See the thing is what passes for top 40 radio, regardless of what city you're in, isn't very good. At it's best, it's songs that you don't initially hate and may even actually kinda like until they begin to get overplayed. At it's worst, it's back to back banal artists, singing the exact same songs written by a handful of songwriters to make an easy buck. It's popularity is easily explained as the byproduct of jaded radio station programmers content to play whatever songs are big three cites over, ensuring the wave of suck is never restricted to just one time zone. But there's nothing that irks me more then the asshats who announce with a devilish glee that the next songs are the most requested songs in [Insert city name here]
Either they're lying and radio is controlled by only a few individuals who are in bed with the big record labels ensuring their artists continue to supply them with coke money or the majority of people who listen to terrestrial radio are bottom feeding idiots. Neither reality is a pretty picture.
So without further ado I present to you the first edition in my monthly series of top 40 radio analysis The following are this month's grossest offenders that managed to find a way to be bad enough to pierce through work induced carpal tunnel.
#5) Maroon 5 - Daylight
I'll let you in on a little secrete about Maroon 5. They're actual not that bad. As far as pop music goes, they occasionally bring some creative ideas to the other wise dull "white guys with guitars" genera in top 40 radio. In a world of grays they're the slightly edge shade of beige. But with their latest album they did the one thing that should be technically impossible for them to ever do; sell out. Bored of his own baffling success, Levine realized he didn't need to work as hard at maintaining the illusion of this "band thing" with his gig as judge on The Voice secured. So he simply hired a ton of outside song writers, wailed over the tunes he liked, and called it a day."Daylight" commits the cardinal sin of begin a 3 minute song that feels like it lasts for 6. Even Adam sounds like he's barley stifling a yawn as he mopes about how hard it is to have tons of beautiful women wanting to have sex with you and having to to leave them in the morning for someone else; a sentiment that no doubt speaks strongly to Adam Levine but alienates everyone else.
#4) Taylor Swift - "I Knew You Were Trouble"
Remember when Taylor Swift made shitty "barely" country music for preteens? Well an older, more mature Taylor has decided to take her career into a completely new direction by no longer concerning herself with the "barely country" tag. "Trouble" represents her latest flirtation with dub step and awful chorus choices. Someone in her camp must have finally told her that no one really cares that she can't sing and that they've been covering it up on the records for years, because she makes sure she leaves no doubt left that she absolutely can't. The worse thing is she briefly toys with the previously unexplored idea that maybe, just maybe she really does have bad taste in men and that maybe she's to blame for the fact that her relationships have shorter life spans then most houseflies. That is until she proudly belts out in the self-assured sing-song way. "I knew YOU were trouble when you walked in!" Ah bait and switch you clever girl.
#3) Rihanna - "Stay"
These days Rihanna's working almost over time to push her bad girl image well past the point of self parody, but she still sprinkles out a gem like this every now and then to let us know that deep down she's still the same boring pop star we all know. "Stay" walks the fine line between being an offensively bad song and a cruel joke at her expense. Keep in mind that sh doesn't write any of these chart toppers and even the most deceptively simply songs (The chorus of "Where Have You Been" is a repetition of the song title no less than ten times) require a think tank of a dozen or so writers. On one hand, "Stay" is boring and dominated by a monotonous piano paired with the cartwauling Rihanna confuses for singing. On the other, well without drawing to many obvious comparisons "Stay" is a song about a women who's in a desperate situation with an abusive lover, she believes she'd be better without him but is too insecure to admit it, wants him to stay, (or "Staaaaaaaaaaaay" as she puts it), and- you know what I'm just going to stop right there.
#2) Bruno Mars - "When I Was Your Man"
All the problems of Rihanna's "Stay" are clashed with the lack of self awareness Adam Levine displayed in "Daylight". Bruno Mars waxes poetically about how he "should have bought you flowers" and other such gestures otherwise you'd still be dancing with him; Bruno Mars and not some jerk that isn't Bruno Mars. But unlike Adam Levine who goes all out to flaunt his total lack of sincerity in a refreshingly honest way, Bruno hints at a more subtle kind of doucheiness. "When I Was Your Man" is the song of a guy faking sincerity so hard that he wares it proudly on his sleeve. See, Bruno Mars doesn't mind if he comes across as the obvious "desperate to get laid" guy by laying it on thick with the bullshit sincerity. He knows that you don't have to fool everyone all of the time into sleeping with you. Just some of them some of the time. Coincidentally, the working title for the album was Songs To Convince Women That Deep Down The Really Want To Sleep With Me, Bruno Mars. Follow up songs, "I Swear I'm Not A Jerk", "I Love You For Your Mind", "You've Got A Great Personality Girl" , "Why Do Girls Always Want The Bad Boys?", and "Lesbian (I Bet She's A)" were wisely left off.
#1) Wil-I-am (Fet. Brittney Spears) - "Scream And Shout"
In "Scream And Shout" Wil-I-Am managed to churn out a 5 minute party anthem which makes you want to do anything but that, a Brittney Spears performance that sounds equal parts "bored sex bot" and "Russian crossing guard", and an irritating loop of sound that reeks of half ass. Most fascinating of all is that he manged to pen out this song in no less than 3 minutes. Wil I Am: The man who when the world says you can't , he manages to find a mannish voiced woman and Macbook just in time to prove them wrong. It's a formula that may appear bizarre to anyone not named Wil-I-am but the results speak for themselves.
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