If you want to understand everything that’s gone wrong in pop music over the last 20 years, a good place to start would be the recent New Yorker article The Song Machine. “Machine” is the operative word, since the article illustrates how the components of today’s pop songs are stripped down, parceled out, and reassembled in the studio. The “songs” that emerge become templates for high-profile “artists” to stamp their brands on and front for the public, invariably by strutting their stuff in front of elaborate stage sets and lip-synching the sounds created for them in the lab. It’s an assembly line process that would have made Henry Ford envious, after he got over his shock at the salaciousness of the product.

The article focuses on the aural machine behind Rhianna, described as “the Barbados-born pop singer (who), at twenty-four…is the queen of urban pop, and the consummate artist of the digital age, in which quantity is more important than quality and personality trumps song craft. She releases an album a year, often recording a new one while she is on an eighty-city world tour promoting the last one.” An album a year may sound impressive, until you remember that when the Beatles were pop (as opposed to “rock”) stars, they recorded eight studio albums between 1963 and 1965, with each new album noticeably different from the last. Rhianna’s machine is emblematic of that behind all Top Forty hits and is described as follows....

Read more »

A lot has happened in the pop music world in the last nine days, so herewith follows a random scattering of music-related observations. ——————————- Whitney Houston’s death really is a tragedy.  If anyone was ever blessed by the musical gods and pre-ordained for greatness, it was Whitney.   And yet, looking back on her recording career, I’m struck by how meager it was.  Just six studio albums in 27 years, and only three in the last 22 years.  Compare that with the Beatles, who at the peak of their popularity used to release three albums a year! I also can’t help but think that, in spite of her tremendous commercial success, Whitney Houston was not well-served by the music industry.  Her first hit single, “Saving All My Love for You,” was indisputably her best and one of the few to show her extraordinary range and control.  Most of her other 80s hits blended into the synth-pop dominating radio at the time.  To see what I mean, compare “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” and “Let’s Hear it For the Boy.”  Houston’s vocal chops (not to mention charisma and sex appeal) leave one-hit wonder Deniece Williams in the dust, but suppose the singers

Read more »

Finding the gaps at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame By Warren Moore The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has announced its newest class of inductees. While I don’t see any Tom Petty-level headscratchers this time around, I’m pretty much left with a resounding “meh.” Not surprisingly, The Small Faces/Faces are my favorite of the lot, but I can understand the importance of the Beasties and Chili Peppers, both of whom have done some interesting genre fusion over the years, and even though I was never a fan, G’n’R were almost a perfect example of over-the-top in their era. All they needed was a plane crash to become truly archetypal. However, the dearth of progressive rock continues as Rush gets Susan Luccied again, and we have yet to hear from Crimson, Yes, ELP or their ilk. On the hard rock end, Motorhead, Blue Oyster Cult and Deep Purple (all remarkably influential acts) are outside looking in as well. While some critics have argued that this is a result of industry bias, Lauren Onkey, who was a prof of mine during my Ph.D. years, and who is now in charge of educational programs at the Rock Hall, suggests that

Read more »

One of the few guitarists who deserves to be called legendary, Hubert Sumlin, died yesterday at the age of 80. Sumlin was the lead guitarist for Howlin Wolf's band and in the 50s and 60s, on tracks like "Killing Floor" and "Smokestack Lightning," laid down some of the most influential guitar licks of all time. Hubert Sumlin was the guitarist that Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck grew up wanting to be.

Read more »