Charli XCX

it's not like bjork did a huge-ass interview with pitchfork about having her songwriting and production questioned

Pitchfork: When it was originally misreported that Vulnicura was produced by Arca, instead of co-produced by you and Arca, it reminded me of the Joni Mitchell quote from the height of her fame about how whichever man was in the room with her got credit for her genius.

B: Yeah, I didn’t want to talk about that kind of thing for 10 years, but then I thought, “You’re a coward if you don’t stand up. Not for you, but for women. Say something.” So around 2006, I put something on my website where I cleared something up, because it’d been online so many times that it was becoming a fact. It wasn’t just one journalist getting it wrong, everybody was getting it wrong. I’ve done music for, what, 30 years? I’ve been in the studio since I was 11; Alejandro had never done an album when I worked with him. He wanted to put something on his own Twitter, just to say it’s co-produced. I said, “No, we’re never going to win this battle. Let’s just leave it.” But he insisted. I’ve sometimes thought about releasing a map of all my albums and just making it clear who did what. But it always comes across as so defensive that, like, it’s pathetic. I could obviously talk about this for a long time.

Pitchfork: The world has a difficult time with the female auteur.

B: I have nothing against Kanye West. Help me with this—I’m not dissing him—this is about how people talk about him. With the last album he did, he got all the best beatmakers on the planet at the time to make beats for him. A lot of the time, he wasn’t even there. Yet no one would question his authorship for a second. If whatever I’m saying to you now helps women, I’m up for saying it. For example, I did 80% of the beats on Vespertine and it took me three years to work on that album, because it was all microbeats—it was like doing a huge embroidery piece. Matmos came in the last two weeks and added percussion on top of the songs, but they didn’t do any of the main parts, and they are credited everywhere as having done the whole album. (Matmos’) Drew (Daniel) is a close friend of mine, and in every single interview he did, he corrected it. And they don’t even listen to him. It really is strange.

"Oh, I know she's still front cover type material (less sincere chaps might say only through the size of her buttocks and mammaries, but I won't) and I know 'Never For Ever' will once again be clung to a nation's collective bosoms, but really the formula does grate so that I'd stop somewhat short of describing the girl as a brave new force in the world of popular music." -- a line from a Kate Bush review in, I think it was, the '80s;

earlier, coverage in the '70s tended to indulge said "less sincere chaps" or lean on David Gilmour as the source of her success. but don't take it from me: http://gaffa.org/reaching/ro_int.html

xpost Ahhhhh I love that interview so much. So relentlessly on point.

As for Charli XCX, I only listened to the snippets on iTunes b/c lol who has time at this point, but it struck me as a partial reversion to the approach of the Super Ultra mixtape, which actually was probably my main Charli release all things considered.

"The former LA 'rock chick' has been reinvented as an introspective singer/songwriter in the great tradition of Joni Mitchell or Suzanne Vega. A corporate makeover by a major label? Probably." -- the beginning of a Tori Amos feature circa _Little Earthquakes_ in NME

tsk, you can prove anything with facts

There's definitely a persistent theme of a drawbridge mentality - all right, we'll allow these (venerable) women in, but any of you new ones outside the gates are automatically suspect.

It's a shame that no one has ever come up with any concepts with which to describe this binary approach to assessing women's worth.

i'd be curious to know if bono could write a song without the edge *and* adam *and* larry *and* eno and god knows who else, damn there are so many people in that machine, but for some reason no one ever asks about that.

I'm just quoting these in response to the hilarious bullshit that is "no one has EVER questioned these singer-songwriters"

obviously -- although the very existence of this tangent suggests maybe it isn't as obviously as it should be -- pop songwriting works differently than solo, probably folky singer-songwriter stuff, but that's how the industry works, just like how publishing houses employ (for some values of "employ," but that's just me complaining) editors and copy editors and proofreaders, ad companies have multiple copywriters...

and rock bands can have topline writers, too. michael stipe is/was a topline writer. people just don't tend to notice it in that situation, and/or they want to hold on this weird belief in the platonic ideal of the lone genius who exists without any kind of collaboration, as if collaboration is somehow a bad thing, as if you can't be genius if you're not locked in a dark room, alone, probably with no food or water.

Yeah, like no one ever is constantly questioning Drake's musicianship, his song writing, and what it is he actually writes and doesn't.

ghostwriting in rap is a whole separate thing

Seriously though who has ever questioned Kate Bush, Tracy Chapman, Tori Amos? No one, because there's nothing to question - for the same reason no one questions Prince or Stevie, they make their own music.

ok so question, who wrote "I Love It" then

ok so question, who wrote "I Love It" then

― a self-reinforcing downward spiral of male-centric indie (katherine), Friday, March 24, 2017 9:16 PM

I believe the vocal "melody" of the song consists of ....1 note.... repeated infinitude. A well trained monkey could've done it.

this type of thing is really muddy these days

1. "producer" means something different now than it did before protools. in the context of major label pop in 2017 it means the person or people responsible for the sounds you hear on a song that aren't human voices. even then, it's usually not that simple - many producers rely on commercially available sample packs as building blocks to construct their songs, which are sometimes elaborate enough to encompass entire chord progressions or instrumental leads. most big-name producer brands don't actually do very much production at all, instead relying on stables of uncredited ghost producers to generate ideas for them. there's no way of really knowing what a pop producer actually did to earn their production credit, and anyone capable of clarifying it is usually under an NDA

2. a popular artist will always get a songwriting credit whether they contributed to the songwriting or not. to make things more complicated, artists who receive bullshit songwriting credits often have outsized and delusional perspectives on how important their contribution was - audiences tend to be ignorant of what producers and songwriters actually do, but artists are often even moreso. they tend to genuinely believe that the twenty minutes they spend changing a lyric in the second verse was the key contribution that turned the song into a hit. major label pop artists these days are often actual teenagers who have no understanding or appreciation for the craft of songwriting. they sincerely believe that bob dylan also made music by talking to max martin about his day for a little while and then coming back the next day to find a completed song waiting to be recorded

it is impossible to fully settle arguments like this because the credits that are generally made available to the public are completely false most of the time and even the people who were in the room when the song was made don't have all the facts about what exactly happened

that said, charli actually does write and she's great at it

well, yeah, barring something like the Robin Thicke deposition it's impossible to fully settle arguments about this, but it's a whole new level of stupid to suggest that someone who makes a significant part of her living as a professional songwriter does not in fact write.

(also, pop artists might be actual teenagers, but songwriters tend to be older [because 25-year-olds are decrepit] and often either used to be "legit" solo singer-songwriters [bonnie mckee, sarah hudson, etc.] or aspired toward it)

Seriously though who has ever questioned Kate Bush, Tracy Chapman, Tori Amos?

http://americablog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/The-spanish-inquisition.jpg

iirc bonnie and sarah are both around the same age as katy perry

well I mean pre-one of the boys katy perry would have also fit the category

listening to TRUE ROMANCE for the first time in a couple of years. holds up pretty well! why haven't i liked anything she's done since (apart from "boom clap")?

nothing else she's done really sounds like it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPRy1B4t5YA

Hopefully this will be enough of a hit so we actually get the album.

Glad she's not trying to be all punky anymore.

this is fab!!

👀 'They're doing all the sexy things that girls usually do in music videos' @charli_xcx reveals the all star cast in the video for 'Boys' pic.twitter.com/vAH0yDXxvl

— BBC Radio 1 (@BBCR1) July 26, 2017

immediately loved this one

it was produced by a guy who has done stuff for terror jr, and you can def hear that muted narcotic thump thing going on but it's a little more playful than i.e. kiaara or what not, feels like her song

it is very lovely

This was a good read.

http://www.stereogum.com/1954158/so-is-charli-xcxs-album-gonna-come-out-soon-or-what/franchises/the-week-in-pop/

Apparently her third album isn't coming out until next year now!

I just hope that the viral clip is enough to get "Boys" on the radio so that people will actually care about a new Charli XCX album, whenever it gets here

holy shit this is so good

it is.

i'm rooting for charli xcx but ugh, the fat jew in the video :(

and cameron dallas? yuck

1. Joe Jonas
2. The Fat Jewish
3. Max Hershenow
4. Charlie Puth
5. Joey Bada$$
6. OLI SYKES 💕
7. Cameron Dallas
8. Sage The Gemini
9 - 10. Chromeo
11. BRENDON URIE 💕
12. Caspar Lee
13. G - Eazy
14. Stormzy
15. Denzel Curry
16. Amine
17-18. Ezra Koeng, Mark Ronson
19. MNEK
20. Rostam Batmanglij (VW)
21. DON'T KNOW
22. DAN SMITH 💕 (Bastille)
23 - 24. Flume & A.G. Cook
25- 26. Wiz Khalifa & Ty Dolla $
27. Tinie Tempah
28- 30. The Swet Shop Boys
31- 33. WSTRN
34. Taka
35. Carl Barat
36. Barns Courtney
37. Connor Franta
38. Shaun Ross
39. Fai Khandra
40. Will.i.am
41. Tommy Cash (rose dude)
42. Jack Guinness
43. Diplo (guy with the puppies)
44. Laurie Vincent (guy w baby)
45. JACK ANTONOFF 💕 (GLASSES) AKA FROM FUN & BLEACHERS AHHH.
46- 47. Tristan Evans & James McVey (dudes with the cake)
48. Tom Daley
49. Frank Carter (candle fingers)
50. The Cobrasnake (cam dude)
51. Fred Macpherson
52- 56. Mic LOWRY (DUDES IN PINK)
57- 58. THEY (BASEBALL BATS)
59. Theo Hutchcraft (pink boxing gloves)
60. Buddy (nice butt sign)
61. JOHN GOURLEY 💕 (PORTUGAL THE MAN) (GETS TATTOED CHARLI)
62. Shokichi (cup in hand)
63. Liam Fray (phone on hand)
64. Jay Park (floating flamingo)
65- 66. Prince & Jacob (beachball)
67. D.R.A.M (smashing tvs)
68. Shamari Maurice (wearing crop top)
69. Tom Grennan
70. Jay Prince (brown jersey)
71. Khalid (holding colorful pups)
72. Poets
73. VANCE JOY 💕 (takin a bite of something)
74. MAC DEMARCO 💕 (LICKING GUITAR)
75. KAYTRANADA
76. CHARLI HERSELF 💕

(that was borrowed from the yt comments)

lotta terrible boys in that video

i guess there's a boy for everyone (to be annoyed by)

Didn't recognise any of 'em! Assumed they were just random, er, boys. Great song.

the Cobrasnake in 2017?

Yea I thought these were all random dudes and Mac Demarco.

p humane to get the fat jew and charlie puth out of the way early

the sound in the chorus is almost exactly "mario gets a coin", right?

Yeah, fitting that D.R.A.M. is in the video having used the same sound on "Cha Cha"

I'm a sucker for that mario coin sound. DRAM did it better but still I can't resist it.

i'm always rooting for Charli XCX to do something better than those other people's hits she's on, but disappointed by the song. that coin sound is regrettable - it becomes
cringe-inducing by the end, for me.

video would be better if it had some GOP limelighters. surely Boehner, Ryan, Kasich and Carson would have been up for some carwash / lawncare action.

kind of amazing nobody's made a youtube of that actually

enjoying Pop 2, especially Backseat and Femmebot