An Add-Shot of Pop: Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso”
Breathy and a bit bratty, in the best possible way, Sabrina Carpenter’s breakout hit, “Espresso” is easily a song-of-the-summer contender. As the track awakens, it’s cool and quiet, just the sound of shimmery synth keys, handclaps, and a deep bass line in the background can be heard. But it’s quick to rise and shine into a caffeinated eight-line chorus (repeated four times in less than three minutes) that proudly boasts the effect one can have on a partner, specifically the prowess of delivering a shot of love so strong, it’s enough to instill a bout of insomnia (“Say you can’t sleep, baby, I know/That’s that me, espresso”).
And while this hook and most of the lyrical content, for that matter, are far from grammatically correct (“Walked in and dream came trued it for ya”; “One touch and I brand newed it for ya”), certain liberties are allowed when crafting a smart, sugary pop song, the kind of sonic addiction that gets into a listener’s veins and brain, and won’t let go. Is it that sweet? I know so.
The Pop Zeal Project (Track 84): Gwen Stefani: “The Real Thing”
When Gwen Stefani of No Doubt ventured out to make her first solo album, 2004’s Love. Angel. Music. Baby., the singer used it as a creative outlet to pursue other forms of music besides the ska/post-punk sound, for which the band was already famous. While on The Harajuku Lovers Tour to support the solo effort, Stefani, during an interaction with the crowd after “Crash,” offered insight as to the intention behind L. A. M. B.:
Stefani’s creative direction for L. A. M. B. pointed towards psychedelic pop-punk.
“I was on tour with No Doubt… and I said to Tony… wouldn’t it be fun to make a dance record? Very, very clean, easy, simple idea… I was never gonna tour the record, but then you guys keep buying the record, you keep bringing me out, you keep tempting me. And I’m on this big ol’ wave and I just wanna crash right down on top of you, and I just wanna hear you guys sing the songs back to me.”
The song in the setlist before “Crash,” entitled “The Real Thing” was cowritten by Stefani, Linda Perry, and Stefani’s then-husband, Gavin Rossdale, and co-produced by Nellee Hooper (No Doubt’s “Hella Good”; “Running”; their cover of Talk Talk’s “It’s My Life”). Lyrically, the love song expresses how much one, after being with another for some time, still wants, and needs, the other around. Presumably, Stefani and Rossdale, each with their own rock-star careers and busy schedules, were writing about each other at the time, with the following lyrics a reflection of their relationship: “And we’re together most days/But I still love to have you around”. However, in 2016, after 14 years of marriage, Stefani and Rossdale divorced, making one of the track’s later verses a bit prophetic: “Heaven knows what will come next/So emotional, you’re so complex/A rollercoaster, built to crash/But I still love to have you around.” (Note another reference to the word, crash.)
Musically, “The Real Thing” was heavily (and intentionally) inspired by New Order’s 1986 track, “Bizarre Love Triangle.” Stefani would have been 17 years old when the synth-pop song was first released, and indicates another musical style that Stefani was interested in besides the ska/post-punk sound that a budding No Doubt was embracing. (One can almost imagine Stefani staying up late on a Sunday night to watch MTV’s “!20 Minutes” to catch the video for “Bizarre,” or sliding a cassette tape into a boombox during lunch at Anaheim’s Loara High School.) Into adulthood, Stefani remained a fan of the English alternative-pop band, and reached out to collaborate with them. After initially declining, the band’s singer, Bernard Sumner ended up contributing backing vocals, while Peter Hook played bass on Stefani’s musical homage.
Listening to “The Real Thing,” one may not necessarily hear the direct influence of “Bizarre.” But in listening to “Bizarre,” and then returning back to “The Real Thing,” the similarities become more evident. For example:
The guitar riff in the outro of “Bizarre”; the intro to “The Real Thing.”
Melody: In “Bizarre” at the lyrics: “There’s no sense in telling me/The wisdom of the fool won’t set you free.” In “The Real Thing” at the aforementioned: “Heaven knows what will come next/So emotional, you’re so complex.”
Gwen Stefani’s “The Real Thing,” and essentially the Love. Angel. Music. Baby. period as a whole, marks one of the most important moments in Stefani’s career: Sonically, it’s a purposeful step from ska to synth pop and other sounds; visually, as seen on The Harajuku Lovers Tour, it’s a shift from rugged rock star to polished platinum-Marilyn pop star, complete with what would become Stefani’s signature: the retro red lip. “The Real Thing” serves as another way Stefani solidified herself as the real deal.
Red Lip Photo by John Shearer.
Dancing With Myself: Aquaria Heads Out Alone in The Knocks’ Video for “Slow Song”
The electronic-music duo, The Knocks, consisting of Ben “B-Roc” Ruttner and James “JPatt” Patterson, released the sound of summer, in spring 2022. “Slow Song,” featuring Martina “Dragonette” Sorbara on vocals, is shimmery, “bassy” synthpop with a melody line in the chorus that’s so sunny it ironically brings the chills (the good kind).
If the song itself isn’t shimmery enough, the Austin Peters-directed music video delivers the (lip) glossy glam, thanks to “Rupaul’s Drag Race” season 10 winner, Aquaria. Stuck in a dead-end job in the dead of night, Aquaria’s character closes up shop at the farmacia, and retreats to a nearly deserted dancehall to spiritually recharge, with music and movement the metaphorical sources of energy.
After sitting solo at a table, the stunning performer stands up, and sashays out to the dance floor, for what could be considered a Flashdance-finale moment.*
During the song’s bridge, the video cuts to footage of a strobe-light-bathed Aquaria suddenly surrounded by other dancing patrons. It seems unlikely the empty club had an influx of nightclubbers, leading to the theory that this could all be in Aquaria’s head, perhaps a dream of life before COVID closed the clubs, before socializing was replaced by social distancing. The video then quickly cuts to Aquaria adamantly exiting the dancehall, a few patrons can be seen off to the sides, but it becomes more about Aquaria’s ownership of a night out alone, reminding us that sometimes you just have to break free, even if it’s—especially nowadays—by yourself.
*Flashdance, directed by Adrian Lyne. Paramount Pictures, 1983.
Hi-Fi Sci-Fi: Five Favorite Daft Punk Moments
Formed in 1993, Daft Punk consists of the French duo, Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo, who have continued to don dapper futuristic personas, shielding their faces from the public by wearing gleaming robot-inspired helmets. In one sense, this allows a focus toward the sci-fi sound of their music, while, in turn, it works as an inventive marketing strategy that balances professional familiarity with personal anonymity.
“Around the World,” from their 1997 debut album, Homework, celebrates the cyclical, from the song title itself (the track’s only lyrics on a synthesized loop) to its therefore mostly instrumental, intentionally repetitive retro-funk sound. Even its video embraced spherical visuals: dancers, assigned to designated riffs, beats and blips, moving on a concentric circular stage, plus there’s colorful backdrop of porthole lighting. Daft Punk made going around in circles more desirable than dizzying:
Four years later, they released, Discovery, which featured the fitting “One More Time”; “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger,” which would later be heavily sampled by Kanye West on his 2007 track, “Stronger”; and “Digital Love.” Remember this commercial for the GAP, with the actress and singer, Juliette Lewis? (The jeans—and the video quality itself—are shall we say, vintage.)
From Madison Avenue to the movies: In 2010, they created the 24-track score for the film, Tron: Legacy, creating a mood to match the gloom-and-doom world that exists inside a cutthroat video game, with “Recognizer” starting out as intensely ominous, then suddenly becoming one of the most hauntingly beautiful tracks:
On 2013’s electro-disco, Random Access Memories, it was filled with inspired collaborations, most notably with Pharrell Williams and Chic’s Nile Rodgers on “Get Lucky” and “Lose Yourself to Dance.” In 2014, the album won the GRAMMY for Album of the Year:
And finally, their work on the 2016 album, Starboy by The Weeknd, in particular on the synth-R&B title track, and on the sexy, soulful bop of a ballad, “I Feel It Coming.” The bass riff that rolls in before the second verse is something for which to wait:
Will there be more good things from Daft Punk in the future, that sound like the future? I feel that coming too.
Love ‘Em and “Leo” Fast: Holiday Sidewinder’s Ode to the One-Night Stand
In the summer of 2018, Australian pop singer, Holiday Sidewinder released her catchy single, “Leo,” with its refrain including a synthesized rhyming roll call of lovers, everyone from Leo to Rodrigo, Marco to Diego, and a few others. The track could be seen as one woman’s reinterpretation of Prince’s “Little Red Corvette,” the tale now told listing the names of “the jockeys that were there before me,” as His Royal Badness once sang.
“Leo” is certainly intriguing, for it manages to sound like one thing, but say something completely different. Sidewinder’s vocal style suggests coy innocence, while the lyrics point to a woman who doesn’t mince words (“I’ll give you tonight, but I won’t call you tomorrow”), even brazenly forewarning: “Lock up your husbands, and lock up your sons.”
Provocative content aside, and there’s lots of it, “Leo” works on its own as a smartly constructed pop song. The first verse features a bass-synthesizer as the hero instrument, giving it all kinds of ‘80s feels, with Sidewinder’s aforementioned vocal delivery adding a dreamy effect; her character mojito-intoxicated in the nightlife. After the roll-call refrain, the rapid-fire drums give way to the carefree-sounding chorus, the morning walk of (no) shame has never sounded sunnier, thanks, in part, to more melodic vocals, reminiscent of Gwen Stefani’s. And with the start of the second verse, the bass-synthesizer gets replaced by a deep bass-guitar riff, only solidifying its ‘80s new-wave nostalgia. Take a listen, and you too might quickly love it; if not, just move on.
Zoot Suits: Kylie Minogue Fits Well on Zoot Woman Track
“Still Feels Like the First Time” from the band, Zoot Woman is another prime example of meditative pop. The band, consisting of Johnny Blake, Adam Blake, and Stuart Price (mega-producer of Madonna’s near-perfect Confessions on a Dance Floor and Kylie Minogue’s fierce and mighty Aphrodite), has been known to embrace a synthpop sound, and “Still Feels Like…” is a three-minute escape to the sci-fi future. With Kylie on guest vocals, with some affected intentionally to create a robotic distortion, the duet is gorgeous and gentle; lovely, light and airy, full of heavenly harmonies.
Erasure Thing: Heartfelt Electro-Techno After All These Years
It would’ve been easy for the Vince Clarke/Andy Bell duo known as Erasure to create a soulless sound, where keyboard-activated blips and beats took predominance over lyrical content and vocal contribution. Thankfully, the group saw equal importance in synth and substance. In 1992, on The Tank, the Swan and the Balloon tour, staging was an additional facet to which importance was paid.
In the show, the producer/programmer Clarke was often in a militaristic “tank” that served as his control booth to initiate the tracks. Bell—always the showman—arrived on stage in a cart designed like a swan, a contrast of peace versus war. The tour also featured the twin sisters/backing vocalists, Annick and Veronique Clarisse. Bell’s voice was nothing short of amazing, easily hitting the highs and dropping the lows, yet it’s the Clarisse sisters’ blended harmony that still remains some of the best and cleanest vocals heard in a live capacity. It’s not hard to imagine the angels on high sounding like these sisters.
In the clip below, “Chorus,” a commentary on environmental collapse, showed the Clarisse sisters in flowing white dresses, portraying a pair of peaceful doves, at times an oracle on the mount, while Bell bopped in his sparkly pants that evoked fish scales in sunlight. Fitting as the chorus of “Chorus” references birds: “And they covered up the sun/Until the birds had flown away,” as well as fish: “And the fishes in the sea/Had gone to sleep.” The bridge showcases the sisters’ heavenly talent: “The sunlight rising over the horizon…”
Another track off Chorus, “Turns the Love to Anger” displays Erasure’s knack for using synth-pop, computerized and seemingly removed, as framework for something more. At the bridge: “Love is where the dream should lie/It’s not for us to reason why/Or to ponder over strategy…” And again, the Clarisse sisters shine… and it’s not their whimsical headdresses that provide the brilliance. Bell takes to his balloon to “… take a ride/Somewhere in the big blue sky…” All these years later, Erasure’s reflections on the environment and “obsession” can still be seen and heard as heartfelt electro-techno.
Holy Synth: Listen to Chvrches Cover “Cry Me a River”
The electro-pop trio, Chvrches visited the BBC 1 Radio Live Lounge, where they performed their re-imagining of Justin Timberlake pop/hip-hop hit, “Cry Me a River.” To say it’s a cover seems inaccurate, as Iain Cook and Martin Doherty (enthusiastically) add their signature preprogrammed blips, bits and synth-infused accompaniment to Lauren Mayberry’s vocals.
Kudos to Timberlake and his production team for creating such an enduring story about infidelity and the karmic consequences about to experienced by a cheater in a relationship (Your bridges were burned/And now it’s your turn/to cry…”). Yet an equal amount of recognition goes to Chvrches: They remain authentic to their haunting electro sound, while staying true to the spirit of the lyrics (note that Mayberry, thankfully, doesn’t change the point of view: “Girl, I refuse/You must have me confused/with some other guy.” And don’t it make you “glad” about it?
Chvrches Had a Heavenly Year
In late 2013, the Scottish synth-pop group, Chvrches released the standout, ultra-moody track, “Lies” from their album, The Bones of What You Believe. The haunting video can’t help but evoke the impassive quality of the early new-wave ‘80s. (Think part Berlin’s “Metro,” part The Human League’s “Mirror Man,” but with a sleek modernity.) The imagery in “Lies” is full of international intrigue; secrecy and eavesdropping; deceit and danger, as well as pensive brooding in the shadows, none better conveyed than by the lead singer, Lauren Mayberry—the Natalie Portman of pixie-cool electronica.
Last year also saw the release of “Gun,” a pulsating, up-tempo track with a trippy kaleidoscopic video treatment that allowed Mayberry’s black eyeliner to become one of the prominent elements; “Recover,” which once again showcased Mayberry’s sweetly soft, yet determined enunciation. There was an intergalactic-inspired video, along with a second version that was more of a travelogue, documenting the band’s relentless touring and press schedules, pinpointing to just some of the reasons for their recent popularity.
Chvrches is approaching the end of 2014 busier than ever. The Coldplay-sounding “Under the Tide,” released in September, doesn’t include the ethereal styling of Mayberry at the helm, yet she returns to lead vocals on “Dead Air” from The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part I soundtrack. And speaking of soundtracks, the exceptional “Get Away” was part of the BBC’s “Radio 1 Rescores: Drive.” Curated by the radio DJ and producer, Zane Low, the project was created as a re-imagining of the new-wave, ‘80s-inspired score and soundtrack to the superb 2011 Nicolas Winding Refn film. “Get Away,” as is “Lies,” is signature Chvrches (steady verses; quieter moments in the bridge; the buildup back to the explosive chorus).
And finally, just a few weeks ago, the group performed at the VH1 “You Oughta Know Live in Concert,” which highlights some of the artists and bands that achieved breakout success in the current year, and naturally, ones to watch in the year to come. Although originally released in 2012 and later re-released in Fall 2013, they performed their debut single, “The Mother We Share,” taking novices a.k.a. future fans back to the beginning, giving them the chance to discover just how heavenly Chvrches is.