I'm Clifford Stumme, and I use literary analysis and research to explain the deeper meanings of pop songs. Feel free to leave a comment or to email me at clifford@popsongprofessor.com with questions or ideas!
April and Clifford get deeper into the meaning behind "Magnets" by Lorde and Disclosure in this edition of the podcast. Comment below or email Clifford at jugglingcliff@gmail.com if you have something to add or have questions!
SONG MEANING: Jojo's song "When Love Hurts" is a celebration of a couple's dedication to love even when things are difficult and neither member of the relationship feels like progress is being made. Keep reading to learn more!
What's a "tringle"? It's what you call three singles released together. Pop artist JoJo (or Joanna Noelle Blagden Levesque--I know her as the older daughter from RV) released her tringle III (actually pronounced "tringle") on August 20th. "When Love Hurts" is the lead single from that EP, meant to draw listeners into the rest of the album. There's also a music video that includes amazing contemporary dance but may not be appropriate for all audiences.
SONG MEANING: "Magnets" is about a relationship that's weakening. Lorde, as the lead singer and narrator, doesn't want it to end and urges her lover to fight on. Keep reading to find out more! "Magnets" was dropped on Friday, September 25th. The song is hypnotic and dreamy with plenty of synth and an almost African/Caribbean dance floor beat. The song's going to make good dancing for a lot of parties this fall, and the constant refrain of "[l]et's embrace the point of no return" will only contribute to the two-stepping madness.
April and Clifford Stumme introduce themselves, the podcast, CliffordStumme.com, and Wiz Khalifa's "See You Again." Thanks for listening!
Song meaning: Wiz Khalifa's Billboard destroying hit single "See You Again" that features Charlie Puth is a tribute to the actor Paul Walker who died in a car accident while filming Fast and Furious 7. Read on to find out more! The song was originally created by Charlie Puth, and then Khalifa was invited to add rap verses to the song. It plays at the end of Fast and Furious 7 as Paul Walker and Vin Diesel's characters drive separate ways. The official music video for the song shows this scene as well.
The Weeknd is taking the Top 100 Billboard by storm with two songs in the top five. His newly released album Beauty behind the Madness immediately took the Top 200. While "Can't Feel My Face" is currently at #1, Abel Tesfaye's song "The Hills" from the same album has reached #4 on Billboard. [The song is intense and readers should be warned that the lyrics contain heavy swearing. Additionally, the music video is not suitable for every age.]
Released in October of 2014, Taylor Swift's 1989 album is still current news. On August 25th, she re-released "Wildest Dreams," the ninth track from the album, as a single, and on the 30th, she released an accompanying music video featuring an African movie set, plenty of lions, and a story line about romanticization.
By now, everyone's heard "Uma Thurman" by Fallout Boy from American Beauty/American Psycho, and everyone probably knows it too. The song doesn't sound anything like most mainstream pop, maintaining a distinct rock pop sound, full of grunge and energy. The song was released January 13, 2015 and a music video to match was released on April 17, 2015. It features a fan who won a sweepstakes to be Fall Out Boy's assistant for 24 hours. In the video, Sarah and the band romp around and have fun.
Blogging is a good time, but little is more frightening than occasionally taking a stroll down the dark alley of the blogosphere--spam comments. But even the blogosphere's dark alley has its nice points: sometimes spam comments can be complimentary. Of course, the writers want you to click on their title/link so that you'll buy something. The compliment is just to get you curious because they know everyone (especially bloggers) likes to feel that someone appreciates them.
Fun facts: Conrad Sewell's full name is Conrad Ignatius Mario Maximilian Sewell. He's 28 and was born in Brisbane Australia. His music career began when at age 8 he began creating demo tapes. Though he failed to pass auditions for Australian Idol, he continued trying to break into the music business big-time which he did successfully in 2014 when he wrote and sang for Kygo's "Firestone," which was hugely successful around the world. "Hold Me Up" is his debut single that preceded announcements about traveling with both Ed Sheeran and Maroon 5.
"Can't Feel My Face" comes from The Weeknd's upcoming album Chapter III and is a synthy, poppy dance-esque track with some of the rhythm and soul of an R&B jam. The song was produced by Max Martin of Taylor Swift fame, and is a departure from Abel Tesfaye's (Weeknd's real name) usual style which is generally overtly R&B. (Think of his "Earned It" from Fifty Shades of Grey and of his "The Hills," which both feature the slow methodical melodies associated with R&B.) More than those songs, "Can't Feel My Face" seems a direct appeal to mainstream pop.
5 Seconds of Summer began on YouTube and was the opening band for One Direction in a 2013 tour, but now the music has taken on a life of its own (including a 7.4M Twitter following). The band consists of Luke Hemmings, Michael Clifford, Calum Hood , and Ashton Irwin, all of whom are 21 years-old or younger. The band bases its music on a whining, punk, almost-90's feel that helps them promote a "we're young and we don't care" message that fans seem to love. According to Daily Mail, "She's Kinda Hot" was the most shared song on Twitter on Tuesday.
Calvin Harris (and the band Disciples) just came out with a new song called "How Deep Is Your Love." The song is a dance track with a strong female vocal. The song's evocative of Avicii's "You Make Me," and is definitely dance-worthy. The song was released on July 17, 2015 to acclaim by a wide variety of critics and reviewers, especially as a return for Harris to the style that made him popular.
Demi Lovato is a 22 year-old former Disney Pop Princess who launched a pop career that's found special success among the club/dance crowd; her followers call themselves "Lovatics." Beginning her career on Barney & Friends, Lovato moved on to Camp Rock in 2008 and finally was the star in Sonny with a Chance. After Disney, she focused primarily on her musical career. She entered rehab in 2010 following a litany of problems including alcohol abuse, cocaine use, assault, and bulimia. According to Wikipedia, Lovato describes herself as a Christian and advocates heavily for gay rights.
April 20th, Panic! at the Disco put out a new single from an upcoming (but unknown) album. The single is "Hallelujah," and it's catchy. Like really catchy. The song made it into the top 40 on Billboard, and just three days ago, the music video came out. Viewers have described the video as being like a video game. In it, Panic! at the Disco frontman Brendon Urie chases a mysterious woman through a variety of corridors and optical illusions. He finally catches her when he embraces the illusions himself and trusts that something he can't see will catch him.
Twenty One Pilots is my favorite band. Period.
They are fun and exciting and catchy; their music is on a par I rarely encounter, and part of the reason for this is their incredible lyrics.
Three of their songs have been so powerful that they've directly influenced my ideas and the way that I think.
Travie McCoy's name is most recognizable from "Billionaire (ft. Bruno Mars)" that got popular in 2010. Since then, he's been mostly out of the spotlight (though he did make it to 82 on the Billboard's The Hot 100 in 2013 with Jason Mraz with "Rough Water"). While it'll likely be a few weeks before the world sees whether "Golden" goes viral or not, the song is interesting and maintains what "Billionaire" would have us believe is Travie McCoy's signature rapping style--a mix of generic rap, island rhythm, and spoken word.
"Organ" is the eighth track on Beneath the Skin by Of Monsters and Men, and the song is a departure from the much of the rest of the album. Not only is the music more like a ballad style than any other song, but the lyrics rely much less on abstract references to nature than other songs do. Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir leads the vocals single-throatedly on this song with a soft and airy style that reminds one of Ingrid Michaelson more than of the Norwegian singer's usual style.
Adam Young, of Owl City fame, just came out with another song from his album Mobile Orchestra, which will be released July 10th. The song is "Unbelievable (ft. Hanson)." The other band, according to Wikipedia, is "best know for the 1997 hit song 'MMMBop' from their major label debut album Middle of Nowhere, which earned three Grammy nominations." And like Hanson, "Unbelievable" feels strongly of the 90's. And, of course, this makes Hanson the perfect band to collaborate with. In an interview with EW, Adam Young says, "Hanson was a total dream collaboration for me . . . I was born in the mid-’80s but grew up in the ’90s, so I am around the same age as those guys, and we connected on a lot of the subjects in the song ‘Unbelievable.’ I just reached out to them, sent them the song, introduced myself and said I’d be thrilled to work with them if they might find the idea appealing at all. They wrote back and said they were down to do it. They wrote Verse 2, added some additional production and just kind of did what felt natural to them, all of which I loved. So imagine me, someone who grew up loving this band, to suddenly have the chance to collaborate on a song of my own was totally surreal. They were the nicest, easiest guys to work with."
"Slow Life" is the seventh track from Beneath the Skin, and it's infuriatingly difficult to puzzle out. The lyrics are vague and HEAVILY symbolic of something. Even if one understands the basic storyline, the event or thing being symbolized may still be beyond reach until Of Monsters and Men spills their secrets on their own. In the meantime, listeners will have to do the best they can to understand what's going on here. While the title is "Slow Life," the music of the song only halfway manages to accomplish the adjectival half of it. The song isn't especially slow; it's fairly quick and is engaging for that quickness. Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir is Of Monsters and Men's only singer on this track (apart from some punctuational background vocals), and her voice, as usual, is wonderfully eerie and haunting. Anything she sings takes on a whole new meaning and idea, giving a powerful mythos to "Slow Life" in particular.
