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

[infov0re.livejournal.com]

Gosh, this is beginning to make me think of a post about emo I meant to write ages ago. There's a lot of interesting wordplay and shifting perspective in some of the MCR and FOB I've been listening to recently. Some of it is a bit DO YOU SEE. Some of it is quite nice. There's a whole essay in Fall Out Boy's use of "he/him" as a universal antagonist.

Re TMBG/TMF - I add "Fountains of Wayne" to the bottom of that pile.

Re: structure; I'm always noticing odd structure in songs. It's about the single thing left I like in the Fratellis' "Chelsea Dagger": the song is basically verse/bridge/verse/bridge/chorus/chorus. Which is unusual, to say the least.