|
Post by Earl Purple on Jul 27, 2020 9:00:27 GMT 1
Queen had all 4 members of the band writing their songs, so you'd expect there to be different styles. e.g. John Deacon wrote "Another One Bites The Dust". He didn't write that many of their songs but it explains why that one sounds a lot different to their others.
However "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" was one of Freddie Mercury's compositions, the one who normally wrote the more dramatic big operatic songs, but he came up with a simple rockabilly song like that.
|
|
|
Post by Earl Purple on Jul 27, 2020 9:03:16 GMT 1
Good Vibrations is going the other way now. The Beach Boys normally made simple "surf" music, or softer but still simple songs like "God Only Knows" but Good Vibrations was far more complex, many parts, and I've always had a liking for that kind of song.
Perhaps not surprisingly it was one of my biggest hits of 1966, reaching #1 in my chart.
|
|
|
Post by Shireblogger on Jul 27, 2020 9:05:39 GMT 1
Beyonce - Irreplaceable
A superb song of female empowerment - something no-one else does as well as Beyoncé. She uses her full vocal range in this song in a way which seems perfectly natural. Far too many other female singers with a wide range force it down our lug holes in a wholly unpleasant manner (yes, Mariah, I'm especially looking at you), but Beyoncé has too much class to need to do that.
Then I listened to the backing track. It is little more than some drums'n'bass. I'd never realised this before, which just serves to reinforce how effective Beyoncé's singing is, as it fills all the spaces, and rounds out the song.
|
|
|
Post by Shireblogger on Jul 27, 2020 9:12:36 GMT 1
Foo Fighters - Pretender
In the early 80s I was quite into hard rock and heavy metal. Iron Maiden, Motorhead, Rainbow etc. Then Bon Jovi and the other American hair metal jokes ruined the genre, and I started seeking out the Bob Dylan back catalogue instead. So I never really listened to the Foo Fighters. My loss. Dave Grohl is an enormous talent, and it is no surprise that it is his band which leads the pack in this field by a country mile.
I'd love this live. But I don't do big festivals, and I certainly wouldn't pay to see them in a stadium. As a consumer, its no longer really for me. 2007 - I'll take Amy Macdonald, Editors and Reverend & the Makers instead, thank you.
|
|
|
Post by Whitneyfan on Jul 27, 2020 9:15:15 GMT 1
I really like Clean Bandit. They are a dance act, but they play their own instruments and their songs have a classical edge to them - making them different from your run of the mill dance acts. They are also fantastic live.
I've seen Louisa Johnson live too and she does have a really strong voice. It's just a shame she came late to the X-Factor, when people were starting to lose interest. She's certainly better than some of the earlier winners.
'Tears' isn't their best song but I still really like it, and it's better than some of the modern stuff which is much higher up the list!
|
|
|
Post by Shireblogger on Jul 27, 2020 9:21:26 GMT 1
Beach Boys - Good VibrationsI'm glad I didn't start this thread by scoring the songs out of ten. Because I'd have to go back to the start and re-score everything in the light of "Good Vibrations". If ever there was a 10/10 single, it is this one. How can 3 minutes be so epic ? There's so much in this cut, it should last the whole side of an album, like Tubular Bells does. Never has a theremin been so well used. Only Goldfrapp come close. The rise and fall of the song is so well executed. And yet despite sounding like it comes from outer space, it is also unmistakeably a Beach Boys song, thanks to those peerless harmonies. It would be churlish to fault this. But it isn't quite the perfect pop song, because the ending doesn't work. It needed a full stop, not a fade out. Just remind me why this didn't win raliverpool's 50s/60s song knock-out.
|
|
|
Post by Shireblogger on Jul 27, 2020 9:30:49 GMT 1
Oasis - Champagne SupernovaSo familiar is What's The Story (Morning Glory), I'd completely forgotten which tracks were singles, and which weren't. But I was still surprised to see this one wasn't. It is exactly what the boys did best. Which means it is quite good. Nice words, but lyrical nonsense. At their swaggering best, they were deservedly the champions of Brit Pop. But it is an over-rated genre, and some of its other contributors were almost as good as Oasis, but had only a fraction of the success - Supergrass, Ash or Cast, for example. To answer SheriffFatman's query, to the best of my knowledge it has only spent 3 weeks inside the Top 200. It made its first appearance at #154 in March 2013 - don't know why. And then had a two week run at #125 and then #180 in June 2017, just after the One Love Manchester concert, which featured Liam Gallagher, although he didn't actually sing this one.
|
|
|
Post by Shireblogger on Jul 27, 2020 9:35:49 GMT 1
Clean Bandit / Louisa Johnson - Tears
I really like Clean Bandit, and am highly appreciative of what they have brought to dance music. The soulless EDM of Guetta/Harris/Avicii has gone on for too long in such an unimaginative way. Thus, I've been a happy buyer of both Clean Bandit albums.
But this song is wholly unremarkable, and doesn't deserve to be a millionaire. In fact, of the six songs I've reviewed this morning, it is the least good. It isn't bad, it's just bland and forgettable. Next please.
|
|
|
Post by Shireblogger on Jul 27, 2020 9:44:14 GMT 1
QueenA corker. One of the many remarkable things about Queen is the breadth of their songwriting and musicianship. Hard rock, synth pop, rock opera, stadium anthems, disco, retro pastiche, rockabilly. I guess that's one of the consequences of having four accomplished songwriters in your band. Queen had all 4 members of the band writing their songs, so you'd expect there to be different styles. e.g. John Deacon wrote "Another One Bites The Dust". He didn't write that many of their songs but it explains why that one sounds a lot different to their others. However "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" was one of Freddie Mercury's compositions, the one who normally wrote the more dramatic big operatic songs, but he came up with a simple rockabilly song like that.
|
|
|
Post by masenz on Jul 27, 2020 20:25:18 GMT 1
Poor old Louisa. As said above, X Factor was too uncool by the time she won that it probably works against her rather than for her. To be fair, her first two solo singles and the Olly Murs ones all had long chart runs and got certified (which is easy these days to be fair) so she has had some success.
Tears is a good pop/dance track. Million seller? Nah. But certainly a decent track and deserved top five hit at least.
|
|
SheriffFatman
Member
Been spending most our lives living in the Cheshire countryside
Posts: 10,935
ONLINE
|
Post by SheriffFatman on Jul 28, 2020 11:20:44 GMT 1
714 - Attention by Charlie Puth No 9 in 2017
The presence of this one is another mystery to me. For research purposes I’ve just listened to it four times, and I still couldn’t hum the tune. It’s innofensive, certainly nothing obviously wrong with it, except that there’s not even anything particularly noticeable about it.
My guess would be that this is an example of a track that has been well placed on Spotify playlists. I stream, I’m on Apple Music and I love it, but I have never once listened to a playlist created by someone else, I always make my own. For me it’s a digital representation of the 90 minute tapes I obsessively recorded when I was younger, but with completely unlimited potential.
There is another type of music consumer though, one who is happy to listen to whatever is already there, a bit like radio but without the inane DJs. It must be those people who have got this track into the millionaires list, it would fit perfectly, barely noticed between two other tracks that sound similar, it’s certainly not likely to make people switch off. It’s hard to imagine anyone eagerly seeking it out either though.
|
|
|
Post by Shireblogger on Jul 28, 2020 12:14:39 GMT 1
I think you're being a little harsh. It has a distinctive enough melody, and clear enough lyrics, for it to be recognisable after a few listens. But it doesn't have an irresistible hook, nor any unique features, which make it worthy of millionaire status. B+ maybe ?
|
|
|
Post by Whitneyfan on Jul 28, 2020 12:30:51 GMT 1
Most of the post-streaming tracks are only here because of people sticking on a Spotify chart or current hits playlist without giving any thought to what is on it.
I had to listen to this to remind myself what it sounded like, and it's average at very best. I would say more like 4/10 though.
|
|
|
Post by Earl Purple on Jul 28, 2020 12:52:20 GMT 1
I went through enormous lengths to build a playlist back in 2017. I have a log of the various lists, though some are on a file drive on a computer I can't currently access. (I could if I plugged it in).
I looked up Charlie Puth - Attention and it turned up for 30 April 2017, so it got onto my list of songs to listen to to build the playlist that week. It was one of 291 songs on the list that week.
State Lights - I Need Time appears on the same list. That ended up as the highest entry that week. I see from the chart 25 songs, 17 of them charted, 8 did not, but Charlie Puth is not anywhere among those 25. So I must have rejected it early on.
Most music listeners did not have the capability to create such a list for searching, as actually compiling a list of what was out required some programming ability and much effort, and a number of other factors, and so of course to discover new music people use means like ready-made Spotify playlists. They probably don't like all the songs on them, but hope they find a few they do like and then listen to them more and more. I don't know how many get on these lists though.
On a Monday night in 2017 I had to listen through bits of 291 songs to shorten it down to a listenable playlist. I usually listened to just a few seconds in the middle of each one and cut stuff pretty quickly. The chances are that one got cut there, as over 90% of the list might well have been, given I ended up with just 25 songs, and even of those 8 didn't reach my chart.
|
|
TheThorne
Member
*Hillside, slip and slide, feel the pain, it's no surprise!*
Posts: 27,542
|
Post by TheThorne on Jul 28, 2020 13:51:11 GMT 1
I went through enormous lengths to build a playlist back in 2017. I have a log of the various lists, though some are on a file drive on a computer I can't currently access. (I could if I plugged it in). I looked up Charlie Puth - Attention and it turned up for 30 April 2017, so it got onto my list of songs to listen to to build the playlist that week. It was one of 291 songs on the list that week. State Lights - I Need Time appears on the same list. That ended up as the highest entry that week. I see from the chart 25 songs, 17 of them charted, 8 did not, but Charlie Puth is not anywhere among those 25. So I must have rejected it early on. Most music listeners did not have the capability to create such a list for searching, as actually compiling a list of what was out required some programming ability and much effort, and a number of other factors, and so of course to discover new music people use means like ready-made Spotify playlists. They probably don't like all the songs on them, but hope they find a few they do like and then listen to them more and more. I don't know how many get on these lists though. On a Monday night in 2017 I had to listen through bits of 291 songs to shorten it down to a listenable playlist. I usually listened to just a few seconds in the middle of each one and cut stuff pretty quickly. The chances are that one got cut there, as over 90% of the list might well have been, given I ended up with just 25 songs, and even of those 8 didn't reach my chart. Or the will or the time. Most Charlie Puth listeners on Spotify would have found him through a playlist like Hot Hits UK , it has 2.6 million followers and really is the main hit making playlist. If you are on that you should make the top 50 at least. Also his other promotion is Radio like Capital or YouTube. Sometimes artists are just well known, I have heard him but I couldn't name or hum a single song he's done, as many have said hes pretty inoffensive.
|
|
|
Post by greendemon on Jul 28, 2020 14:12:05 GMT 1
To be honest I like his new one, 'Girlfriend', better than this.
|
|
|
Post by Earl Purple on Jul 28, 2020 14:15:27 GMT 1
Yes, that's it, they get their lists from those just like we used to listen to the radio or check the charts to find the music in the past. Those who wanted to go a bit further would check the new release shelves in the shops, or independent shops, and might listen to John Peel rather than daytime radio, but still, it was others finding the music for you.
There's plenty of also-ran stuff back then too. Inoffensive, doesn't get taken off my playlist, but not that memorable.
|
|
|
Post by onehitwonder on Jul 28, 2020 14:26:56 GMT 1
739 - S&M by Rihanna No. 3 in 2011
Was number 1 on my chart, my sister loves Rihanna and played her a lot when we lived together or whenever she is having a party. I really like this one and the video is fun.
|
|
|
Post by onehitwonder on Jul 28, 2020 14:34:09 GMT 1
735 - Missing by Everything But The Girl No. 3 in 1995 (originally charted in 1994)
Not a fan of the original, but the remix turned everything around, love it. They still play it in clubs at times.
|
|
|
Post by onehitwonder on Jul 28, 2020 14:37:41 GMT 1
I Believe I Can Fly by R. Kelly No. 1 in 1997
I want to say I hate it because of the latest events, but I can't, because it brings back a lot of good memories and you cannot just erase them off your mind.
|
|