the bell melody from They Might Be Giants' “The Bells Are Ringing” in the chorus, and “I Melt with You” in the intro) in the arrangement.

It's a beautiful night
We're looking for something dumb to do
Hey baby, I think I wanna marry you
Is it the look in your eyes
or is it this dancing juice?
Who cares, baby
I think I wanna marry you

Since it contains the title, I'm going to assume the “Hey baby, I think I wanna marry you” part is the chorus, though the “just say yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah” stuff is repeated about as often (and was probably the hook that sold the single). Regardless, it sounds awfully condescending-- getting married is his idea of something dumb to do, just to pass the time, and he's not even certain if this whim is inspired by the girl or the drink.

Quick answer: if you're not sure if it's the booze or not, you're too drunk to be making a decision like this. Do us all a favor and sleep on it.

Also, for a song called “Marry You,” I don't think there's a single mention of love.  It is vocally in support of letting the choir bells sing "like ooooh," (which, by the way, is not the sound bells make), but it doesn't have anything to say about love.

The repetition of the two parts I've already quoted make up most of the running time of the song, but one of the few other lines is “Who cares if we're trash, got a pocket full of cash we can blow.” I'm sure it's meant to be quirky, but it's probably also an honest reflection of what the writers think of their audience.

I haven't mentioned it in a while because I don't want to repeat myself by continually harping on Autotune, but this is an example of the other way it can be misapplied... like Billy Joel singing the national anthem (okay, maybe it's not that bad), no one's trying for a stylish effect here; the voice is just being jerked into key every time he drifts a bit. He's probably not a bad singer, but forcing this vocal part into computer perfection sounds painfully imperfect.

On the other hand, we should be thankful when we hear the autotune engage on that howling, hound dog summoning “Just say 'I dooooooooooo.'” I'm betting autotune is the lesser of two evils in that case.

 

RUN!

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

Kanye West & Jay Z - Monster

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Nicki Minaj is one for three, but this is the one

Kanye West
Jay-Z
Monster
Bragging
#99 (Low)
Dec 9, 2010
Kanye West
Shawn Carter
William Roberts
Onika Maraj
Justin Vernon
Kanye West

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I never laid out the rule that a week would be reviewed top-down, so this week I'll start with the Low position, simply because it's the song that's having the most impact on the blog. Exactly like changing to a Stay, Walk, Run strategy, Kanye's “Monster” made me recursively add featured and guest stars into my listings for one reason: Nicki Minaj.

There's been a bit of recurrence in the featured slot before, but Nicki made me reconsider the whole system because, though she hasn't been the main name of any song I've reviewed so far, she keeps popping up and always gets some mention. She was autotuned and blank in the awful “Check It Out,” so much so that you'd never really notice it was her; she was my least favorite part of “Bottom's Up,” but I detected some interesting turns in her voice, changing characters from her normal tone to a dainty little girl to a growling beast.

The neat little turns I noticed in “Bottoms Up” live large in “Monster;” three MCs each get a verse, and they get some time to do what they do (the song runs longer than six minutes), but Nicki Minaj is the real monster of the track, a force of nature and a goddamned rockstar. Her verse starts slow, but she's already playing with character in the song; she employs Rastafarian accent at her convenience, sometimes for a line, sometimes just to hit a word. She writes her verse with smaller crescendos, ramping up with the music, digging in and raising intensity as the builds, and switching to her little girl voice when the beat backs off a bit, and then dropping into her growl to cap off a line. Her part has lots of little arcs that follow the music, but eventually builds to a scream and roaring “I'm a motherfuckin Monster!” I didn't really dig her in the last two songs; I love her in this.

The first two verses pale in comparison. Rick Ross in the first verse is solid and serviceable... since this is a brag track and everyone's declaring their monstrousness, you know someone had to pull out and show us his dick (it was bound to happen), but “Have you ever had sex with a Pharaoh? I put the pussy in a sarcophagus. Now she's claiming that I bruised her esophagus” is sort of amazing: even if it makes absolutely no sense*, that dude just rhymed sarcophagus with esophagus. Jay-Z's verse is done in that style where the rapper just can't seem to keep up with the beat-- he never hits the one, always seems to be lagging, and you can hear him struggling for breath in the gaps; I've heard other rappers use this style, so maybe my palette just isn't developed enough to appreciate it, but I don't like it. Regardless, neither of these guys make as much with the music as the lady who follows them.

Musically, this one's pretty good-- I'm not sure how much we're all supposed to be praising Kanye these days (and again: I'm a hermit, and  outside of Garfunkel & Oates, I have no idea where Kanye West falls on the current cultural barometer), but the beats are well written and dramatic, rising and falling within the song to keep its length from flatlining the whole thing. Bon Iver opens the song with an octave-synthesized voice that could just as easily be introducing Dr. Funkenstein and closes with a coda that might have appeared on an early 80's Prince record; neither of these things occur within the body of the song, but “Monster” begins and ends with stylized vocal melodies, both of which are pretty cool.

I have to admit, I'm sort of on the fence with this one... there are parts of “Monster” so good they're outstanding, but it's only bits and pieces, and I'm not sure how often I'd listen to a six-and-a-half minute song simply because I like the third verse. It's compelling, though; this is as close to Stay as a song I'm not actually keeping can get.
 

Walk

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

* the sarcophagus part, I mean-- I'm not so dim as to misunderstand the bruised esophagus.  [back]

Pitbull - Bon Bon

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It's my job to be repetitive. My job. My job. Repetitiveness is my job!

Pitbull
Bon Bon
Club Anthem
#99 (Low)
Dec 2, 2010
Matthew Handley
Nicola Salerno
Armando C. Perez
Andrew Stanley
Duncan Maclennan
Renato Carosone
Yolanda Be Cool & D Cup
Nicola Fasano

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You're kidding, right? No, seriously.

Okay, if they're calling this a complete song, can I just write “Bon bon bon bon” as my review and call it done?

No fair! Double standard!

The problem here is that I have nothing to write about. There's one synth line, which sounds like it ought to back Sonic the Hedgehog racing across the screen... except simpler (would have been too much to ask for three notes, guys? Is the two note line as much work as you're willing to put in?). The beat actually has some nice layers but, like the synth line, it never changes. If you've heard 30 seconds of this song, you've heard the whole thing; unfortunately, you keep hearing it for 3:30.

Somehow, it took six people to write this... sort of.  Looking up the writer/producer credits, I discovered this was an immediate remix/cover of another song still on the charts; I don't know how the "writing" credits break down between Pitbull's track and the original composition.  Nevertheless, nothing this simple should have that many names attached.

Another difficulty I'm having is a lack of Spanish; I don't speak a word, so all I get from this song is the neverending chant of “Bon bon bon bon,” which, much like every other aspect of this song, is repeated too often and for too long. It. Just. Won't. Stop! Please make it stop!

Google Translate seems to imply that this is a Club track, and I can't imagine this song working in any other way: dance to the beat. You have three and a half minutes of uninterrupted kick drum, and even the bon bon bons are more percussion than lyrics, so the only thing I can imagine anyone getting from this track is a beat by which to dance.

Beyond that, it's likely to get stuck in your head the way repetitive children's music will lodge itself in the lizard center of your brain. “Bon Bon” is the “I Love You” of dance music; Pitbull is Barney.

One more note before I flee from this song forever: the lyrical highlight from Google Translate is “Lady Gaga tell I'm putting together a scandalous manner.”

 

RUN!

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

My Darkest Days - Porn Star Dancing

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Is anyone surprised that the Nickelback-supported band fails to rock?

My Darkest Days
Porn Star Dancing
Sleaze
#99 (Low)
Nov 25, 2010
Chad Kroeger
Joey Moi
Matt Walst
Ted Bruner
Joey Moi

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Does no one fucking rock anymore? I suppose I had my hopes up with the band name, and I wouldn't have been surprised if they turned out to be one of those Hot Topic themed bands like Love's Dying Bleeding Love in Dying Bloody Death, or whatever they're called, but this song has Zakk Wylde as a guest guitarist. Even if I never cared for Zakk Wylde, I'm aware that he's an advocate of Rocking... and that's the only time I hear from him: if I read anything Wylde has to say, he's either reflecting on the strength and purity of his rock or disparaging all the girlymen that only pretend to rock (they pale before the power of his awesome rocking!) and should be destroyed.

And yet here we are, listening to the Mighty Rocking Zakk contributing to the sub-basement of post Downward Spiral dance music. I'm not actually going to spend too much time comparing this moronic shit to Nine Inch Nails; it makes me think of a different story...

In the late 60's and early 70's, Alice Cooper wasn't a him but a they-- it was a band name, a Detroit group that hung in the same time and place as the MC5 and The Stooges, but with a psychedelic bent, some baroque instrumental movements, and a tendency for freak out jams. When the band broke up and the lead singer took the name out for his solo act, he did okay for a while, but Alice Cooper was not an A-lister by the mid 80's. Eventually he looked around and saw the rock world was covered in makeup wearing dudes with teased up hair and, since he'd been doing that sort of thing when they were kindergärtners, he said “Move over, kids,” and became a hit again by sounding like Poison. So it goes: Alice's newest album cashes in on his early 70's garage days (so hip now... well, five years ago). It's sort of become a theme: Alice manages to join any trend he helped influence, but he always comes in too late and sounding more derivative of the kids than what he'd originally inspired them with. It doesn't make me love my copies of Easy Action or Love It To Death any less.

Long story not-so-short, the popular rise of Marilyn Manson inspired a me too in Alice (gothic death theatrics! I started that!)... “Porn Star Dancing” sounds like someone in 2010 trying to horn in on Alice Cooper from 2000 trying to compete with the 1996 version Marilyn Manson (which borrowed heavily from the NIN and Ministry push/pull in the early 90's). While I respect that everyone has influences and all artists draw from somewhere, I reserve the right to dislike anything this derivative.

Once again, the devil's in the details-- I can forgive all the derivation in the world for a catchy melody or some energy, fire, or personality, but this song's complete lack of rock doesn't leave me in a very forgiving mood. Throwing a guest solo over the top of the track doesn't do much to cover the fact that this is dance pop; these guys are about as dangerous and rebellious as Pink. It doesn't help any that I've started including writing credits for the music I review, and I find myself unable to ignore the fact a Nickelback collaborator co-wrote this song.

I know that generalizations are the devil (the people who use them should be killed! Every single one of them!), but all right-thinking people hate Nickelback.

Kylie won't kiss my friend Cassandra
Jessica won't play ball
Mandy won't share her friend Miranda
Doesn't anybody live at all?

This may be my punishment for making a joke that I'd like “Strip Me” if it were actually about strippers, ironic penance sent from on high. I suppose “Porn Star Dancing” is more coherent than the Natasha Bedingfield song, because the verses are about girls with standards too high to sleep with this skeezy bastard, or if he could get them interested, he blows it by trying to get the girl to bring a friend (the “doesn't anybody live at all?” line just rubs salt in the wound... listen, guy, it's not because the girls are uptight; it's because you're a slimy douchebag).

Stacy's gonna save herself for marriage
But that's just not my style
She's got a pair that's nice to stare at
But I want girls gone wild

Verse two is the girl who's “saving herself for marriage,” which I'm willing to bet was as honest a refusal of this guy's advances as “I'm a lesbian” or “the leader of my religion won't unlock my chastity belt until I'm 30” or “how many times do I have to tell you to fuck off?” But, hey, she's got a pair that's nice to stare at, brah!

The pole-dancing obsessed chorus, punctuated by reverbed out group chants of “Yeah!” so cheesy they'd have Def Leppard rolling their eyes, is actually sort of depressing: since singer has blown it with every woman in the world, he goes to a strip club, sits right up front, and watches a girl who engages in the titular (ha!) “Porn Star Dancing.” If “a dollar decides how far she'll go,” maybe he should just hire hookers and be done with it. Kylie may not want to kiss Cassandra, but if he's willing to pay their asking price, I'm sure Bambi and Pepper will do whatever he wants.

Gak. This song is my kryptonite, musically and lyrically. It's been a strange week: the “rock” band is the worst thing in the bunch (mostly because it's not rock at all, just hair band lyrics over crappy dance music)... it's well below the quality of the indie pop band and the country starlet.


Typing that made me feel dirty, and I think I need to put on my Black Breath record. (What is it with translucent blue vinyl, lately?)

RUN!

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

Natasha Bedingfield - Strip Me

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Really, is it that hard to make sense?

Natasha Bedingfield
Strip Me
Stand Up
#99 (Low)
Nov 18, 2010
Ryan Tedder
Ryan Tedder

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Compelling title. Is Natasha Bedingfield here to offer something to all the girls tired of stripping to Danzig's “She Rides”? Sadly, no... just a misleading name for the song. I'd probably enjoy the naughtiness implied by the name to the generic anthem we've actually got before us here, too. So far, I think these pop songs are best when they're hedonistic, silly, and over-the-top. I like music that means something, but these label-constructed songs, worked on by teams of writers, passed to a hip producer, and eventually given to a singer in attempts to expand their brand... meaning sounds pretty forced and unnatural coming from them.

From the opening “la la la”s, I knew this wasn't the song for me, but the verses are backed by odd, loping, reverbed-out beats and the vocal melody has unconventional note choi-- wait a minute! Just how badly do you want to be Bjork? Seriously, listen to the line at 1:18 “My heart is like a loudspeak-e-ar” and tell me that not was not sung by someone worships at the altar of the diminutive, Icelandic, and weird.

There are worse artists to steal from-- I'm still giddy it's not another song built from an ancient house music loop CD (“everything you need to start making dance music, now!”)-- but the song descends into a bland and generic neverwhere in its chorus. I would honestly prefer more Bjork theft; these choruses fulfill the plastic lack of inspiration promised by the “la la la”s. I doubt it would be complete without the “oh oh oh”s she layered in there between the endless refrain of “You ain't takin' that from me,” which would be a more accurate title... but I can see why they went with “Strip Me.”

Yes, my prejudice is showing: I really don't like hearing about the La La Las or the Oh Oh Ohs. I had a bad experience with a La La La once, and an Oh Oh Oh just stood there and did nothing! As a result, I'm scarred for life and tend to react badly whenever a song glamorizes either of them. I'm probably going to need a good cry as soon as I'm done with this.

Moving on... the title seems to refer to an identity stripped of ego and fame, but I can't make out if it has any kind of point, or even perspective. We know she fights every day for all of her “future somethings,” but seems against wasting her life “earning things that I don't need, but that's like chasing rainbows.” So she fights for the things but doesn't want to spend a lifetime earning the things she fights for every day and... wait, what? It seems the “things” in question are career advancement and trappings of fame (it's all a bit dodgy), because the chorus focuses on being built up, cut down, and stealing pride... but she'll still be herself. Her exact words are that she'll “just scream,” which seems like a bit of an empty threat, considering the source.

Here's the tricky part: the bridge claims that “it's what you do and what you say that makes you who you are,” which is funny, because what she's done is become a pop star, but what the song says is that she doesn't care about being a pop star. Where does this leave her fighting wars for her future somethings and earning things she doesn't need? These are the things she say she does, but I have no clue what she's saying about the things she says she does... and I don't know what she actually does, other than be famous (which she says isn't important.) After declaring that your words and actions make you what you are, the next line is “Makes you think about it, doesn't it?” Well, yeah, but only because nothing she says makes any sense. I'm so confused.

The bridge ends with “Sometimes it takes only one voice.” Er... to do what, exactly? It's the first this song's offered about anything taking anything to get any result, and there's no hint of what it takes only one voice to accomplish. What are we doing, again? Much like the refrain, where she's “only one voice in a million, but you ain't taking that from me,” and we hear over and over that we're not going to take... what? She's proud to be an anonymous voice in the crowd, and that can never be taken from her?

Except for the fact that she's a pop star on the radio. Maybe the thing we can't take from her is her ability to never make sense... or maybe the one voice in a million refers to the person who wrote the song, whose voice we never actually hear. Or that we can strip Natasha of the people who write songs for her...

I'm giving myself a headache. It must be time to stop: I've already thought about this song more than I should, probably more than anyone ever has, including the people who wrote, recorded, and sang the damned thing, and it hasn't been a terribly rewarding experience.

RUN!

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

Blake Shelton - Who Are You When I'm Not Looking

Fairly important: the formatting on this post goes to hell in most feeds, and it will be best read at ericonthecharts.blogspot.com

And now, the worst rhyme ever sung...

Blake Shelton
Who Are You When I'm Not Looking
Ass Kissing
#99 (Low)
Nov 11, 2010
Earl Bud Lee
John Wiggins
Scott Hendricks

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When the song starts, I get the immediate impression that Blake Shelton is the countriest dude to come down the pipe so far. The music's not rollicking at all, but it's mopey in a somewhat traditional, cryin' in yer beer way, with weepy pedal steel backing up a pretty straight forward guitar.

Then he sings.

And then I pick myself up off the floor and back the song up, because I missed most of it laughing so hard. For bad rhymes, Taio Cruz has nothing on this guy. He can rhyme “plans” with “dance” all he wants, as long as he's a buffer between me and this chorus:

My oh my, you're so good lookin'
Hold yourself together like a pair of book ends
But I've not tasted all your cookin'
Who are you when I'm not lookin?

I know he rhymes “lookin” with “lookin,” and that usually bugs me. “Lookin” and “cookin” rhyme, sure, but let's go right to line 2, where the laughter starts and just won't stop. What rhymes with “lookin?” I dunno... how about “book ends,” which not only do not rhyme, but also do not hold themselves together, if anyone wants to give Mr. Shelton a refresher course in irony.

Rhyming aside, that refrain is so badly composed, so nonsensical, and so fucking corny... I can't believe he sings it twice in the first 90 seconds of a three minute song. Yes, I get it: the cookin' in question is a metaphor for all the different facets of the woman in the song, but it's a really, really bad metaphor. It's a metaphor that could have been avoided if he didn't feel the need to open with “My oh my, you're so good lookin,” which is lame in its own right.

The rest of the song is basically sucking up to womankind, the best way Blake Shelton knows how: it's got bubble baths, painted nails, and phone calls to mom. It's definitely a song about the Ways of a Woman written by a man, but he's doing his best to show interest and play to the crowd. “You ladies like chocolate, right? Lemme hear it!”

For as bad as this song is, it made me laugh (and laughter is a good thing), and it does have the basic, bedrock quality of not sounding like someone raped country music in a Pro Tools session and handed it to a London producer. Faint praise, sure, but better than no praise at all.

Walk

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

Eric Church - Smoke a Little Smoke

Fairly important: the formatting on this post goes to hell in most feeds, and it will be best read at ericonthecharts.blogspot.com

Eric Church
Smoke a Little Smoke
Party Anthem
#99 (Low)
Nov 4, 2010
Myspace

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I have to lead with a flat out statement that I dislike this song, because if I don't, everything point I make is going to sound like praise in the wake of Rascal Flatts. I don't think “Smoke a Little” smoke is a good song, but it is so much less infuriating than “Why Wait” (the only other pop country tune so far) that it can't help but come up on top.

First, it begins with an acoustic guitar... it actually sounds like country when it starts. Of course, it's not country-- it's the same hybrid pop style (with synth flourishes and dance beats) as all the other generic stuff it'll be shuffled in with-- but at least when it starts, my first thought was “Country.”

Second, this song is not going to be endorsed by the Christian Coalition. If it's still light years from Charlie Daniels' “Long Haired Country Boy,” at least it's not Values Porn for them that think pro wrestling and Fox News are real. This is a Party Anthem, plenty proud to drink cheap beer and smoke weed... even though I have a hard time imagining a real good ole' boy drinking and smoking to an overproduced pop song like this.

It tips its hand that this won't be doing anything traditional when the song starts putting in the rhythmic, tempo-locked tremolo on the guitars that originally sounded country-- they start getting “Ana Ng” (or “How Soon Is Now?”) early on-- as the intro establishes itself with one guitar on the left, trading with a guitar on the right, and then a third guitar line in the center that sort of flies in for one little line at the end of each phrase... this thing was obviously just pasted together on a computer.

Through the first verse, until the big electric guitars and synths come in, I suppose this song could pass as the relatively-old-style pop country that Garth Brooks used to sell in the 90s (that's the most backhanded compliment I've ever given), but once all the massive pop production is rolling full speed, it sounds more Steve Winwood than Brooks.

...okay, how much of a descent was that? Didn't I start out with Charlie Daniels?

To back away from the hyperbole precipice, this is a considerably better written and produced song than “Why Wait;” they're both carefully studio-machined pop pieces that have only the remotest resemblance to Country Music, but “Smoke a Little Smoke” actually sounds like it was written by a person, as opposed to an ad agency, two marketing committees, and three months of focus groups.

Not to be shallow, but-- when did the country stars all start looking like hipster douchebags?

And finally-- why is it so hard to find legitimate streaming links for these pop country tunes?  There's a "media awareness" joke to be made here, but I want a few more country tunes to come up in my roster before I start poking fun.  We'll see how the trends pan out...

Walk

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

T.I. - Got Your Back

Fairly important: the formatting on this post goes to hell in most feeds, and it will be best read at ericonthecharts.blogspot.com

T.I.
Got Your Back
Ass Kissing
#99 (Low)
Oct 28, 2010
DJBooth

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He'll go to church with you
and then visit your mom

Huh. T.I's a kiss-ass. Who woulda thought?

“Got Your Back” is somewhere between that groveling stand-up guy who proclaims “women are smarter than men” to his audience to win approval and the easy sketch comedy bit about the perfect boyfriend who loves to hang out with the lady's mother, watch Oprah, and take dance lessons together.

Maybe T.I's making up for Wiz Khalifa's casual misogyny, but I don't know if he needs to be stroking the female ego this hard-- he comes across as the hero in his own romance novel. Maybe he should re-think his promotional photos and go with something a little more book-cover Fabio... because, seriously: “We front row at fashion shows as well as sunday morning service.” He left out the part where he makes her breakfast in bed and does the dishes after.

Like the other songs this week, no one's using stock beats-- musically, this is a more thoughtful piece than something that raids the europop handbook-- but that lead synth sounds like the Casio my little sister had when she was 8. So: points for actually doing something with the music... points off for it not sounding very good.

One thing that stands out over the course of this song is T.I's skill with rhythm and rhyme: this guy is clever and unconventional, stacking rhymes within and throughout lines, having the rhythmic payoff hit a beat later than you'd expect; it's my first time listening to him, but it's pretty easy to tell that this guy has some chops.

It's a little sad that this song is so damned cheesy, though. It's hard to listen to anyone pander this shamelessly.

Walk

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell:

Linkin Park - The Catalyst

Fairly important: the formatting on this post goes to hell in most feeds, and it will be best read at ericonthecharts.blogspot.com

Linkin Park
The Catalyst
Complaint Rock
#99 (Low)
Oct 21, 2010
MySpace

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Oh sweet Jesus.

Linkin. Fucking. Park. I know I claimed not to be clued in to the legacy and backstory behind these tracks, but I've known about Linkin Park for many years-- if anything, I'm surprised they're still around.

(maybe this #99 thing wasn't such a good idea after all.)

I used to use Linkin Park as an example about how fads and media hype dull anything original that crops up. Though I'm not a fan, Korn kicked off a wholly unique sound when they first came out; it's actually kind of amazing they became popular. Their impact rippled out into bands like Limp Bizkit, which shined up the nu metal thing and made it mass consumable for the frat boy crowd. But wait! We can water this trend down further!

And so Linkin Park was constructed and packaged for the crowd that just wasn't ready for something as hard (dude!) as Limp Bizkit, already a more mass-consumable Korn. A copy of a copy... and that was ten years ago.

If my first reaction was “Oh no, not these guys again,” my second though was... well, it's nice to see a band on the list. I was starting to wonder if people still listened to bands-- everything I was getting up to this point has all been a singer and a producer, and I'm much more interested in a group of musicians working and playing together. I've actually done both, and I prefer my band to my studio work. Personal preference.

Good news first: Linkin Park is no longer playing rap rock infused nu metal, so if you want to find juvie rebellion at Wal*Mart, these are no longer your guys.

Now the bad news: Nothing that starts with polka intro this long is allowed to sell us this much tortured artist angst.  With the organ washes, plaintive pianos, and plinky raver synths, the tortured vocals make me think someone's been taking Reznor lessons.

The somber, self-serious vibe is more annoying when you figure out that the song doesn't actually make any sense-- it seems like it might be a kind of anti-oppression or brink of self destruction song... but it's not.  I'm wondering if Linkin Park have turned into an anti-music Dadaist collective, and threw endless chanting, polka beat intros, self important rock posturing, a Creed-like "save me" coda, archaic synth stabs, and nonsense bits of purple prose into a blender as a statement against the modern music world.  That would make the endless chanting of "God bless us every one" make some sort of sense.

I sort of wish that were true...

RUN!

Stay with the song, walk away, or run like hell: