I’ve been taking in Ringlets with hope in my heart but I’m not sure Van Der Graaf Generator with guitars is my idea of a good time. They’re very clever though and might turn out to be a great thing when they calm down. I guess it was only a matter of time until some jazz school kids discovered the dictionary.
I feel Lorde has become the indie artist she was always was at heart. She’s not PJ Harvey yet but maybe she’s getting to her Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea (my personal PJ fave) from the other direction. Rock on girl.
VDGG WITH guitars? I'm risking my relationship (the Venn diagram, girlfriends and VDGGenerator sint no venn diagram at all, just two seperate circles, one of which is demanding Nadirs Big Chance never gets played again)... but dammit, I gotta play it.
Totally on point, George. I'm listening to the Lorde album right now and I'm enjoying it.
You mention authenticity in there in regard to Lorde's "marked gaucheness"; I wrote in a piece with Chris Schulz that I thought authenticity was the key to breaking through in music last year. "Authenticity is crucial. You need to be seen as a real person, relatable and accessible. Think of someone like MJ Lenderman, who is topping all sorts of best-of lists: he presents as a realistic version of himself, he plays his own instruments, he sings about relatable subject matter."
Lorde's gaucheness (such a good word) is definitely helpful in the era of too-much-music, as it gives her a way to stand out from the crowd.
Agreed, I think some people still break thru by being pretentious, if the costumes and themes line up with the zeitgeist, but it's a riskier strategy and these days you still need the authentic experience under it and reflected in the art.
Rob Sheffield's 'Heart Break Is The National Anthem' is worth a read. He looks at Taylor Swift and the massive influence she is having on the current pop girlies coming through. He focuses on her authenticity, speaking directly to and inspiring a massive number of young women to write their desires and fears into songs. Billie Illish and Lorde both seem to draw from that but take it further, into some darker places. It was sometime during the covid lockdowns that I started listening to chart pop... started when I noticed a Billboard playlist, every #1 from thd birth of the pop chart. Fascinating hearing pop evolve, in fits and starts, sometimes #1s built off each other, more often throw backs than great leaps forward. Goddammit I've Thomas DeQuincey'd myself, phone keyboard swimming around ... digging the new Lorde. Wish the production kicked a little more, Melodrama (my fave) is far stronger and way more consistent. Virgin is just too inconsistent... hate it when the producer seems to have dropped 90% of his time and effort on the singles, then given the back half of the project a token effort. Right, gonna nod off in the corner now. Bx
The Katie Perry crash out is a marker for the current pop scene kicking inauthentic mofo's to the curb. Kendrick vs Drake is another... a rapper with a ghost writer? What the f happened? What I wanna know is how the hell pop boy Aubrey got into the Rap-a-Lot bbq in the first place?
I’ve been taking in Ringlets with hope in my heart but I’m not sure Van Der Graaf Generator with guitars is my idea of a good time. They’re very clever though and might turn out to be a great thing when they calm down. I guess it was only a matter of time until some jazz school kids discovered the dictionary.
I feel Lorde has become the indie artist she was always was at heart. She’s not PJ Harvey yet but maybe she’s getting to her Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea (my personal PJ fave) from the other direction. Rock on girl.
Well put both of those and pop like Lorde's is more Indie than pop that tries to sound like Indie rock
There's a bit on virgin where the string sound like GarageBand strings which is indie AF
She just needs a band. That’s my answer to everything.
Devilskin!
VDGG WITH guitars? I'm risking my relationship (the Venn diagram, girlfriends and VDGGenerator sint no venn diagram at all, just two seperate circles, one of which is demanding Nadirs Big Chance never gets played again)... but dammit, I gotta play it.
Totally on point, George. I'm listening to the Lorde album right now and I'm enjoying it.
You mention authenticity in there in regard to Lorde's "marked gaucheness"; I wrote in a piece with Chris Schulz that I thought authenticity was the key to breaking through in music last year. "Authenticity is crucial. You need to be seen as a real person, relatable and accessible. Think of someone like MJ Lenderman, who is topping all sorts of best-of lists: he presents as a realistic version of himself, he plays his own instruments, he sings about relatable subject matter."
Lorde's gaucheness (such a good word) is definitely helpful in the era of too-much-music, as it gives her a way to stand out from the crowd.
Agreed, I think some people still break thru by being pretentious, if the costumes and themes line up with the zeitgeist, but it's a riskier strategy and these days you still need the authentic experience under it and reflected in the art.
Rob Sheffield's 'Heart Break Is The National Anthem' is worth a read. He looks at Taylor Swift and the massive influence she is having on the current pop girlies coming through. He focuses on her authenticity, speaking directly to and inspiring a massive number of young women to write their desires and fears into songs. Billie Illish and Lorde both seem to draw from that but take it further, into some darker places. It was sometime during the covid lockdowns that I started listening to chart pop... started when I noticed a Billboard playlist, every #1 from thd birth of the pop chart. Fascinating hearing pop evolve, in fits and starts, sometimes #1s built off each other, more often throw backs than great leaps forward. Goddammit I've Thomas DeQuincey'd myself, phone keyboard swimming around ... digging the new Lorde. Wish the production kicked a little more, Melodrama (my fave) is far stronger and way more consistent. Virgin is just too inconsistent... hate it when the producer seems to have dropped 90% of his time and effort on the singles, then given the back half of the project a token effort. Right, gonna nod off in the corner now. Bx
The Katie Perry crash out is a marker for the current pop scene kicking inauthentic mofo's to the curb. Kendrick vs Drake is another... a rapper with a ghost writer? What the f happened? What I wanna know is how the hell pop boy Aubrey got into the Rap-a-Lot bbq in the first place?