Pop The Music

Pop music is underrated.

Pop music is being trashed by all the self-declared 'real'-music lovers. People who believe that singers should write their own songs to be credible. People who think that music nowadays is becoming too commercialised. People who have the rubbish perspective that sex sells albums. (I think I hear Britney stripping when I play In The Zone dammit.) People who believe that as long as the background music doesn't sound like it comes from a guitar or piano, it means that the entire song has been created from a computer, and for them, that just ain't real.



To all those people who have that much disrespect to Pop - balls to you!

What is pop music? Essentially, it is popular music. Although it has been associated with a bit of cheesy music now and then doesn't mean that it isn't serious, or that it wasn't written or sung from the bottom of the singers heart. Pop music includes Creed's Higher or U2's Beautiful Day. You might want to argue that those songs aren't Pop, they're rock. But that would just be a narrow scope of Pop. The songs became so huge they were impossible to ignore, and everyone knew the lyrics and they therefore are Popular. So why the hell are these Pop songs considered more real and superior to N'sync's Bye Bye Bye or Britney's Toxic?

The growing stigma has got to stop. The music has taken a beating and all I ever hear now on radio is rock bands trying to have a successful Pop song. I say - Fuck it. Don't let me hear it until it becomes popular, till more people have said 'Yeah, that sounds good.'. Don't get me wrong. I love Green Day's Holiday, Caesars' Jerk It Out , Good Charlotte's We Believe and songs that sound like that. Those are, in my honest opinion, good Pop songs. I'm fine with that. Songs that try to rock it out in the pretense of being cool deserve to be canned ASAP.



I've seen Pop music evolve in the past 6 years I've been observing the industry. Bands come and go, some make an impression, some don't. Some formats last (rap with singing female chorus ala Eminem's Stan to current songs like 50 Cents' Candy Shop), some don't (duets like Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey's When You Believe).

I celebrate songs that make it big, that more people can relate to. Don't tell me that charts don't matter and that they are fabricated for the industry, and record sales don't matter as long as you make 'real' music, and that people nowdays have bad taste because the cheerleading song Hollaback Girl is #1. Don't tell me that N'sync sold 2 millions albums in one week just because they looked cute and had a lot of teeny booper girl fans (it was off the strength of Bye Bye Bye). Don't tell me that they can't sing because if you're looking for real singing, I suggest listening to opera or choirs dammit. From the past to the present, music is most meaningful when, in Madonna's words - it brings the people together.



So if you're bopping to the Spice Girls' Wannabe, crying to Joey McIntyre's Stay The Same, dancing to Backstreet Boys' Larger Than Life, grooving to Madison Avenue's Don't Call Me Baby, singing to a1's Same Old Brand New You or panting to Britney's I'm A Slave 4 U, be proud of it! Pop is always cool. It's never outdated. I'm sure some of the titles bring back memories of time in school, or out having fun. It doesn't have to be something the singers wrote themselves or that they played their own instruments to. It's about feeling GOOD. Meaningful lyrics are a plus, but personally, I don't give a damn if the song sounds good.



Do you ever wonder why
This music gets you high
It takes you on a ride
Feel it when your
Body starts to rock
Baby you can't stop
And the music's all you got
Baby come on

This must be - Pop