Not too terribly long after I first began DJing (over twenty years ago), I grew tired of playing the same sixties' soul hits over and over, so I decided to just make a mix tape of the songs that the older crowd most loved to dance to. My plan was to let that tape run whilst I read a book or clipped my toenails or made lists of superfluous ephemera. I spent days and days making that tape, selecting the proper songs, placing them in order according to overall feel and beats per minute, and ensuring that the fades and the BPM meshed together as seamlessly as possible. After many frustrating stops and starts, I finally had done it: I'd created the perfect mixtape for the soul-loving Baby Boomer dancing machines.
Back then, I DJed every gig with my father (whereas today, we DJ together only about half the time), so I sought his opinion about my mixtape. He looked at my setlist, and told that it looked great. I didn't let him off that easily, though: he had to listen to it, if at least only to the transitions. He obliged. He plugged in his earphones into my cheap tape deck and listened, and he liked what he heard. In fact, he liked it so much, that he was sure that his friends would like it too, and--heck--they might even pay us for making them a copy. Really? I was thrilled to receive that level of praise, but I felt uncomfortable about selling copies of mixtapes to people because it was, uh, illegal! What really bugged me, though, was the worry that if these Baby Boomers all had copies of this COMPLETELY AWESOME TAPE, then they might not want to pay us to DJ at their little parties anymore, for they could just bring their stereo system, stick the tape in, and press play, and then POOF: no more Hardy Party. I didn't tell my dad this, though, 'cause I didn't want to come across as being too greedy.
My dad told me that if I was worried about copyright violation (though he didn't use those terms), I could just make copies for his friends, and we'd just give them away as gifts.* "Sure," I said, though that's not what I thought. What I thought was, "Sure...now down the drain goes my idea of sitting back and let this tape do the work for me at all these old geezer gigs because these folks aren't going to let me just sit back and play one tape the whole night, a tape they all now have because I gave it to them." Oh, well.
I made the tapes, numerous copies, and then one day--for what reason I can't remember--I listened to my master tape, and I noticed a discernable downgrade in sonics: the master tape had lost clarity. What should I do? I still had a large number of copies to make. Should I just quit? No, I couldn't do that. Should I remix a brand new tape? No way! Too much work involved from that. Should I just make copies from a copy, as not to further denegrate my original? Sure!
After I made that first copy of a copy, I listened to the result, the copied tape, and oh my goodness did it sound terrible. It was then I deduced something I most definately should have already known: with each passing generation--with each copy of a copy--sound deteriorates, and clarity is the first aspect to go, 'cause the highs and lows, the details, get aurally smudged. I also learned that playing analog tape--cassette tape, especially--causes wear and tear on the tape (not the shell), and the sound ultimately grows increasingly muddier (which is why an old 45 played 150 times will sound better than a cassette tape of the same song played the same amount of times). What to do now? Since--as I mentioned before--sure wasn't going to remix another master copy (as I was--and still am--much too lazy for work that I can justify not having to do right that very moment), I'd just continue my (dad's) original plan, and his friends' ears would just have to suffer. That was alright with me, though, for when they came to hear us DJ, those same songs would sound much better (for various reasons), and we'd, therefore, sound much better. For nothing beats the original sound, the original record, and we played original songs...uh...okay, no, we didn't, but still, our copies sounded better than some of their originals...or at least as good...except for when we copied ourselves. And still, then, if we were careful, and had just the right mix, just the right tweaking of the equalizer....
Then we'd have what Britney Spears has with "Oops!...I Did It Again." What does she have with that, praytell? Why, she copies herself! The record is almost a twin of Spears's first big hit, "...Baby One More Time": the structure (other than the spoken-word interlude) is the same, the sound is the same, the vocals vary very little, both have ellipses in their titles (which is about as odd a similarity one will ever find between copycat songs), and they both placed in the Top Ten: "...Baby One More Time" hit #8, and "Oops!...I Did It Again" hit #9. Know what? The latter's almost as good as the former.
Sure, "Oops..." doesn't have that explosive, surprising, captivating, brand-new -artist quality that "...Baby..." did, but Spears--and songwriter/producer Max Martin--deliver in about every other facet: Spears's vocals are slinky and sultry in the verses, and forceful and sexy in the chorus, delivering upon that early promise; the synths plink, the piano rises and falls, and the bass just pops the funk while the guitars--Martin learned a lot from hair metal--play those distorted power chords at the appropriate moments, and the chorus just booms, as Martin pushes everything to the fore, and the melody's strong enough to handle it.
The song's clever, too (Britney--at least on record--has never lacked for wit). First, there's the song title, where Spears and Martin acknowledge that not only is this essentially the same song as Spears's first hit, but also that it will be just as big a hit. Then, there's the spoken-word interlude, a parody/satire of the romance in Titanic, where Spears and Martin send up the naive notions of the lovers (and filmmakers) of said movie. Finally, there's the big line from the song, the line that had people talking, the line that had people ridiculing both Spears and this song: "I'm not that innocent." Well, duh, everyone knew that, but I think Spears (and Martin, 'cause he wrote the lyric) isn't being dumb here by stating the obvious; I think she's playing upon her image, as she now officially gives the oglers the okay sign, 'cause now she's legal, and they can look all they want without feeling guilty, which means that they won't want to look as much anymore, 'cause she's no longer the forbidden fruit. With this admonition, Spears comes clean in more than one way.
I, of course, think this record is fabulous, but it's got its naysayers. I've heard many people diss this song because it sounded so similar to "...Baby...," that it should be discounted because it's completely unoriginal. I've also heard many of those same people praise, say, old rock outfits and blues artists for all their classic material, and...man, some people just don't get it. Pop/Rock/Blues/Country/Rap acts--the big ones and the small ones--have always aped their greatest achievements. Here's a small sampling:
The Rolling Stones: "Get Off My Cloud" = "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction"The Kinks: "All Day and All of the Night" = "You Really Got Me"
The Four Tops: "It's the Same Old Song" = "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)"
and my absolute favorite of all the copycat songs, as it had me rolling on the floor laughing the first time I heard it...
Ben E. King: "Don't Play That Song (You Lied)" = "Stand By Me"
See? There's nothing new here with Spears does. She may lose a smidgen of originality here and there, but the result--with Martin at the helm--still wows the crowd, who--despite owning Spears' original hit--keeps coming back for more of the same. Someone just needs to make a mixtape of this one and other similar hits. Hmmm....I wonder who could do that for me....
*This was, of course, years before the RIAA grew as litigious as they are now, though they--the RIAA--have always had major problems with people sharing music, though that's a story for another day because it's late, and I'm tired, and if I wake up late tomorrow morning--or if I go back to bed after I've showered and dressed--my wife will have a story to tell me.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment