“Teenage Dreamland: Getting hooked on the hits -- and kind of liking it” |
| Teenage Dreamland: Getting hooked on the hits -- and kind of liking it Posted: 06 Oct 2010 09:22 PM PDT Jaaa-son De-ruuulo! How many times have you heard that signature at the top of his songs this summer? The R&B singer, who will be playing the sold-out homecoming concert at nearby Indiana University this weekend, first broke with "Whatcha Say" in May 2009 and has been in heavy rotation ever since, with that song, plus follow-ups "Ridin' Solo" and "In My Head." I don't like this man, as he is among the artists I hold personally responsible for my current fixation with the Top 40. Prior to this situation, my car jams were iPod mixes of bands such as Phoenix, The Hold Steady, TV on the Radio, Wolf Parade and Built to Spill -- you know, the usual stuff rock critics listen to. If that got boring, it was WDVE/3WS for the classic-rock fix, or WYEP, hoping it wasn't the Indigo Girls or something of the sort. In the spring of 2010, I became outnumbered by increasingly opinionated kids -- teens and preteens -- who have taken control not just of my life, but my radio now that they are old enough to reach the dials. On frequent trips to Kennywood (like 20 times this summer, but who's counting?) and Little League games, they would flip to 96.1 Kiss-FM. I would flip it back. And so on. Then, I gave up. Now, god help me, I find myself listening to it when they're not even in the car -- don't tell them or send them this link! -- and believe me, I'm getting dumber by the day for it. Blame it on Derulo, Ke$ha, Katy, Rihanna, Taio, Bruno, the whole lot of 'em. For driving around on a sunny day, they sure beat the Arcade Fire. Same goes for a rainy day too, actually. I would say this is a great time for hit radio, but that would be disingenuous given that I wasn't really paying that much attention to it over the past few years, other than hearing tracks here and there by Black Eyed Peas, Lady Gaga or Beyonce. Having listened to it too much lately, a few thoughts to unload: DeRulo rules: Top 40 regulars have to be sick of it by now, but, unless I'm brainwashed, "Whatcha Say" is absolute pop gold. With hit producer J.R. Rotem, he took a piece of a bizarre and obscure Imogen Heap song, "Hide and Seek," and wrapped his soulful and autotuned vocals around it. Derulo, who toured with Lady Gaga last year, is a Haitian singer from Miami who started writing songs for the likes of Diddy and Danity Kane at the age of 16 and graduated from the American Musical and Dramatic Academy in New York, where he studied everything from ballet to opera to musical theater to Shakespeare. He's another Michael Jackson-like pop crooner, but a good one, who is likely to stick around, especially with all that schooling. Ke$ha is krazy fun: Ke$ha surely ranks high on the parental banned list for her trashy, R-rated songs that reference throwing up in the rich dude's closet and brushing her teeth with a bottle of Jack. If the kids are at all impressionable this could be a big problem, because the hooks are as addictive as the stuff she's singing about. Ke$ha, who grew up on food stamps with a songwriter mom and no dad, started out writing songs for other artists, got her breakthrough with an uncredited feature on the Flo Rida hit "Right Round" and then dropped the chart-topping party anthem "Tik Tok" last December, followed by "Your Love Is My Drug" and "Take It Off." She might not be a Lady Gaga-level singer and autotune is her best friend, but her phrasing is a trip and the songs, like Ke$ha herself, are obnoxiously fun. Rihanna is for real: While Beyonce is known for elegance and grace, Rihanna is flat-out hard, owing perhaps to her upbringing: crackhead father and her training as an army cadet (with drill sergeant Shontelle!). She's had seven No. 1 singles and is probably the most ubiquitous female on the radio right now, between her current feature on Eminem's "Love the Way You Lie" and the hit "Rude Boy," which might as well be sold on those 800 numbers. Although she follows in the Beyonce mold to some extent, Rihanna has the edge to front a rock band and her monotonal "heys" or "yeps" are unstoppable. The angriest man in the world: Eminem is a riot. He drops a first single, "I'm Not Afraid," about changing his life around and becoming a better man, and then, on his second one, "Love the Way You Lie," he's threatening to tie a woman to a bed and set the house on fire. Somehow, Rihanna, who was famously beaten by Chris Brown, agreed to go along for this abusive hell ride, as did Megan Fox in the video. How is this song appropriate for the radio? When will they stop playing it already? And show me someone who loves the way someone lies. Katy, stay home: The adorable and curvy Katy Perry gave us the beach classic of summer 2010 with "California Gurls" and now "Teenage Dream" is almost as catchy. Thing is, she's not much of a singer. Even with pitch control, she sounds like she's in pain, and it's been way worse on live TV. When she played "The Today Show" and "Saturday Night Live," she looked like a robot. No doubt, the visuals will be great on this tour she's doing, but the vocals have the makings of a teenage nightmare. Hayley's comet: If the great Johnny Rotten was a master at rolling his "R's," Hayley Williams is a master at caressing them. Can't get enough of the way she lingers on the choruses of Paramore's lovely "The Only Exception" and the B.o.B. hit "Airplanes," one of the standout singles of the year. Punching it in: One complaint about those feature spots, whether it's Hayley on "Airplanes," Rihanna on "Love the Way You Lie" or Rivers Cuomo on B.o.B.'s "Magic" is that they obviously took the singer's best take on the chorus and kept punching it into the song, so even as the verses build momentum, the chorus stays the same. Please, sing it again, and vary the chorus just to connect the song together. Mr. Yankovic, meet Mr. Cruz: Weird Al Yankovic told the PG this summer he was having a harder time these days finding modern hits to parody. What, did he not hear "Dynomite"?! It's an insidiously catchy dance track from British singer Taio Cruz despite having the most laughable lyrics ever. The gist is that everyone should get out of the way because he and his crew need room to dance all night. "I hit the floor cause that's my plans plans plans plans/I'm wearing all my favorite brands brands brands brands/Give me space for both my hands hands hands hands." Weird Al, you don't even have to change the lyrics on this one. Equally comical is the half-hearted attempt to bleep the glaring curse word. Is rock this bad?: Brooklyn indie-rock heroes the Strokes have a Top 40 hit with "Animal." Only it's not the Strokes. It's a Utah band called Neon Trees that's Strokes Lite. It's not an awful song and not only is it far more welcome than Nickelback or Hinder, it represents "rock," if that's what they're trying to do, a good deal better than John Mayer, The Script and Maroon 5 -- that "Misery" song is a channel-changer every time. Meanwhile, the Strokes never charted one single. Posner or poser?: He was on the Warped Tour this summer, but it was too hard to leave the wild Andrew W.K. party to go up and see him. He definitely hit a nerve with the geek-powered "Cooler Than Me," but the follow-up, "Please Don't Go," has to go. The new Jersey jam: So, there are songs about big dreams, songs about dancing, first love, breakups, partying till you puke ... Then there are the low-down dirty cheatin' ones, top among them Enrique Iglesias' spicy hot "I Like It." No wonder it has become the soundtrack for "The Jersey Shore," because the club banger jam makes you want to take a shower. "No one can do it better/Turn around I'll give you more." Yeah, Enrique, you're coming on a little strong. Multicultural flavors: More than rock radio and certainly country, the current pop hitmakers are a diverse lot culturally, which is pretty cool. Bruno Mars hails from Hawaii, Rihanna (Barbados), Taio Cruz (British with Nigerian-Brazilian parents), Derulo (Haitian descendent), Nicki Minaj (Trinidad via Queens), Mr. Iglesias (Spain). It often slips into the music, even when they are just trying to do Michael Jackson. It's October: OK, now that we've heard every one of these songs an indecent amount of times, the season has changed and we need new blood. Bye Usher, bye Taio, bye Enrique. What's next? Nelly, Kanye, Lil Wayne ... or can I maybe find a station that's playing the new Bad Religion? First published on October 7, 2010 at 12:00 am This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
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