OK it seems like I can post now but I don't remember everything I wrote before but I'll lay out my case against Stevie.
Extended harmonica solos suck. Always. Maybe there are some Blues Traveler stans here who beg to differ but I feel confident in this take.
Also. Stevie is the original soul cheesemonger. Yes, his hokeyness reached its zenith in the 80s but he was never not a singing Hallmark card.
And finally... Ebony & Ivory. Just Good Friends. That's What Friends Are For. You can try to compartmentalize the man's collab track record and deflect with your Obama gifs but in your heart you know I speak truth
I submitted a reply that got deleted because the pop-soul industrial complex fears TRUTH but all I'm saying is that no living human has ever uttered the words, "Boy, this minute-long harmonica solo really ties the whole song together"
I mean, we can get into it if you want! May I submit:
* Every Stevie song is at least 2 minutes longer than it needs to be
* Extended harmonica solos suck
* People act like he suddenly became hokey and saccharine in the 80s but dude was a cheese factory from day one
* Dude is collab poison: Just Good Friends, Ebony & Ivory, That's What Friends Are For, honestly do I need to go on
You already know it will be a mess, concept-wise, and that in itself will be on brand. Those of us who quibble will be haters who don't get MEMETIC CULTURE.
The important question is, will the songs bang?? (Early indications are nah)
The reason there are so many writers credited on pop songs nowadays isn't because more people are working on them, but because people get songwriting credits for stuff that would have been unimaginable even 20 years ago. Somebody might throw you a line for the bridge or punch up the drums and get a credit.
Whereas historically you could come up with the entire guitar line for a song but if you didn't write the lyrics and melody, what you did wouldn't be considered "songwriting". It's kinda like how every major Hollywood movie has five uncredited people who punch up the script but nobody considers them to be the screenwriter.
R&H getting 90% isn't weird at all. Remember that Jagger/Richards own 100% of "Bittersweet Symphony." When you sample a legend, you pretty much consent to being hosed by their lawyers.
Okay, let's start a thread. Best versions/interpolations of "My Favorite Things". I'll start:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cckpRS9QkzY
One of my favorite musical jokes is Elvis Costello's "This is Hell," which depicts an underworld where "'My Favorite Things' is playing again and again / But it's by Julie Andrews and not by John Coltrane."
My version of hell would swap out Julie for Ariana and John for Alice.
Love ya Win, but the day I read a 500 word pomo screed comparing Father John Misty and Grimes is the day you can shuffle me off to the old glue factory
Yep! I'm from the NY/North Jersey area. Pretty easy band name to remember. I think they may have come through my town or maybe we played together on one of the few little road jags we did.
As much as I prefer the 98% of the time when SG has the best comments in the game, it's almost refreshing when you remember that this site is still, in fact, part of the internet.
Suggestion: instead of rewarding trolls by listing the worst comments of the week, list the most controversial comments (i.e. the ones that generated the greatest combo of up and down votes). That way you still include the spicy takes and devil's advocates, but not the outright douchebags.
Our grandchildren's grandchildren will sit in history class and learn about the days when it was permitted to just fucking admit that some music is bad.
I think it's because the idea behind the Robin Williams casting was that the genie is a one man show who sings and does a million voices, so Williams's nonstop "flipping thru the channels" brand of comedy matched the constant changes in character. By contrast, Smith's schtick is just... being likeable. His Genie looks like it'll just be a blue Maui. Which is cool. I like Maui.
People on this site – all of them music lovers – were saying just last week that they couldn't name a single Seal song. Is it really hard to imagine that Bill de Blasio was doing the requisite white-politician-making-a-fool-of-himself-in-a-black-church trip and had no idea this was an R Kelly tune?
I am a huge lifelong MJ fan. I haven't seen the doc yet and haven't felt like listening to the music in a while, so I haven't yet grappled with the question of what role it will play in my life going forward.
But I can say with all confidence that this song is pure ass.
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