Pop Music at the End of the 00s

The latter half of this decade seemed full of pop promise. From the monster JT/Timbaland collaboration FutureSex to Polow da Don's club-rap/R&B/synth-pop production hybrids to Madonna and Janet's reintroduction of top 40 house (not to mention Kanye's dot-connecting Graduation), pop music's future looked secure. Sure, 15 American Idol contestants were there to smother every positive trend with warmed-over easy listening, but the positives kept coming.

Every example in that list? 2007 or older.

The closest we've got to a pop savior in 2009 is the same we had in 2003, and even if Britney has proven as reliable musically as she is troubled personally, we haven't seen any significant imitation in American pop. The startling fusion of styles on Blackout and Circus provides a perfect blueprint for pop in the 21^st century – it'd be nice to hear someone paying attention. M.I.A. had a surprise hit with the terrific "Paper Planes," but Kala hasn't gone gold in the U.S. Given M.I.A.'s usual aversion to direct pop moments (and deliberate censor-baiting even on "Paper Planes"), it's hard to imagine a follow-up hit. Kanye followed Graduation with the alienating detour of 808s and Heartbreak, connected to contemporary pop only by inexplicable and egregious Auto-Tune use.

So, yeah, we're at the rhetorical question point. Why do I give a shit? Why should you? No doubt you're familiar with the arguments that pop music is breaking down and apart, and the "good riddance" take on the same. Niche-based cultural consumption combined with the democratizing force of social media and the instant availability of (almost) everything ever recorded means we don't have to give a shit about some dominant pop narrative. Supposedly.

Here's the deal, starry-eyed optimists. The top still matters…and most of our country still hears what everyone else hears and only what everyone else hears. If the argument I outlined above is "decentralized and democratized culture plus accessibility means we all win," the emerging counter-argument is "everything popular gets more popular, and that's scary." The debate has as much to do with the internet and culture in general as it has to do with pop music, I know. Getting to that.

All the way back in 2004, Kelly Clarkson put out Breakaway, a pretty impressive but totally unambitious record. In 2009, Jordin Sparks has released Battlefield. If you've heard the first single and title track, you know it's fucking massive. Not "Since U Been Gone" massive, but as big as anything since. The buried lede: the rest of Battlefield is pretty impressive too. The bonus is that Sparks and her collaborators aren't content to go straight down-the-middle – or more appropriately, they realize there isn't a neat, conventional middle to be found. The arrangements aren't nearly as bold/dangerous as Britney's latest, and the songs aren't as good as Clarkson's, but for a recent American Idol alum – hell, for an American pop artist in this godforsaken landscape – Battlefield is very solid stuff. The album is shot through with slightly edgy beat- and synth-programming, coupled with some nice vocal processing that shows Sparks isn't afraid to subordinate her voice to the songs (like Britney of late, and unlike far too many of our nominally digital-era pop vocalists). When the producers back off, Sparks still sells vocal showcases like closers "Faith" and "The Cure." Additional bonus points for superb guitar session work throughout.

Ok, but if I miss great, ambitious pop, why am I talking about this Jordin Sparks record? The sad truth is that, in 2009, "Battlefield" is a noteworthy song and the album is a noteworthy one too. I'd rather be talking about the next "Billie Jean" or "Hey Jude" or "Lucky Star" or "What You Know," but it's getting rough out there. Decry the musical relativism all you want – I say we need to fight for the records that stand out even a little, now more than ever. We need to argue with coworkers and little brothers/sisters and strangers in clubs (especially fucking DJs). Pop music is still the high ground of musical culture, however low the brow, and if you'll forgive the militant quality of the metaphor, if we care about the music, we should care about control of that high ground. If we all crawl into our tiny market-share caves – Animal Collective here, T-Pain there, Coldplay by the Borders display case – we're renouncing the unifying idea of pop music entirely, which is that we're capable of shared language…even if it's sung or played rather than spoken. Allowing mutually reinforcing biases to fester sounds awful to a musical omnivore like me. Instead, let's embrace the differences and negotiate them.*

*Note: the “you can do it, girl!" undertones throughout Battlefield might have crept in a bit here. The shorter and more restrained version: take the current state of pop as an opportunity to participate in the conversation rather than an excuse to ignore it. Withdrawing from that conversation has consequences.**

**I realize that not everyone cares about pop music. If you do and don't feel satisfied, all I'm suggesting is that you find a way to communicate that. And stop finding your fix (exclusively) with indie pop, please. I can promise you that jj n° 2 is not, in fact, comparable to or better than every mainstream pop record from 2009, however weak the year's been. The tastemakers might be desperate enough to canonize every third group from Jacksonville or Sweden, but you don't have to be dumb enough to follow along. You certainly don't need to pretend that a basement cover of a mediocre Lil Wayne single is a revelation. There's a place for this kind of all-devouring no-boundaries amateur pop, but does it have to be every place? There's my start, now let's continue the argument.

Animal Collective's MPP: Praising with Faint Criticism

I feel a bit lonely. Which is convenient, of course. By and large I can't stand the people who DISlike Merriweather Post Pavilion...or their reasons. The most (only?) intelligent take I've seen is Chris Ott's, but I'm still miles away from him on this record.

But I also don't like Merriweather. Why? I've spent well over a month now trying to figure that out, time I could have spent on music I actually give a shit about.

Ok, so why spend that time? Easier question to answer. First, because Merriweather Post Pavilion is an Important Record. Being an Important Record isn't a knock on the record, or on the band, for that matter. Animal Collective (as even Ott would admit unless I'm way off) didn't confer that status themselves, they just made a record. We The Internet Commentariat and Serious Music Listeners made that decision and bestowed that status upon them, rightly or wrongly. I generally try to keep up with Important Records, because -all appearances aside- I'm not really much of a contrarian, and I like all kinds of popular and/or well-regarded records (certainly not always the same thing). Many of my favorite records are or have been Important Records. Not only do I not immediately disregard well-received albums, I usually go out of my way to listen to them.

So when the praise came rolling in, I felt both obligated AND interested in investigating. I've never cared for Animal Collective, but friends who felt the same way were into this release (my second major motivation). Steely-eyed critics -and favorites of mine- were enthusiastic (number three). Hell, I wanted something new to listen to in early 2009.

I got the record. I listened. I kept listening. A few listens in, I didn't get it. I don't always have a sense of my ultimate take on an album through one listen, but by two or three, I usually know whether it falls into the like, dislike, or ignore categories. Sorting out love from like takes a much longer time, but it's very very rare for an album to pull a 180. Back in my days of writing reviews for (ultralow circulation) print, I felt an obligation to listen at least four or five times to any record I was reviewing. Now an album that doesn't grab me in a couple of listens tends to get lost in the 200gb maze of my iTunes. I (and you) could say a lot about that admission right there, but let's leave it at this: I've given Merriweather much more of a chance than I give most records.

On to the disliking and why:

Maybe I don't get this album. That's the way I phrased it above, and I'm sure that's how some people would put it. Leaving aside most of the tricky questions that phrasing and the idea behind it raise, there may well be some musical configuration at work here that I can't grasp. I have a hard time accepting that there's genius that eludes me on Merriweather, but there may be subtleties I'm somehow missing. Maybe there's an error in my pathway configuration that prevents me from appreciating what so many others do. I really fucking doubt it.

More likely (and more intelligibly), I or you or we could say that it's "not my thing." That's a common explanation in this kind of case. I don't buy this explanation either. Part of my skepticism re: both explanations comes from my fondness for Person Pitch, most recent solo album by, yes, Animal Collective member Panda Bear.

Are Person Pitch and Merriweather Post Pavilion the same album? Absolutely not, and therein lies MY explanation. Or at least part of it. The songwriting of Noah Lennox (Panda Bear) is closely related on his most recent solo and Animal Collective records, but the arrangements are radically different. The aesthetic of Merriweather is much more cluttered, driven by melodic instruments used frequently as noisemaking devices. The tempos are accelerated. Jarring effects are applied with little apparent consideration for their contribution to the whole, and the contrast does not appear to be particularly illuminating. The fast off-tempo phaser in "Bluing" might be the most egregious example. Person Pitch, on the other hand, was characterized by restraint, by (apparently) careful consideration of every element in the largely-sample driven arrangements. Do I have a problem with busy, complicated arrangements? Absolutely not. But I do think that some songs are better suited to that style than others, and the songs on Merriweather are drowning in poor choices.

In other words, I consider Merriweather a failure of execution (arrangements) rather than concept (songwriting) - although I should also say that I think the songwriting here falls a bit short. It is "my thing," and I think I have some reasonable (if vague) idea of what the artists are attempting. I don't have any grandiose conspiracy theory about artist-press collaboration to sell us a bad product. I don't think critics saw dollar signs when they heard Merriweather. I just don't buy that the artists have succeeded.