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There’s a latin expression which fans of the old TV show The West Wing will be aware of, and it’s kind of relevant here so…

It’s post hoc, ergo propter hoc, which means something like “after this, therefore because of this”. And it refers to the assumption people make when something happens after something else. So if there’s a dramatic drop in the sales of washing machines, but a huge rush to buy chocolate, you could make a reasonable claim that there was a trend to do less washing and eat more chocolate. You could even extrapolate that people were choosing to eat less crumbly, flaky chocolate, and therefore had less need to wash their clothes after eating than they had in the past.

It would be total codswallop, but SOMEONE would believe it.

In pop music, the relationship between certain songs is a lot more complicated, and you can’t go claiming that a person has directly pinched the idea for something from something else, even if the one song came after the other, not least because there are definite legal connotations to making wild claims like these.

With that in mind, I shall just say this: if you’re going to use the director of Britney Spears’s ‘Toxic’ video, and you want to make a video which uses very similar themes, it is perhaps not the best idea for your song to be called ‘Poison’.

It might just make people compare the two songs in entirety, and THEN where would you be?

(Here’s the video. Honestly! Same director and everything!)

Y’see, ‘Toxic’ enjoys the status of a modern classic of popular music. It’s the kind of unbeatable perfect pop song that drastically damages anything it is compared to. You’d think a producer like RedOne would’ve kept Nicole an actual mile away from making a song which seeks to make that link between chemical things which are bad for you, and sexy things which are bad for you, and then illustrates this with a cartoony superhero video. Seems not.

And that just leaves us here with a song which is all stomp and huff, a dramatic bang of a thing, which seeks to drag all the bad girls to the dancefloor so they can holler their evil intentions to into the faces of nervous men. It’s a song which makes the most of Nicole’s unwholesome sexiness – as opposed to wholesome, you understand, I’m not saying there’s anything gross about her – and has drama and fury on its side.

It is not, however, anywhere near as good as ‘Toxic’ by Britney Spears.

Download: Out now

www.nicolescherzingermusic.com
BBC Music page

(Fraser McAlpine)

The Reflective Inklings says: “The track is downright lethal and that chorus just kills with much-appreciated ferocity”

Unreality Shout says: “Without a video to associate with it, the song itself is fairly generic electropop.”

Idolator says: “Since when has the Hot 100 shyed away from generic pop tunes we’ve heard over and over again? This one could go either way, folks.”

View full post on BBC – Chart blog

True fact: This song made Fearne Cotton cry. Out of her EYES, dammit!

It all happened on the Sky 1 sort-of-like-the-X-Factor-but-the-judges-are-all-off-Later-With-Jools musical talent show Must Be The Music. You all know the setup by now. Three judges, a big audition arena show, a presenter backstage talking to the acts before they go on. Two girls walk up to Fearne, who is basically the ‘Dermot’ in this situation. One is called Katie Pepper and the other is called Emma, she plays the piano, hence the name. They are from Manchester and they are excited and nervous.

Emma reveals she has had some troubles in her life, and that making music with Katie has helped her pull herself together. They then take to the stage. Then The Magic happens:

Instead of performing an off-key version of an Alicia Keys song, or even a bland re-write of an even blander recent pop ballad, Emma strikes up some dour chords, and then Katie opens her mouth and sings up a great big bruise. A massive black-eye of a song. An ‘Everybody Hurts’ where literally everybody hurts.

(Can’t show you the video. Ad cooties.)

I don’t mean it’s painful to listen to, not in the sense that they’re doing anything musically wrong, at any rate. It’s just…blimey that’s an unsettling noise to hear coming out of a televised human face, isn’t it? Katie’s voice is closer to that of Antony (of …and the Johnsons fame) than, say, Leona Lewis, and although the song they’re playing is a little clunky and unvarnished (by the standards of yer slick Top 40 acts), it’s clearly a thing of substance, especially when sung like that.

Outside of the viciously-pigeonholed TV context, it would probably make less of an impact, a slightly wonky song, earnestly sung, by a lady with a boyishly deep, but operatically huge voice. But stick it in the middle of a silly old TV talent show and WHOAH!

The looks of shock and delight on everyone’s faces are perhaps similar to those you would see if you organised an imaginary dinner party, where you and your friends have dressed up smart, and gathered around an immaculately-laid table, only to spend the entire evening pretending to enjoy a sumptuous feast (more ghost beef, vicar?), with all the not-really-there trimmings…and then a latecomer arrives with real home-made trifle.

It might not be the finest trifle money can buy: some of the jelly hasn’t set properly and the custard is a little runny, and there are peanuts and raisins sprinkled all over the top, as a radical garnish. But you can’t deny that it is actual food.

Download: Out now

www.facebook.com/pepperandpianoofficial

(Fraser McAlpine)

View full post on BBC – Chart blog