Blast from the Past: Positively Perfect Pop Songs!

Pop music gets very little respect from music fans. For those of us who like it, it's just a fun confection, an enjoyable lark. From "real" music fans, pop music is disposable, meaningless, without artistic merit. The equivalent of Stephen King or Dean Koontz in the fiction genre. Well, you know what? I dig King and Koontz! And I dig pop music too!

There are numerous pop songs that just strike me as pop confection perfection. And this is my list of some of the best of the best.

1. Misery - Maroon 5 - This group, headlined by The Voice's Adam Levine, is one of the most successful acts at crafting pure pop perfection. Usually, they include a little profanity to add a little street cred. But their songs are just little balls of perfectly crafted song candy. Misery is one of the best, making an abusive relationship sound fun and bouncy! Yay! I'm in misery!

2. Express Yourself - Madonna - It would be impossible to narrow down Madonna's discography to find the best, most perfect pop song. That's why I didn't, and there is more than one. This one isn't just perfect, it has alternate versions that are equally perfect! And that shouldn't be possible!



3. Mony Mony - Billy Idol - This is an eighties version of a sixties song, that is largely meaningless. But it is absolute perfection in what it sets out to do: set dance floors on fire, and make people happy for no reason. Its recent inclusion in a Nissan Sentra ad is just proof.

4. Steal My Sunshine - Len - Usually, when an act samples parts of another song to put into their own, the result is derivative, uninspired and something of a retread. In this case, one-hit-wonder Len achieves pop perfection, using Andrea True's More, More, More disco tune as a foundation.



5. Just Can't Get Enough - Depeche Mode - You can tell when even an "alternative" band has become mainstream when their old tunes not only get mixed in on "80s and More!" radio stations, but get put into GAP ads. This song might be from a band with a heavy artistic cred, but the song is a pop meringue.

6. Vogue - Madonna - Leave it to Madonna to take an underground gay dance craze, and turn it into mainstream success. And then, make it enough of a classic that if you played it on any dance floor 20+ years later, it would still draw a crowd.



7. Waterloo - ABBA - I am of the opinion that ABBA's catalog--almost all of it--could be released today, and be successful. Many, if not most of their hit songs are masterpieces of pop music. Songs like Ring, Ring and On and On and On should be re-released, just to see what happens. But Waterloo, to me, is a perfect pop song.

8. A Little More Love - Olivia Newton-John - This one might seem like a stretch, but hear me out. Pay attention to Olivia's change-ups in melody. Notice that she changes the note structure in each lead-in to the chorus, and each chorus itself. Much like Adam Levine does in Maroon 5, Olivia plays with the notes, going all over the place, but always in tune, and sounding perfect.




Okay, kids, that's my bit for this week. Hope you had a great Easter and/or Walking Dead finale weekend! Have a great week, and happy Monday!

Blast from the Past: Perfect Pop Songs

Pop music gets very little respect from music fans. For those of us who like it, it's just a fun confection, an enjoyable lark. From "real" music fans, pop music is disposable, meaningless, without artistic merit. The equivalent of Stephen King or Dean Koontz in the fiction genre. Well, you know what? I dig King and Koontz! And I dig pop music too!

There are numerous pop songs that just strike me as pop confection perfection. And this is my list of some of the best of the best.

1. Misery - Maroon 5 - This group, headlined by The Voice's Adam Levine, is one of the most successful acts at crafting pure pop perfection. Usually, they include a little profanity to add a little street cred. But their songs are just little balls of perfectly crafted song candy. Misery is one of the best, making an abusive relationship sound fun and bouncy! Yay! I'm in misery!

2. Express Yourself - Madonna - It would be impossible to narrow down Madonna's discography to find the best, most perfect pop song. That's why I didn't, and there is more than one. This one isn't just perfect, it has alternate versions that are equally perfect! And that shouldn't be possible!



3. Mony Mony - Billy Idol - This is an eighties version of a sixties song, that is largely meaningless. But it is absolute perfection in what it sets out to do: set dance floors on fire, and make people happy for no reason.

4. Steal My Sunshine - Len - Usually, when an act samples parts of another song to put into their own, the result is derivative, uninspired and something of a retread. In this case, one-hit-wonder Len achieves pop perfection, using Andrea True's More, More, More disco tune as a foundation.



5. Just Can't Get Enough - Depeche Mode - You can tell when even an "alternative" band has become mainstream when their old tunes not only get mixed in on "80s and More!" radio stations, but get put into GAP ads. This song might be from a band with a heavy artistic cred, but the song is a pop confection.

6. Vogue - Madonna - Leave it to Madonna to take an underground gay dance craze, and turn it into mainstream success. And then, make it enough of a classic that if you played it on any dance floor 20+ years later, it would still draw a crowd.



7. Waterloo - ABBA - I am of the opinion that ABBA's catalog--almost all of it--could be released today, and be successful. Many, if not most of their hit songs are masterpieces of pop music. Songs like Ring, Ring and On and On and On should be re-released, just to see what happens. But Waterloo, to me, is a perfect pop song.

8. A Little More Love - Olivia Newton-John - This one might seem like a stretch, but hear me out. Pay attention to Olivia's change-ups in melody. Notice that she changes the note structure in each lead-in to the chorus, and each chorus itself. Much like Adam Levine does in Maroon 5, Olivia plays with the notes, going all over the place, but always in tune, and sounding perfect.




Okay, kids, that's my bit for this week. Hope you had a great Easter and/or Walking Dead finale weekend! Have a great week, and happy Monday!

Favorite Songs: Maroon 5's "Won't Go Home Without You"

Here's a little break from the holiday-themed posts (not to mention the politics). One of my favorite groups over the past few years is Maroon 5. I'm aware that whenever I like a group, inevitably they're considered "lame" by a bunch of people, but I don't care.

I don't listen to music on the radio very much, so when I happen upon an album I like, it is there that become familiar with it. The first time I heard this song, I thought it should be a hit. It's not often that the first listen of any song catches my fancy, but this one did.

From a cursory look at a few Google hits, it doesn't look like this song is catching fire--but maybe it's just too new. Anyway, I like it, and hey, this is my blog right? So here it is, Maroon 5's "Won't Go Home Without You."

Censorship: What the F**k?

Ever since Janet Jackson's "nipplegate" controversy a few years ago at the Superbowl, broadcast TV and radio have gotten very skittish about foul language and perceived indecency. Curiously, cable channels like FX (a Rupert Murdoch property!), Showtime and HBO have gotten racier.

Anyway, the other day, I was listing to "JackFM" here in Las Vegas, a station that plays a pretty diverse song set, the best songs of the last 40 years or so. Great concept, I know it's popular all over. I heard a Maroon 5 song, with the F-word fuzzed out. I don't know why Adam Levine always has to throw the F-word around in his catchy little songs, but he does. A short while later, I heard "Unbelievable" by EMF, a very catchy song from a one-hit wonder in the early 90s.

Interesting fun fact? The line, "What the F**k" is heard in the song, over and over and over again! Uncensored. Then I remembered another ditty that has been around for closer to what, 35 years, The Who's "Who Are You?" (the theme song from CSI). This song says "Who the F**k are You?" a couple of times. These songs have been played uncensored for years and years. See for yourself:



This is an edited clip, and the video is barely there (just the opening of a CSI episode), but the f-word in question is sung at 3:02.

Behind the Blogger, Part Seven: The Age Thing

It's been awhile since I've posted a "Behind the Blogger," where I tell you the reader a little more about me. Age has become more of an issue for me lately. Not my age so much, as how I relate to the younger crowd.

I'm 41 years old, but have usually found myself surrounded by older people. Most of my friends are older than I am, so is The Other Half. Increasingly however, I am no longer the youngster in the room. My brother recently discovered that he has an 18 year old daughter. She could conceivably conceive, and make him (15 months younger than I am) a grandfather when he himself is 41. No rush though, girl! That realization, that you are grandparent age can come as something of a shock.

I'm pretty comfortable in my age bracket. It doesn't hurt that The Other Half breaks in each age for me, and it's like a comfy old shoe by the time I get there. No surprises. I look back on my younger self--as little as five-years ago "me"--and cringe. I wouldn't go back for anything, unless I could retain the brain of the me I am now. I've always been considered mature for my age--my brother called me a 40-year-old 12-year-old years ago--but I find that very hard to believe when I look back. Like the Indigo Girls song, "Watershed" says, "every five years or so, I look back on my life, and I have a good laugh."

What I'm saying in a somewhat disjointed way is, don't be afraid of any future age you might be. It is far less scary to hit the big 4-0 than you think it is. The biggest problem is dealing with the younger set. Many twenty-somethings seem to have no knowledge whatsoever about what came before them. They don't even seem to know what's going on right now. All that information at their fingertips, and they just can't be bothered.

One observation about getting older is the realization that time moves much more quickly the more of it you burn up. When you're a freshman in high school, three years means the difference between 6th and 9th grade--a tremendous change. Three years at my age happens in a blink of an eye. I have the same job, same house, same relationship, same cat, same truck. Actually, most of those things have remained the same since the turn of the century and before. I couldn't tell you what year I went to England, or precisely when we got the "new" TV or couch.

Songs from three years ago are still "new songs" to me. Maroon 5 went five years between albums, and I still think of their first hit ("Harder to Breathe") as recent. I'm often stunned that a TV show I've never watched (The King of Queens, for example) is wrapping up their run of eight years. To me, it's been a very short time since the beginning of Lindsay Lohan's and Britney Spears' careers, and they're effectively over now. I've got a very good memory for many things, but don't ask me what year Tina Fey left Saturday Night Live.

I couldn't tell you the highlights (or lowlights) of 2004 versus 2005--I can't distinguish the two! I've considered starting a journal, separate from this blog, if only to distinguish 2007 from 2009 in the future.

So in conclusion, young folks, enjoy your youth, and maybe start a diary. It'll all start to blur together, and sooner than you think. Oh, yeah, and read a book! Open the newspaper! Pay attention! Your generation is starting to look bad. I'm not sure if that is because it is, or because the older generation always thinks that of the younger. I'm thinking, a little of both. And respect your elders! Heh-heh.