Never dead, just out of material.
If you can't tell, I've had a bit of a... hiatus lately. You don't understand how hard it is to find good material for a post. If it was last year, I would have plenty of great material to work with, because 2015 was a great year for pop music. This year? Not so much.
For one, there is far more mediocrity all-around than last year. I can remember how pretty much every song off of the 2015 year-end list went. This year I can barely remember how every song in the top 40 goes. The overall quality is also sorely lacking. We have no Uptown Funk, no Shut Up and Dance, not even a single Taylor Swift song. We have Rihanna at her worst, Drake at his worst, and it's overall lame.
The show must go on, however, and I think I've got just the right song for you guys. This is Side to Side, a reggae-R&B fusion by Ariana Grande and vocals from rapper and singer Nicki Minaj (who, by the way, gets way too much flack). There is plenty of sex appeal if you're into that sort of thing (I'm pretty indifferent, myself), and considering it only debuted two weeks ago, it's still doing fairly well. Let's get into it.
For one, there is far more mediocrity all-around than last year. I can remember how pretty much every song off of the 2015 year-end list went. This year I can barely remember how every song in the top 40 goes. The overall quality is also sorely lacking. We have no Uptown Funk, no Shut Up and Dance, not even a single Taylor Swift song. We have Rihanna at her worst, Drake at his worst, and it's overall lame.
The show must go on, however, and I think I've got just the right song for you guys. This is Side to Side, a reggae-R&B fusion by Ariana Grande and vocals from rapper and singer Nicki Minaj (who, by the way, gets way too much flack). There is plenty of sex appeal if you're into that sort of thing (I'm pretty indifferent, myself), and considering it only debuted two weeks ago, it's still doing fairly well. Let's get into it.
Might as well start with the artists themselves. Ariana is still trying really hard to be Mariah Carey, albeit she could still use some work when she's trying to go loud. She could also stand to improve her diction, but hey, not gonna complain when not even the most famous of musicians could enunciate properly. Still, when she's not performing Problem or something, I think she's pretty great. Nicki Minaj is untouchable on her performance, as always. Let's move on.
Lyrically, this song is a whole other story. If Into You was too subtle for you, here's the song for you. There's no sidestepping it now. Basically, what I can gather from this is the following:
"That sex was good, but now I'm sore all over, but hey, it was totally worth it."
That's basically it. Then Nicki Minaj pops up and raps. She's basically the only female rapper with consistent commercial success right now. You could argue for Iggy Azalea, but she hasn't had a hit in two years, and her latest album tanked. I don't have much to say about Nicki, it's just Nicki being Nicki. So yeah, lyrically, this song's alright, I guess.
Production-wise, it's pretty good. We've got Max Martin working on both this and the writing, and that's alright. Max Martin is basically the God of pop music and he can do whatever the hell he want because he's famous. It's basically the most authentic reggae experience we're getting in mainstream American pop music, though it's mixed with some pop and R&B because that's what Ariana does best. Bubbly and upbeat tone, less-than-sunny lyrics, it's got it all. All it's missing is some actual reggae performers.
So yeah, it's pretty good. Not terribly perfect, but hey, I'll take it above the wannabe dancehall we've been getting tons of this year. Check these two out, totally.
SCORE: 7.75/10
"That sex was good, but now I'm sore all over, but hey, it was totally worth it."
That's basically it. Then Nicki Minaj pops up and raps. She's basically the only female rapper with consistent commercial success right now. You could argue for Iggy Azalea, but she hasn't had a hit in two years, and her latest album tanked. I don't have much to say about Nicki, it's just Nicki being Nicki. So yeah, lyrically, this song's alright, I guess.
Production-wise, it's pretty good. We've got Max Martin working on both this and the writing, and that's alright. Max Martin is basically the God of pop music and he can do whatever the hell he want because he's famous. It's basically the most authentic reggae experience we're getting in mainstream American pop music, though it's mixed with some pop and R&B because that's what Ariana does best. Bubbly and upbeat tone, less-than-sunny lyrics, it's got it all. All it's missing is some actual reggae performers.
So yeah, it's pretty good. Not terribly perfect, but hey, I'll take it above the wannabe dancehall we've been getting tons of this year. Check these two out, totally.
SCORE: 7.75/10
