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

Re: cleverness zones

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I was just thinking that on the bus - so much 'cleverness' is really in the image the act put across. eg 'Overpowered' isn't really too weird a song, but Roisin's known as a kook and wears a strange dress in the video => it is clever-pop rather than Britney-pop.

G Stefani is fertile territory here b/c something like 'Hollaback Girl' is obv on the face of it as dumb as you get but there's a level of self-awareness there which puts Stefani firmly into clever territory (contra (the (entirely inaccurate) public perception) of Fergie Ferg).