Shout out to...

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

In the canteen just now the Miley song was on (and the Miley song was on, and the Miley song was oooooon etc), and it got me thinking...

...Do pop songs intentionally name drop other artists anymore? Did this use to be more of a common occurrence? Obviously this is a big thing in hiphop where shout-outs to your mates (especially dead ones) or ruthless disses are very common. Also, tediously-long lists of dudes who have influenced the artist seem to be mostly confined to dance music (Daft Punk, LCD Soundsystem, Soulwax, er Scooter), though feel free to correct me on that. Does the same thing happen in country or rock at all?

Off the top of my head I can think of the following pop tracks that reference other artists not directly involved in the making of the track:

Miley Cyrus - Party In The USA (Jay-Z and Britney)
Robbie Williams - She's Madonna
Wheatus - Teenage Dirtbag (Iron Maiden)
CSS - Meeting Paris Hilton (who is technically a pop star I guess)

There must be more! Who would you say is name-dropped the most? Does it tend to be in the context of Artist 1 actually in the act of listening to Artist 2, like Miley is doing? Or swooning over them, like Robbie?

Comments

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

It happens a bit in country I think. Erm well I dunno, but anyway it happens in "Save A Horse (Ride A Cowboy)" where Big (or Rich) sings the girl every Willie Nelson song he can think of (and they made LUVVVVVV)

[edgeofwhatever.livejournal.com]

See also Taylor Swift, "Tim McGraw."

[koganbot]

Yeah, a bit, like very six songs or so. The whole genre is awash in social markers, basically. Jamey Johnson sang "Somewhere Between Haggard and Jones" a couple of nights ago at the CMAs. Country music basically gives you a never-ending callout to Haggard and Jones and Cash and Hank, on and on and on, whenever someone wants to align himself/herself with the tried and the true, and the red, the white, and the true blue. Eric Church sings "Pledge Allegiance To The Hag." Waylon Jennings "Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way?" Ashley Monroe "Hank's Cadillac" (this one's pretty interesting actually, about how she'd have saved his life if she'd been there: "I'd have kept the coffee strong, oh I coulda kept him hangin' on, if I'd've been in the back of Hank's Cadillac"). I mean, those are just titles that come to mind. I'm sure there are many more. As for lyrics, just off the top of my head, there are the Dixie Chicks complaining in "Long Time Gone" that the radio ain't got no soul:

Now they sound tired but they don't sound Haggard
They've got money but they don't have Cash
They got Junior but they don't have Hank

Montgomery Gentry's "She Couldn't Change Me"

She changed direction headed back home
She changed her tune it's all Haggard and Jones

More Big & Rich ("Rollin' (The Ballad Of Big & Rich)"):

Charlie Pride was the man in black
Rock and roll used to be about Johnny Cash
Yeah, whatcha think about that?

But they're pulling an interesting switch there, in effect saying that if you leave blacks out you've left out some of country, and that country's there early on giving birth to rock and roll, so they'll rock out if they want to (and swipe the riff from "Secret Agent Man"). Is also possibly the first country song to use the words "crunk," "rave," and "trance."

Let's see, farther off the beaten path we've got Gretchen Wilson assuring us, "I know all the words to every Tanya Tucker song." And Big & Rich again: "I got a spaceship/Fully equipped/Cuz I'm a cowboy Stevie Wonder." And Brooks & Dunn quote from "You Can't Always Get What You Want" (not to mention lifting licks from "Brown Sugar"). And I'm sure there's a Tim McGraw song that also references the Stones.

I better call Chuck to this thread where he can list all the country bands that reference Charlie Daniels and Lynyrd Skynryd.

Another Willie ref: Toby Keith's "Weed With Willie," but that's apparently based on actual events ("In the fetal position with drool on our chins/We broke down and smoked weed with Willie again").

As for Taylor Swift's "Tim McGraw," it was a canny career-starting callout, but also, since she and co-writer Liz Rose really know what they're doing, the name doesn't just function as a callout but gets worked into the plot of the song, which isn't about McGraw, and isn't addressed to McGraw but to an ex of Taylor's (who presumably dumped her): "When you think Tim McGraw/I hope you think my favorite song/The one we danced to all night long/The moon like a spotlight on the lake/When you think happiness/I hope you think that little black dress/Think of my head on your chest/And my old faded blue jeans/When you think Tim McGraw/I hope you think of me." Very touching, and in the context of the song very hurt and manipulative too, and I'm almost ready to start crying, though isn't that asking too much of a boy, to remember two pieces of women's apparel?

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Do you think country is more likely to mention other country singers that aren't actually the focus of the song? i.e. instead of the song being about smoking weed with Willie Nelson, the song might be about smoking weed and just happens to mention Willie Nelson as an example of a Willie that smokes said weed?

There seems to be a few distinct categories emerging:
- songs focusing on another artist ('R Kelly's 12 Play')
- songs about liking specific artists' music ('Can U Dig It')
- songs about shagging another artist ('Do It With Madonna')
- songs where the artist's music just happens to be playing in the background ('Let's Make Love And Listen Death From Above')
- songs taking the piss out of the artist (Half Man Half Biscuit's entire back catalogue)
- songs where the artist name is basically used as a throwaway lyrical placeholder ('Party In The USA' - though this falls into the background music too I suppose)

[koganbot]

songs where the artist's music just happens to be playing in the background ('Let's Make Love And Listen Death From Above')

Surely the music is premeditated (though one doesn't know if the and is congruent or temporal, whether they're going to make love and listen to Death From Above simultaneously or make love and then listen to Death From Above.

And I thought the point of the artist shout-outs in "Party In The USA" was that anywhere is home once you hear the familiar music - e.g. Jay-Z and Britney - even if you'd felt alienated and the outsider just before those songs began to play. And hearing the songs, you knew what to do, whereas before those songs, you didn't.

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

Where do "songs setting yourself in opposition to other artists" fit into this formulation? (Is that the same as taking the piss?) Obviously tons of battle-rap songs, but also Skynyrd "Sweet Home Alabama" (re: Neil Young); Clash "1977" (Elvis, Beatles, Stones); Mott the Hoople "All The Young Dudes" (Beatles, Stones, maybe T.Rex??), etc. (I was all ready to say Generation X "Ready Steady Go," but actually that one said they were in love with Beatles/Stones/Bobby Dylan).

And then there's just the whole "laundry list" concept, which contrary to popular belief these day,s LCD Soundsystem did not invent. To wit:

Clash "White Man In Hammersmith Palais"

Dillinger and Leroy Smart
Delroy Wilson, your cool operator
Ken Boothe for UK pop reggae
With backing bands sound systems
And if they've got anything to say
There's many black ears here to listen
But it was Four Tops all night with encores from stage right...

and "Clash City Rockers"

Come on and show me say the bells of Old Bowie
When I am fitter say the bells of Gary Glitter
No one but you and I say the bells of Prince Far-I

Def Leppard, "Rocket"

G.G.*, Killer Queen
Dizzy Lizzy Major Tom
So c'mon

* -- I assume this means "Gary Glitter," but other people say they're saying "Jean Genie" (as in Bowie) instead.


and especially Reunion "Life Is A Rock (But The Radio Rolled Me)" (a top 10 U.S. hit in 1974):

B.B. Bumble and the Stingers, Mott the Hoople, Ray Charles Singers
Lonnie Mack and twangin' Eddy, here's my ring we're goin' steady
Take it easy, take me higher, liar liar, house on fire
Locomotion, Poco, Passion, Deeper Purple, Satisfaction
Baby baby gotta gotta gimme gimme gettin' hotter
Sammy's cookin', Lesley Gore and Ritchie Valens, end of story
Mahavishnu, fujiyama, kama-sutra, rama-lama
Richard Perry, Spector, Barry, Archies, Righteous, Nilsson, Harry
Shimmy shimmy ko-ko bop and Fats is back and Finger Poppin'

Life is a Rock,
But the radio rolled me.
At the end of my rainbow
Lies a Golden Oldie.

FM, AM, hits are clickin' while the clock is tock-a-tickin'
Friends and Romans, salutations, Brenda and the Tabulations
Carly Simon, I behold her, Rolling Stones and centerfoldin'
Johnny Cash and Johnny Rivers, can't stop now, I got the shivers
Mungo Jerry, Peter Peter Paul and Paul and Mary Mary
Dr. John the nightly tripper, Doris Day and Jack the Ripper
Gotta go Sir, gotta swelter, Leon Russell, Gimme Shelter
Miracles in smokey places, slide guitars and Fender basses
Mushroom omelet, Bonnie Bramlett, Wilson Pickett, stop and kick it

Arthur Janov's primal screamin', Hawkins, Jay and
Dale and Ronnie, Kukla, Fran and Norma Okla
Denver, John and Osmond, Donny
JJ Cale and ZZ Top and LL Bean and De De Dinah
David Bowie, Steely Dan and sing me prouder, CC Rider
Edgar Winter, Joanie Sommers, Osmond Brothers, Johnny Thunders
Eric Clapton, pedal wah-wah, Stephen Foster, do-dah do-dah
Good Vibrations, Help Me Rhonda, Surfer Girl and Little Honda
Tighter, tighter, honey, honey, sugar, sugar, yummy, yummy
CBS and Warner Brothers, RCA and all the others

[koganbot]

Opposition to other artists: Chuck Berry, "Roll over Beethoven, tell Tchaikovsky the news."

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

And then there's the one where it's probably a namedrop, but you're not exactly sure, like "Rumors" by Timex Social Club:

Did you hear the one about Michael? - Some say he must be gay- I tried to argue but they said if he were straight he would'nt move that way-
Did you hear the one about Tina? - some say she's just a tease- in a camosal she's six feet tall
she'll knock you to you knees..

Or maybe even "Attack Of the Name Game" by Stacy Lattisaw:

Come on, let do Teena”

Tack it back, I gotta Tack attack
I gotta Tee Ty Toe the Tack a jack
Turn the Teena, gotta move the Meena
Gotta wham-bam funkify the Feena, Teena

Well, how ‘bout Stevie
(That’s easy)

Stack it back, I gotta Stack attack
I gotta Stee Sty Stoe the Stack a jack
Turn the Tevie, gotta move the Mevie
Gotta wham-bam funkify the Fevie, Stevie

I always assumed the first song meant Michael Jackson and Tina Turner, and the second one meant Teena Marie and Stevie Wonder, but I might be wrong.

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

Yeah, sometimes it seems like every other country song mentions Merle or George or Willie or all three -- country is even more obsessed with its own history, and proving its bonafides that way, than rock is. Hank Williams Jr, especially, is barely able to get through a single song without mentioning his Dad.

But when I saw this question, the first songs that came to mind were "Willie, Waylon, and Me" by David Allan Coe (who was known to namedrop Merle Haggard too) and "The South's Gonna Do It Again" by Charlie Daniels (which is more Southern Rock, I guess):

Well, the train to Grinder's Switch is runnin' right on time
And them Tucker Boys are cookin' down in Caroline
People down in Florida can't be still
When ol' Lynyrd Skynrd's pickin' down in Jacksonville
People down in Georgia come from near and far
To hear Richard Betts pickin' on that red guitar

Elvin Bishop sittin' on a bale of hay
He ain't good lookin', but he sure can play
And there's ZZ Top and you can't forget
That old brother Willie's gettin' soakin' wet
And all the good people down in Tennessee
Are diggin' Barefoot Jerry and C.D.B

(Grinderswitch, Barefoot Jerry, and Marshall Tucker -- along with lots of other names there -- being '70s Southern rock artists, for those unaware.)


"Luckenbach, Texas (Back To The Basics Of Love)" is weird because of an unexplained switch between Waylon Jennings's verse...

Let's go to Luckenbach Texas with Waylon and Willie and the boys
This successful life we're livin' got us feuding
like the Hatfield and McCoy's
Between Hank Williams pain songs, Newberry's train songs
and blue eyes cryin' in the rain out in Luckenbach Texas
ain't nobody feelin' no pain

and Willie Nelson's verse:

Let's go to Luckenbach Texas with Willie and Waylon and the boys
This successful life we're livin' got us feuding
like the Hatfield and McCoy's
Between Hank Williams pain songs and Jerry Jeff's train songs
and blue eyes cryin' in the rain out in Luckenbach Texas
ain't nobody feelin' no pain

I asked on ILX last year "Did Willie not like (Micky) Newbury? Also, whose train songs are better? I've never much listened to either contestant's train songs, though every time I hear this song, it reminds me that I probably should." Here's what Don Allred replied, which explanation I love even if he made it up on the spot: "According to his daughter Susie or Suzie Nelson's Dad-bio/memoir, think it's titled Stardust Memories, Willie belatedly discovered that his offspring was about to elope with Mr. Newbury (forget how old he was, but way older than her). So, it was Willie who approached the waiting sports car that fateful morn, Willie and his .357, bringing enlightment (it worked, as least as far as Willie's kids were concerned)."

Also worth mentioning, if nobody has already, that country artists sometimes namedrop non country artists' names, too. For instance, Kenny Chesney had a hit a couple years ago that either named or direclty quoted Steve Miller and Billy Joel (or more likely song titles by them.) And here is "American Radio," a (disappointing, unfortunately) country hit by Carolina Rain from last year:

The first time I kissed Julie Ann in a Chevy Van
It was my old mans, it was George Straits baby blues.
And when she move back to San Jose, it was Missing You and Purple Rain
That I leaned on to get me through.
Its been the soundtrack to my life since I remember
My memories are all in stereo.

All I have to do is hear two notes, or give me three steps and a Mac Top boat
My Grandad in 1989 and all I need to hear are the first few words of Jumpin' Jack Flash or even Free Bird and I'm ready for a good time

It was Randy Travis on the beach and Barry White in that back seat.
The ups and downs, my highs and lows, Ive lived them all in stereo, American radio

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

Actually, I meant to say it's country is even more obssesed with proving its bonafides by dropping hall-of-fame name than rap (not rock) is. Rock would clearly finish a distant third in the competition.

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

AAAARGGH!!!!: Translation of my translation: "Actually, I meant to say THAT country is even more obssesed with proving its bonafides by dropping hall-of-fame NAMES than rap (not rock) is. Rock would clearly finish a distant third in the competition."

(Not that anbody is reading this stuff anyway. One thing I, uh, love about livejournal is that the threads apparently die about ten minutes after they're started, but I tend not to notice them for at least ten hours, at which time the threads are obviously yesteday's news and everybody else has moved on.)

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

I am reading! But then I get all the comments emailed to me as I started the post.

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

Kenny Chesney directly naming three classic rock songs (though not naming the artists) in "I Go Back":

"Jack and Diane" painted a picture of my life and my dreams,
Suddenly this crazy world made more sense to me
Well I heard it today and I couldn't help but sing along
Cause everytime I hear that song...

I go back to a two toned short bed Chevy
Drivin my first love out to the levvy
Livin life with no sense of time
And I go back to the feel of a fifty yard line
A blanket, a girl, some raspberry wine
Wishin time would stop right in its tracks
Everytime I hear that song, I go back

I used to rock all night long to "Keep On Rockin Me Baby"
Frat parties, college bars, just tryin to impress the ladies
I heard it today and I couldn't help but sing along
Cause everytime I hear that song....

I go back to the smell of an old gym floor
The taste of salt on the Carolina shore
After graduation and drinkin goodbye to friends
And I go back to watchin summer fade to fall
Growin up too fast and I do recall
Wishin time would stop right in its tracks
Everytime I hear that song, I go back, I go back

We all have a song that somehow stamped our lives
Takes us to another place and time

So I go back to a pew,preacher, and a choir
Singin bout God, brimstone, and fire
And the smell of Sunday chicken after church
And I go back to the loss of a real good friend
And the sixteen summers I shared with him
Now "Only The Good Die Young" stops me in my tracks
Everytime I hear that song

The first verse of which reminded me of John Cougar Mellencamp's namedrops in "R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A.":

Voices from nowhere
And voices from the larger towns
Filled our head full of dreams
Turned the world upside down
There was Frankie Lyman-Bobby Fuller-Mitch Ryder
(They were Rockin')
Jackie Wilson-Shangra-las-Young Rascals
(They were Rockin')
Spotlight on Martha Reeves
Let's don't forget James Brown

And I just noticed this in Tom Petty's "Running Down A Dream" a couple days ago:

It was a beautiful day, the sun beat down
I had the radio on, I was driving
Trees flew by, me and Del were singing
Little Runaway I was flying

Del of course being Del Shannon.

Which reminds me of Golden Earring's "Radar Love":

The radio's playing some forgotten song
Brenda Lee's coming on strong
The road's got me hypnotized
And I'm speeding into a new sunrise

Which reminds me of Led Zeppelin saying it's been a long time since "Book of Love" and doing the stroll in "Rock and Roll." Honestly, there are thousands of these...it's not remotely rare, and probably never was.

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

So most of these songs are using music that happens to be playing in the background to set the scene (often for nostalgic purposes.) But the Charlie Daniels and Waylon and David Allan Coe ones are more like a roll-call of who's in their fraternity. And the Melencamp one is a history lesson, teaching his fans important names they might otherwise not know.

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

Though actually, duh, I just rememberd that, in addition to being a fraternity rollcall (in which David Allan Coe strategically appoints himself the third muskateer to two already hugely respected icons), "Willie, Waylon and Me" is also a history lesson (about the history of country rock, specifically):

I'd heard The Burritos out in California
could fly higher than The Byrds
Roger McQuinn had a 12 string guitar.
It was like nothing I'd ever heard
And The Eagles flew in from the west coast
Like The Byrds they were trying to be free
While in Texas the talk turned to Outlaws
Like Willie and Waylon and me.

They say The Beatles were just the beginning
of everything music could be
Just like The Stones I was rolling a lone
Like a ship lost out on the sea
And Joplin would die for the future
And Dylan would write poetry
And in Texas the talk turned to Outlaws
Like Willie and Waylon and me


Also worth mentioning (and this is as good a place as any, I guess) that the very first instance of electronica-shoutout was almost definitely in "Trans Europe Express" by Kraftwerk, from 1977:

From station to station
back to Dusseldorf City
Meet Iggy Pop and David Bowie

[gingermint.livejournal.com]

the hold steady's "certain songs" is about, specifically, "only the good die young" (also) and "paradise by the dashboard light."

http://www.songmeanings.net/songs/view/3530822107858513197/

speaking of the hold steady, they have a song ("joke about jamaica") which uses many led zeppelin titles in the lyrics:

http://www.songmeanings.net/songs/view/3530822107858725388/

[koganbot]

More Dixie Chicks, though this isn't a simple tribute but rather a sense of solidarity in the midst of Natalie Maines' haterade towards her and Buddy Holly's hometown:

International airport
A quarter after nine
Paris Texas, Athens Georgia's
Not what I had in mind
As I'm getting out I laugh to myself
Cause this is the only place
Where as you're getting on the plane
You see Buddy Holly's face

I hear they hate me now
Just like they hated you
Maybe when I'm dead and gone
I'm gonna get a statue too
--The Dixie Chicks "Lubbock Or Leave It" (possibly their best song)