Cleverness In Pop

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Do you appreciate what I'm going to call 'cleverness' - wordplay, allusion, non-standard structures, etc. - in pop music? Is it something you look for? Who does it well?

Do you think there's an opposition between cleverness and directness (in emotional or physical impact)? Should pop be cleverer?

(Qn arising from today's Popular entry)

Comments

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Well maybe I'm assuming a distinction between clever and intelligent - formalist fun vs content fun I guess.

But for all that I seem to want to fall into this distinction quite easily it seems weak to me - like Frank says, why can't the one be a route to the other? (And the follow-up question - how come it so often isn't?)