Taking Sides: "Don't Let Me Get Me" vs. "9 to 5"

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I'm kind of obsessed with Pink's "Don't Let Me Get Me," especially the line:

"LA Told me/ you’ll be a pop star/ all you have to change/ is everything you are"

What I find amazing in this line is how detailed and specific it is to Pink's life – it’s pure autobiography, and there is no way a listener could relate to it directly, unless they, too, happen to be a pop star. Sure there is the general idea that people have to defend who they really are against the desires of those who would manipulate, but I don’t think that’s germane to the appeal of the song. The listener is supposed to relate to Pink as a person, not relate to the abstracted ideas of the song. Pink's PR tack in promoting this album is to say, "This is me talking about myself and my life, nothing manufactured", etc. You’re not supposed to relate to the ideas or situations, but the person.

Contrast this with something like Dolly Parton’s "9 to 5," which explores the idea of workaday servitude from the perspective of a fictional narrative. "People like me on the job from 9 to 5." We know Dolly Parton never really kept those hours, and yet millions of people related to the song because they heard something of themselves in it. I suppose Springsteen has built his career on these kind of narratives as well.

It seems like there’s a massive shift in pop music toward the narcissistic Pink side of things, that people want their pop stars to be "real" and talk about their personal struggles in a very direct way. I would guess that the influence of hip-hop has been the key to this shift, as hip-hop has put personality & "the real" at the center from the beginning. Even though first-person observations have a long history in pop music, there's a huge difference between the approach of something like "Idiot Wind" (hailed as one of Dylan's most personal & autobiographical songs) and "Don’t Let Me Get Me."

What do you think? Is there a shift afoot, even outside the world of hip-hop? And if this trend exists, do you think it’s a positive development? Is it confined to specific genres? What is gained and what is lost by a shift from fictional narrative to the first-person "real"?

― Mark, Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Sorry if this is a little half-baked, I'm using the ILM collective brain as my finishing oven.

― Mark, Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

"You can't be a man 'cause you don't smoke the same cigarettes as me."

When was rock music not this way, Mark? "We Are the World" doesn't count.

― dleone, Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

When was rock music not this way, Mark? "We Are the World" doesn't count.

Always! Rock songwriters always approached autobiographical stuff w/ the technique of the short story class -- "Base it on experience, but change things around to suit the needs of the piece, don't just tell the story verbatim." Mick wouldn't mention Andrew Loog Oldham by name in a song and quote a conversation they'd had word-for-word. If Pink wrote "American Pie" all the names would have been named. Instead of "and while the King was looking down the Jester stole his mortal crown" it would have been "Elvis got a little tired and then Bob Dylan took over."

― Mark, Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Well, name some more examples besides Pink. Besides, I thought selling your soul for a record deal or whatever was a pretty well- known scenario -- and it actually does have relevance to people outside the music biz. I sell my soul on a daily basis for my job, and I don't even like that song!

― dleone, Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Oh, and there was "Ballad of John and Yoko".

― dleone, Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Oddly, this "personal" tactic has the opposite approach to me by making it seem more like a calculated business tactic (jumping off of the sinking ship of pop) than a real expression of her self. I think this is mostly due to the suddenness of the change, if she had gradually shifted it would have seemed more like her real personality overshadowing what the label wants her to be. Of course, it's all bullshit - if the label wanted her to be a pop star, why would they allow her to release this sudden statement of individuality? I think "9 to 5" is a bad example of the opposite tactic, just because Parton was a star when she wrote it, doesn't mean she's never lived a working life. I'm not an expert on her personal life, but I'm pretty sure she came out of a working class background and is therefore capable of writing a personal song about working "9 to 5." I would also disagree that there's a sudden shift - I haven't perceived one at least. Popular music has almost always been assumed to be from the point of view of the performer. If it wasn't, then Randy Newman wouldn't have been so controversial with his songs about racism and hating short people. I would personally like to have more fictional narratives, especially in pop music. I am fucking sick of pop stars who write entire sophomore albums about how hard it is to be rich and popular. Even if it is true (ha!), it's become trite and redundant to say so.

― Nick A., Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Why I can't get paragraphs in my replies?

― Nick A., Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I always thought she meant "LA" to be Los Angeles, as a kind of shorthand for all the smarminess of show business... But this is an interesting question. Is there something about music that lends itself toward autobiography? Or is that just the way we're trained to look at it? I mean, we're not really supposed to think Nabokov is Humbert Humbert, for instance. Why do we automatically assume the speaker in a song is the singer?

― Prude, Tuesday, 2 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

"Why do we automatically assume the speaker in a song is the singer?"

Possibly because when we listen to a song, the words are coming directly out of the mouth of the singer, whereas in a book, we're given a narrative distance from the "middle man" of the page (author writes on page, we read from page) which makes the separation between author and character more obvious? I don't know, just a thought.

― Nick A., Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

The last half of the cited phrase is the more troubling one for its solipsistic essentialism (pop culture's diseased bastard offspring that ate the world)

― dave q, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

It is a great line, however, since it has been on high rotation in three countries, cynicism has got me. It seems to me another case of monufactured rebellion and, whether or not it is autobiographical, the market has decided it is time for a punky, dirty Britney, so Pink, and the song, is limited in any subversive/inspirational power. I don't think the idea of having to change to be accepted under hypercapitalism is restricted to pop stars, and so the line can speak to any of us with desires beyond 9 to 5. Perhaps the two have more in common than previously thought?

― Narelle Walker, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Unless the issue is that Pink names names and Dylan doesn't, I don't necessarily believe there's a "huge difference" between "Don't Let Me Get Me" and "Idiot Wind"--both sound to me like those revelatory moments when you wake up, not from sleep per se, but from a bad situation, be it a lousy relationship, a shitty life at home, disenchantment with your career--whatever. Transitional songs, in a way: still blurry and pissed about the bad situation (hence the venting), but nonetheless determined to get on with it, to turn your own ugliness or the cruelty of the world (or your girlfriend) (or the cruelty of yourself in relation to your girlfriend) into something. Anyway, Dylan didn't name names, but everyone knew it was about his ex (whose name I can't happen to remember).

― s woods, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

yeah but Dylan refers to his own career in a really similar way on the record in question: "I wrote Sad-Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands for you", he sings. Is this any different than Pink referring to her disillusionment with her management? Basically it's an artist saying "I made this piece of art hoping you'd like it, this art is me and you rejected it so fuck off, you make me sad." It's exactly the same technique of tipping the cards to reveal to the listener that the narrator in the song is a singer, not an office schlub or a valkerie or whatever.

― fritz, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Dylan didn't name names, but everyone knew it was about his ex (whose name I can't happen to remember). Her name is Sara, and he named names in songs such as "Sara".

― fritz, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Thanks, Fritz, I thought it might be Sara, but was too lazy to confirm it. I don't think the lyric you quote is from "Idiot Wind," though...hmmm. (I can't say I've ever heard that line, but it sounds pretty great--something else from 'Blood on the Tracks'?)

― s woods, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

actually, it's from "Sara" which is on "Desire", I think

― fritz, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

so I was wrong, not "the record in question" but its sequel - both records mostly about his breakup with sara.

― fritz, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

As far as seeing a trend in pop music goes, I respectfully withdraw the question.

HOWEVER, I do think there's something interesting about songs that draw very specifically from the singer's life (and the singer admits it) vs. songs that are written using the techniques of fiction. A more properly worded question about this subject might be interesting.

― Mark, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

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