pop-as-sound vs pop-as-ethos

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

This is something which came up a) between Gareth and I last night at Lovelife, and b) in the comments box of the last post in the wake of Sweden's first round upset/The Knife's dominance of the pie thingy.

It's been noticeable recently (over the past year or so definitely) that the ahem 'online pro-pop community' seems to have collectively decided that 'pop' is a fixed sonic genre: synth-based, very gay (large elements of androgyny and burlesque), very white (a deliberate move away from turn-of-the-century r&b-influenced pop eg Britney, Xtina), and Swedish for preference. I don't like much of this stuff as I find it all very bloodless - those I approve of (Annie, The Knife) often have a harder electro edge, but for the most part it's incredibly unimaginative and wimpy (Bodies Without Organs, those terrible people whose entire career seems to be based on covering the Pet Shop Boys) - and as we all know, WIMPY = INDIE.

But surely the entire point of 'pop', the point of music made with commercial impact in mind, is that it can never be rooted in any particular sound: it's anything and everything which cannibalises anything and everything else, leading to sonic results all over the musical map. It's an ethos rather than a genre - I think the scattergun Xenomania approach typifies it quite well - which means that the pop umbrella can cover everything it or you or the public wants it to.

How do you view pop? And what's your view on the trend towards wimpy, bloodless Scandinavians being held up as some sort of ULTIMO-POP?

Comments

[poptasticuk.livejournal.com]

As quite possibly the most pop obsessed person on the planet, I have to respond to this. Pop to me is pretty much synonymous with happiness - it's almost Platonic, to me pop is like "the good" and every song's closeness to "the good" is determined by how poppy it is, how happy it sounds. If you think BWO are wimpy, you must be listening to the wrong songs. Listen to Sunshine In The Rain or Conquering America - does that not sound like pure sparkling happiness to you? For me pop is:

- extravagant & OTT
- uplifting in sound & usually message

It doesn't matter which instruments are used to reach this result, although obviously some instruments (such as synths as you mentioned) make it easier than others. Of course there are some great sad, slow songs which could be called pop, but these tend to have other pop qualities in such a huge way that makes up for what they lack.

Pop is certainly not about fitting into what's currently popular, because that would make Arctic Monkeys more pop than Annie, which they're obviously not - they're more popULAR. The word "pop" may have been derived from "popular", but it's become something quite separate, yet many people still can't separate the two.

[martinskidmore.livejournal.com]

Well I was just listening to Baby Huey's cover of A Change Is Gonna Come. It's insanely extravagant and OTT - his screaming fucking terrified me the first time I hear it, and I still adjust the volume whenever it starts. Its message is plainly uplifting, and his version is punchier and bouncier than many, so it's kind of uplifting in sound too. But there is no way in the world it's a pop record, nor has anyone ever tried to claim it is. There isn't a good definition of pop, I think - all of them have exceptions, mostly lots of important ones. And I'm very distrustful of anything that ties it (or any other genre term) to judgements of quality. There's good and bad pop like there is good and bad indie - if you start to claim otherwise you drift into hopeless circular arguments.

I do think pop has ALWAYS been about fitting in with what's popular. That's not all there is to it, but it's what has meant there has been pop for so long, and yet Girls Aloud sound nothing like Frank Sinatra.

[poptasticuk.livejournal.com]

I've never heard that song so I can't comment. My criteria for pop was rather rushed and not supposed to be definitive. What I was trying to say is that there must be criteria for pop, it just isn't a specific sound, and my suggestion is that it's to do with how the music makes you feel. The fact that you knew your song wasn't pop shows that there is such a thing as pop as a genre and therefore it must have criteria for what belongs to it or not.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

V interesting - I have toyed with equating 'poppy' to 'happy' myself but as you point out ballads are a bit of a stumbling block: what are their 'other pop qualities'? What makes a Will Young or Sugababes acoustic ballad pop, but a Jose Gonzalez or Sufjan Stevens one indie? And then there are people like Coldplay who both pop people and indie people would like to reject and push into the other category. As far as I can see the only possible answer is that Will Young and Sugababes are people who usually make unarguably pop songs.

Also - there are many non-ballad pop songs which sound ostensibly happy but in fact are about quite depressing subjects: much of the Emma Bunton solo album, a lot of Annie's songs come to that. But then maybe what makes them pop is their ability to have some sort of uplift - whooshing synths or whatever - despite the darker lyrics.

Extravagant and uplifting is interesting because they're things I usually associate with dance music, stuff like really blissful microhouse - that Gabriel Ananda track I mentioned the other day for example. My idea of poppy happiness is more...I don't really know how to describe it as it is the morning, but it's the difference between dancing to Jamelia's 'Superstar' and Madonna's 'Hung Up'. Or indeed the difference between 'What You Waiting For?' and 'What You Waiting For? (Jacques Lu Cont remix)'.

I don't know which BWO songs I've heard, but the World Cup one reminded me of what I don't like about them - it really isn't so much the synths (which I just find a bit unimaginative) as the vocals, which aren't...muscular or distinctive enough.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

I prefer Data 80 to BWO

I don't think happiness is a requisite for Good Pop really. If anything a lot of my favourite pop songs have that perfect blend of euphoria and some sense of pathos or pain or regret, even if one is only reflected in the sound and one in the lyrics/voice - 'Don't You Want Me' and 'Tainted Love', 'Digital Love' and 'Heartbeats' - the list is fortunately never-ending!

My favourite track ever is Officially And Always Will Be 'Blue Monday' but perhaps I'd be reaching to suggest that the beat/music is quite 'jolly'.

[poptasticuk.livejournal.com]

I think the main difference between a Will Young acoustic ballad and a Sufjan Stevens one is the singer - they have different voices and styles of singing, and also they are known to be pop or indie so that influences our responses to them. If Will had sung Heartbeats instead of José, as he fairly feasibly could have, it surely would have been considered pop. If José had sung Leave Right Now, that in turn would probably have been called indie.

You make a good point about some of the best pop songs not being extravagant - perhaps extravagant was not really the word I was looking for, it's very difficult to think of one which sums up exactly what I meant by it. There's just something instant about pop music that grabs you - most pop songs aren't growers, you don't have to ease into or get used to them, although there are some great exceptions.

It seems like the pop and indie work ethics have mixed so much with producers like Xenomania, that music like electro-pop is difficult to categorise as either pop or indie. I don't think there has to be two definite categories though - most music seems to be inbetween, either more or less poppy.

Gone (the world cup song) is by far the weakest BWO song. Perhaps I should post some of their others so you & other Poptimists who don't like/get them from what you hear in Gone can get a better idea of what they're really like.