Olivia Rodrigo is great, and she fits right in with the current landscape of popular music, which I will dub the “self made” era, with artists like her, Lizzo, and Billie Eilish being in charge of their own artistic vision, while mainstays like Taylor Swift are taking ownership of their art back from the industry. After almost two decades of stale industry driven pop, the new trend of artists doing what they want is refreshing and so far has led to the strongest and most diverse releases pop has seen in decades.
Well said. As someone who grew up loving pop music in the 80's, and who is always a sucker for a catchy tune, I'd love to see a major resurgence in good pop music. Seeing some of these stars taking ownership and writing their own songs, even with a partner or two, is really nice to see. Granted, the "songwriting by committee" approach has worked wonderfully for mega superstars like Rihanna and Beyonce, but I will always think a little more of artists who have their fingerprints all over the DNA of the songs they release.
Why do you think those artists didn't have their "fingerprints all over the DNA" of their songs?
I don't know that for sure, but I will come at this from a different angle: there is a big difference between songwriting and performance. Take Whitney Houston. Incredible voice, probably one of the best ever (not one of my favorites, but I won't quibble over that since she obviously had pipes most of us would kill for), but couldn't write a song to save her life, so while her DNA was non-existent when it came to the writing of the songs she performed, she put her DNA all over the song with her voice and her performances. And there is obviously great value in that.
But take a great singer, who is a great singer and nothing more. That is like watching a great actor in a film that isn't very good at times. You need the great writing to bring out the best in the actor. Same goes for music. And someone who can write AND perform will always have much great value to me that someone who can perform but maybe not write. Now, I am not saying the examples that I used, Beyonce and Rihanna, cannot write, but it seems like they always use the writing by committee approach. A quick scan of a few of both of their albums shows that there are always 5-10 (or more!) writers on literally every song. And I get that collaboration is a trademark in music, but it does make me wonder if either would be capable of sitting down and writing an entire album on their own that would then be successful the way someone like Taylor Swift has (with Speak Now).
And this brings me back to what I said the other day, as I like seeing some of these younger stars writing more on their own, or maybe only collaborating with one of two people, rather than bringing in a team of writers to piece together a song. The allure of success would make it easy to give in and let others do the heavy lifting when it comes to songwriting to make it big, but I love when artists have the balls to basically say, "I am going to do it my way and write my own songs, and if I fail, at least I gave it my best shot." That is something to be admired in that mentality, IMO.
Forgive if I am rambling or was a bit all over the place, but that is the best way I can explain it while still half asleep.
Topic: Olivia Rodrigo - Sour (Read 1206 times)
