Year In America August 21, 2008

[koganbot]

Olympic platitudes from Chris and Taylor, David warms up the studio, Yung Berg satisfies Casha but not me.

David Archuleta "Crush": Combo of sugar and anguish similar to Jordin and Chris on "No Air"; his lower register has more feeling than it did on AI; this is generic but far better than he gave us on Idol. Easy TICK.

Taylor Swift "Change": A wave of guitars and cymbals, her tenuous expressive voice as fetching and biting as ever, but the lyrics are boring abstractions - "These walls/That they put up/To hold us back/Will fall down" - and the chorus is a nondescript wash. A TICK for sure, but disappointing.

Chris Brown "Dreamer": His voice is precise against a choppy rhythm, but layered-in African harmonies give this a Kumbaya feel. This is worthless piffle. NO TICK.

Yung Berg f. Casha "The Business": "You know just what to do/You give me the business," sings a delighted Casha. At this point, all r&b sex lyrics sound like parodies. Song takes interesting form, all intros and curlicues, but the result is still dumb and dull. NO TICK.

Comments

[koganbot]

According to Wiki, "Crush" is written by Jess Cates, Dave Hodges, and Emanuel Kiriakou and produced by Emanuel Kiriakou. Cates I don't know anything about, Hodges used to play piano in Evanescence, then co-wrote and co-produced "Because Of You" and "Addicted" on Kelly Clarkson's Breakaway and was her object of affection in "Never Again," Kiriakou has written and produced a whole bunch of stuff, almost none of which has ever come to my attention except for Nick Lachey's "What's Left Of Me," which I can barely remember now. For that matter, the second that "Crush" ends, its melody has evaporated from my memory. Still is a nice bit of music. Watching American Idol I was irritated by David's demonstrating a bubbly personality while holding his actual personality in reserve. Made him seem a blank. On this song he's not a personality either, but that's not necessarily a drawback; it's just several minutes of good sound, not several minutes of identifiably David Archuleta sound, the latter not yet existing.

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

Pretty sure poptasticuk just wrote something about Kiriakou recently in connection with another artist, and mentioned that she thought Lachey's album was really underrated. I've never heard it, but I do like "What's Left of Me" OK.

I don't think the latter -- "Archuleta sound" -- is ever gonna happen, in the same way it could never happen for, e.g., Jesse McCartney.

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

Ah, she was talking about "Crush."

[koganbot]

I'm getting so caught up on livejournal that I'm neglecting the blogs!

I remember streaming the Nick Lachey album and thinking that while it had good sound, I didn't like his voice; but I was probably reanimating an old, uninformed prejudice against 98 Degrees. Definitely a subject for further research.

Archuleta is young enough so that almost anything could happen. E.g., I've got 50 Cent back in 2000 taking a guest shot on the remix to Blaque's "Bring It All To Me," and while he doesn't sound anonymous, he hasn't yet found his way to his slow pleasing drawl, at least not on that track.