Why I Hate Pop vs. Why I Love Girls Aloud: The Lex vs. Plan B

Cause in truth, they don't actually like Bright Eyes/Wolfmother/insert name of this month's indie sensation, they just PRETEND to like it coz it's like, rebellious and cool to like it.

Anyway, as I proved to Anna yesterday, GA are actually Spacerock. So there.

Is it the same article?

How do you figure this? They were both op-ed pieces by individual writers wth bylines

x-post

haha indeed, but i wrote mine about five months ago - it got held over from the last issue because i think we couldn't find an illustrator in time. a good thing, as i think the illo it's run with is FUCKING AWESOME (girls aloud carved into mount rushmore-esque landscape! monolithic!)

I don't understand this "pretending to like it" tag.

Why is it that no one ever accuses fans of other styles of genres or music of "pretending to like it" - only bubblegum pop? "You don't REALLY like Jazz/Country/Rap/Metal, you just PRETEND to like it." Can you imagine?

But the assumption is that no SERIOUS music fan could like pop. And if you say "actually, I do like it, I like the tunes, I like the production" then that's just a pose? Huh? WTF?

The Lex hit the nail on the head when he was saying that it's snobbery thinly veiling both sexism and classism.

This assumption is that music beloved by straight, white, middle class males MUST be somehow more pure. And music made by (gasp) not just female, but working class females is dismissied illegitimate in exactly the way that fetishised "working class" males music (Oasis, Artic Monkeys) as Authentic or whatever.

I thought The Lex's article was one of the most brilliant pieces of music writing I've read in a while. Coz I don't care about posh scribes or whatever doing their think pieces about bubblegum and why it's suddenly OK to like it.

It still wasn't as bad as the one about 'false metal' in the last issue, which made me want to strangle things

xpost I liked the illustration as well!

Well that's fair enough.

It's just irritating when you see lazy journos - and invariably ones who have issues with the music blogosphere - expressing "their views" and you know exactly whom they've been reading. It's happened a lot with CoM. Hopefully once the book's out and everything in it is copyrighted, the practice should stop.

marcello - i know what you mean but i hope you wouldn't think i'd do that.

WTF, this happens all the time!

also, indie kids and 'do you REALLY like x? haven't you only just got into them now they're cool? aren't you just pretending and not a real fan at all?' - existe, n'est pas?

xpost

I used to rattle on about Mingus to TY in his On A Friday/Jericho Tavern days so it's probably my fault.

No, Lex, you're OK, unlike some prominent broadsheet writers I can think of...

Yeah, I loved the illustration. And it did actually persuade me to go out and buy the two most recent Girls Aloud albums. Cause I thought you were kidding about the songs about fisting but oh no, oh my.

(OK, this was actually because I was mixing, and I had to do something to get the Stooges out of my CD drive, because I was starting to read the interviews with Iggy going "mixing was a bit Spinal Tap... I was looking at all the dials and one was not up in the red, so I said to the engineer 'why is that one not up in the red, get it up in the red, too!'" and thinking "hrrrrmmmm, that would be a good idea" but NO NO NO that would be bad.)

Sorry for not paying attention etc, but where did this appear please?

There are plenty* of pop lovers at Plan B.

*OK, 3. But we shout pretty loud.

Though she's been worryingly into the emo lately, I know that's just a phase.

Is this a diss?

I mean, my love of pop is dependent on several things. Firstly, yeah, it is about the songwriting and the production. I like it because it SOUNDS good, the amount of craft that has gone into making it shiny and perfect and slick. Sure, maybe it's the aural equivalent of junk food or chocolate bars or whatever, but I *like* chocolate bars.

On a deeper level, I love pop because it's simple. Not unsophisticated or immature, don't get me wrong. But pop is a world of perfection, no messy edges, Xanadu, and the emotional complications are only really there as plot devices to get to the middle eight. It's a perfect soap opera world in three minutes and twenty seconds. Maybe that is some kind of non-adult longing for a world of childlike simplicity, but what's wrong with that? Escapism has its place, too.

Why isn't The Lex writing for Touch? Or Blues & Soul? Or whatever mags in that vein are still going?

Why isn't Geir writing for Blues & Soul?

he was beaten to the Editor position by the drummer from Gay Dad.

AHEM i'm holding it down like a big dogg, if you care to read. just in the film section.

All of this typical shit has already been covered here:

Girls Aloud diss longstanding ILM heart-throb.

I mean, my love of pop is dependent on several things. Firstly, yeah, it is about the songwriting and the production. I like it because it SOUNDS good, the amount of craft that has gone into making it shiny and perfect and slick. Sure, maybe it's the aural equivalent of junk food or chocolate bars or whatever, but I *like* chocolate bars.

On a deeper level, I love pop because it's simple. Not unsophisticated or immature, don't get me wrong. But pop is a world of perfection, no messy edges, Xanadu, and the emotional complications are only really there as plot devices to get to the middle eight. It's a perfect soap opera world in three minutes and twenty seconds. Maybe that is some kind of non-adult longing for a world of childlike simplicity, but what's wrong with that? Escapism has its place, too.

with me this all is what hooks me in initially, but as often as not i find myself emotionally involved in pop songs in much the same way as, for example, i did when i was a teenager with tori amos, pj harvey &c - except i'm more aware of the various projection issues. examples - hilary duff's 'the math', girls aloud's 'whole lotta history', will young's 'leave right now', britney's...britney's entire catalogue, actually. oh and that awesome 60s-tinged emma bunton album! i think it most appeals to me when either the emotions described are totally, stereotypically teenage, like those american high school rom-coms; or when the singer appears to hit on something quite, quite universal (mariah carey's 'we belong together'). there is also a lot of abjection stuff involved with this but i gotta get back to work now innit. but i am going to make a cd of abjection in pop this weekend.

David is not indie!!! (yes he bloody is)

Been thinking about the sound of pop - what I really love is when small details of the instrumentation/arrangement really reinforce a simple narrative. I was listening to that Jack Nitschze (sp?) compilation yesterday and he was a genius in the way that he would just bring in a shaker or a string line to heighten the emotional pull of the lyric. Actually Trevor Horn does this really well too, but in a more high tech way. It can be down to knowing *exactly* when to bring in a harmony backing vocal or exactly when to throw in an extra splash on the crash cymbal. I think pop producer, at least the great ones, HAVE to be control freaks about this. In rock, a lot of this detail doesn't seem to be so important, or at least if it's there, it's there cos they kinda felt like it on the day, rather than it *having* to be there.

This probably part of the reason why I feel the song intro is urgent and key in pop, but not that important in rock.

Tangentially, I don't think Chris Walla is a very good producer.

feel i have to point out that Ben Myers wrote his first book off his own back, devoting a year to it - unpaid - and not seeing much in return of it. It was just something he really wanted to do. In addition he runs the Captains Of Industry label and last time I spoke to him was looking at setting up a small indie publishing company to publish other writers doing slightly left-of-centre (not pop, obviously, but not worthless either) writing.

hardly a hack, in my book.

Marcello, what magazines do you write for.............

I'm going to have to think about this, Nick. Some kind of vague anti-establishment/rebel attitude (not important in pop, but not incompatible either)? Riffs rather than hooks? A feeling of being outside of society (thanks, Patti Smith), rather than in pop where lots of the action takes place implicitly in 'normal life'.

Really? If so much effort has gone into it, then why not a comparison to fine food? I'd save the junk food analogy for terrible 'copy cat' bands. Theres a lot more work that goes into pop music and thats why I like it.

I love the encyclopedic knowledge of pop and rock music that some producers seem to have. I remember the lecture that turned me on to pop music; we had to analyse it to fuck. The relationships between Phi and the perfect pop song really struck me, I'd prob been smoking too much back then. Look at where the big explosion comes in 'My Way'. Its right on the golden ratio point, this can also be found in a number of other 'perfect' pop songs, Pure Shores is a good example.

A lot of synthy pop music doesn't use equal temperment, so we get some lovely perfect intervals, which puts way less tension on the ears and makes a shineyer, well, more perfect sound. Its fun to look at the scores and see where each idea comes from, how all the parts can often be related to one really simple, but effective idea. Kind of how some of the Holy Minimalists compose.

Musical signifiers are generally much more closely matched with the lyrics/subject matter pop music, I love all that shit. Bah, I could go on, but I don't wanna come across like a total geek. I guess when it comes to songs, I like them to be composed well. There seems to be very few bands where theres a decent composer involved, especially one who's trying to innovate in some way.

Sorry if this is all stuff thats been discussed a million times before, Im kinda new to this board, after stumbling across it loads of times then losing the URL, thought I really need something to do while working over the summer.

The junk food analogy was that of the original critic, not mine. I'd compare it more to Chocolate, or to, say, Chinese Food or something.

Some chocolate is watered down crap, and some chocolate is amazing high quality. It's tempting to say "all chocolate is bad for you because it's sugary and designed just to taste good, not be good for you" because maybe it is, but you can't deny that there are different qualities for different tastes.

Or the Chinese Food metaphor (what's with these food metaphors, I must be hungry) to throw back at the indie kids - who cares if it's "authentic" or if it's what actual Cantonese people eat at home. I care that it tastes good.

(pop has greater quality control than fusion food though)

Anyway, lets all get exited about post-Girls Aloud indie guitar ipop without riffs or hooks.. that, er.. really rocks!

Could you explain this a bit?
I thought that synths used the other temperament, the non-equal one (what's it called?). So most pop would. Is that wrong?

Could you explain this a bit?
I thought that synths used the other temperament, the non-equal one (what's it called?). So most pop would. Is that wrong?

The other one is just intonation.

Any synth you buy today, by default, uses equal temperament. Many, perhaps most synths, can be programmed w/alternate temperaments, just, werkmeister, etc. I'm not aware of any pop record that uses just. It's very unusual. I've no idea where the poster got this information from.

Pianos are in the tuning that makes them only actually in tune in 'C' aren't they? So that must be how synths (at least ones with keyboards) are tuned too.

I probably am wrong about this.

Any keyboard/midi synth you buy will be tuned to equal temperament by default. Changin it to just (if possible) would involve farting around with the master menu, generally.

Strings are often tuned to just intonation according to wikipedia, so any pop song with frank sinatra singing to an orchestra might be like that???

(Sonic Youth to thread!)

Modern bowed string instruments have no frets, and the player is able to change intonation all the time. A regular fretted guitar is tuned to equal temperament, special instruments are available, though, as custom orders, see:

http://www.johngzowski.com/31%20tone%20angle%202.gif

for example.

Steel guitars are an exception, I guess slide guitar as well? Reading up on the origin of the "blue note" is interesting, in a related vein.

I swear I can hear that kind of stability in a lot intervals used on pop records/dance records though, especially some of those records that have insanely good production. Although Im not going to embarass myself further by mentioning examples.

For anyone interested in intonation and tunings:

http://www.kylegann.com/tuning.html - lots of his music on here for free a well, some of it rather good.

http://www.justintonation.net/

Watch out for insane people that seem to blame all of the problems in the western world on equal temperament. The theory is that we're constantly exposed to tensions in the sounds we hear, and that this tension isn't natural and causes all kinds of problems for us. Hmm!

Theres certainly something to it though, if you listen to some pure intervals that are totally stable it can have quite a profound effect, its kind of unsettling, but in a calming way. Anyone who's read about sound and the effect it can have on the brain and different states it can put you in will have come across this sort of stuff.

I like the idea of mixing pure intervals with some big beats to make some sort of hyper euphoric dance music. I'd be happy to YSI some examples of the differences between equal temp and stable intervals if anyone is interested?? Although perhaps this thread has been derailed quite enough.

Anyway, thread derailed, bigotry achieved, confusion all round. Job done!

We're not allowed to YSI here anymore but e-mail me your examples!

Email me too please?

meirion.lewis@gmail.com

It would be interesting if that were true, but I feel like it's more due to all of the pitch correction used on those records.

Guitars AFAIK aren't tuned in equal temperment, and it doesn't really matter since the intonation wobbles depending on how you're actually playing the note.

I'd like some samples too.

This thread got much more interesting! Thanks TomTom.

http://users.adelphia.net/~cygnusx_1/equal_temperament.html

Whoa, is this true? That blows my mind if so. What are some examples of dance tunes in just intonation?

(Regular non-customized) guitars are absolutely tuned in equal temperament if tuned 'correctly.' If you tune them a little off I guess that you're not in = temperament anymore but the frets are still in = temperament relationships. Just because you can bend notes doesn't mean that the instrument is tuned in a different intonation system. When people talk about Sonic Youth using alternate tunings, they just mean that they tune the strings to different pitches than EADGBE (e.g. F#F#GGAA on one guitar in "Schizophrenia"). These are alternate tunings in the same way that Joni Mitchell, Jimmy Page, Soundgarden, Nick Drake, Robert Johnson, ... use alternate tunings, just SY's are even more non-standard (at least in their older days.) But the F# is still basically an equal temperament F#. They aren't really using an alternative intonation system, although they often don't tune very precisely (often on purpose, I gather) so you get a lot of microtonal ringing on some of their records (as with e.g. Pavement). Sten Hosfalt, on the other hand, is a good example of a guitarist who has customized his instrument to work in a new microtonal intonation system.

One way you can get around the = temperament setup of the frets is by using harmonics, which are pure intervals. I recently performed a piece by a composer here where the strings were tuned to harmonics of other strings and much of the piece (though certainly not all) was also in harmonics.

W/r/t strings - I dunno. When they're playing w/ a piano or other = temperament instrument, surely they do tune to = temperament. In a string quartet, I suppose they often naturally tend to JI when judging by ear but I would think that if playing something where exact chromatic pitch is very important (Schoenberg, say, or probably even Beethoven) they'd aim for ET?

The Ben Myers piece is extraordinarily bad; the kind of writing I thought had been outlawed by law in 1995 or thereabouts.

Lex's piece was superb and said exactly what needed to be said. Comes at a different angle from me so that's fine.

Kulkarni's singles column was exceptional. I don't necessarily agree with all of it but suspect that a lot of it is truth.

Nice to see a bit of blood and guts in music writing again.

also bought the new alex smoke album on the basis of your article and it's a goodie!

the alex smoke is terrific yes! i had to cut quite a few quotes for space unfortunately, he said some quite interesting things about film music vs dancefloor music vs album music. btw have you heard the ellen allien album yet?

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