"Call Me" vs. "Call Me Maybe"

As much as I love Blondie, "Call Me" has always felt too cold & clinical; a marker of how remote they briefly became at the apex of their imperial phase.

I love cold, clinical and remote Blondie! I'm always a little disappointed by "Atomic" (which I guess is their most remote track, and is brilliant despite my disappointment) because it's never quite as icy as I remember it. But "Call Me" is not even in my top 5 Blondie songs - not remote enough for me.

I still probably like it better than CMM but this needs more thought.

"Call me" was the first Blondie single I didn't buy. Probably because it wasn't on a nice 12" single.

Does it stop being truly great when you hit 17, 18 or maybe 22?

It's similar to a pitcher velocity aging curve, but moved 10 years up. So it's in peak form when you're 15, holds steady until 18, then declines every year until you hit about 30, when it's value over a replacement song (say, "All Out of Love" by Air Supply) becomes about zero

I have never made the musical connection between "Children Of The Grave" and "Call Me" before this moment. LOL, thanks ILM!

gotta give xhuxk total credit for that link, even if he got it from somewhere else back in the day

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17ktP8hmqHs

wish this were slooower

ahh here we go

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teHgkrMVpz0

oh and one of these

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSxquE6VDiQ

That Fallon/Roots clip made me like Call Me Maybe a lot more but I think it's more to do with Questo playing a kazoo than Carly May Jetson or w/e her name is

Still Blondie

Carly May Jetson

dn of the future!

I do appreciate lex's interpretation up above but I think she's looking into it way too much, as far as I can tell this woman's being marketed to the 14-year old Bieber crowd

the song has pretty broad appeal across age groups, demographically it's more like "Toxic" than a Bieber single

i am a teenpop person but "call me maybe" doesn't really do it for me; it gets stuck in my head sometimes and i think i like it and then i play it and get bored. lex otm about the "maybe" part, though, that is my favorite thing about it.

same here. it's just an OK song imo, not bad but not great.

I disagree respectfully even, frog; I think Lex is a great writere who's made a career out of loving this stuff (and getting others to love it too) and I think he has nailed how the song's appeal works rather masterfully

I was going to say, Call Me Maybe clearly appeals to a generation of people who have felt alienated by the majority of post-Gaga, post-Guetta chart pop.

I disagree respectfully even, frog; I think Lex is a great writere who's made a career out of loving this stuff (and getting others to love it too) and I think he has nailed how the song's appeal works rather masterfully

are you 30?

idk those chord changes still sound pretty ravey to me, in a way.

xp

xp haha what? p sure there is a big overlap bw ppl who like jepsen and gaga/guetta

(Wow I totally fucked up those first four words! Xxp)

for another month and a half, Alfred. But I'm voting for Blondie, mind you

I was unfamiliar with Tweet's "Call Me" before this thread, but damn. That song makes me feel all icky. Cheating is bad behavior and desparate and aggressive cheating is even worse. So imo Tweet's song isn't better than either of these, and is in fact something I'll probably never listen to again if I can help it.

how about that beat though

dope beat.

I disagree respectfully even, frog; I think Lex is a great writere who's made a career out of loving this stuff (and getting others to love it too) and I think he has nailed how the song's appeal works rather masterfully

Well you can see whatever you want to see in the tune. I mean, 26 is old for this kind of music (she's older than me!), and I don't feel like it's being marketed that way. Would you know how old she was if you didn't look it up? What would you have guessed if you hadn't? Also "Call Me Baby" wouldn't really work, but yes that part is interesting. I mean theres plenty to like about the tune but I would be careful ascribing it that kind of meaning

haha what? p sure there is a big overlap bw ppl who like jepsen and gaga/guetta

Of course, but there's also going to be a chunk of that fanbase who don't, because Call Me Maybe is considerably more 00s or even late 90s teenpop than it is 10s teenpop.

why do you care so much about the proper age at which you listen to shit?

youthful appeal a liability, says They Might Be Giants fan

in the eighties frogbs would have been stanning for Steve Winwood albums

i don't hear any '90s in it, it's a very mid-'00s Veronicas-via-Vanessa Carlton thing imo

speaking of which, i remember how shocked people were at Carlton being 21 when "A Thousand Miles" dropped

yeaaahhhh that Tweet song. just, no.

I liked 'Oops, Oh My' - 'Call Me', not so much.

TMBG is a totally different thing, dunno what you're on about there

"The proper age" - to me it feels a lot more like Bieber than say Lady Gaga or even "Toxic", there's just a certain type of wide-eyed romantic idealism that hits so much harder for a teenager than it does somene who's 15 years removed from puberty, if you are and you still love the song, more power to ya. I mean I do appreciate this for being the biggest earworm since "Born This Way", at least

feel like only the strings are giving it the Vanessa Carlton feel and the vocal affectations give it a sort of juvenile quality a la Barbie girl but everything else about this song to me is dr. luke/Katy perry type joint

There's no obvious use of autotune or massive rave clouds or thudding house beats. It's got a completely different feel.

yeah it's by no means an anti-Katy/Luke but it's got a pretty distinct sensibility from that stuff

it's definitely a breath of fresh air in the era of Lady Gaga/Katy Perry/Black Eyed Peas/Guetta, I don't think the strings quite give it a vibe like Vanessa Carlton, I think they're just there because that's what makes the song the catchiest, simple as that

Katy Perry and Carly Rae Jepsen are doing the same things musically, imo

yes. you can sing p much all of "teenage dream" to the instrumental of "call me maybe"

Call Me Maybe strikes me as being more in the Michelle Branch/Sara Bareilles axis of Vanessa Carlton type stuff.

Katy Perry and Carly Rae Jepsen are doing the same things musically, imo

not that i know any CRJ outside of this song but the hallmark of Katy Perry is her Jeff Mangum style of singing everything is LOUDLY AS FUCKING POSSIBLE while "Call Me Maybe" at least has the option of being ignored

please, nobody listen to the Slate Culture Gabfest discussing Call Me Maybe this week.

done and done

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

you're still talking about "call me" nearly 30 years later. I'm pretty sure everyone will have forgotten "Call me maybe" by this time next year. utterly forgettable.

I'm prettty everyone won't.

pretty sure

yeah i hate when people say that. people remember EVERYTHING now, especially things that have reached a certain level of ubiquity.

what evidence have you that critics and listeners thought Blondie's "Call Me" would vanish after summer '80?

xpost

If people still remember "French Kissing in the USA" (and they do) then they will certainly remember "Call Me Maybe".

is that the original title of "Party In The USA"?