Rolling Teenpop 2006 Thread

(Can't tell if the "you" in the lyrics is a friend, the listener, or whom. In verse one I thought it might be Jesus, and that still might be right, but "you're the star you're on tonight" seems to be something you'd tell a friend, not a deity. "Like a neighborhood on a city street/I know the path, it knows my feet" is a good couplet - the second half, anyway, the path knowing the feet [not sure how a neighborhood can be on a street, however].)

(Btw, the one track on the original release that Armato and James helped write was "Sticks and Stones.")

As to Acoustic Hearts of Winter, I have to say I was disappointed. Granted, the two originals are great but couldn't they have:
1) Included more originals
2) Tried to do SOMETHING with the well-known carols they covered
3) At least made some effort to pick lesser known carols that haven't been done a thousand times before?

That said, "Greatest Time of Year" and "Not This Year" are both on the shortlist for top 10 Christmas pop songs of all time. ("All I Want for Christmas Is You" is number one naturally).

Lots of clips from Cow Belles, which was awful.

JoJoToTo: Kelefa Sanneh mentions in his generally favorable review of the new JoJo album that she samples Toto's "Africa."

Platinum Weird does live session on mp3.com. This version of "Crying at the Disco" definitely better than the one on the album. More fuzz-tone, more Yardbirds, more pound pound pound.

Also, as far as I can tell, the Platinum Weird album I reviewed for the New Times NY sub-affiliate didn't actually come out in mid September, as its publicist said it would, but has been postponed until early next year. Don't know this for certain, and am too lazy to find out.

But, in the meantime, Make Believe, the faux 1974 Platinum Weird album, did get released for reals eight days ago, and is available in, like, stores and stuff. Haven't heard it, other than the three tracks that are streamed on their MySpace page, two of which ("Happiness" and "Will You Be Around") are overlaps from the other alb, but in folkier, goopier, deader versions, unfortunately. Another two songs on Make Believe ("Love Can Kill the Blues" and "I Pray") are also on Platinum Weird and from the 30-second Allmusic clips seem to be sung in the same deep, dull round tones, which are supposed to be the fictitious Erin Grace's voice, I guess.

Hollywood's SECRET NEW DIET PILLS! They Melt Pounds FAST - Who's TAKING THEM & Who's Not. (Ashlee one of four women on this cover, think it was Life & Style)

ASHLEE'S HAD MORE SURGERY! Now She's Got New Eyes and a Softer Chin. Friends Worry: "Her Addiction Is Out Of Control" (In Touch, the full cover for her, not counting the sideboxes)

Is Jess jealous? She wants ASHLEE'S NOSE! (sidebox in Life & Style)

Interesting that in the short interview Jeff linked above, Ashlee calls herself "boring." I hope that she doesn't mean boring, actually, but "normal," i.e., not newsworthy. I believe her in "Autobiography" and "Shadow," where she says she has a million subtleties and that there's so much more to her we haven't seen. But these I presume would be human-being normal subtleties, ways of being, the flavor and character of a particular person, rather than celeb-sized melodrama.

Could you say more about "I Live For the Day"? I assume by "structural shapes" you mean chord shifts and harmonic mood changes and the like. The basic song pattern is standard enough: verse, second part of verse, chorus; verse, second part of verse, chorus; break, chorus, finale. Of course, as Lex says, it's MAGNIFICENT (streamed on what seems to be her actual MySpace page), and her "Oh-oh, wanna see you CRAWLin'" at the end is right up there with Jagger's "Black as night, black as coal, I wanna see the sun, blotted out from the sky" in the fadeout of "Paint It, Black" as one of the all-time great song cappers. There are interesting ways that the song throws her from the first part of the verse into the second, or after the first chorus throws her right back into the verse (as opposed to having clear demarcations). And what I call "break" above is actually these extraordinary wails that foreshadow the rocketworks of the finale.

The Veronicas are all business--killer intro; catchy verse; maybe a fake-out feedback thing; reapeat-o girl chorus--back to work.

Lohan demands a certain amount of attention paid. "Live for the..." sets a mood, the verse a situation, Lohan's voice fills with her sense of betrayal, and then the chorus comes not so much as catchy, sing-in-shower pay-off, but as an escalation and first indication of how she feels about what was set up in the verse. (And yes--the chorus repeats the signature line, but each sentence complicates it.)

the first time I heard it, my reaction was, What the fuck was that?

Still searching for Platinum Weird? Best Buy has 'Make Believe' (the '74-style album) packaged along with a disc that is identical to the advance of the '06-style album. Could probably help you locate a copy.

There's a new trend that I don't really understand these days, albums being given limited releases initially and then broader releases later - though I doubt that that's what's happening with Platinum Weird. The Teddybears got a release through indie retailers in late September, but are due to get the release through major retailers in early '07.

The rhythm is pretty much in clave throughout. And the way the vocals are low pitch at the start and given talk-like emphasis (rather than wails and melismas and such) seems very r&b.

The lyric sites have this as "on a city street," but now I think I'm hearing "on a certain street," which makes a little more sense, since you can interpret the line as "Like [being in] a neighborhood, [like being] on a certain street..."

But Jesus isn't just their Savior, he's their Bestest Friend!

The rhythm is pretty much in clave throughout. That is:

http://img231.imageshack.us/img231/8482/clavesongc4.png

(Bo Diddley does a lot of variants on this, too, even though he's not Cuban.)

I like it, but not as much as "Outside Looking In"

Babelfish translation:

Composition: (Edson Carvalho [which according to Babelfish means "Oak"])

Crying the ice that you gave to me
Finding that you already it forgot me
I do not know if she was you or if I, girl, girl
Were I you being with a sensation
That I was the track and you, the airplane
You it train and I it station, girl, girl
I remember kisses, blues and poetry.
The salt in the skin, you licked me and I said: "Oh baby, I love you" I remember the face that you made
Will be that I remember what I did not exist?
You he said: "Oh baby, I love you"
Tô in the Bahia and tô feeling cold
Beach tá full; in me all emptiness
I tô for a wire, girl, girl
Broke the rope, I look for to you until not being able more
In the InterNet, bars, in periodicals.
Trombar you is what I want more, girl, girl
I remember kisses, blues and poetry the salt in the skin you licked me and I said: "Oh baby, I love you"
I remember the face that you made, I
I remember day and night, night and day
You said: "Oh baby, I love you... Baby, I love you... Baby, I love you... I love you "

So...this is like conceptually halfway between M2M and tATu? With some Wreckers thrown in?

"Tem Dias (Que A Noite É Foda)" (more rockabilly, less fetching)

"Experimento". The new wave. Good tune.

The lipsynch.

OK. Question. If I'm writing a review for readers who don't know anything about ninths and subdominant chords and relative minors, is there any way to give them this information without boring them and getting in the way of everything else I want to say? Or even if the reader does know what those technical terms mean, does using them really communicated anything that's essential to what the song does? I made this the Song Of The Day over in the left column of my MySpace profile, and I left out the technicalities and just wrote this: "gentle and pensive, uses complex jazz chords, which don't turn this into 'smooth jazz' but rather keep the flow just unsettled enough so that it is flow, a quiet push in the music. This is the one soft song in a hundred that maintains its emotion throughout." Still might not mean a whole lot to people. I don't know.

I meant to write: "G (do), which is the ninth note in the F-minor chord."

Also, I really really really really really need to tell someone how awesome '1980' by Pascal Obispo & Melissa Mars is. It's in the French charts too - again, not exactly teenagers, but she looks about half his age, so, y'know.

Soddit, while I'm at it - Najoua Belyzel's 'Je Ferme Les Yeux' is still bloody amazing. And she's possibly teenaged too. I bet she bloody isn't, but she's got better odds than Pascal Obispo.

So yeah, in summary - French chart-pop: not half bad, sometimes.

"This Christmas card is so contrived
A mannequin looks more alive
Haven't meant a word I've written here
The page is full not one thing sincere"

It's the third line I'd not taken in, which changes the whole meaning for me. It's not a pre-printed card she's calling phony, but her own words.

(*I have no idea which voice is Aly's and which A.J.'s. In fact, looking at them in their videos I don't know who is who either, never having seen their respective TV shows. I suppose I should google their album cover; presumably, Aly'll be on the left and A.J. on the right.)

The Teen Cultural Revolution

2) Do any older-time listeners of Radio Disney know if Hoobastank or Maroon 5 got any plays on RD at the time?

3) I've been watching the WB Summerland lately which has implications on the teen singer/actor discussion thread above as it stars Jesse McCartney and Zac Efron, and also features Sara Paxton as a regular guest star. Zac and Sara were good as alyways, but I have to say I thought Jesse McCartney was surprisingly very good as an actor. Don't care for his singing though. I will probably post my full thoughts on my blog soon.

I saw them do "Chemicals React" on the Megan Mullally show, seemed like their voices were distinct (Aly's voice was stronger and less pinched), but on record it's not clear.

"Silent Night"

"Joy to the World"

"Let It Snow"

"Deck the Halls"

Links for "Greatest Time of Year," "I'll Be Home for Chistmas," and "Not This Year" >here.

("Greatest Time of Year" and "Not This Year" are very good, "I'll Be Home for Christmas" is pretty good, "Silent Night," is not so bad, the other three are adequate, I guess.)

UK chart notes:

1. Meat Loaf & Marion Raven made the UK Top 10 this week. Quite possibly the last time Marion will ever reach such giddy heights over here, but you never know.

2. My Chemical Romance have the #1 single for second straight week (and the LP, released today, is sure to follow it to #1). MCR are pomp-emo but have a large teen girl following here judging by the crowd that attended their gigs in London (one of them a matinee!) a year or so ago.

Aly of Phil of the Future adopted all sorts of crazy hairstyles, practically a new one every episode. But yeah, I agree that she looks best with just the normal straight hair.