Contrary to what you may believe, I don’t hate pop music. The varieties of music (and other things besides) I do hate and revile is quite lengthy, especially when you break it down by artist, but something as broad and generally inoffensive as ‘pop’ doesn’t begin to qualify. After all, I’m not a hipster, nor am I a surly 16-year old who listens to “everything but country and rap”, a line I once, regretfully, used.
I am a snob, and a proud one at that, but that’s led me, in recent years, to sample far more music than I necessarily talk about. Being a snob isn’t about dismissing things out of hand, but judgment and critique. I actually listen to terrible music before bitching at length about it, which I consider remarkable progress.
Generally speaking, anyone who says that they hate a given genre of music isn’t worth your time. There’s something of worth to be found in every genre under the sun, with the possible exception of genres snobs like me occasionally conjure up to describe the things we hate (corporate/plastic (or plasticine as I may start saying) pop, in my case). Even in those cases, someone with enough bullheadedness could probably get me to weakly acknowledge some Top 40 bubblegum swill as decent, even without relying on the nostalgia factor, which can override anyone’s common sense.
Of course, when I say that I don’t hate pop music it doesn’t carry much weight. After all, when a single genre can be stretched and distorted enough to contain Michael Jackson, Weezer, Frank Sinatra, The Beatles (you don’t a fucking link, I think), The Who, Blondie, and Aretha Franklin among many, many others, it holds little actual meaning. Saying, “I like pop music,” is rather similar to saying, “I like weather.” It begs a follow-up question: “What kind of pop music?”
Which is of course a ridiculous question if you read it literally: saying, “I like pop,” is supposed to be the equivalent of, “I like whatever’s on the radio,” or “I like what everyone else likes,” and should earn the immediate follow-up of a disdainful glance and a sip of your liquor of choice. However, as Steve Hyden pointed out, “’Pop’ is no longer short for ‘popular’; it’s simply one choice in a sea of genres.” Much like the terms ‘indie’ or ‘alternative’ (which will be addressed at some point in the future, promise), the label of ‘pop’ has become as hazy and indistinct as a telephone pole on an ill-advised drive home.
So what do I mean when I use the term pop? My definition is flexible: generally you can label anything that seems to deliberately seek an appealing sound as pop, or a more suitable sub-genre (eg. pop rock) of your choice. Pop music does not push any envelopes. It is not a challenge, it does not have a message. It does not belong to any particular era, culture, person, or style. It has a sense of play about it, but does not seek to make you laugh. It does not seek to surprise but instead to impress; advances in technology are used to enhance and exaggerate the melodic and rhythmic techniques that have survived the test of time, and to eke ever closer to an ideal sound. It plays off of what has been successful before.
I am here distinguishing pop, which is made with the intention of appealing to people, from popular music, which simply appeals to people. The latter actually has a great deal of variety; all of the artists I linked to above were, at one point or another, considered popular, and they sound remarkably distinct from one another. Conversely, none of them fit my critique for ‘pop’ music, at least not for the songs in question: Michael Jackson was creating unabashedly unique dance music that came from some very specific, niche (arguable) genres; Weezer, during the Blue Album and Pinkerton era anyway, were far too honest and direct to qualify as idealized; Frank Sinatra was acting to appeal to an established genre, true, but was doing it seemingly without effort or need to impress; The Beatles constantly pushed the envelope from around A Hard Day’s Night on; The Who were acting as the voice for the Mod generation, as well as youths in general, and Daltrey’s stuttering delivery is about far from perfect as you can get; Blondie were singing a revenge fantasy without teeth (“Rat food” instead of the expected “rat poison” in the last verse); and Aretha Franklin was speaking for women and black people alike when she yelled out for respect.
However, all of the above artists have been guilty of turning away from appealing to themselves toward appealing to an audience. Fewer chances were taken and less honesty was spoken. The most blatant/depressing example of this would be Weezer, who went from the heart-on-my-sleeve songwriting of Pinkerton to whatever the hell Make Believe was supposed to be in less than a decade.
Trying to appeal to an audience by making slick, listenable music isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Big Star is beloved by critics and modern-day snobs alike but no one’s going to start claiming that they were trying to push things forward (except for Third/Sister Lovers, which is the closest anyone’s ever come to putting complete and utter desperation on record). They were just trying to make some great music. Same with The Band, The Kinks, Buckethead, Radiohead, or this week’s artist, Holy Ghost!.
Holy Ghost (no, I’m not going to type the exclamation point each time) is not challenging music. This is not music you play to that friend of yours who wears scarves and has an acoustic guitar autographed by Colin Meloy and Win Butler. You don’t look up the lyrics or analyze note placement. None of that shit; this is pop gloss finery.
And, like I said before, I really do enjoy it. I enjoy music that you can sit down and listen to without worrying that you somehow don’t get it. Don’t get me wrong, I love the more effortful albums like Swordfishtrombones, but in the end I come to music looking for something I’ll enjoy. As with books, film, or any other art form, that enjoyment can come from something relatively mindless as well as from something more meaningful. The latter will stick in your memory more, but the former certainly helps to pass the time.
For that reason, among others, I’m not surprised that this album barely made a ripple in the pond upon release. For all the poptimist talk in critical circles, Pitchfork still prefers its literary twee and deliberately difficult witch house nonsense, along with the artists able and willing to pay the Pitchfork ransom on 8.5+ scores. Every reviewer known to magazines has accepted payment for a score or grade (with the possible exception of Christgau, who is basically music’s Ebert considering his trend toward populist tastes) and the ones able to give away that kind of money are the ones often considered central to the poptimist argument of presentation and glitz as king.
Holy Ghost distinguishes itself from bubblegum pop, the self-aggrandizing R&B of Beyonce, and the future-Madonna sound of Lady Gaga through sheer simplicity. It’s rare to hear dance music that neither rushes nor insists upon itself, but that’s exactly what this album sounds like to me. By and large, this is music without ethos, time, or place. This is, more or less, an example of the ideal music that pop strives for, in my opinion at least.
The personality of the band comes through, mainly, from the album’s New Wave sound and the vaguely hip-hop-esque delivery of the vocals (not surprising, considering their background as hip-hop group Automato). In sound, it’s similar to Robyn’s recent work on the electropop/new disco scene; Depeche Mode for the clubs, more or less. The vocals are more subdued than Robyn’s, and the hooks less whistleable, but the beats, at least, are a definite rival.
That new disco sound of drum machines and synths is interesting to listen to, mainly because of how Holy Ghost twists them about. Listen to “It’s Not Over” (previous link) again and pay attention to the drum breakdown at 1:33; I count at least three different drum tracks being played over each other, something I honestly can’t match to any other artificially produced drum line I’ve heard. It sounds more like something off a classic Fiona Apple track than anything in New Wave/disco/whatever. The same trick is used again on “Slow Motion”, and percussion is used in a simpler manner as the intro hook for “Do It Again”. Considering that’s the first track on the album, I’d say Holy Ghost put a good deal of effort into those drum stylings, and it’s that percussive style that drives most of these tracks.
The sad fact about musicians making pop music is that just because it sounds like something that could be played on the radio it won’t necessarily make it there. For every Big Star that gets credited long after the fact, there are hundreds of legitimately talented groups that even the Numero Group won’t ever uncover. There are artists that made beautiful music that only a few people, their close family maybe, or a few friends, ever heard. I don’t romanticize unheard music like that anymore than I worship lo-fi recordings of the old blues, but it’s worth keeping in mind all the same. Just because something is pop doesn’t make it popular, and visa versa. No one really knows how to make something people are guaranteed to enjoy.
Cheers. See you next week.
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