Michael Lione-Listening Journal #7

 

                This week’s Listening Journal focuses on Chapters 13 and 14 in the book American Popular Music. The Chapters focused on Digital Technology, MTV, as well as Popular Mainstream, and Hip Hop.  During the course of my readings, I also listened to several different songs that were written around the same period. I learned about several musicians from these eras such as Bruce Springsteen, Prince, Madonna, as well as Peter Gabriel.

                One of the first recordings I listened to was “Sledgehammer” by Peter Gabriel. This song was first recorded in 1986. This recording was one of the biggest hits of Gabriel’s long career. The song begins with a trumpet fanfare. The tempo of the song is a straightforward tempo and does not waiver. I thought that some of the lyrics were interesting in the song. Some of the words in the lyrics you hear are big dippers, steam trains, fruitcake and honeybee. The form of the song seems to be built on 12 bar and 8 bar sections. Some of the instruments that I heard on the recording were flute, snare drum, keyboard, guitar and synthesizer. Some of these instruments are heard in random four block sections. From a visual perspective, the music video to “Sledgehammer” was one of the most complicated to produce and famous music videos of all time. Even almost thirty years later, this music video still is impressive! Please check out this link to the music video : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJWJE0x7T4Q

                “Thriller” was first recorded by Michael Jackson in 1982. This song is considered by many to be the greatest pop songs of all-time and contains an iconic short movie/music video as well. The lyrics of the song talk about being in the dark close to midnight and scary things lurking in the night. The tempo of this song is up-tempo throughout. The dominant instrument that we hear during the song is some kind of synthesizer. You also hear a heavy bass part as well. The syncopation of the instruments along with Jackson’s vocals give it a funk feel to me. Much like “Sledgehammer”, this song had an iconic music video that helped in the development of MTV in the early 1980’s. In comparing these two songs, they are very different musically but they were both big hits so they had an appeal to the general listening audience. Please check out this link to the music video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hG6oy46qKE4

                                During the course of my readings and other listening, I learned that many of the popular songs from other genres as well. I listened to the music of Nirvana. “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was recorded by Nirvana in 1991 and was their most popular song during the band’s short career. This song was also the first alternative rock song to crack the top 10 in the 1990’s.  The song contains 4, 8 and 12-bar sections. The form of the song is ABC and is repeated at different times of the song. Cobain uses different vocal hooks to keep the audience engaged. This year marks the 20^th anniversary of Cobain’s suicide in 1994. I remember being in 7^th grade when I heard the news and my female friends at the time being so sad!