warning: may make Lex explode

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

(Which reminds me, I should sort out the 20p music prize, shouldn't I?)

Mr PJ, regarding '1973' by James Blunt-
It contains all the best bits of a great pop song: wistfulness, nostalgia and references to dancing, music making the people come together and happier times, all with a very slight sense of emo clinginess and possible 'you really have to stop phoning me now' tendencies.

Now I know what you're all thinking, 'what the fvck are you posting that for?' and things but I think it's a jolly good description of one of my favourite musical genres: COMFORT POP. I'm not sure about you, Poptimists but it seems like a substantial part of the music-buying public is also after comfort pop at the minute (and indeed always) and I think it is worth a punt at a discussion.

I actually like '1973' quite a lot and not just because it has the same beat as 'Rock The Casbah' and appears to imply that Mr Blunt has discovered time travel but due to a general (irrational?) cuddly response to it. It's got a very warm feel to it that, which gives me a bit of the same feeling as, say, 'I Found U' by Axwell; something comforting and warm and fuzzy and generally hot chocolate-y about the whole business, whilst maintaining a sort of poppy level of danceability to some degree. A little like 'Heartbeat' by Annie (and indeed 'Heartbeats' by ver Knife) and millions of other songs that aim for the warm and fuzzies and yet don't abandon (or indeed fully embrace) being played in An Disco. Kylie is, of course, queen of this sort of business.

Whilst I'm admitting to liking a James Blunt song, I might as well throw out that my favourite comfort pop song recently was Just Dance by Lady GaGa -nominally a big stupid party song but actually all about being hopelessly drunk and needing the reassurance that it's all ok. Which is sort of super-sweet.

Obviously I also like terrifying noises, million-bpm boshfests and weird clicky things and Electrik Red and there's a markable difference between comfort pop and comfort rock but what think ye, Poptimists, is 'comfort pop' not so much a deliberate and definite genre as something that's an irrational emotional response to things that entirely personal or is it something more concrete? Is it, in fact, a significant part of what pop music is?

Comments

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Yeah it's a massive part of pop surely - has something vaguely to do with ideas of the 'generic' I'd guess.

It's funny you shd mention the Lex cos when I posted some top songs of the year so far list on my LJ he was all "WTF, some of these don't deserve to be anywhere NEAR a list" and my thinking is "well maybe not but I have to do right by them, I listened to them so often". At the moment I don't care if I never hear "Rabbit Heart" again in my life but it's probably my most-played song of 2009, it did what it did well and struck a chord.

(And increasingly I'm thinking that acknowledging this kind of stuff and being honest about it is important. I sent in my Pitchfork 00s LPs ballot yesterday after some agonising about whether I should do one at all, but I decided that the way I listen to albums - shove one on when there's washing up to do, but otherwise dump the lot on the ipod and filter after - IS a valid way and needs some representation.)

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

wait, '1973' has Rock The Casbah beat, and at the same tempo? i always assumed it was some turgid Cold Patrol plodathon...or at best a rubbisher version of Take That's 'Patience'. but yeah i've not heard it.

Goldfrapp's album last year was strong in this factor, probably the best thing about it...easing off the sense of weirdness or menace hey had before but kept their pleasant lush sonic palette and stuck more widely appealing songs around that, with mixed results. Most of it wasn't danceable tho, and much of it was fairly twee.

I'll usually go to plush electronic dudes with girl singing for this tho e.g. the mellower tracks on Royksopp's 'Junior', maybe including 'You Don't Have A Clue' altho that might be too 'rushy' for this ha.

[friend-of-tofu.livejournal.com]

Hm, interested now - what *is* the difference between "comfort" & "twee"?

Speaking personally, the things I find comforting in music are so dispersed that it's hard to conceive of there being any useful sort of genre involved - a lot of "comfort" in music for me is a very soporific quality. Since one of my all-time most comforting songs is Artica's "Boemia", which is a meandering violin-riddled Italian goth-rock ballad (which my Italian-speaking friend says was about something involving blood and probable death), I may not be a good judge of this. I used to listen to 'Carnage Visors' to cheer myself up, FFS! OTOH, I am often absurdly cheered by very silly pop music indeed (last month it was Tigercity), so it's rather difficult to pull much of a connection out of that, although no doubt someone else may spot one.

Whip it on 'em, Jim

[koganbot]

Actually, I'm not clear on the concept, since what you're calling "Comfort Pop" means, "signifies as the sort of thing that a lot of people find comforting, without necessarily comforting Frank Kogan."

Back when we learned that the time for a Russian intercontinental ballistic missile to reach the lower 48 states of the United States Of America was estimated to be 17 minutes,* the immediate response of my friend Charlotte and I was, "Excellent! Just enough time to listen to 'Sister Ray.'"

Anyway, I if I said "the genre 'Comfort Pop'" most people would think of adult contemporary, or more like adult contemporary of twenty years ago, before the AC stations began playing tracks like Evanescence's "Bring Me To Life" or rousing dancers like the Pointer Sisters' "I'm So Excited." Maybe "smooth jazz" would be the immediate association. I like Sade's "Smooth Operator," but there's something icy and unsettling in the sound and I wouldn't want to hear it a lot.

My favorite song that (I assume) gets ongoing strong play on AC would be Fleetwood Mac's "Dreams," which I love but I associate with the total pain of a particular breakup, and even if I didn't, the soft intensity of the bass and drums and the suppressed rage in the singing makes it feel more like "soft hard rock" than like the comfort genre.

Shannon's "Let The Music Play" takes a sense of devastating tragedy and loss (the music changed, the plan was rearranged, he went to dance with someone else) and promises deliverance from it (he tried pretending a dance is just a dance, but I see he's dancing his way back to me), is maybe the ultimate in comfort for me, even more than "Sister Ray," but is too ecstatic in its release to meet the qualifications for "Comfort Pop," probably.

*Subsequently was reduced to nine minutes

Re: Whip it on 'em, Jim

[petronia.livejournal.com]

The thing that happens with the bass and drums in "Dreams" is why I like it so much - it's almost motorik. (That and the suppressed rage were what Rilo Kiley played on in that one album where they sounded like Fleetwood Mac.) But then, motorik rhythms are probably the #1 thing I find "comforting" in the sense of this post, with tabla/bongo drumming being #2. XD;

[credoimprobus]

This is like 80% of the appeal of the Ryan Leslie album -- still one of my faves of the year -- for me, actually: it felt as comfortable and familiar as an album that's followed me along for years right from the first listen. <3 (Mind, the old-friend feeling could probably be largely attributed to the Cassie debut, innit, haha.) Ne-Yo is also amazing at that whole producing warm fuzzies thing, which probably explains why his songwriting tends to leave me so RIDICULOUSLY HAPPY. (I'm just saying, In My Own Words. MADE ENTIRELY OF WARM FUZZIES.)

(As a footnote, not partic pop but I can't comment on this topic and not represent: my ultimate comfort album of all time, though = ORBITAL'S SNIVILISATION. I once listened to it on constant loop for two straight days when sick as dog!)

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I would say, extremely significant and extremely personal.

I have an entire self-defined genre of albums I listen to in order to soothe myself and fall asleep on airplanes etc. and if I had to make a list my favorite albums of all time they would all be on it, even if it doesn't sound particularly flattering to say "I like sleeping to them." (People who have never tried napping to Vocalcity are missing out. XD)