Day 17 (April 5): Pulp - Common People

His 'N' Hers' 25 Years Later: The Birth Of “Modern-Day Pulp ...Though every post on this blog is a work of titanic effort and skill (how else?), I will admit that it's a little easier on the typing fingers to discuss songs that I figure are at least moderately niche. At least then I am quote-unquote-quote-again 'informing' people about this new song, and that I have something to say.

It's a wee bit harder with songs that everybody has already heard. Imagine trying to have a take on the Beatles in 2020. You can try, but it will have been done before and is probably being done right now by someone more talented with a faster typing speed.

As somebody who has recently completed a two-term module on Shakespeare, original analysis does not blend very well with popular things. Still, I like a challenge. Well, actually, I don't, but it's a good thing to say that I like.

Therefore, today's song of the day is a Popular Song, Pulp's 'Common People', one of those Britpop tunes that bleeds into the synapses of every kid or teenager of a remotely similar age in this country.

'Common People' has been streamed 83.6 million times on Spotify at the time of writing. I take it that's not 83.6 million people, but that's certainly quite a few people with some of an opinion. How do I come up with something that none of those guys have thought of before?

And, aw shit. That's just streams. 'Common People' came out in 1995. You have to account for CD and digital sales, exposure on Top of the Pops and use in adverts and film/TV (just this month, Westworld used it as An Ironic Musical Accompaniment to Violence). That's so many opinions! How do I negotiate that gap? What is my relevance??

Have I the right to write about music at all? Is my remit 100,000 monthly streams per artist or below? How can I tell? Am I just a stenographer of the already-said?

I think it's back to indie for now.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Month 2: Bright Eyes - At The Bottom of Everything

Image
It's May 19, 2020, and it has been two months since I started this song-diary-cum-blog-cum-something-I'll-think-of-later. It's day 58 of the UK-wide lockdown, though we're now staying alert rather than staying home and I'm pretty sure I saw eight guys who weren't part of the same family playing basketball in the park yesterday, which doesn't seem right. Today's post comes from you in the middle of my final exam week, which is a strange time to be writing a daily blog. Honestly, though exams are still a gigantic fart in an elevator, I'm mildly grateful that something is happening to make a week feel different at all. Next month will come to you from the endless morass of post-degree-in-a-pandemic uncertainty, and while I look forward to watching nothing but Star Wars: The Clone Wars all day along, I don't look forward to that bit. It's at this point that I should point out that my degree ends in three days. It's kind of a whole thing,
Read more

Day 58 (May 16): Public Enemy - Harder Than You Think

Image
It's a shame when a song gets boxed in as an advertising thing. It kind of squeezes the life out of them; artistic achievement reduced to corporate ones and zeroes, the actual meaning of the song dissolving into a catchy jingle. On the other hand... Look, there he goes, defending capitalism again. Well, hold on one second. Sometimes, songs being jinglefied for popular consumption on TV is good and interesting, actually. Sometimes it recommends music to an audience who would absolutely not think of otherwise consuming it. Sometimes it's just curiously weird. Such is today's song of the day, "Harder Than You Think" from Public Enemy's 2007 mouthful How Do You Sell a Soul to a Soulless People Who Sold Their Soul? . For reasons I'm actually very happy keeping a fun mystery, this song is now best known in Britain as the main jingle for the coverage of the 2012 Paralympics. None of the actual lyrics were ever used, so audiences could happily be fooled into t
Read more

Month 1: Murray Gold - The Shepherd's Boy

Image
It's April 19, 2020, and it has been one month since I started this Frankenstein's monster of a song- diary-blog experiment. It's day 28 of the UK-wide lockdown, with no perceptible end in sight. During this month, this blog has accidentally become my main source of how I can tell human time. You might have noticed that the days are increasingly congealing into a gigantic mulch that are impossible to tell apart, after all. Days of the week? Ha. Everything is Sunday is Monday is Thursday but definitely never Saturday now. Dates? Don't be ridiculous. Months are just about possible to keep straight, but don't be trying to actually distinguish where we are in that big blob of time. There is the golden times of Before Corona, there is the endless Now, and there is After Corona, a theoretical future both close and far, depending on which government exit strategy leaks you read. Moving forward or progressing in the endless Now seems basically impossible, because every da
Read more