Year In America August 14, 2008

[koganbot]

Rihanna's "Disturbia" finally knocks Katy Perry off the top spot, M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes" jumps into the top five, both "Disturbia" and "Paper Planes" charting on the basis of huge downloads - "Disturbia" gets relatively few airplay points, as radio is still high on Rihanna's previous track, "Take A Bow"; probably pulls extra download numbers, however, since there are over a million people who bought the alb before "Disturbia" became a bonus track, and I can't imagine a lot of them are going to shell out for the alb all over again. "Paper Planes" has a small amount of airplay on the Top 40 and alternative rock stations, and almost nothing anywhere else - except of course on the TV commercials for Pineapple Express. All of which is more interesting than this week's new crop.

The Jonas Brothers "A Little Bit Longer": Reasonably OK melody, sung with the usual ache 'n' agony and the occasional clonking moment of sensitive restraint; more listenable than last week's dreadful "Tonight," but still no adventure in sound. NO TICK.

The Game f. Lil Wayne "My Life": The Game is doggedly weary, which I suppose is appropriate since the rap adds a suicide threat to the standard thuggery, but is still a drag. Wayne does the melody slow and pretty, and is prettied up further with shimmering autotune. This doesn't prevent slowness from being dullness. NO TICK.

Leona Lewis "Better In Time": Bright piano repetitions at the start build some tension that the track resolves too quickly. The singing is nu-Mariah (single-syllable notes outnumbering the old-time melisma), but w/ the young people's sugar glaze, which substitutes for any kind of convincing passion. Negligible but consistently pretty. BORDERLINE TICK.

As a bonus for Year In America's intrepid readers, here's the trailer for Pineapple Express:

Watch on YouTube

Comments

[koganbot]

Haven't seen the movie, but the few reviews I read were mixed, saying that pleasant drifting stonerisms ultimately give way to a hack buddy-buddy chase flick.

[poptasticuk.livejournal.com]

MIA is in the top 5 in the singles chart? That's a shocker! I thought she was just famous with indie people.