Jop Tournament Round 1, FITE 5

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I have a day off today, which is grebt, but I forgot to note down the various FITEs for today's poll. So no poll. EXCEPT! I can remember the very next one - because it is an MONSTER.

So this is the televised centre court pick-of-the-round tie, if you like.


[Poll #917645]


Crikey! Maybe this afternoon I will do the rules for the League Of Pop. Or maybe I will go and get a haircut.

Comments

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Easiest fite ever.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I know innit.

Poptimists don't fail me now.

Quick off the mark

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Hahaha also check out which ppl have notifications set up for 'poptimists'.... ;-)

Re: Quick off the mark

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

How does one do this?

Re: Quick off the mark

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

By looking at who has filled out the poll within 30 secs of it being posted ;-)

Re: Quick off the mark

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, I understand your technical wizardry now.

[lockedintheatti.livejournal.com]

I am going to have to go away and think about this for a while. That's very, very tough indeed.

[friend-of-tofu.livejournal.com]

No surprise that Missy's well in the lead, there.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

It's only now hardened Pulp voter braisedbywolves has voted Missy that I think she might actually win.

[bengraham.livejournal.com]

It's a miracle! Pulp always win Poptimist polls, but for once, they might have met their match. Go Missy!

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

I now work next to St. Martin's College - the knowledge that it's not all that has taken some of the shine off.

Also, in fairness, HOLLAAAA!

[celentari.livejournal.com]

I like both so I voted for the underdog. Was that fair? Fair schmair.

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

Voted Pulp basically because I am having a Rubbish Day and do not want to hear Missy right now.

[http://users.livejournal.com/xyzzzz__/]

I'd like to sit on a pointy fence here.

[koganbot]

Are you willing to tell us "Freak On's seeding? (Was surprised "Common People" hadn't been in the original 32, and I'm assuming that "Freak On" is closer to 32 than to 1 or it wouldn't be battling "Common People" so early.)

Always happy to talk methodology!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

"Freak On" is 6 or 7 IIRC.

"Common People" was quite low, it won its poll with only 75% or so, and was around 50-60 in the rankings. That put it in the top pot for the groups, but not in the seeds.

The way the groups meeting seeds were worked out was that I added the rankings of all songs in a group together, and the sum of that group (representing its relative weakness or strength) determined which seed its winner met. So the group with the highest ranking total sent its winner up against "Into The Groove". "Common People" was in a fairly weak group, hence its strong draw.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Of course, the seeding system throws up the occasional anomaly - being a strong track in a crappy P&J poll can inflate your percentage hugely. But I guess the tennis analogy holds (the Lex can help me out here): aren't there players who are only good on clay who end up seeded on grass events because of their world ranking, and then go out in the first round?

"Wannabe" is the lowest-ranked song still in the tournament, by the way. The Utah Saints are second-lowest.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Yes - Wimbledon actively tries to rearrange the seeds to prevent this but this is 'controversial' and it can hardly drop a top 10 player out of the top 30.

There are also players with artificially high rankings because they play lots of weak events and clean up in them, but whenever they face a true elite player tend to lose heavily. I see this analogy holds up - 'Common People' is the Anna Smashnova or Anabel Medina Garrigues of the pop world.

And 'Get Ur Freak On' is Serena Williams :)

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Although this is still not that cut and dried - I guess this is a rusty, struggling Serena, but she's led all the way and hopefully when this is over I can say the result was never in doubt, as valiantly as her overmatched opponent fought.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[koganbot]

So the group with the highest ranking total sent its winner up against "Into The Groove".

Wouldn't that be "lowest ranking total"? Or am I not understanding you?

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[justfanoe.livejournal.com]

I presume he means "highest ranking" in the sense of numerically highest. i.e. a group with a total ranking of 350 has less liked songs than a group with total ranking of 300, but has a "higher ranking". So that "highest ranking total" = worst group. That is how I interpreted it.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Yes, highest numerically = weakest group. Sorry for confusion!

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[koganbot]

I think I get it: something that's ranked 33 has more "strength" than something ranked 64, hence the lower number is the stronger. But the phrase "highest ranking total" is totally confusing, since 32 is higher ranking than 64. I presume, though, that Tom intends "highest ranking total" to mean "highest numerical total."

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

Given that CP is By Science the second best song on any of the NOWs, I imagine it could have gone a lot further if it hadn't been up against a song with such across-the-board support (EG it would clean Into The Groove's clock, I suspect).

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I don't know - remember Madonna isn't on any Now albums: I think CP would have run into trouble against any of the really huge Madonna hits.

I'd agree that this result, if it holds, would suggest Missy could go all the way.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

I had forgotten what I should have remembered :(

[martinskidmore.livejournal.com]

A distressing match for me - Common People may still be my favourite single ever, so it gets my vote, but I love Freak deeply too,so I won't really be terribly distressed if it wins, which looks likely.

[koganbot]

The sitar (or whatever it is) riff that "Get Ur Freak On" builds itself around is being used much like old style r&b/rock riffs such as in "Train Kept A-Rollin'" and "Psychotic Reaction".

[koganbot]

Er, want someone to notice this insight, since I don't see much support around here for (or interest in) Yardbirds et al., despite their being the Missy-Timbo of their day. Not to say that there aren't dissimilarities between Yardbirds and Missy-Timbo, but both the Yardbirds' push towards experiment and their predilection towards a never-ending groove are very Missy-Timbo. The Yardbirds in both riffage and rave-ups are very rhythm-is-all and are appearing at the same time that James Brown is doing something similar in r&b. The rhythm-noise (rather than conventional solo) that the Count Five lead guitar plays during their rave-up is lifted straight from some of Clapton's work on Five Live Yardbirds. (Of course, "Train Kept A-Rollin'" has Beck, not Clapton.) "Train" may be more interesting than "Freak On" is to me as "Train" is poised between "drive towards climax" and "let the groove roll forever." Tries to do both.

(Side comment: without the Yardbirds, there is no Velvet Underground.)

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I noticed the insight, but the shameful truth is that I've never knowingly heard the Yardbirds! I think I have some on my hard drive, though.

You were talking about the drive vs groove thing on the Hendrix thread on Popular: I have kept it in mind.

[dickmalone.livejournal.com]

This seems like an "abstain because of conflict of interest" kind of vote.

N.B

[jel-bugle.livejournal.com]

I only voted for Common People because of William Shatner's cover version.

Maybe I listened to the wrong mix or something

[blue-russian.livejournal.com]

(or just got up on the wrong side of bed :)

I kind of vaguely remember this song (Get Ur Freak On) but honestly probably heard it once, and that's it. As usual, I dl'ed and listened, and I just don't get the passion. I mean, yes she's picked a great sample. Yes, it's got a catchy title. But is it really that good? Why? (Or are people transferring Missy-love to the song?)

I understand why (albeit not necessarily agree with) people might vote against Common People - so I'm not looking for that answer.

Re: Maybe I listened to the wrong mix or something

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

It's a point at which erm 'futurist' hip-hop (Not that Orientialist samples sound futurist now exactly, but the video and the marketing campaign and everything were pushing that angle) meets call-and-response party hip-hop. (It is a great record to shout along to.)

Missy's charisma is a huge part of it too, of course.

Re: Maybe I listened to the wrong mix or something

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

It's not just the Eastern sample which makes it sound futuristic though - it's a really minimal track but every single sound is a) somewhere where you least expect it and b) completely arresting - the off beats, the squelchy bass, the INCREDIBLE amounts of space - even the emptiness of the song sounds loud! And of course Missy's vocal performance is maybe THE greatest of the decade so far, all those tics and catchphrases.

I've never witnessed such consensus about any song as GUFO received at the time, for what it's worth.

Re: Maybe I listened to the wrong mix or something

[justfanoe.livejournal.com]

Oh, I don't know about this Lex. "Hey Ya" for example, had more consensus, I think. And I don't see how GUFO had more consensus even than "Work It". Then you've got "Since U Been Gone", "Crazy", etc. And this is just the last 3 or 4 years.