Today I want to discuss about the simple-but-sweet 3 minute pop song. As a talking point, here’s the DC-based Julie Ocean, with a track from their just-released Long Gone and Nearly There.
#1 Song – Julie Ocean
I have absolutely no problem believing that contemporary popular music is every bit as meaningful as classical music. Sure, the more people out there producing songs the more dreck you are going to get, but at its pinnacle, any form of music which inspires people, gets them dancing, or gives them some happiness is worth remembering.
The Beatles were immensely popular and are every bit as deserving of a place in a conversation about history’s greatest music as Mozart or Bach. But it’s more than just that. We don’t need to fall back on The Beatles for this. Take “Toxic” from Britney Spears. Set aside all the sad tabloid covers and drama of the past decade and just listen to the song. It has a quality that is absolutely transcendent – like it or not, you can’t deny it’s there. And there’s a reason why songs like “Umbrella” and “Paper Planes” were so popular last year. They tap into that same magic of pop music that can occasionally turn a few simple chords into something incandescent.
But that invites another question. What of all the others, the songs that don’t glow in the same way? The song linked above for example, is perfectly nice, but doesn’t really go anywhere not already perfectly tread by hundreds of other bands who grew up loving The Ramones. That certainly doesn’t make it bad, but should we glean anything more than that? I say yes, but perhaps not for the most obvious reason.
It would be easy to just say: “well, the 999 duds are a necessary field that we wade through in order to discover the occasional true gem.” But I don’t think that’s really what it’s about.
Because for me, the real joy of music is in the idiosyncrasies. The communal experience of a summer pop song that everyone in the country knows is neat, but when push comes to shove I’m more into the idea that there are people who absolutely LOVE some band that virtually no one else has ever heard of. That’s part of what got me interested in music blogs in the first place: the chance to talk about some of my hidden bands and to hear about hundreds of others.
Now, that’s that uncommon of a thought. But the slightly different place I want to go is to say that I think this idiosyncratic experience is far more interesting in regards to straightforward pop music than anything else. There are lots of folks who get bored with mainstream stuff and then wander off into experimental stuff, or pysch-rock, or whatever. That’s cool and all, but I get very bored very quickly with almost all of that stuff.
What I’m far more interested in is the way that a genre that’s totally mainstream, where we’ve presumably discussed ad infinitum what goes into making a perfect pop song, can still contain so many diverse opinions. I absolutely love that even if they’re not quite what I’m looking for, bands like Julie Ocean can still have absolutely passionate fans.
So while it’s relatively easy to pick a few standards that will gain common acclaim, I think it’s often a lot more interesting to ask someone to pick 4 or 5 songs they adore in a mainstream genre which don’t tend to be commonly recognized. You’ll often end up with songs that to your ears sound completely standard. You’re tempted to call them Ramones knockoffs or U2 retreads. But then you stop and ask yourself what does this person hear that I can’t?
It makes me happy to think that something as seemingly uncomplicated as a straightforward 3 minute guitar-pop song might not actually be as simple as it seems. Maybe it’s just me, but I like the unpredictability.
So along those lines, here’s a couple tracks that occupy that weird space between “guilty pleasure” and “unheralded genius” that often characterizes this type of song. These are all clearly “popular” in nature, though none of them was ever actually all that popular. And they’re all lacking in that unknown spark that could have made them universal favorites, but for whatever reason they work for me.
Charm Attack – Leona Naess
Mirage – Mack Starks
Tape It – Winterkids
Einstein on the Beach – Counting Crows
Leona Naess was briefly popular about 10 years ago with this track, but I can’t say I’ve anything about her since. And this is probably the best song Juliana Hatfield never wrote, and it’s almost the perfect example. I know it’s cheesy. I know it’s totally obvious. The lyrics are silly. But it’s just too tasty to resist.
Mack Starks is the vaguely country, soulful, radio-ready pop version of the same phenomenon. Sure, it’s totally telegraphed, but somehow I don’t care.
The Winterkids are clearly a C+ version of British New New Wavers, and yet this song gets me every time.
And the Counting Crows are a slightly different take on this effect. Obviously, they are/were tremendously popular, but the thing I’ve never been able to understand is why this song – by miles and miles their best, in my opinion – was never big.
Anyone else got some songs along these lines they’d like to share? I do love hearing the answer to this question.