Another Year In Pop: 27

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Congratulations to Dizzee on his first number one, albeit in a quiet week.

[Poll #1219130]

(Glasto influence watch: The Verve are at 58, Kings Of Leon at 64, but Jay-Z has four songs in the top 100 <-- WINNAR!)

Comments

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Dizzee - keep going back and forth on this one, right this second it is TICK VG.

Basshunter - rub.

Estelle - great song, terrible video (get two times pieces of tit tape, woman) except for the Faith-jukebox at the beginning which is awesome.

Jay-Z - still grebt.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Have to say I feel a bit sorry for Wiley, who huffed and puffed his way to #2 and had the Biggest Ever Grime Hit for all of 3 weeks before Dizzee just breezes up with a straight-in-at-#1!

[tjanik.livejournal.com]

How's it grime? It's clearly electrohouse

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

another EPIC FAIL for the British public here.

Dizz - can only get to No 1 w/ the first dreadful single of his career apparently

Basshunter - wvs. Same tune as Princess's 'Pretty Rave Girl' (http://youtube.com/watch?v=mdQ9FFty500) but has boring Eurocheese vox instead of bratty Southern ho-rapper.

Estelle - hurrah for SUMMER, hurrah for doing one's own raps oneself this time round, hurrah for "boy, who you think you is, bad gyal nah tek dis!" Non-hurrah for this stalling at No 30.

Jay-Z - yeah I like this but COME ON he has approx a gazillion much much better singles. Jay-Z has four songs in the top 100 <-- WINNAR! - I say the British are LOSERS here b/c they have somehow only rewarded the worst bits of a huge and magnificent back catalogue. 'Hard Knock Life' is still awful after all these years, 'Numb' even worse, Jay-Z is negligible on 'Umbrella' and '99 Problems'...I mean, it's OK, obv, but COME ON it is no 'Big Pimpin' or 'Can I Get A...' or 'Heart Of The City' or 'Izzo (HOVA)' or 'Is That Yo Bitch' or 'Can't Knock The Hustle' or 'Hola Hovito' or 'So Ghetto' or 'Come And Get Me' OR OR OR ET-EFFIN-C

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

or 'GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS'

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

It was physically released last week :(

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

I fear the rub video may be impeding its progress :(

[miss-newham.livejournal.com]

Dizzee is great! Then again, all my favourite songs this year tread the line between great and quite horrifically irritatingly catchy. I also like the fact that Calvin Harris is obliged to stand in the corner throughout the video and does not get to dance with the nice ladies.

[koganbot]

Just want to say "Hi" and that I'm 2,000 miles away from a computer where I can actually listen to any of these. I'd enthusiastically tick "99 Problems" except I don't generally tick re-entries, though I might make an exception for something that's so obviously a current event. I agree with Lex that there are many better, including "Dirt Off My Shoulder" from the same year and "Takeover," which is a far superior example of Jay-Z going rock.

Haven't heard the Basshunter, need to rehear the Estelle, need to rehear the Dizzy/Calvin but I was ho-hum the only time I heard it.

[misspelledwerd.livejournal.com]

I don't have any problem with "99 Problems" placing highest. It's not his best ever, but it's a) kinda historical and b) the most obvious way to say STFU to N. Gallagher, right? Do you guys think it's high because people actually thought it was his best track?

Elsewhere, hmmm...Love the "Faith" melody on "No Substitute Love"! Also the way she says boyyyyyy!!! It's not a super interesting song, but like "Love Like This," I'm not going to turn it off when it comes on the radio. (tick)

Dizzee sucksss as I discussed earlier. Basshunter is also a mess. I didn't know that sort of lame DJ Sammy-inspired shit still existed on pop radio!

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

I think it is his best track, it's certainly one of his biggest, I'd be surprised if it didn't top the canon if and when poptimists run one. Though you're right that it's largely there because it was first song on at Glastonbury.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

what you think there were people who only watched the first song of his set? fuck them!

also HOW is it his best song?

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

Well, as misspelledwerd says, it's the historical one. If you only saw five minutes of it on iPlayer because you heard about it on the news, then it'd be him singing Oasis, then the crowd going mental as he goes into this.

(also there's bound to be a factor of "Oh, THAT'S Jay-Z. I should get that track!")

I think it's his best because it's got great rock*, great beats, great rhymes, and I've never failed to see it set a dancefloor alight.

*I totally understand that this might not make you that fond of it, it is a very rock song.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I agree that it's got great beats/rhymes/even rock - I can appreciate rock sometimes! - though it's a bit too clumsy/lurchy for me to really really love, but my point isn't that it's bad, it's that...his other songs are so much better, and not exactly lacking in the great beats & rhymes. I can't see any reason why 'Big Pimpin' isn't up in the top 75 as well, for example.

Also it's historical in no context except Glastonbury '08, which in the context of Jay-Z's career isn't really hugely significant.

Fuck people who only watched Jay-Z because they heard about him on the news and then switched off after one song. Fuck them. Idiots.

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

Well maybe they didn't have an hour to spare! Not everyone gets to listen to as much music as they'd ideally like.

Sorry, crossed wires, I meant it's historical in the context of it's the one that got on the news for Glastonbury.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

TBH I think he could have not played it at all and it would still have been the one that got into the top 40. It's his most famous track here, easily. EASILY. Sorry Lex.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I ticked all four by the way, on faith. I am going to go on a listening binge this evening I hope, my music time has been sorely limited and when I have been near headphones I've only been playing upcoming Popular stuff and Al Green, for relaxation purposes.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Yeah I know, it's a retrospective EPIC FAIL for the British public as well as a new one. So bizarre that this is his most successful single here.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

actually i'm not sure it is, with 'Hard Knock Life' selling more and probably 'Girls Girls Girls' too. from a right now pov '99 Problems' is more popular than both but that's probably just because it's a lot more recent.

what is his biggest selling single in the US? i think 'Can I Get A...' may have been #1 iver there (maybe a few others too)

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

going by chart peaks 'Hard Knock Life', 'Girls Girls Girls' and '03 Bonnie & Clyde' were bigger than '99 Problems' here.

'Big Pimpin' far and away his biggest in the US!

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

btw did you hear about Touch magazine folding (despite sales increase)? shame as i thought you should write for them. apparently the reason is because nobody wants to advertise in a 'black magazine'/urban music publication (v interesting comment in yesterday's Media Graun highlighting the new Primrose Hill set steering ad men towards indie rock and forget everything else. astounding and depressing)

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

not really so astounding any more. Britons be racist, still.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

it just seemed very surprising from an advertising point of view. the magazine circulation apparently increasing, street culture surely a lucrative market...and yet there's this supposed lack of confidence in it from companies - something not there 10 years ago. don't geddit.

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

I am v. tempted to call 1Extra syndrome on all of this. I have always hated the idea of that channel and probably always will; right at the peak of urban (I also hate the word 'urban' to describe 'music invented by black people' since that is basically ALL POPULAR MUSIC, anyway, if the media weren't such n00bs about everything) music's integration into the UK chart, they announced that it had to be sidelined off into a specialist channel because people who like urban music are Different From Us, the Jo Whiley demographic.

If I was not experiencing work currently that would make far more sense.

Anyway, I think you should start 1x new post/thread re: Touch closing. That advertising thinger is relevant to our interests & not everyone may have seen it this far down the comments.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

popular black music needs a catch-all term purely because of all the fusion and cross-pollination going on and the cultural connections between so much of it. whether good or bad, 'urban' is short and sweet enough to fulfil that purpose. the connotations needn't go beyond that imo.

i kind of agree tho re 1Xtra but that channel seems to have flourished with the space it's been given, and surely it reflects socio-cultural divides as much as re-inforces them. the real danger is if it gets axed due to inevitable cutbacks and then there's no room to re-integrate it's remit back into Radio 1 (who don't seem too fussed about grooming the new Westwood, Nelson or whatever).

[bengraham.livejournal.com]

Dizzee w. Calvin is brilliant.

Jay Z benefitting not just from Glasto, but from Wireless as well? He was certainly blimming amazing at Hyde Park, to the extent that I've gone out and downloaded some old singles (Give It To Me, Show Me What U Got) on the back of the show.

Let's not forget...

[mcarratala.livejournal.com]

1) For many people my age (late 30s) Glastonbury, either those who are there or (more likely) watching it on TV while tending the kids, is the key musical event of the year, like it or not (and I've never been a festival person myself).
2) Back in the day, many British people either had their first big taste of hip-hop with Rick Rubin's work for Run DMC, the Beasties and LL, or at least reconnected with it having drifting away after breakdancing to White Lines. 99 Problems is a cracking homage to that era and therefore a good starting point to Hova's extensive back catalogue.
3) 99 Problems is also my favourite Jay-Z track, and I'm tolerating no lessons in what real hip-hop is from any Lex-come-latelies.

[tjanik.livejournal.com]

Dance wiv me original isn't particularly good. However the Agent X remix is awesome. (http://www.zshare.net/audio/133481777f37c5b6/)

[koganbot]

Dizzee Rascal f. Calvin Harris "Dance Wiv Me": Boring singing from all involved, humorous bass ascents and descents, however, and Dizzee's fine in his rhythm. Gets over on Dizzee and bass. TICK.

Basshunter "All I Ever Wanted": Tune is requisitely pretty, guy was better when bot-infatuated, but this is serviceable Europop. TICK.

Estelle "No Substitute Love": A glaze of old-style style, too contained within itself, but an island breeze and a nice splash of sound. TICK.