Here’s a condensed version of my typical rant: The Beatles ruined it for everyone.
I don’t even care if I’m right, but here’s how I understand things. Before The Beatles it typically went like so: there were musicians, who could play their instruments and/or sing. There were also songwriters who were good at writing songs. Record producers would match a great song with a great musician, and boom: magic. Willie Nelson wrote “Crazy”, which got sung by Patsy Cline. Kris Kristofferson wrote “Me & Bobby McGee,” done by Janis Joplin. Leon Russell wrote “Superstar” for The Carpenters. (Okay, some post-Beatles examples, but you get it)
Then along come the Beatles, those magical shitheads, who could sing, play and write their own songs. Slowly, a handful of songwriters start coming out of the woodwork who could sing too. Before long, everyone but everyone was expected to write their own songs and sing them as well. Over time, it got to the point where playing a song that wasn’t your own began to be looked down upon — brushed off with a dismissive sniff as a “cover version”. Common knowledge now has it fixed that it’s all-around better, more respectable, for everyone to play their own song. Never mind if it’s good, more important is that it’s yours.
Great. Now we live in a world where (to adapt the old Frank Zappa adage) people who can’t write songs are attempting to sing them, in voices they don’t have, on instruments they can’t play, to people who don’t know any better.
And honestly, not that there’s anything wrong with that. I like Syd Barrett as much as anyone else.
But it does seem in this brave new world that we’ve forgotten what actually makes a great song, and an important distinction has been lost between people who write songs and those who are regarded as great songwriters. Here, in a nutshell, is that distinction: great songs transcend the voice of their writers, the public persona of their writers, their particular recorded context, their genre, often even their historical moment. In fact they are often performed better by others, with different production styles and in other genres. They are not about their writer in any pivotal way, and this gets at the heart of what I believe is a common confusion.
In determining what makes a great song or a great songwriter, people increasingly seem to value “authenticity” above craftsmanship: What’s the biography of the singer? Does the song reveal some deep secret about their personal life? Do they sing/perform in some strange way? Do they seem to be “pouring their heart out?” All of these things can indeed be moving, and again, there’s nothing wrong with that. I like Cat Power as much as anyone else. Really.
But remove the song from the performer and it often falls apart like a body with no bones. Sure, you can effectively cover a song from an influential performer, but more often than not the effect comes from knowledge of the writer, or the performance of the cover-er.
So why do I care? Why should anyone? Because I want to be the Allan Bloom of popular music? Hell no. I love all sorts of fucked up, freaky music. I love rock n’ roll and artifice. I love the fucking Thong Song (esp. the modulation at 2:46).
On the other hand, I also believe there’s a historical tradition of song which has important aesthetic values that should be retained. Maybe that makes me an asshole, and I’m just short of comfortable with that. But imagine if sometime in the future, French and English history got lumped together. I mean, all the same shit happened, it just happened over in that nebulous region that we don’t care to distinguish. France, England, England, France: why get so uptight about it?
I get a very similar bee in my bonnet about what gets called folk music. Folk music is a relatively definable body of generations-old music and song, rarely attributed to any author, that holds an important place in a cultural/national identity. Bob Dylan songs are not folk songs. The Indigo Girls do not sing folk music. The presence of an acoustic instrument does not make a song more “folksy”.
Do I hate these people, or wanna harsh on their vibe? No way. Seriously, The Indigo Girls?: respek. Shirley Collins they ain’t, tho. And that’s not in any way a value judgment, it’s a simple distinction and one that I feel should be understood.
…I’m pretty sure this still happens. At least, it does in country music, and pop (the genre). And blues. And R&B, at least to a point. It just doesn’t happen as often as it did in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. Songwriters turned into singer/songwriters and genres developed around them. I don’t think the Beatles ruined it. People like Kris Kristofferson, John Denver, Seals and Crofts and (yes) Bob Dylan ruined it for everyone.
As far as pop singers, inre: sagenc’s comment above – some of them ARE talented. Christina Aguilera can sing the hell out of a song.
I once heard this record exec say that sometime in the 90s, the big record companies found the best way of making the most money, in the shortest time, with the lowest risk: get singing models to re-record the existing back-catalogue of songs the label already owned the publishing for.
This is a major reason why suddenly everything sucks.
Added to that, there have been successive waves of major-money-spinning musical genres that haven’t been about “songs”: rap, dance, metal in various forms etc.
And authenticity IS important. Music is an emotional resonator – if it has back-story, then it will resonate more… but more often than not I suspect, covers tend to sound a bit shite because the singers have better voices than the writers. David Byrne once said “the better someone’s voice, the harder it is for people to believe what they’re singing”.
So when someone who does a cover tries to make it sound “better”, it may be more polished, but it’s actually less credible.
Authenticity via back-story is an important innovation. Music from the days when Artistes and Repetoire meant separate things, sucked.
You’re right Rick, the old model definitely still survives. Still, across the board it’s largely preferred that people write their own, or at least be ‘involved’ in the writing of their material, the way The Matrix “co-writes” with Avril Lavigne. And I believe this valuing of personality above craft has even infected the old model of songwriting: writers are now hired to sound as shitty as every other amateur song on the radio. So now these writers get called great songwriters, when what they are is great hit-writers. And don’t get me wrong, I love a hit. They’re just not songs.
I second you on Christina too. But it’s not a matter of not being talented with her, it’s a matter of taste, ie singing every goddamn note to death. I was listening to Aretha Franklin today and was amazed at how simply and directly she sings. Then again, she had great songs.
Let me clarify myself, Nick. I’m not pulling that tired old musical-superiority trip on rap, or metal, or dance or anything. I love rap — RUN DMC’s debut was my first record. And I’m not begrudging the record industry their right to make money on any old flashy dross. I love that shit too. In fact, I’m hard-pressed to believe ANY musical-superiority argument from anyone. So let’s put that right out. This isn’t about “integrity”. All I’m doing is making sure we distinguish one form from another.
And with regard to authenticity: if you’re responding to a back-story, you’re responding to a context, not content. Again, nothing wrong with that, let’s just be able to distinguish. A falsely-accused convict who’s been imprisoned for 50 years can walk out of a jail and sing Row, Row, Row Your Boat and it might kill — doesn’t make it a great song. A great song can survive on a lyric sheet and a melody alone.
I’m afraid however when you insist that artists & repertoire be the same thing, you misunderstand the beauty of each. To paraphrase Mitch Hedberg: “You come out to Hollywood as a comedian and everyone wants you to write. Can you write? Write me a screenplay. It’s as if I work my ass off all my life to be the best cook I can be and then someone’s like great, you’re a cook. Can you farm?”
Bob Dylan wrote propaganda songs.
Bob Dylan wrote propaganda songs? Propaganda songs for whom? One-eyed midget dwarfs on acid? Motorcycle Black Madonna Two-Wheeled Gypsy Queens?
Check yo’self, TerryB. His Bobness wrote ALOT of stuff, much of it esoteric symbolist gibberish.
Missing a Minutemen reference on your own music blog, Casey? Really? Don’t be that guy.
Oh, damn.
It’s Double Nickels on my drive to NC, then.
Double Nickels will suffice, but it’s off ‘What Makes a Man Start Fires?”
Only had DN in my guypod.
Either way, I’m ashamed at lapse in comprehension here. [hangs head.]
Thank you. I am a songwriter.
Beyonce is an amazing singer live. And to do that on top of tripping the light fantastic and yet sound great she’s truly got gift. She is one of the hottest (possibly the best) PERFORMERS of our generation.
Great article! My pet peeve are all the pop singers out there. They have no voice and no range, can’t write a song, can’t play an instrument, and have backup muscians that are interchangable and no loyalty to them like in a band. I just don’t get why anyone thinks that Britney Spears, or the Backstreet Boys or any them actually had any talent.