Ultraviolence, which debuted this week at #1 on the Billboard charts, is as unlikely a number-one album as any you could imagine.Its songs are not made for the radio or the dance floor. Almost all the music is slow enough to induce narcolepsy and the lyrical content is R-rated, troubling, and fierce. Lana Del Rey is simultaneously creating pop music and commenting on its culture and values.
Welcome to “Recorded Conversations,” an occasional feature where all the Addison Recorder editors contribute their thoughts about a question, idea, or prompt. Everyone will chime in, and then we see where the conversation wanders. The question for this first Conversation was posed by Alex Bean:
Question: What cultural object (movie, music, show, book, play, whatever) do you find yourself coming back to again and again over the years?
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It began with, of all things, cassette tapes: a disorganized collection of cassette tapes, current whereabouts unknown. The tapes were my dad’s, and the first one was, in fact, a mix tape, an assemblage of he and my mom’s favorite Billy Joel songs, made about the time they saw him in concert eight months before I was born.
One day at the age of four, for reasons unknown (maybe I grew tired of nursery rhymes), I popped the tape into Dad’s Ford Escort, and from the propulsive first bars of “Movin’ Out,” I was hooked, lined, sinkered, and fried like a Lake Erie perch on the music. For five years, I listened to that Billy Joel tape until it finally wore out, and by that time I knew the words to every song on it, for Dad and I had sung them together through so many cruises through the freeways of Mahoning County. Not only did I learn vocabulary and a bit about how to craft poetry, but as I let the songs’ meanings sink in more and more, “Scenes From an Italian Restaurant,” “Goodnight Saigon,” and others clued me in to a range of emotions and ideas more complex than those found in my picture books. It was an early, formative step into growing up.
But this was not the only tape in Dad’s collection. Hungry to hear what else he had stored in his seat pockets and glove compartment, my fortuitous next step was a cassette with Rubber Soul on one side and Revolver on the other. Those songs were committed to memory within two months, and the Beatles became and remain one of my great obsessions… in wanting to learn all about them, I discovered how much care went into every note and every lyric that had seemed so fun and effortless upon first listen. Twenty years later, among many things which come to mind when I think of the Beatles, I always think of the work which must be expended to create art, or excel at a job, or raise a child, or make a relationship last…my family did all of those things, and the Beatles are inextricably linked to my family.
Gotta love a band with a name like Supertramp
There were more tapes beyond those. More Beatles with the White Album. Tommy, which Dad owned on vinyl too, and the lyric book’s illustrations scared me as much as the crazy sounds of “Revolution #9.” Days of Future Passed by the Moody Blues. Mix tapes of Supertramp and the Association. The Best of the Doors. A tape with two Rock and Roll Hall of Famers making sounds I’d never dreamed of on each side, Pink Floyd’s monumental Dark Side of the Moon giving way to Traffic’s folk-jazz hybrid John Barleycorn Must Die. And there were the songs Dad sang to me in the bathtub, songs from all those cassettes, plus Donovan and Crosby, Stills, and Nash and Cat Stevens and Carole King and Bob Dylan and Harry Chapin.
Dad and I didn’t care much for “Cat’s in the Cradle;” our songs were “30,000 Pounds of Bananas” and “Mail Order Annie.”
Today, I listen to anything and everything, having grown to love classical, country, jazz, and even rap by now, but the starting point was that original set of songs my Dad had on cassettes. From there, I built the foundation for a lifetime of exploration, and not just in music.
When Dad exposed me to so many great and varied sounds before I’d even started kindergarten, he and Mom (she was responsible for the Carole King) were telling me without words that there was so much out there, and not just in art, to experience, and I should not hold myself back for any reason; they certainly weren’t holding me back. With that simple expression of love and trust in me, I did more than go out to find new music, eventually music my parents had never even heard of; I read every book which interested me, saw every movie that caught my eye, tried as many foods and occupations and college courses as I could, and all those experiences and memories have bled into my writing. In a way, that music led to my becoming a writer. It was the first step in a journey which guaranteed I would always have inspiration, always have things to draw on in my own life to write about.
Nobody listens to cassettes anymore. But I still listen to those artists and albums all the time, and always smile with love and gratitude…and the occasional chuckle when I picture my five year-old self hear Lou Reed sing about “giving head” and having no idea what that meant.
Read the responses from the other editors: Bean, Travis, and -J.
When Adam Yauch died before his time early in May, I wasn’t sure how to react, because I am not and have never been a Beastie Boys fan. My “tortured” adolescent years were spent with Harry Chapin and classic CTI Records and John Coltrane that nobody I knew listened to. I was out of it. And I still am in many ways.
Readers of this periodical need to know upfront: the tally marks of my contemporary cultural failings would cover the entire John Hancock Center. I have almost zero exposure to the Lethem-Wallace literary generation. I enjoy a well-made chick flick, Barry Manilow, Air Supply, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and cartoons made for children. And I am not caught up with a single show airing on TV right now…I have not even SEEN a single episode of Louie, Justified, Community, or Breaking Bad.
But there is one attribute of my current tastes which unanimously draws derisive or aghast reactions from all of my friends, so I am going to launch my pieces by bravely facing this six-ton elephant in the room.
I think very highly of Taylor Swift.
Remember, these are OPINIONS.
And I am saying this in Chicago, a cradle of blues, jazz, and experimental music–the antithesis of lily-white feel-good country-pop something-else-that’s-hyphenated.
I understand why Swift has her detractors, but her virtues far outweigh her weaknesses and keep getting stronger. For one thing, she has one of the most impeccable gifts for pop music composition anyone could ask for in an artist so young. I would seriously compare her to John Lennon and Paul McCartney at the same age: though worlds apart genre-wise, A Hard Day’s Night and Fearless are two albums filled with hooks, albums on which the vast majority of songs, be they driving uptempo rockers or torchy ballads, have incessant melodies. I still remember cruising along my street in Los Angeles and hearing “You Belong With Me” for the first time…that song stayed in my head for months and I knew from then on Swift would be a superstar.
To be perfectly clear, saying that Swift and the young Lennon & McCartney have comparable musical talent is definitely not saying she’s in the same league as the Beatles. Far from it. Because even in their early 20s, John and Paul had mastered a secret of great pop music: being able to write lyrics which anyone can relate to. Even though the Beatles were clearly four young men singing, and their lyrics were written from a male point of view, the thematics they dealt with were universal. You can be any gender, any race, any age, and you can relate to the heartbreak and anger and goofiness and love the Beatles sang about. “In My Life” and “Let it Be” are not tied to a specific young man’s feelings but deal with emotions and desires we’ve all experienced, couched in precise language which doesn’t date or overly ground the song. Leonard Cohen, Carole King, and Joni Mitchell write much the same way, and no one is greater at it than Bob Dylan.
Swift is not at their level yet, and that she can reach that level and stay consistent is far from certain. For all the musical joys of her albums, the majority of her lyrics are written from the unmistakable point of view of a teenage or just-past-high-school girl. Her vocabulary, psychology, and imagery all are tied to a slightly immature and almost always feminine point of view: the storybook fantasies of “Love Story” and “Mine,” the oh-I’m-growing-up “White Horse” and “Picture to Burn.” and the blatantly obvious “Fifteen” and “Today Was a Fairytale” (the latter a horrid piece of dreck). Indeed, my second thought after judging “You Belong With Me,” a minor pop masterpiece was that the lyrics were some of the worst I’ve ever heard…but that’s partly because I am not a teenage girl. Swift knows her audience well and writes for them. This isn’t necessarily bad, but as a pop-rock devotee I couldn’t help but wonder if she would remain mired in this state for the rest of a short or prolonged and ultimately embarrassing career.
Two songs changed my opinion and now put the cap on my argument. When I heard “Back to December” for the first time, I was shocked…then delighted. Swift had finally written a song which never made me feel it was coming from a teenage girl’s point of view. “Back to December” was a near-perfect ballad about the confusion and pain anyone can feel when encountering an ex-lover whom they still have regrets over. Her tone was fragile yet strong and above all mature. The art involved went beyond the music and lyrics; Swift broke from her usual kind of twangy guitar and keyboard arrangement to frame her voice in the great Paul Buckmaster’s strings.*
And just this year, Swift co-wrote and recorded a song miles away from pop: her collaboration with the Civil Wars, “Safe and Sound.” Hearing this number made me think she had found a lost Fairport Convention or Pentangle single and copied it note for note, a traditional folk melody with dark lyrics containing only a glimmer of hope. What stood out for me the most was Swift’s vocal, sung in a resonant tone which harmonized not only with the Civil Wars’ voices but also with the acoustic guitar lines to the point where voice and instrument sounded like extensions of each other.
I think Swift could record a terrific old-school acoustic country-folk album or, if she keeps working on her lyrics, produce a pop classic full of songs as strong as “Back to December.” I think as she ages, her voice will get even better, will deepen just enough to where she’ll sound like an American Sandy Denny. I also think she could get stalled in the hit machine process of Nashville and never make any more progress. But those two records, and the strength she already displays, are indications that she will push herself, and we who enjoy pop music will be rewarded.
She's even starting to look like Denny and McShee
*For those of you not familiar, Paul Buckmaster is one of the finest arrangers and orchestrators in pop and rock history. He supervised the strings and horns for songs as diverse as David Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” The Grateful Dead’s “Terrapin Station,” and Train’s “Drops of Jupiter.” He contributed to chart-topping records by The Rolling Stones, Carly Simon, and Harry Nilsson. His masterpieces, however, are his work from 1969 to 1971 with Elton John…when I first heard “Back to December,” the strings immediately reminded me of the Madman Across the Water album. That Swift collaborated with Buckmaster is a further sign of her growing maturity, that she is finding a place in the pop tradition.
Photo credit: http://userserve-ak.last.fm/serve/500/39596675/Taylor+Swift+TAYLOR.png
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