Switched on Pop

There is no contemporary pop music without Nile Rodgers. Born in 1952, Rodgers grew up playing classical music on flute and clarinet before picking up jazz guitar. And at age 20, alongside bass player Bernard Edwards, Rodgers formed the band Chic. They wrote the biggest disco hits of the 70s, like: “Dance Dance Dance,” “Everybody Dance,” “Le Freak," and "Good TImes," which formed the core of Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper's Delight”.

In his music career spanning six decades, Rodgers has produced and played on some of the biggest pop songs in history, for artists like Sister Sledge, Diana Ross, David Bowie, Madonna, Daft Punk, and Beyoncé. He is also the chair of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, so with the Songwriters Hall of Fame ceremony taking place this June, we invited him onto Switched on Pop to talk about the making of a great song.

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There's no music writer like the essayist and poet Hanif Abdurraqib: whether he's narrating the beautiful awkwardness of a Carly Rae Jepsen concert or talking jazz and eastern spirituality with Andre 3000, he manages to coax stories and insights out of songs in a way that never fails to surprise. His latest book, There's Always This Year, is a free flowing meditation on basketball, childhood, his home state of Ohio, and of course, music – so on the precipice of the NBA finals, Hanif returns to Switched On Pop to discuss classic soul, sports, and sound with musicologist Nate Sloan.

You can buy Hanif's work through his website here.

Songs discussed:

• Boyz II Men, "On Bended Knee"
• Otis Redding, "My Girl"
• The Temptations, "My Girl"
• Joy Oladokun, "My Girl"
• Stevie Wonder, "My Girl"
• Stevie Wonder, "Knocks Me Off My Feet"
• Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross, "Challengers: Match Point"

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On her latest album, Taylor Swift “declared Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist.” No one was more surprised by this than Charlie Puth himself: the singer, pianist, and songwriter whose career has always straddled pop stardom and behind the scenes anonymity. After three albums, billions of streams, and numerous songwriting credits – including one on the award-winning number one track “Stay” from the Kid Laroi – Puth has been busier than ever. His new song “Hero” comes on the heels of the Swift mention, and takes him in a new direction, with acoustic guitars and hushed, contemplative vocals.

On the heels of this song’s release, Nate sat down with Charlie Puth himself at Conway Studios in Hollywood to discuss the new track, aided by a piano and all of “Hero”’s isolated stems.

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On Billie Eilish’s third album, Hit Me Hard and Soft, Eilish finally graduates from her signature anti-pop persona into full blown pop stardom. This record finds Eilish experimenting on the themes from her earlier records, while crafting an economic ten tracks that position themselves for mainstream radio consumption. There’s “L’amour de ma vie,” her five-and-a-half minute beat-switching eulogy for a failed relationship, or “Birds Of A Feather,” where she contrasts the soft, dreamy melodies we’ve come to know Eilish for with hauntingly dark lyrical content. This duality is a recurring motif throughout Hit Me Hard and Soft, with each song offering a unique blend of vulnerability and strength. These tracks, along with the rest of the album, develop a satisfying and diverse creative arc that speaks to the album’s title: they hit both hard and soft. This week’s episode of Switched On Pop explores Eilish’s new record track by track, unpacking the sonic duality of her new sound.

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When you go out for a meal, it’s not just what's on your plate that matters, it's what's in your eardrums, too. From dining rooms so loud you have to shout to be heard, to playlists that sound like a generic Millennial Spotify account, it's not surprising that sound is the single most complained about aspect of restaurants.

A few years ago, Charlie and Nate explored this in an episode on restaurant playlists. This week, they joined Cynthia and Nicky on their show Gastropod to help them explore the science behind the sonic experience of eating.

Are restaurants really getting louder, and, if so, why? What does it take to create the perfect acoustic environment for dining? Can restaurateurs design their playlists to make customers order more or eat faster? Listen in now for the secrets to culinary acoustic bliss – and check out Cynthia and Nicky's guest spot on our episode of Switched On Pop.

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Where were you when you learned that the McDonald's jingle "I'm lovin' it" was originally part of a full-fledged pop song by Justin Timberlake and Pharrell that flopped on the charts but found staying power as a slogan? For us, it was recording our live episode about sponsored content in pop back in March 2024, and we have not been the same since. Shaken by this revelation, we found ourselves asking, "What else don't we know about fast food jingles?"

Turns out, it's a lot. From Taco Bell to Popeye's to Chili's, the music of fast food represent some of the most familiar melodies in society, across state lines and generations. But the stories behind those songs, and the way that fast food production and pop music production often move in parallel, was something we never saw coming once.

Since we are music experts but amateur foodies, we invited the brilliant hosts of Eater's Gastropod podcast, Cynthia Graber and Nicola Twilley, to help serve up the history of fast food and its changing role in culture. Tune in and pig out with us as we listen and debate the artistic and ethical implications of the sounds of fast food.

More

Check out more episodes of Gastropod

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Tongue twisters that mock techno-optimism and cite critical theory don’t usually make for catchy song lyrics. But indie rocker Rosie Tucker’s Utopia Now! finds beauty in the dross of late capitalism. Over 13 songs backed by distorted guitars and blazing drum fills, Tucker’s searing vocals bemoan the inherent dislocation of our modern world while searching for moments of truth and human connection.

The night before Tucker embarked on a tour, Nate visited their home studio to speak to them about the inspirations behind their latest album. Although it deals with “big” topics, Tucker stressed that it all comes back to the individual and that the world we have reflects the world we make. “I am trying to reckon with both processing personal resentment,” they told Nate, “and recognizing my own role in my own misery.”

Songs Discussed:

Rosie Tucker - All My Exes Live In Vortexes, Lightbulb, Paperclip Maximizer, Unending Bliss

Erik Satie - Gymnopedie No 1

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It’s that time of year again when the entirety of Europe (and a few other countries) come together to celebrate kitschy, bombastic songwriting through the Eurovision Song Contest! This year’s competition, held in Malmo, Sweden, features everything from rave-pop on behalf of the Netherlands, to folk-rapping hybrids courtesy of Ukraine – and Charlie and Nate are here to musicologically unpack the craziest tracks that have the potential to win it all. 

For more on the controversy surrounding this year’s contest, check out Charlie’s appearance on Vox’s podcast Today, Explained.

Songs discussed:

• Joost – Europapa
• Angelina Mango – La noia
• alyona alyona, Jerry Heil – Teresa & Maria
• Nemo – The Code
• Baby Lasagna – Rim Tim Tagi Dim
• Windows95Man – No Rules!
• Kaleen – We Will Rave
• Olly Alexander – Dizzy
• Bambie Thug – Doomsday Blue
• Ladaniva – Jako

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Gaspard Augé and Xavier de Rosnay of the French electronic duo Justice speak with cohost Charlie Harding about their new album Hyperdrama.

Song Discussed

• Justice - Phantom Pt II, D.A.N.C.E., Neveender, New Jack, Genesis, Horsepower, Civilization, One Night-All Night, Dear Alan, Incognito, Moonlight Rendez-vous, Audio Video Disco, Afterimage, The End, Generator, Pleasure
• The Who - My Generation
• The White Stripes - Black Math
• The Human League - Human
• John Carpenter - Night
• Serge Gainsourg & Jane Birkin - Je T’aime… moi non plus
• Michel Berger - Le Paradis Blanc
• Stardust - Music Sounds Better With You
• Chaka Khan - Fate

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The beginning of 2024 has brought new music aplenty. Some big releases are in the form of big-ticket albums by the world’s biggest superstars (shoutout Taylor and Beyoncé); some are in the form of soon-to-be radio-friendly staples (we love you, "Espresso"); and some are in the form of personal earworms (Justice! Rosie Tucker! Dua!).

This episode of Switched on Pop, we take a look at the records that we can’t stop listening to from the past few months, from Metro Boomin to Kacey Musgraves to Willow Smith. 

Songs discussed: 

• Metro Boomin, Future, Kendrick Lamar – Like That
• J Cole – 7 Minute Drill
• Drake – Push Ups
• Rick Ross – Champagne Moments
• WILLOW – Big Feelings
• Hozier – Too Sweet
• Sabrina Carpenter – Espresso
• Justice, Tame Impala – One Night/All Night
• Justice – Generator
• Rosie Tucker – All My Exes Live In Vortexes
• Lizzy McAlpine – I Guess
• Kacey Musgraves – Too Good To Be True
• Maggie Rogers – The Kill
• Dua Lipa – Illusion
• Kacey Musgraves – Deeper Well

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The Tortured Poets Department, Taylor Swift's 11th studio album, finds the songwriter in the world of literature. She interweaves personal romance with mythical creation and quotations from high and low culture: Genesis, Peter Pan and even Playstation. Despite calling herself a "modern idiot," less-than-subtle nods to Sylvia Plath, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Dylan Thomas, and Patti Smith reveal the artist’s literary aspirations and “legendary” status. The full length Anthology version contains a bookshelf of many genres: pulp fiction, diary entries, period pieces, epic poems, and her very own genre, Taylor Swift.

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Lost Notes by KCRW explores how Fela Kuti’s time in LA in 1969 was instrumental in the creation of his legendary Afrobeat sound. Hosted by Michael Barnes and Novena Carmel. Find a full transcript of Lost Notes at KCRW. And subscribe to the show.

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There are few artists pushing the boundaries of their respective genres like Maryland rapper Rico Nasty and German-Iraqi electronic producer Boys Noize. The two have run in the same circles for over half a decade, but their joint collaboration has reached an apex with their three song EP, HARDC0RE DR3AMZ, a dance-floor ready project that owes as much to Berlin techno as it does to Dutch gabber music. Rico and Boys Noize – a.k.a. Alexander Ridha – are also incredible friends with a lot of love for one another, and for producer Reanna Cruz, all of these reasons make the duo’s EP one of the best projects of the year.

On the heels of Berlin techno being added to the UNESCO list of intangible cultural heritage for Germany, Reanna sat down with Rico and Alex for this episode of Switched on Pop.

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Joe Keery is best known for his acting roles, such as the reformed jock Steve Harrington in "Stranger Things" and his chilling performance in season 5 of "Fargo." But he's also a spectacular musician. Rising through the Chicago music scene in college, he has self-released two albums under the moniker 'Djo.' His latest work, "Decide" from 2022, serves as a coming-of-age story and a meditation on navigating modern life. Despite strong initial reviews, the album only gained widespread attention two years later when its breakout hit "End of Beginning" became a soundtrack for youthful nostalgia on TikTok, casting Keery as an accidental pop star. Joe Keery joined "Switched On Pop" to discuss the creation and significance of "Decide."

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Beyoncé's Cowboy Carter is her foray into country music, but this isn't just dirt roads, blue jeans and whiskey. Her country music distills all of American pop: blues, gospel, R&B, soul, house, hip-hop and yes, country. If this ain't country, what is?

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Hip-hop is in a weird place right now. Research says that the genre, in both streaming and chart performance, has declined over the last decade. And while rap artists can still get number one songs on the Hot 100, it’s a far cry from the peak of trap circa 2017, when Nielsen data named hip-hop as the most popular genre in the U.S.

So what does that mean for the future of rap? To find out, producer Reanna Cruz spent all weekend reporting from Inglewood, CA, at the California edition of the world’s largest hip-hop festival: Rolling Loud. Through talking to attendees and catching the weekend’s hottest sets, they learned about the current state of hip-hop – the good and the bad – as well as what the future may hold.

To read Reanna’s highs and lows from the festival, check out their Vulture article here. 

Special thanks to Antonio Cruz for his production help on this episode.

Songs Discussed:

• OsamaSon – Pop
• Nicki Minaj – BARBIE DANGEROUS
• ¥$, Kanye West, & Ty Dolla $ign – EVERYBODY (live)
• ¥$, Kanye West, & Ty Dolla $ign – BACK TO ME (live)
• Junior H – Y LLORO
• Natanael Cano – Pacas de Billetes
• Fuerza Regida – Enculado
• That Mexican OT, Lefty SM – Barrio (with Lefty SM)
• That Mexican OT – Cowboy Killer (live)
• KenTheMan – Not My N**** – Extended
• KenTheMan – Poppin Sh!t
• KenTheMan – Keep Going (live)
• Kaliii – Area Codes
• Action Bronson & Statik Selektah – Respect the Moustache
• Drake, SZA, & Sexyy Red – Rich Baby Daddy (live)
• Sexyy Red, Sukihana – Born By the River (feat. Sukihana)
• Sexyy Red, Chief Keef – Skee Yee (live)
• Nettspend – shine n peace (live)
• Nettspend – deftones snippet (live)
• Matt Ox – Overwhelming
• Nettspend – What they say
• SOPHIE – BIPP

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What do Duke Ellington, United Airlines, and the K Pop group Red Velvet share in common? They've all covered George Gershwin's piano concerto, Rhapsody in Blue. First premiered in 1924, the piece became an immediate hit for the way it blended American jazz with the European symphonic tradition. Gershwin had a number of successes as a composer in his day—his aria "Summertime" from the opera Porgy and Bess is by some measures the most covered song ever—but the staying power of the Rhapsody make it a rare instrumental piece that's instantly familiar. Maybe too familiar.

In 2024, there will be many centennial performances of this iconic piece, but pianist Lara Downes wanted to do something more than just the sound the notes of Gershwin's score for the umpteenth time. Downes commissioned Puerto Rican musician Edmar Colon to create a new version of Gershwin's composition, one that brought in the full spectrum of American life in 1924: fiery improvisation, Latin percussion, and dance rhythms. The resultant piece both pays tribute to an American icon while adding a new set of modern counterpoint.

Nate sat down with Lara to ask her if she was nervous to rewrite such a canonic piece, why a concerto is like a musical kaleidoscope, and the surprising family connection to Gershwin's musical world she discovered while researching Rhapsody in Blue.

Songs Discussed

George Gershwin, Lara Downes, Edmar Colon - Rhapsody in Blue Reimagined

Gershwin - Rhapsody in Blue

Gershwin - 3 Preludes: II. Andante con moto e poco rubato

Sarah Vaughan - Nice Work if You can Get It

Sam Cooke - Summertime

Chet Baker - But not For ME

Louis Armstrong - Aint Misbehavin

Ella Fitzgerald - Blue Skies

Red Velvet - Birthday

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Sidestep the gossip and focus on the music in Ariana Grande’s latest album Eternal Sunshine. The music is an exercise in nostalgia: 70s Disco, 90s R&B, and 00s pop and dance music. As she moves through the musical past, her lyrics tear through past relationship. But its the way her lyrics interweave with the deft melodies and harmonies that reveal the meaning of the record. 

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Songs Discussed

• Ariana Grande - Eternal Sunshine, Bye, Don’t Wanna Break Up Again, True Story, The Boy Is Mine, We Can’t Be Friends, Imperfect For You
• Isaac Hayes - Theme From Shaft
• Barry White - Can’t Get Enough of Your Love Babe
• Britney Spears - Oops I Did It Again, Gimme More
• Brandy, Monica - The Boy Is Mine
• Aaliyah - Are You That Somebody
• Ginuwine - Pony
• Robyn - Call Your Girlfriend, Show Me Love

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In a landscape where the music industry seems designed to stifle creativity and independence, Amelia Meath stands as a beacon of resistance. Through her involvement in bands like Sylvan Esso, Mountain Man, and The A's, and as a founder of label Psychic Hotline, Meath defies the narratives that label success in music. This conversation dives into the systemic challenges musicians face today—from the pitfalls of streaming economics to the trials of touring and beyond. Yet, it's not just about the hurdles; it's a conversation on solutions, embodied by Meath's multifaceted career and the inspirational journey of David Gray, whose story of grassroots success with "Babylon" serves as a case study in artistic resilience and independence.

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Songs Discussed

David Gray - Babylon, Shine, What Have I Become, Skellig

Sylvan Esso - Coffee, Die Young

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Live from On-Air Fest in Brooklyn, Nate and Charlie investigate listeners’ burning musical mysteries, such as: Is Beyoncé’s reference to Lexus in “Texas Hold ’Em” product placement? And, could we be tuning all our music the wrong way? These stories have twists, turns, and a live parody performance that no asked for.

Thanks to Steve Stoute, Lucas Keller, Samer Ghadry, Helen Zaltzman, and Phil Pappas for contributing to this episode.

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Songs Discussed:

• Beyoncé – TEXAS HOLD ‘EM
• RUN DMC – My Adidas
• Busta Rhymes – Pass The Courvoisier Part II
• Taylor Swift – Out of the Woods
• Outkast – Hey Ya!
• Jason Aldean – Take A Little Ride
• Justin Timberlake – I'm Lovin' It
• Chris Brown – Forever
• Pitbull – Rain Over Me (ft. Marc Anthony)
• Lady Gaga – Telephone (ft. Beyoncé)
• Beyoncé – SUMMER RENAISSANCE
• Beyoncé – Crazy In Love (ft. Jay-Z)
• LFO – Summer Girls
• Aqua – Barbie Girl
• Moonlight Sonata (432hz)
• Here Comes the Sun (432hz)
• Deep Focus Music with 432 Hz Tuning and Binaural Beats for Concentration - Study Music

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One of the most inventive and gifted musicians working today is none other than Jacob Collier. Maybe you know him from his YouTube videos, or co-writing SZA’s “Good Days,” or even performing alongside Joni Mitchell at this year’s Grammys. Jacob is a musician with thunderous chops, proficient on multiple instruments and with a voice that ranges from bass to soprano. over the past few years, he’s managed to release several records, net collaborations with everyone from Michael McDonald to T-Pain, and become the first British artist to receive a Grammy Award for each of his first four albums. His latest album Djesse 4 is the conclusion to his Djesse quadrilogy, and it features a kaleidoscopic range of style, from Indian sitar to Colombian reggaeton to a haunting Simon and Garfunkel cover. This week, we’re going to take a look inside the work and process of a musical mad scientist – our resident songwriter Charlie Harding sat down with Jacob to learn about his new record, his collaborators, and the beautifully unique way he sees and thinks about music.

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SONGS DISCUSSED

Jacob Collier - In My Room, 100,000 Voices, A Rock Somewhere, Little Blue, She Put Sunshine

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Renaissance Act II truthers, your time has come: There’s new music from Beyoncé, and boy, is it country. Her two new singles dropped two weeks ago, and in the time since, they’ve both climbed up the chart and taken the internet by storm. There’s the barnstorming stomp and holler ditty “TEXAS HOLD 'EM,” which just notched the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100, and the dark horse “16 CARRIAGES,” a autobiographical work song detailing Beyoncé’s roots in Houston, Texas. Charlie and Nate unpack both of these two songs, highlighting their structures, inspirations, and collaborators, from Raphael Saddiq to Rhiannon Giddens. Then, producer Reanna Cruz speaks to music journalist Taylor Crumpton, whose article for Time, “Beyoncé Has Always Been Country” lays out the cultural implications of this sonic pivot for one of the biggest artists of all time. 

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Songs Discussed

• Beyoncé - Texas Hold 'Em, 16 Carriages, Break My Soul, Formation, Daddy Lessons
• Dink Roberts - Georgia Buck
• Carolina Chocolate Drops - Hit 'Em Up Style
• Elvis Presley - Mystery Train
• Unidentified African American Chain Gang - Waterboy, Run
• James Carter and the Prisoners - Po Lazarus
• Robert Randolph and the Family Band - Find a Way
• Vince Gill ft Justus West- High Lonesome Sound

More

Read Taylor Crumpton's article Beyoncé Has Always Been Country

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The Canadian Electro-Funk duo CHROMEO have made consistently funky, highly danceable music for twenty years. They’ve released five studios albums, done the Coachella festival circuit and have been nominated for a Grammy for their sound that’s been compared to Prince, Zapp and Hall and Oates. Now with their latest album, Adult Contemporary, they are challenging preconceptions of adult contemporary music by redefining its whole meaning.

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Songs discussed

CHROMEO - (I Don't Need A) New Girl, BTS, Coda, Fancy Footwork, Needy Girl, Replacements, Clorox Wipe, Six Feet Away

Dolly Parton - Nine to Five

Donna Summer - She Works Hard For The Money

Gwen Guthrie - Ain't Nothin' Goin' on but the Rent

Kenny G - Songbird, You're Beautiful

Kenny Loggins - This Is It

Kenny Rodgers - We've Got Tonight, You And I

Michael Bolton - How Am I Supposed To Live

Michael Bublé - Home

Michael Jackson - Human Nature, Working Day and Night

NWA - Straight Outta Compton

Steely Dan - Black Cow, Ricky Don't Lose That Number, Time Out of Mind

The Bee Gees - Staying Alive

Toto - I'll be Over You

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Who is the biggest Diva of them all? The U.S. National Anthem, which borrows its melody from a historic British drinking song, has undergone enormous musical change in the hands of pop music vocalists. Famously, José Feliciano, Marvin Gaye and Whitney Houston each changed the meaning of "The Star Spangled Banner" by finding new approaches to the performance. Countless others have followed in their footsteps. Now every major sporting event is an excuse for pop divas to make their own creative interpretation. So who does it best? Or worst? Jan Diehm and Michelle McGhee, data journalists at The Pudding, analyzed the pitch fluctuations of over a hundred famous performances to answer these questions and more.

Check out Jan and Michelle's full analysis at pudding.cool

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When it comes to powerful artistry, few can match the intensity of Brittany Howard. Over the past decade, we’ve seen her bring her signature Southern belt to the Alabama Shakes, her intimate songwriting to her first solo record, and now, her boundary-pushing genre experimentation on her new album What Now. The record, which drops on Friday, February 9th, continues to show Howard’s versatility – the record jumps from disco pop to pared-back R&B to roaring psychedelia. 

This episode of Switched On Pop, we’re giving you an early look at all What Now has to offer, as well as an interview with the woman behind it all: Brittany Howard. 

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Songs Discussed:

• Brittany Howard – What Now
• Alabama Shakes – Hold On
• Alabama Shakes – Don’t Wanna Fight
• Alabama Shakes – Future People
• Leon Bridges – Coming Home
• Khruangbin – Two Fish and an Elephant
• Brittany Howard – Tomorrow
• Erykah Badu – Window Seat
• Brittany Howard – Stay High
• Brittany Howard – Prove It To You
• Brittany Howard – I Don’t
• Brittany Howard – Another Day
• Brittany Howard – Interlude
• Brittany Howard – Red Flags
• Robin S – Show Me Love
• Brittany Howard – Every Color In Blue
• Brittany Howard – To Be Still
• The Shangri-Las – Leader Of The Pack

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When it comes to musical theater, everyone has an opinion. And Bridger Winegar, host of the very funny podcast I Said No Gifts!, is no exception. In the paradoxical tradition of Bridger's podcast, Charlie and Nate have brought a series of gifts in the form of a sonic smorgasbord: a tour through musical theater's finest offerings, from Les Miserables to Spring Awakening.

Check out Bridger's podcast I Said No Gifts! here.

For more on movie musicals, check out this episode of Vox's Today Explained.

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Songs discussed:

• Brian Johnson, Gideon Glick, John Gallagher Jr., Jonathan B. Wright, Jonathan Groff, Skylar Astin – The Bitch Of Living – Original Broadway Cast Recording/2006
• Duncan Sheik – Barely Breathing
• Thee Oh Sees – The Dream
• Liars – Mr Your On Fire Mr
• The Electric Prunes – I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night)
• Ariana Grande – yes, and?
• Robyn – Call Your Girlfriend
• Randy Graff – I Dreamed a Dream
• Ali Stroker – I Cain't Say No
• Josh Groban, Annaleigh Ashford, Stephen Sondheim, Sweeney Todd 2023 Broadway Company – My Friends
• Frank Sinatra – Send In The Clowns
• Billy Bragg, Wilco – California Stars

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Colombian-American singer Kali Uchis has cemented herself as something of a vibe curator; her signature genre fusion has brought forward everything from Latin radio mainstays to Bootsy Collins collaborations. But instead of looking to the genres of the future for her latest record, Orchídeas finds Uchis digging into genres of the past and present, creating a global soundscape across the record’s 14 tracks. On this episode of Switched on Pop, producer Reanna Cruz guides Charlie and Nate through the flowery world of Orchídeas, exploring multiple genres of the Latine diaspora (with a quick stop in South Africa) in the process.

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Songs Discussed:

• Kali Uchis – Pensamientos Intrusivos
• Kali Uchis – telepatía
• Kali Uchis – Te Mata
• Kali Uchis – la luna enamorada
• José Pepe Sánchez, Irving Lara y su Orquesta – Tristezas
• La Sonora Santanera – Perfume de Gardenias
• Kali Uchis, El Alfa, JT – Muñekita (with El Alfa & JT) 
• ROSALÍA – BIZCOCHITO
• Busta Rhymes – Dangerous
• Lorna – Papi Chulo… Te Traigo El Mmmm
• Kali Uchis, Peso Pluma – Igual Que Un Ángel (with Peso Pluma)
• Kali Uchis, KAROL G – Labios Mordidos (with KAROL G)
• Toots & The Maytals – Bam Bam
• Chaka Demus & Pliers – Murder She Wrote
• Kali Uchis – Dame Beso // Muevete
• Bad Bunny – Después de la Playa
• Kali Uchis – Diosa
• Trompies, Lebo Mathosa – Magasman
• Tyla – Water
• Amaarae, Kali Uchis, Moliy – SAD GIRLZ LUV MONEY Remix (feat. Kali Uchis and Moliy)

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We live in an age of musical nostalgia where artists wear influences on their sleaves. Case in point, two established artists who are drawing from established pop music history: Lil Nas X's "J. Christ" sounds like a Kendrick Lamar "Humble" type beat, and Ariana Grande's "Yes, And?" unabashedly interpolates Madonna's "Vogue." So are these songs mere copies or do they actually say something new with their reference material?

Songs Discussed

• Lil Nas X - J CHRIST
• Lil Nas X - Old Town Road
• Lil Nas X - Panini
• Lil Nas X - MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)
• Kendrick Lamar - HUMBLE.
• Noreaga - Superthug
• N.E.R.D - Lapdance
• Busta Rhymes - Pass The Courvoisier Part II (feat. P. Diddy & Pharrell) - Remix
• Kendrick Lamar - Alright
• Cardi B - Money
• Iggy Azalea - Sally Walker
• Cardi B - Up
• Anne-Marie - PSYCHO
• Megan Thee Stallion - Savage
• Megan Thee Stallion - Megan's Piano
• Ariana Grande - yes, and?
• Madonna - Vogue
• Marshall Jefferson - Move Your Body
• Derrick May - Strings of Life
• Farley "Jackmaster" Funk, Jesse Saunders - Love Can't Turn Around

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All throughout the year, Switched on Pop gets a litany of musical questions that need answering. To kick off 2024, hosts Charlie and Nate answer some of these questions live on air! From the renewed interest in Cass Elliot's "Make Your Own Kind of Music" to the lack of multi-part harmonies on the charts, this episode takes a closer look at some listeners' musical maladies – alongside special guest star Joe Treble.

Songs Discussed:

• Eagles - Take It Easy
• Jack Harlow - Lovin On Me
• Cadillac Dale - Whatever (Bass Soliloquy)
• Tate McRae - greedy
• Dua Lipa - Houdini
• Fleetwood Mac – The Chain
• Ariana Grande - shut up
• boygenius – Not Strong Enough
• boygenius - Without You Without Them
• Jerry Goldsmith - Jake And Evelyn (From The “Chinatown” Soundtrack)
• Terence Blanchard - Perry Sees Teddy (From HBO Series Perry Mason: Season 1)
• Cass Elliot - Make Your Own Kind of Music
• David Bowie – Space Oddity
• Elton John - Rocket Man (I Think It’s Going To Be A Long, Long Time)
• TALK - Run Away to Mars
• Tommy Tutone - 867-5309/Jenny
• Blondie - Call Me
• Lady Gaga - Telephone ft. Beyoncé
• Rico Nasty - IPHONE
• R.E.M. - Star 69
• 50 Cent - High All The Time
• Beyoncé – Crazy in Love ft. Jay-Z
• Britney Spears – E-Mail My Heart

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In case you missed it, last January, we published this story on the rising trend of sped-up music. It seems like the tempo-shifting isn't going anywhere, so we're rerunning our history and exploration into the phenomenon.

Original description below:

Over the past few months, you may have heard your favorite song pop up on the Internet – just slightly faster. You’re not alone: the phenomenon of the “sped-up” remix has taken over social media, with everyone from Lady Gaga to Thundercat getting the tempo treatment. The popularity of the craze has led to millions of TikTok videos, Billboard number ones, and songs becoming relevant again, decades after release. Ever since the proliferation of these “remixes,” the big questions remain: where did these songs come from and why are they here? 

On this episode of Switched on Pop, we explore this exact phenomenon, tracing its roots from Thomas Edison to Cam’ron to vaporwave to nightcore.

Songs Discussed:

• “Dream On” – Aerosmith (sped up)
• “Escapism” – RAYE, 070 Shake (sped up)
• “Bad Habit” – Steve Lacy (sped up)
• “Miss You” – Oliver Tree (sped up)
• “Say It Right” – Nelly Furtado (sped up)
• “Bloody Mary” – Lady Gaga (sped up)
• “Heat Waves” – Glass Animals (slowed down)
• “Juicy” – Notorious B.I.G. 
• “Juicy” – DJ Screw
• “Jolene” – Dolly Parton (slowed down)
• “リサフランク420 / 現代のコンピュー |” – Macintosh Plus
• “In Da Club Before Eleven O’ Clock” – DJ Rashad
• “Monster [Nightcore]” – Meg & Dia, remixed by Barren Gates 
• “Concrete Angel” – Hannah Diamond
• “Witch Doctor” – David Seville
• “Oh Boy” – Cam’ron, Juelz Santana
• “Cool for the Summer” – Demi Lovato (sped up)
• “Them Changes” – Thundercat (sped up & Chopnotslop remix)
• “That’s All” – Genesis

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In case you missed it, Wham’s 1984 contribution to the holiday cannon, “Last Christmas,” has surprising staying power. When Grammy-winning pianist Chilly Gonzales set out to record a holiday album, “A Very Chilly Christmas,” most of the selections were over a half century old. That’s because most of our favorite seasonal songs come from the 1960s and earlier. But in addition to Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas,” Wham’s “Last Christmas” reliably returns each winter. Despite the cheesy 80s synths and drum machines, the song’s harmonies are remarkable resilient, a testament to George Michael’s auteur songwriting method. Celebrated artist known for his solo piano works, collaborations with Feist and Daft Punk, and his musical masterclasses series, Chilly Gonzales—musical genius—AKA “Gonzo,” sits down at the piano to share in the beauty of this nu-classical Christmas love song, as well as a few selections from his new album “A Very Chilly Christmas.”

Originally aired Dec 2020

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Holiday album releases sometimes have a sense of pandering to them. "I'm a pop star. Here's me singing the nineteen-millionth cover of 'Jingle Bell Rock.' Please give me money."

The comedian and singer Matt Rogers understands this dichotomy of the holiday hit—part grotesque cash-grab, part unfathomably genuine cheer—better than anyone. His new album, Have You Heard of Christmas?, mines that tension for tragicomic gold.

"Also It's Christmas," the album opener, announces this satirical spirit blithely, with an exhortation to "play this song seasonally!" "Rum Pum Pum" turns the little drummer's beat into a sexy club anthem: "Saw your name on the naughty list highlighted in red / Now you're up in the club in someone else's sweat." Over the course of Have You Heard..., Rogers poses questions that poke at the edges of Christmas lore: "Is it weird to hook up on Christmas day?" "How does it feel to be the hottest female in Whoville?" And, "Why does Santa needs so much lube for his sleigh?"

Matt joined Nate and Charlie to share how his pop writing draws from sketch comedy rhythm, the influence he drew from both Ariana Grande and the Lonely Island, and how he accidentally created a sincere holiday hit in the middle of making a comedy album.

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Nicki Minaj is one of the most unique rappers of all time. She’s given us numerous iconic guest verses from “Monster” to “Flawless (Remix),” everlasting hits like “Super Bass” and “Starships,” and legions of loyal fans in the Barbz. She’s also given us over twenty alter-egos in the course of her career. However, no alter-ego of hers has been more impactful than Roman. The voice at the center of Nicki’s most unhinged music, the “Roman” persona serves a conduit for Nicki to put forward a high level of theatricality and character work in her music, from beats to bars. And to understand Nicki, you need to understand Roman. 

This episode of Switched on Pop, producer Reanna Cruz takes us on a journey through the history of Roman, on the heels of Nicki Minaj’s latest record, Pink Friday 2. 

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Songs Discussed:

• Nicki Minaj – Chun-Li
• Nicki Minaj – Red Ruby Da Sleeze
• Nicki Minaj – Itty Bitty Piggy
• Kanye West, Nicki Minaj, Jay-Z, Rick Ross, Bon Iver – Monster
• Nicki Minaj – Roman In Moscow
• Nicki Minaj – Pound the Alarm
• Nicki Minaj – Starships
• Ludacris, Nicki Minaj – My Chick Bad
• Nicki Minaj, PTAF – Boss A** B**** (with PTAF) – Remix
• Nicki Minaj, Eminem – Roman's Revenge
• Nicki Minaj – Come On A Cone
• Nicki Minaj – Beez In The Trap
• Nicki Minaj – Roman Holiday
• Eminem – The Way I Am
• Eminem – My Name Is
• Lil' Kim – Queen B****
• Nicki Minaj, Drake, Lil Wayne – Truffle Butter
• Trey Songz, Nicki Minaj – Bottoms Up (feat. Nicki Minaj)
• Nicki Minaj – Barbie Dreams
• Nicki Minaj – Super Freaky Girl – Roman Remix
• Nicki Minaj – My Life

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When you make a weekly podcast about pop music, there’s some things that, naturally, slip through the cracks. On this episode of Switched On Pop, our hosts – alongside our editor, Jolie Myers, our engineer, Brandon McFarland, and our producer, Reanna Cruz – try to course correct that by discussing our team’s (and a listener’s) favorite picks of 2023. Whether it’s something we got to in the later months or something we felt still deserved its flowers, this episode hops around genres to show the musical versatility of the Switched On Pop team. We even got some of our selections, specifically Laufey and Chappell Roan, on the show to talk about the music that made our year. Who knows: maybe you’ll find the song to top your personal best-of list!

Songs Discussed:

• Troye Sivan ft. Guitarricadelafuente - In My Room
• Troye Sivan - Rush
• Troye Sivan - One Of Your Girls
• Daft Punk ft. Julian Casablancas - Instant Crush
• Victoria Monet - On My Mama
• Chalie Boi - I Look Good
• Victoria Monét ft. Earth, Wind & Fire + Hazel Monét - Hollywood
• Laufey - Bewitched
• Laufey - Questions For The Universe
• Laufey - Dreamer
• Laufey - From The Start
• Laufey - Misty
• Stray Kids - S-Class
• Sampha - Spirit 2.0
• Little Dragon - Twice
• James Blake - There’s A Limit To Your Love
• Chappell Roan - Super Graphic Ultra Modern Girl
• Chappell Roan - Casual
• Chappell Roan - Femininomenon
• Village People - Y.M.C.A.
• Chappell Roan - HOT TO GO!

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Nate and Charlie were recently featured on Harman Audio Talks. While our team takes the week off, we wanted to share that conversation with you as we pull back the curtain on how we make the show and select songs for the podcast.

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Noah Kahan is having a banner year. Between his Best New Artist nomination at the Grammys, his debut SNL performance, and collaborations with everyone from Post Malone to Hozier, the Vermont singer-songwriter has transcended the confines of New England to become one of the harbingers of the 2023 stomp-clap revival. This episode of Switched on Pop, host Charlie Harding sits down in person with Kahan to find some secret magic chords, opine on car commercial music, and talk about all things Stick Season. 

Songs Discussed

• Noah Kahan - Stick Season
• Noah Kahan - You’re A Mess
• Paul Simon - Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard
• James Taylor - Sweet Baby James
• Cat Stevens - Father & Son
• The Avett Brothers - Live and Die
• Lumineers - Hey Ho
• Olivia Rodrigo - Stick Season
• Olivia Rodrigo - drivers license
• Noah Kahan, Hozier - Northern Attitude
• Noah Kahan - Homesick
• Sam Fender - 17 Going Under
• Phoebe Bridgers - Moon Song
• Simpler Times - Roll in my Sweet Baby’s Arms
• Noah Kahan, Post Malone - Dial Drunk
• Taylor Swift - Mean
• Olivia Rodrigo - Logical
• Noah Kahan - Young Blood
• Noah Kahan - Catastrophize

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Country music's had a massive year. Seriously, not since 1958 have we seen so many country tunes topping the Hot 100 in a single year – and it's not been without its share of controversy. Leading this country music revival? Morgan Wallen, for starters. He bounced back from being shunned for dropping a racial slur with his number one single “Last Night.” Then there's Jason Aldean with “Try That in a Small Town,” a song and music video that which unsubtly lynching references. Next up, newcomer Oliver Anthony Music dropped “Richmond North of Richmond,” weaving in QAnon references and welfare shaming into a track largely about government distrust. On a lighter but still contentious note, Luke Combs covered the mega 90s hit “Fast Car,” turning Tracy Chapman into the first black woman with a number one country hit. And let's not forget Zach Bryan and Kacey Musgraves' beautiful duet “I Remember Everything” about a past romance, which also climbed to the top. Many of these songs have just been nominated for Grammys, including “Last Night,” “Fast Car,” and “I Remember Everything.”

When all this started happening, we were scratching our heads. Country songs topping the Hot 100? Sure, but not this many in quick succession. Something felt different. And we think we've finally figured it out after diving into Chris Molanphy's new book: Old Town Road. Chris, a music and charts critic, author of Slate’s Why Is This Song No. 1 column, and host of the excellent music podcast Hit Parade, explores country music's chart history in his latest book “Old Town Road,” part of Duke's Single Series. He zeroes in on Lil Nas X's 2018 “Old Town Road” and its 2019 Billy Ray Cyrus-amped remix as a case study. So, to get the lowdown on 2023's country chart toppers, we've got to rewind to 2018 and re-examine “Old Town Road” with Chris Molanphy's insights.

SONGS DISCUSSED

• Lil Nas X - Old Town Road
• Lil Nas X, Billy Ray Cyrus - Old Town Road remix
• Morgan Waller - Last Night
• Jason Aldean - Try That In A Small Town
• Oliver Anthony Music - Rich Men North of Richmond
• Luke Combs - Fast Car
• Zach Bryan, Kacey Musgraves - I Remember Everything 
• Lil Nas X - Sonic Shit
• Nine Inch Nails - 34 Ghosts IV
• Billy Ray Cyrus - Achy Breaky Heart
• Luke Bryan - Light It Up
• Morgan Wallen - Thinking’ Bout Me
• Jason Aldean - Burnin’ It Down 
• DeFord Bailey - Fox Chase
• Carter Family - Can The Circle Be Unbroken 
• Bill Monroe - Mule Skinner Blues 
• Hank Williams - Wealth Won’t Save Your Soul 
• Ray Charles - You Are My Sunshine
• Pine Ridge Boys - You Are My Sunshine
• Patsy Cline - Crazy 
• Lionel Richie - Stuck On You 
• Blano Brown - The Git Up 

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When Paul McCartney announced that he and Ringo Starr had produced a new Beatles song with the aid of AI, many music pundits were skeptical. Was this new song be another gimmick like the fake Drake hit "Heart on My Sleeve"? No. Instead, the Beatles simply used AI voice separation technology to repair a well-worn John Lennon demo tape. 

Back in the '90s, Yoko Ono gave shared a collection of unfinished John Lennon demos with Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, and George Harrison (who died in 2001) as part of a final recording session that resulted in the singles "Free As a Bird" and "Real Love." However, the third song, “Now And Then" was marred by hissing and humming, and the piano was overly loud. Harrison called it rubbish, and after a few hours of tracking a rough song they left it on the cutting room floor. 

But now in 2023, using film maker Peter Jackson’s latest restoration technology created for his "Get Back" documentary, the Beatles were able to create one last song together, though in three different eras. Lennon tracked his vocals in the '70s, Harrison's parts were lifted from the '90s sessions, and McCartney and Starr added their parts in 2022. The band is filled out by a string arrangement by Giles Martin (Beatles cataloger and son of the late Beatles producer George Martin) and Ben Foster, in addition to reused backing vocals from earlier Beatles tracks. 

So, did the Beatles successfully bring this worn-out recording back to life? Does this AI song sound like Beatles, let alone human? Find out on Switched On Pop.

SONGS DISCUSSED

• The Beatles - Now And Then
• The Beatles - Free As A Bird
• The Beatles - Real Love
• The Beatles - Taxman
• The Beatles - While My Guitar Gently Weeps
• The Beatles - Two Of Us
• The Beatles - Eleanor Rigby
• The Beatles - Because
• The Beatles - Here, There And Everywhere
• The Beatles - The End
• The Beatles - Penny Lane
• The Beatles - Tomorrow Never Knows
• The Beatles - In My Life
• The Beatles - You Won't See Me
• The Beatles - When I'm Sixty Four
• The Beatles - Hello, Goodbye
• The Beatles - Blackbird
• The Beatles - I Want You (She's So Heavy)

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Three big artists have rerecorded their most hallowed musical material. Taylor Swift, Roger Water and Demi Lovato each have different intentions in painstakingly putting their old songs onto new proverbial tape. On 1989 (Taylor's Version), Taylor Swift seeks control of her master recordings. On Dark Side of the Moon Redux Roger Waters explores his most vaunted work from his youth now with from perspective of an octogenarian. And Demi Lovato Revamped pivots their old pop hits into a hard rock aesthetic. Switched On Pop listens back to all three albums to see how they hold up to the original and to uncover new musical discoveries.

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It’s time for another edition of our series Chartbreakers, where we take a look at the trends and shakeups happening on the Billboard Hot 100. This week, however, the chart has been dominated by Drake and his album For All the Dogs, which takes up a grand total of 23 spots on the Hot 100. So, rather than do a story on that, Charlie and Nate take a look at the brand new TikTok Billboard Top 50 chart, established only last month.

This chart – which measures the most popular songs on the platform through each song’s number of videos, views, and user engagement – perhaps best shows the things that are popular and pervasive among a contingent of younger music listeners. Here, there’s room for everybody from Mitski to Sexyy Red to J. Dash, highlighting that the music that’s popular isn’t necessarily what hits the radio.

SONGS DISCUSSED

• Drake - First Person Shooter (feat. J. Cole)
• Mitski - My Love Mine All Mine
• Elvis Presley - Blue Moon
• SUICIDAL-IDOL - ecstacy (slowed)
• SUICIDAL-IDOL - ecstacy
• SUICIDAL-IDOL - ecstacy (super slowed)
• J. Dash - Wop (Official Version)
• CeeLo Green - I'll Be Around (feat. Timbaland) - Club Mix
• Paul Russell - Lil Boo Thang
• The Emotions - Best of My Love
• Will Smith - Gettin' Jiggy Wit It
• Sister Sledge - He's the Greatest Dancer - 1995 Remaster
• Will Smith - Miami
• The Whispers - And the Beat Goes On
• Will Smith - Wild Wild West (feat. Dru Hill & Kool Mo Dee) - Album Version With Intro
• Stevie Wonder - I Wish
• Will Smith - Men In Black - From "Men In Black" Soundtrack
• Patrice Rushen - Forget Me Nots - Remastered
• Sexyy Red - SkeeYee
• BabyTron - Crocs & Wock'
• Ice Spice - In Ha Mood
• Tyla - Water

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Talking Head's concert film Stop Making Sense first came out forty years ago, and it’s just been rereleased in theaters in a 4k remaster by A24. The film finds the band — Tina Weymouth, Chris Frantz, David Byrne and Jerry Harrison — at the height of their powers over three successive nights at the the Hollywood Pantages Theater. As Chris and Tina remembered it when they spoke to producer Reanna Cruz, "We'd reached a state in our career and our lives when we felt, 'we've gotten pretty good at this now. We can show the world.'"

Director Jonathan Demme spliced the band's performances into an eighty-eight minute odyssey beginning with Byrne solo on the stage and gradually bringing in the rest of the band and a cast of stellar guest musicians: vocalists Lynn Mabry and Ednah Holt, keyboardist Bernie Worrell, percussionist Steve Scales, and guitarist Alex Weir. The film introduced landmark moments like Byrne’s big suit, Demme’s cinematic approach to concert cinematography, Chris's and Tina’s Tom Tom Club performing the perennial sample flip "Genius of Love," and a theater-rocking version of "Burning Down the House." Stop Making Sense broke the mold of concert films and created a new paradigm for artists to follow ever since.

Nate, Charlie, and Reanna take insights from Reanna's conversation with Tina and Chris on the legacy of Stop Making Sense as a guide to think through our own favorite concert movies — the Band's The Last Waltz, Madonna's Truth or Dare, and Beyonce's Homecoming — to identify the musical and visual choices that make them so indelible.

Songs Discussed

Talking Heads - This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody) - Live

Talking Heads - Burning Down the House - Live

Beyoncé - Diva - Homecoming Live

Beyoncé - Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It) - Homecoming Live

Madonna - Express Yourself

Madonna - Live to Tell

The Band - The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down - Live

The Band - I Shall Be Released (Finale) - Live

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The past two episodes of the show have been in Atlanta, and this week, we’re staying there with a look at singer-songwriter Faye Webster. Her music defies genre and convention: over the course of four albums, her sound has come to contain both pedal steel and indie rock as well as soft vocals and R&B sensibilities, all the while embodying the city of Atlanta. On this episode of Switched on Pop, we take a look at the work of Webster and how she builds her anomalous sound – even talking to the artist herself.

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Few producers have had such a demonstrated impact on the the last decade of music as Metro Boomin. Described by GQ as the “architect of Atlanta rap,” Metro has netted collaborations as far-ranging from Coldplay to Gucci Mane, garnered three #1 projects on the Billboard 200, and is credited with bolstering trap music’s presence both in and out of the South. From “Jumpman” to “Bad & Boujee” to “Creepin’,” we’ve been hearing his productions for years – all of which manage to capture the ear due to his penchant for eerie soundscapes and light and dark dichotomy. 

This episode of Switched on Pop, we take a closer look at Metro Boomin’s career, highlighting what makes his production style so versatile. 

Songs Discussed:

• Metro Boomin, John Legend – On Time
• ILOVEMAKONNEN, Drake – Tuesday (feat. Drake)
• Future – Radical
• Drake, Future – Jumpman
• Kanye West – Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1
• Big Sean – Bounce Back
• Migos, Lil Uzi Vert – Bad and Boujee (feat. Lil Uzi Vert)
• 21 Savage, Metro Boomin, Future – X (feat. Future)
• Future – Wicked
• Future – Mask Off
• Metro Boomin, 21 Savage – Don't Come Out The House (with 21 Savage)
• Metro Boomin, J Balvin, Wizkid, Offset – Only You (feat. Wizkid, Offset & J Balvin)
• Thompson Twins, Metro Boomin – Hold Me Now (Metro Boomin Remix)
• Solange – Stay Flo
• James Blake, Moses Sumney, Metro Boomin – Tell Them (feat. Moses Sumney & Metro Boomin)
• The Weeknd – Heartless
• Metro Boomin, The Weeknd, 21 Savage – Creepin' (with The Weeknd & 21 Savage)
• Mario Winans, Enya, Diddy – I Don't Wanna Know (feat. Enya & P. Diddy)

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Twenty years ago, the song "Get Low" by Lil Jon & The East Side Boyz and Ying Yang Twins was released; in the years since, the song has managed to stand the test of time, becoming the paragon of what we know as crunk music. In this episode of Switched on Pop, we take a look at crunk – from its roots in Memphis and Atlanta to its sonic successors, and give flowers to the man behind it all: Lil Jon himself.

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In case you missed it rerun from 2016. Back in 2011, two pop songs dropped with the same patriotic title: "Made in America." But the similarities pretty much end there. Toby Keith's country smash and Jay Z, Kanye West and Frank Ocean's soulful hip hop anthem have little in common except a firm conviction that each song knows what it really means to be American. Five years later, these tracks have a lot to tell us about the role music plays in shaping our national identity, and begs the question: does music truly bring us together?

Music Discussed

• Toby Keith - Made In America
• Jay Z and Kanye West ft. Frank Ocean - Made in America
• Sisqo - Thong Song
• Usher - Yeah!
• Beyoncé - Daddy Lessons
• Jimmie Rodgers - Blue Yodel No. 9
• Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys - Ida Red Likes to Boogie

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In hip-hop, what draws us to an artist is not just the content of their lyrics but how they deliver them. Along with tapping your foot to the rhythm, understanding something called “flow” is essential to understanding hip-hop as a whole.

In this episode of Switched On Pop, we interview genre icon DJ Jazzy Jeff on the concept of flow: what it is, how it applies to all music – not just hip-hop – and how any rapper’s flow can be analyzed under his guidelines. Taking his word for it, we put our magnifying glasses on to look at the bars of our favorite rappers, from Megan thee Stallion to Babytron.

Songs Discussed:

• The Notorious B.I.G. - Big Poppa
• Mary J. Blige - Family Affair
• A Tribe Called Quest - The Hop
• Danger Mouse, Black Thought - Aquamarine
• BabyTron - Crocs & Wock’ 
• RXKNephew - Take Three
• JID - Better Days (feat. Johnta Austin)
• Megan Thee Stallion - Not Nice
• Megan Thee Stallion - Cocky Af

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For the first time in 2023, a rap song is at number one on Billboard's Hot 100: Doja Cat's “Paint the Town Red.” It’s her second number one single after the disco inspired “Say So.” But the ubiquitous and lighthearted bop didn’t accurately reflect Doja’s divisive persona, an extremely online meme lord, and sometimes troll, with a history of riling up internet controversy. 

Doja Cat recently called out her fans for their parasocial obsessiveness, losing 250k instagram followers in the process. Simultaneously, religious conservatives have accused her of Satanism for her playful use of illuminati imagery at her 27th birthday bash. But rather than recoil, Doja Cat is clapping back at criticism by embracing the devil. 

On “Paint the Town Red” she’s following the playbook of Lil Nas X’s “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)” and Sam Smith and Kim Petras’ “Unholy,” all of which use demonic imagery to spark religious controversy while also commenting on artists’ indiscretions and the hellish nature of the attention economy. In her satanic suite — “Paint The Town Red,” “Demon,” and “Attention” — Doja Cat’s turns online flame wars into musical gold. 

More

• Listen to The Allusionist with Helen Zaltzman, the best and funniest podcast about language
• Read the history of the loon sample on Pitchfork by Philip Sherburne

Songs Discussed:

• Doja Cat - Paint The Town Red
• Vanilla Ice - Ice Ice Baby
• Lil Nas X - MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)
• Sam Smith - Unholy (feat. Kim Petras)
• Doja Cat - Say So
• Doja Cat - Kiss Me More (feat. SZA)
• Doja Cat - Woman
• Doja Cat - Demons
• Daddy Yankee - Gasolina
• Kelis - Milkshake
• Kendrick Lamar - HUMBLE.
• Bernard Herrmann - A Narrative for String Orchestra (From "Psycho") [Arr. J. Mauceri]
• John Williams - Main Title/John Williams/Jaws - From The "Jaws" Soundtrack
• Lil Nas X - MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)
• Doja Cat - Attention
• 808 State - Pacific 202
• Nicki Minaj - Anaconda
• Calvin Harris - Prayers Up (feat. Travis Scott & A-Trak)
• Dionne Warwick - Walk on By
• Doja Cat - Paint The Town Red - Slowed Down & Sped Up
• Doja Cat - Vegas (From the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack ELVIS)
• Beyoncé - Naughty Girl

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When Jimmy Buffett died on the first day of September, 2023, musicians from Paul McCartney to Pitbull mourned the death of the "Margaritaville" singer. This surprised Nate and Charlie, because frankly, they had never listened deeply to Buffett's work before, and viewed him more as a branding genius than a great musician. How wrong were your faithful podcast hosts. Jimmy Buffett was no novelty act or one-hit wonder. He found a precise combination of yearning lyrics, hip modulations, and singable melodies that produced a collection of songs that questioned the fantasy of Island Life as much as they celebrated it. Journey with us across the seas of Buffett's artistry as we listen for everything we might have missed about this unique musical icon.

Songs Discussed

Jimmy Buffett - Margaritaville, Cheeseburger in Paradise, Why Don't We Get Drunk, Come Monday, Fins, A Pirate Looks at 40, My Gummie Just Kicked In

Harry Belafonte - Will His Love Be Like His Rum?

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In case you missed it, Beyoncé’s new album Renaissance is one of her most ambitious albums yet. On this week’s episode of Switched On Pop, we discuss Renaissance with beloved guest Sam Sanders, host of the new Vulture podcast Into It. In Sanders’ words: “it’s trying to do a lot” – but in the best way. The album incorporates seemingly every decade of contemporary popular dance music from Chic’s “Good Times” to Right Said Fred’s “I’m Too Sexy.”

Much of the early discourse surrounding the album was marred by a confusing controversy over a small sample (we try to resolve the issue musicologically) – but the references on Renaissance are worth listening closely to, acting as a guide through essential dance music. The album is an homage to the black and queer innovators of dance; with samples and interpolations of songs both niche and mainstream flying by, like a DJ set curated by house music pioneers. 

On Renaissance, Beyoncé goes out of her way to cite, credit and compensate her influences, resulting in a triumph of musical curation. Just look at “Alien Superstar”: the song credits twenty-four people, largely due to Beyoncé’s musical nods, rather than an exercise in boardroom style songwriting. Sanders says “the liner notes themselves are showing you that this woman and her team have a PhD in music history.”

Listen to Switched On Pop to hear how Renaissance honors dance music innovators and finds new modes of expression in the genre. 

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Everyone seems to be getting Olivia Rodrigo wrong. She's one of the few pop stars who has made it big in the current era of fragmented music streaming, but so much of the narrative has been about whose songs she's stealing from, whether it be Taylor Swift, Elvis Costello or Paramore. Rodrigo's new album Guts arrives next Friday: while we wait patiently, we take a close listen to her new singles "vampire" and "bad idea right?" to subvert the narrative. These songs show that she isn't stealing from pop music, but rather uses a deep repertoire of musical predecessors to write very crafty music.

Songs discussed:

• Olivia Rodrigo – vampire
• Olivia Rodrigo – bad idea right?
• Olivia Rodrigo – driver's license
• Olivia Rodrigo – brutal
• Elvis Costello & The Attractions – Pump It Up
• Olivia Rodrigo – good 4 u
• Paramore – Misery Business
• Olivia Rodrigo – deja vu
• Taylor Swift – Cruel Summer
• Radiohead – Creep
• Scala & Kolacny Brothers – Creep
• Lana del Rey – Get Free
• David Bowie – Space Oddity
• Elvis Presley – That's When Your Heartaches Begin
• Roy Orbison – Oh, Pretty Woman
• Talking Heads – And She Was
• The Breeders – Cannonball
• Liz Phair – Supernova
• Wet Leg – Chaise Longue
• The Beatles – Twist And Shout
• Rage Against The Machine – Killing In The Name

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In 2003, amidst a bunch of bleak alternative rock bangers like “Numb” by Linkin Park and “Bring Me To Life” by Evanescence, a rock song stood out on the charts for its fantastic hooks and juvenile sense of humor. “Stacy’s Mom” turned the New Jersey band Fountains of Wayne into MTV mainstays and Grammy nominees. But while they continued to release music, tour the country, and maintain a devoted fanbase, they never reached the same level of fame again.

Most people never looked further than the raunchy music video, but Fountains of Wayne released six albums across two decades, each filled with tracks of quirky, clever, and undeniably catchy power pop. And the writer of that song, FOW bassist Adam Schlesinger, had a rich and fascinating career behind the scenes in film, TV, and more. In this episode of Switched on Pop, we explore the history of “Stacy’s Mom”, a perfectly crafted pop song that stands as a testament to the brilliance of a musician whose career was cut tragically short.

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Right now, the two biggest records in the country come to us from two of hip-hop’s biggest superstars: Travis Scott and Post Malone. Both artists have been releasing mainstream records for nearly a decade; their records UTOPIA and AUSTIN, respectfully, sit at number one and two on the Billboard 200. But going further than the numbers, these albums signify a shift in these artists’ sounds, moving them out of their usual genres into previously uncharted territory in both of their careers. And as this is Post Malone’s fifth record and Travis Scott’s fourth, we also must ask: what does it mean to be a mid-career artist?

Songs discussed:

• Travis Scott – HYAENA
• Post Malone – Mourning
• Travis Scott, Teezo Touchdown – MODERN JAM
• Post Malone – Chemical
• Madonna – Borderline
• Madonna – Ray of Light
• Madonna – Don’t Tell Me
• Kendrick Lamar – m.a.a.d. city
• Kendrick Lamar – For Free? – interlude
• Travis Scott, Swae Lee, Chief Keef – Nightcrawler
• Travis Scott, Yung Lean – PARASAIL
• Travis Scott, Kid Cudi – LOOOVE 
• Kanye West – I Am A God
• Gentle Giant – Proclamation
• Travis Scott, Beyoncé – DELRESTO (ECHOES)
• Post Malone – White Iverson
• Post Malone, 21 Savage – rockstar
• Post Malone – Overdrive
• Pixies – Where Is My Mind?
• Semisonic – Closing Time
• Post Malone – Something Real

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Part two of the secret world of song camps looks at the different roles in a songwriting session. There are producers who sit behind a console desk or computer and record, arrange and craft the instrumental and track the vocal. Often they double as engineers who use their technical knowledge to select mics, set up signal chains, and ensure the best recording. Then there is the topliner, a singer who generates melodies on the fly, throwing ideas at the instrumental, looking for the best hooks. Often the top liner is also a songwriter who crafts chords and lyrics to fit the topline melody. And then there is of course the artist who performs the piece. 

These roles aren’t always clearly divided - most musicians have multiple skills. But for the sake of understanding how each role is essential to creating a song, we asked four musical luminaries to embody one of these roles and break it down: producer/engineer Alex Tumay, topliner Wolftyla, Songwriter and Walk the Moon frontman Nicholas Petricca and Artist Grace VanderWall.

This conversation happened live at the College of Performing Arts at The New School as part of Anti Social Camp 2023, the largest song camp in the world that is working to revive to the NYC songwriting scene. 

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Beginning in the nineties, pop songwriters have traveled to a 13th-century castle in the south of France for what’s come to be known as a “song camp” – a place where songwriters and collaborators can hunker down and spend a week together writing the next big hits.

The castle’s owner Miles Copeland, former manager of The Police, brought songwriters to this far-flung location for a dose of creativity, and yielded massive success through the process: artists like Celine Dion, Britney Spears and Miranda Lambert have all benefited from songs stemming from these retreats.

Over the last fifteen years, song camps have exploded in popularity from Peter Coquillard’s Bali Invitational, to Rihanna’s $200k LA camp, to the Anti Social Camp: a NYC-based event and the world’s largest songwriting retreat. This episode of Switched On Pop, we take a look at the secret world of song camps, and even manage to be a fly-on-the-wall in a camp with songwriter Nicholas Petricca of Walk The Moon, Julia Cumming of Sunflower Bean, engineer Will Campbell and producer Andrew Maury. 

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Recently while scrolling twitter we saw a clip from American Idol of judge Katy Perry admonishing an auditioner on the show to “Enunciate!”

The video went viral because of Perry’s incensed reaction, but also because the contestant’s performance of Amy Winehouse’s “Valerie” offered a crystalline example of a popular style of singing that has produced reactions of love and—like for Perry—hate. 

It’s a style that features elongated vowels, clipped consonants, and runaway phrasing associated with contemporary singers like Halsey, Jorja Smith, and Shawn Mendes, and like many things in the 21st century it got its name from a tweet—specifically by the user @trackdroppa who boasted in 2009, “Voice so smooth it’s like i’m singing in cursive”

In this episode we speak to vocal coaches and journalists to to ask: Where did this cursive style come from? What are the vocal techniques used to create this sound? And why does cursive singing create so much backlash?

Songs Discussed

• Shawn Mendes - Stitches
• Zooey Deschanel, M. Ward - Winnie the Pooh
• Mick Jagger - Strange Game
• Selena Gomez, A$AP Rocky - Good For You
• Frank Zappa, Moon Zappa - Valley Girl
• Mark Ronson, Amy Winehouse - Valerie
• benny blanco, Halsey, Khalid - Eastside 
• Jorja Smith - Teenage Fantasy
• Tones And I - Dance Monkey
• Sia - Cheap Thrills
• Corinne Bailey Rae - Put Your Records On
• Blink-182 - All The Small Things
• SZA - Kill Bill

More

Ashaala Shanae

https://www.themahi.com/founder

Jumi Akinfenwa

https://www.vice.com/en/contributor/jumi-akinfenwa

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This past week, the film Barbie opened nationwide to massive success – and with it came a soundtrack, executive produced by Mark Ronson.

Functioning as both a companion to the movie and a stand-alone collection of hits, the album features everyone from Dua Lipa to reggaeton star Karol G to K-Pop group FIFTY FIFTY. This episode of Switched on Pop, we take a look at the singles from the soundtrack and see how well they embody the ethos of Barbie: plastic and all. 

• Check out our 2021 interview with Mark Ronson (about Ginuwine’s “Pony”) here.
• We reference “vibe snatching” in this episode. Take a listen to our episode breaking down the phenomenon here.
• For more on Billie Eilish’s “No Time to Die,” check out our Bond episode from October 2021 here.

Songs Discussed: 

• Dua Lipa – Dance The Night
• Billie Eilish – What Was I Made For?
• PinkPantheress – Angel
• FIFTY FIFTY, Kaliii – Barbie Dreams
• Janet Jackson – Together Again
• FIFTY FIFTY – Cupid
• The Cardigans – Lovefool
• Charli XCX – Speed Drive
• Billie Eilish – No Time To Die
• Aqua – Barbie Girl
• Nicki Minaj, Ice Spice, Aqua – Barbie World
• Karol G, Aldo Ranks – WATATI
• Jul – My World
• Ludacris, Wiz Khalifa, Jeremih, Cashmere Cat – Party Girls
• Ava Max – Not Your Barbie Girl
• Ava Max – My Head & My Heart
• A Touch Of Class – Around the World (La La La La La)

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In 1964, Louis Armstrong knocked the Beatles off the top of the charts with his recording of “Hello, Dolly!” becoming, at age 62, the oldest artist to ever hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100. Sixty years later, Louis Armstrong remains a beloved cultural figure, his oft-imitated voice still instantly recognizable. But Armstrong is more than a source of levity — his artistry and innovations when he made his first recordings a century ago in 1923 set the template for the modern pop star. On this centennial episode, hear Armstrong as you’ve never heard him: a defiant, pathbreaking musician whose voice resonates in every hit record. 

Songs Discussed

• Louis Armstrong - Hello, Dolly!
• King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band - Dippermouth Blues
• Fletcher Henderson & His Orchestra - Sugar Foot Stomp
• Louis Armstrong & His Hot Seven - Potato Head Blues, West End Blues, Big Butter And Egg Man, Heebie Jeebies
• Louis Armstrong - Ain't Misbehavin', Dinah, I'm a Ding Dong Daddy (From Dumas), Black And Blue, Swing That Music
• Bing Crosby, The Mills Brothers - Dinah
• The Boswell Sisters - Heebie Jeebies
• Ella Fitzgerald - Mack The Knife - Live At The Deutschlandhalle, Berlin, 1960
• Joey Ramone - What a Wonderful World
• Ghostface Killah - The Forest
• Jon Batiste - What A Wonderful World

More

Read Terry Teachout’s brilliant biography of Armstrong, Pops

Visit the Louis Armstrong House Museum in Queens, NY

Listen to Lil Hardin Armstrong’s 1968 interview with Chris Albertson for Riverside Records

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Taylor Swift is currently the most streamed artist in the world as she’s commandeered the media as she embarks on her Eras tour around the globe. It's likely to be the highest grossing tour of all time, crossing $1B in sales. What’s more, she’s just released her 6th studio album since 2020, and her 3rd re-recording of her older material called Taylor’s Versions. She famously got in a spat with the new owner of her master recordings. She decided to take back control with her own hands and voice, creating mostly true-to-the-original updates alongside a smorgasbord of bonus material.

First there was Fearless from 2008, then Red from 2012 and now Speak Now the last of her more country leaning albums having originally arrived in 2010. Switched On Pop listens to Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) for whats is and isn’t working musically, how the re-recordings are fairing, and where this ambitious project may go next.

Joining the conversation is Lauren Michele Jackson American cultural critic, assistant professor of English and African American studies at Northwestern, author of White Negroes: When Cornrows Were in Vogue ... and Other Thoughts on Cultural Appropriation and a contributing writer to the New Yorker in her review of Taylor Swift’s midnights said “I’ve always maintained that Swift is incapable of writing a bad song.”

MORE

Pop Pantheon: Checking in on Taylor Swift's Re-Recordings So Far (with Charlie Harding, Larisha Paul & Nora Princiotti)

SONGS DISCUSSED

Taylor Swift - Fearless, Red, Speak Now, Never Grow Up, The Story Of Us, Sparks Fly, Mine, Mean, Superman, Karma, Better than Revenge, Electric Touch, Castles Crumbling, When Emma Falls in Love, I Can See You, Back, To December, Last Kiss

Def Leppard - Pour Some Sugar On Me

Gloria Gaynor - I Will Survive 

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Us at Switched On Pop are off on vacation, but don't fret – this week we're still bringing you an episode, courtesy of the Vulture podcast Into It with Sam Sanders. If you've openly wondered why concert tickets seemingly have gotten more confusing and expensive, this episode's for you.

–

Content creator and head of the Beyhive Kalen Allen is more than OK spending four thousand dollars on one ticket for Beyoncé’s Renaissance tour. 2023 feels like a big year for huge stadium tours for artists like Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, Bruce Springsteen, Ed Sheeran and more. But why are tickets so expensive, and how much are fans willing to put up with in order to go? Sam talks with music journalist Nate Rogers about why the touring industry might just be broken and what lawmakers and some artists are trying to do to fix it.

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Vulture might have killed the song of the summer back in 2016, but if you’re a member of the LGBTQ+ community, it’s hard to argue against “Padam Padam” by Kylie Minogue. The track, released this May, has taken the queer community by storm, quickly becoming ubiquitous and inescapable – it's hard to even scroll on Twitter without a well-timed meme about the "padam-ic" popping up on the timeline. However, Minogue's song hasn't even cracked the Billboard Hot 100; instead, its status has morphed into that of a "gay anthem," a song widely celebrated inside the community but unable to garner longstanding success outside of it.

This episode of Switched on Pop, producer Reanna Cruz tackles a question that the LGBTQ+ community has debated over for decades: what makes a gay anthem? Through talking with everyone from academics to their close friends, the answer takes us from Judy Garland to 1920s cabaret to, of course, "Padam Padam."

Songs Discussed:

• Kylie Minogue – Padam Padam
• Édith Piaf – Padam padam
• Kylie Minogue – Supernova
• Mischa Spoliansky – Das lila Lied (The Lavender Song)
• Queen – I Want To Break Free
• Lady Gaga – Born This Way
• London Philharmonic Choir – Amazing Grace
• Traditional – God Save The King
• Queen – We Are The Champions
• Tom Robinson Band – Glad to be Gay
• Diana Ross – I'm Coming Out
• Judy Garland – Alone Together (Live At Carnegie Hall/1961)
• Countess Luann – Chic C'est La Vie
• Judy Garland – The Trolley Song
• Lady Gaga – La Vie En Rose
• Bronski Beat – Smalltown Boy
• Village People – Y.M.C.A.
• Sylvester – You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)
• Miquel Brown – So Many Men, So Little Time
• Depeche Mode – Never Let Me Down Again
• The Weather Girls – It's Raining Men
• Gloria Gaynor – I Will Survive

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Another installment of Switches Brew the show where you get to hear from the larger team Switched On Pop team and community about what we're listening to old and new. With recommendations from editor Jolie Myers, producer Reanna Cruz, and listeners Micah Salkind and JT.

Songs Discussed

• Saint Levant - Nails
• BewhY - Adaptation
• The Pointer Sisters - Dare Me, I'm So Excited, Jump
• Junior Jack - Stupidisco
• blink-182 - Man Overboard, What's My Age Again? All The Small THings
• White Poppy - Orchid Child
• Odyssey - Native New Yorker
• Kate Bush - The Morning Fog
• Spencer Zahn, Dave Harrington, Jeremy Gustin - A Visit To Harry's House
• Cicada Ensemble - Murmuration Clip

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As summer comes upon us, it’s time for some Billboard shake ups. On this week’s edition of Chartbreakers, we’re looking at the recent iterations of the Hot 100 and a trend that has slowly been creeping up in popularity over the past few months: the influx of regional Mexican music. The past two years have seen many songs by Mexican artists making their way onto Billboard, all managing to highlight different scenes and sounds from the different states in Mexico. 

We’re joined this week by the cohost of the NPR Music podcast Alt. Latino, Anamaria Sayre, who says that Mexican regional, or simply, regional, is a marketing “bucket term” that encompasses different Latin genres including everything from norteño to corridos, all genres that are comfortably finding a home in the top 20 of the Hot 100 in 2023.

Of course, there’s more happening outside of Latin music. Much of the chart has been stagnant since our last iteration of Chartbreakers, but, as always, there’s been some shake ups thanks to the world of the TikTok sped-up remix, the legacy artist, and on some occasions, a mix of both (we’re looking at you, Miguel).

Songs Discussed:

• Eslabon Armado, Peso Pluma – Ella Baila Sola
• Bizarrap, Peso Pluma – Peso Pluma: Bzrp Music Sessions, Vol. 55
• Grupo Frontera, Bad Bunny – un x100to
• Fuerza Regida – TQM
• Grupo Frontera, Fuerza Regida – Bebe Dame
• Los Tigres del Norte – Prisión De Amor
• Chalino Sanchez, Banda Brava – Alma Enamorada
• Chalino Sanchez, Los Amables Del Norte – El Crimen De Culiacán
• Ramon Ayala y Sus Bravos del Norte – Solo Una Patada
• Grupo Firme, Junior H – Tronando Ligas
• Banda MS de Sergio Lizárraga – Que Bendición
• DannyLux – Mi Otra Mitad
• Natanael Cano – Pacas De Billetes
• Miguel – Sure Thing
• FIFTY FIFTY – Cupid
• Lana del Rey – Say Yes to Heaven
• Taylor Swift, Ice Spice – Karma (ft. Ice Spice)

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In the song "Touch" from Daft Punk's final studio album, 2013's Random Access Memories, featured artist Paul Williams sings a line that augured the end of an impressive collaboration: "I need something more." With RAM, Daft Punk pulled out all the stops, going the opposite direction of their previous albums, to "give life back to music" and bestow hearts and souls upon their robotic doppelgängers.

RAM features almost no samples or programmed digital instruments, instead leaning into extensive collaborations with legendary studio musicians, iconic producers like Nile Rodgers, and modern mavens such as Pharrell. The making of RAM followed the blueprint of classic albums from what Daft Punk called "the golden age" of recording—Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles, Pink Floyd. The duo spent over a million dollars, held five years of studio sessions, and painstakingly crafted each track. The result was a record that helped usher in a retro disco-funk revival across pop music and generated a smash hit in "Get Lucky." The band had perhaps crafted their magnum opus—but did it also represent the conclusion of their epic narrative of the battle between human and machine?

Songs Discussed

Daft Punk - Give Life Back to Music

Daft Punk - Lose Yourself to Dance (feat. Pharrell Williams)

Daft Punk - Get Lucky (feat. Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers)

Daft Punk - Giorgio by Moroder

Eagles - Hotel California

Daft Punk - Contact

The Sherbs - We Ride Tonight

Daft Punk - The Prime Time of Your Life

Daft Punk, Paul Williams - Touch (feat. Paul Williams)

Thomas Bangalter - Mythologies: X. L'Accouchement

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Throughout their legendary career, Daft Punk continued to prove that the more robotic their music became, the more human they sounded. This dichotomy came to a head on their third album, aptly titled Human After All. Where their past two records wired their circuits and gave the robots a voice, on Human After All, Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo gave Daft Punk sentience. On Human After All robots rock, but they also question their rigid programming. The record's ensuing tour and resulting live album, Alive 2007, furthered the narrative by ushering in a new age of live electronic performance. The impact of these two records range from the development of EDM to everlasting hits like “Technologic.” On episode three of our Listening 2 Daft Punk series, we take a look at these two records, and how both Alive and Human After All imbued the robots with super intelligence.

Songs Discussed

• Daft Punk - Human After All
• Daft Punk - The Prime Time of Your Life
• Daft Punk - Robot Rock
• Breakwater - Release the Beast
• Daft Punk - Steam Machine
• Daft Punk - The Brainwasher
• Black Sabbath - Iron Man
• Daft Punk - Technologic
• Daft Punk - Emotion
• John Williams – Wild Signals
• Daft Punk – Touch It / Technologic
• Daft Punk – Oh Yeah
• Daft Punk – Technologic
• Busta Rhymes – Touch It
• Daft Punk – Around the World / Harder Better Faster Stronger
• Daft Punk – Face to Face / Short Circuit
• Daft Punk – Da Funk / Daftendirekt
• Kanye West – Stronger
• Kanye West – On Sight
• Daft Punk – Human After All / Together / One More Time / Music Sounds Better With You

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Daft Punk’s first album laid the groundwork for their robot personas, with four to the floor beats, programmed drum machines, and sequenced synthesizers. On their second album Discovery, Daft Punk fully lean into the artificial – singing through robotic vocoders that correspond with their now-iconic robot helmets.

But in there is a paradox, explored on episode 2 of Listening to Daft Punk: the more machine the robots become, the more human the music sounds.

Songs Discussed

• Daft Punk - One More Time
• Daft Punk - Teachers
• Daft Punk - Aerodynamic
• Sister Sledge - Il Macquillage Lady
• AC/DC - Thunderstruck
• Laurie Anderson - O Superman
• Daft Punk - Revolution 909
• Kraftwerk - Autobahn
• Kraftwerk - The Robots
• Earth, Wind & Fire - Let's Groove
• Herbie Hancock - I Thought It Was You
• Zapp - More Bounce to the Ounce
• Stevie Wonder - 1-2-3 Sesame Street
• Cher - Believe
• Kid Rock - Only God Knows Why
• Barry Manilow - Who's Been Sleeping In My Bed
• Daft Punk - Superheroes
• Edwin Birdsong - Cola Bottle Baby
• Electric Light Orchestra - Evil Woman
• Daft Punk - Face to Face
• Daft Punk - Something About Us
• Daft Punk - Voyager
• Daft Punk - Veridis Quo
• Daft Punk - Superheroes
• Daft Punk, Pharrell Williams - LYTD (Vocoder Tests) [feat. Pharrell Williams]
• Daft Punk - Digital Love
• Daft Punk - Crescendolls
• Eddie Johns - More Spell On You
• George Duke - I Love You More

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Ten years ago, Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories gave life back to music. The world-beating smash “Get Lucky” broke streaming records, forged a retro sound that still dominates the charts, and paved the way for artists like The Weeknd, Dua Lipa and Lizzo to craft their own throwback hits. How did Daft Punk do it? Switched On Pop’s four part-mini series Listening 2: Daft Punk unlocks the sounds, voices, and stories across all four of the group’s studio albums. On their first album, Homework, Daft Punk stretched the boundaries of electronic music and began wiring the circuits that would become their robot alter-egos, asking a fundamental question: where does the human end and the machine begin?

Songs Discussed

• ​​Daft Punk - Give Life Back to Music
• Daft Punk - Get Lucky (feat. Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers)
• The Beach Boys - Darlin'
• Daft Punk - Around the World
• Daft Punk - Harder Better Faster Strong
• Daft Punk - Robot Rock
• Daft Punk - Game of Love
• Daft Punk - Da Funk
• Daft Punk - Teachers
• Black Box - Ride on Time
• Daft Punk - Daftendirekt
• Daft Punk - Fresh
• Daft Punk - High Fidelity
• Daft Punk - Oh Yeah
• Daft Punk - Phoenix
• Daft Punk - Rollin' & Scratchin'
• Daft Punk - Rock'n Roll
• Daft Punk - Burnin'
• Kraftwerk - The Robots
• Vangelis - Main Titles
• Brad Fiedel - Main Title - The Terminator
• Ben Salisbury, Geoff Barrow - The Turing Test
• Daft Punk - TRON Legacy (End Titles)
• Daft Punk - Indo Silver Club

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After nearly two decades as a band the Jonas Brothers are staking their claim to a magnum opus by calling their next album, quite simply, The Album (out May 12). The project follows the success of their 2019 comeback project Happiness Begins — which blended polished pop sounds with ‘70s funk breaks and produced the No. 1 single “Sucker” — with a focus on the smooth sounds of yacht rock. Switched On pop co-host Charlie Harding spoke with Nick, Joe and Kevin Jonas in March 2023, during their five night broadway run, in anticipation for the release of The Album.  

Songs Discussed

• Jonas Brothers - Wings, Waffle House, Montana Sky, Summer Baby, Before the Storm
• Daryl Hall & John Oates - She's Gone, Wings
• Kenny Loggins - Meet Me Half Way
• Steely Dan - Reelin' In The Years
• Stevie Wonder - Higher Ground
• Michael Jackson - The Way You Make Me Feel, Leave Me Alone
• The Doobie Brothers - Takin' It to the Streets, Minute By Minute
• Thundercat, Michael McDonald, Kenny Loggins - Show You The Way
• Michael McDonald - I Keep Forgettin'
• Steve Miller Band - Fly Like An Eagle
• Eagles - Take It Easy

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It’s May, and that can only mean one thing: it’s time for the Eurovision Song Contest. This year’s edition of the international-but-primarily-in-Europe competition features a uniquely eclectic group of songs (per usual), from a take on electro-flamenco, to Game of Thrones EDM, to a previous winner’s return to the Eurovision stage. On this episode, Charlie and Nate look at the six songs bookmakers are looking at to lead the pack of this year’s entries.

Songs Discussed:

• Alessandra – Queen of Kings
• Deadmau5 – Right This Second
• Gabry Ponte, R3HAB, Timmy Trumpet – Call Me 
• La Zarra – Évidemment
• Édith Piaf – Non, je ne regrette rien
• Claude François – Alexandrie Alexandra
• Blanca Paloma – EAEA
• TVORCHI – Heart of Steel
• Kalush Orchesta – Stefania
• Käärijä – Cha Cha Cha
• Kraftwerk – Radioactivity
• Alice Deejay – Better Off Alone
• Metallica – 72 Seasons
• Loreen – Tattoo

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When trouble strikes in music town, there’s one guy who gets the call. That’s me, Joe Treble, forensic musicologist. This week, I've got one of the most shocking cases I've ever worked. Someone killed the key change in pop music, and I’m going to do whatever it takes to find the perpetrator.

The key change used to be at large on the Billboard charts. From the 1950s to the 1990s, 20-30% of all number one hits featured one. In Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody," the key change hits right before the final chorus. The song’s harmonic center shifts up, raising the pitch of the song, challenging the vocalist to hit higher and higher notes, juicing the big finish with excitement and pep. But starting in the 1990s the key change virtually disappeared from the Hot 100. Now, hit songs start and end in the same key, and no one seems to have even noticed. Except for me.

This investigation will bring me face to face with a rogue's gallery of suspects and sources: Chris Dalla Riva, music and data specialist; Brandon McFarland, alias 1-O.A.K., producer; Emily King, singer and songwriter. Each interrogation brings me closer to revealing the murderer, but will I be able to handle the terrible truth? Tune in as I tackle the hardest case of my career: the case of the missing key change!

Songs Discussed

Emily King - Georgia Sleepwalker, Medal, The Way that You Love Me

YG, Kamaiyah, RJ, Mitch, Ty Dolla $ign - Do Yo Dance (feat. Kamaiyah, RJ, Mitch, Ty Dolla $ign)

Beyoncé - Love On Top

Bon Jovi - Livin' On A Prayer

Whitney Houston - I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)

Frank Sinatra - Strangers In The Night

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We have an emergency podcast drop because the biggest and fastest moving story on the internet right now is about a song called “Heart On My Sleeve.” The track sounds like it was made by the producer Metro Boomin featuring Drake and The Weeknd. It might be one of the most consequential songs in music history because it was actually a fake, made with artificial intelligence. The blowback from this song has been enormous and a bit confusing. So host Charlie Harding went on The Vergecast podcast to break down how this song was likely made, and what it might mean for the music industry, the tech industry and all of our intellectual property. 

• Listen to the whole episode on The Vergecast
• Read Alex Cranz's story on Laser Bongs on The Verge

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The South Korean idol group BTS is one of the biggest musical sensations in history. They're constantly breaking records and they have one of the most dedicated fan bases in the world known as Army. Their hit singles like “Boy With Love,” “Dynamite,” and “Butter” have been discussed on the show in the past for breaking through the US charts. But back in 2022, they decided to take a break from group activities and start releasing solo material because of their obligations to each fulfill mandatory military service in South Korea, precluding them from working together at the same time. Solo projects aren’t new for the group – BTS members have released mixtapes as far back as 2015 and countless solo singles – but this was the first time that BTS had ever announced a prolonged break. This moment, originally presented as a hiatus, has evolved into a whole new musical chapter for the group, with a seemingly endless array of new solo releases. Switched On Pop listens back to one track from each solo effort so far to introduce the casual listener to what is happening in this new era of BTS. Joining the show is Lenika Cruz, senior editor at The Atlantic, who literally wrote the book on BTS, simply called On BTS out on the Atlantic Editions imprint.

Songs Discussed:

• j-hope, J. Cole - on the street
• Jimin - Like Crazy
• RM, Youjeen - Wild Flower
• Agust D - People Pt.2
• Agust D - People
• Jung Kook - Dreamers
• JIN - The Astronaut
• BTS - Singularity, Inner Child
• Coldplay, BTS - My Universe

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From the first seconds of her latest album Desire, I Want to Turn Into You, Caroline Polachek asserts that she is truly a once-in-a-generation artist. From her work in the indie band Chairlift to years of behind-the-scenes songwriting, she has worked hard over years to build a stellar music career – culminating in the pop opus Desire, already one of the best rated albums of 2023. On this episode of Switched on Pop, we look at Polachek’s career thus far, and talk to her about the intricacies of her latest.

Songs Discussed

• Caroline Polachek - Desire, I Want To Turn Into You
• Caroline Polachek - So Hot You’re Hurting My Feelings
• Chairlift - Bruises
• Ramona Lisa - Dominic
• Beyoncé - No Angel
• Danny L Harle, Caroline Polachek - Ashes of Love
• Charli XCX, Caroline Polachek - Tears
• CEP - Lilian’s Pavilion
• Caroline Polachek - Pretty in Possible
• Suzanne Vega - Tom’s Diner DNA remix
• Caroline Polachek - Welcome to my Island
• Caroline Polachek - Bunny Is A Rider
• Caroline Polachek - Smoke
• Caroline Polachek - Crude Drawing of An Angel
• Caroline Polachek - Butterfly Net
• Caroline Polachek - Sunset 
• Caroline Polachek - Fly To You
• Caroline Polachek - Hopedrunk Ever Asking
• Caroline Polachek - Billions
• Caroline Polachek - Blood And Butter
• Caroline Polachek - Butterfly Net

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Shakira is back on the Billboard Hot 100 – thanks to the help of Argentinian producer Bizarrap. Together, their song “Shakira: BZRP Music Sessions, Vol. 53,” is layered with musical and lyrical references, from the callbacks to “She Wolf” to the multiple beat switches. It also works to play into something larger: something akin to a pop music conspiracy. On this episode of Switched On Pop, we take a closer look at Shakira’s latest, and how it’s indicative of a larger metatextual shift in pop music. 

Songs Discussed:

• Shakira, Bizarrap – Shakira: BZRP Music Sessions, Vol. 53
• Shakira – Vuelve
• Alanis Morrisette – Not The Doctor
• Shakira – Whenever, Wherever
• Shakira, Alejandro Sanz – La Tortura
• Shakira, Wyclef Jean – Hips Don’t Lie
• Shakira – She Wolf
• The Weeknd – Blinding Lights
• Giorgio Moroder – Palm Springs Drive
• LMFAO – Party Rock Anthem
• Pascal Letoublon – Friendships
• Beyoncé – Sorry
• Taylor Swift – All Too Well
• Olivia Rodrigo – Driver’s License

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If you’ve ever learned classical piano, you probably tried to play one of Bach’s Inventions. The composer wrote fifteen pieces containing the most important fifteen keys in order to teach his son the fundamentals of piano and composition. Today, they remain some of the most popular pieces of piano music. Acclaimed jazz pianist Dan Tepfer recently revisited his childhood music books seeing them in a way he’d never realized as a student: the Inventions are much more than novice piano works.

For Tepfer, each of the Inventions not only highlight masterful command over harmony and counterpoint, but also contain moving character arcs that resemble the hero’s journey. A character is introduced at home in place of safety in act I. And then they are thrust into chaos and must overcome unsurmountable challenges in Act II. Finally, in Act III, our hero overcomes their final battle and returns home transformed by the journey. Once Tepfer heard this character arc, he started to apply it to his own free improv.

Through studying Bach, Tepfer conceived a new album: Inventions / Reinventions. In this project Tepfer fills in the missing keys from the Bach to complete all twenty four keys (there are twelve major and twelve minor keys) while updating the music with modern improvisation. In this conversation Tepfer walks co-host Charlie Harding through his process of playing Bach and applying it to jazz improv.

Listen to Dan Tepfer’s Inventions / Reinventions on StorySound Records

Listen to Into It with Sam Sanders on Fair Use

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Everyone will describe the music of 100 gecs differently. To some, Dylan Brady and Laura Les make deeply satisfying earworms, tracks able to scratch the itches that occupy the deepest memory-holed corners of the brain. To others, though, their music is an "anarchic assault on the ears,” a quilt of all of the genres historically ridiculed in the popular canon: nu-metal, scuzz-rock, ska and 90’s pop punk are all fair game in the world of gecs.

On their latest record, aptly titled 10000 gecs, Brady and Les double down on the crunchy distortion and harmonics, creating tracks equally influenced by Primus and Eddie Van Halen as they are by their hyperpop contemporaries. The album reflects a Internet-core approach to music as a whole, shedding notions of “good” and “bad” music in favor of catchy melodies and intricate song construction. 

On this episode on Switched On Pop, we dig deep into the ethos of 100 gecs, and producer Reanna Cruz talks to the duo themselves about their eclectic sophomore record.

Songs discussed: 

• 100 gecs – Hollywood Baby
• 100 gecs – Billy Knows Jamie
• 100 gecs – stupid horse
• 100 gecs – 745 sticky
• 100 gecs – Doritos & Fritos
• Primus – Jerry Was A Racecar Driver
• Ween – Bananas and Blow
• Limp Bizkit – My Generation
• Gorillaz – Dirty Harry
• Future – I Been Drinking
• J-Kwon – Tipsy
• Justin Timberlake – Summer Love
• Violent Femmes – Added Up
• 100 gecs – Dumbest Girl Alive
• THX Deep Note
• Cypress Hill – Insane in the Membrane
• 100 gecs – The Most Wanted Person in the United States
• 100 gecs – Frog on the Floor
• Alan Jackson – Chattahoochee
• Limp Bizkit – Dad Vibes

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Every week the Switched On Pop team gets together and everybody shares one song they’re loving right now. It is one of our favorite conversations each week because we hear music that is new and old, on and off the charts. We’re sharing that conversation with you as a new format we’re calling Switches Brew alongside friend of the show Brittany Luse, host of NPR's It's Been A Minute

Listen to Brittany Luse on NPR’s It’s Been A Minute: Web, Apple, Spotify

Songs Discussed

• Little Freddie King - Messin' Around tha House
• De La Soul - Tread Water
• Nick Hakim - Qadir
• Lana Del Rey - Born to Die (Marcus Intalex Remix) on Bandcamp
• Madison Cunningham - Hospital (One Man Down) (feat. Remi Wolf)
• Remi Wolf - Down the Line

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“Kiss From a Rose” is one of the most unusual number one hits of all time. Seal’s song can’t decide if it’s in minor or major, it uses an old-fashioned waltz rhythm, and its lush orchestration and elaborate vocal harmonies support mysterious lyrics about a “greying tower alone on the sea.” Seal himself wasn’t sure about the song, and needed some convincing to include the composition on his 1994 album SEAL II. But once director Joel Schumacher decided to use the track for the end credits of the film Batman Forever, the song went global and has remained a cultural phenomenon ever since. Ahead of his upcoming 30th anniversary tour for the albums SEAL I and SEAL II, we speak with the singer and songwriter about the enduring appeal of “Kiss From A Rose.”

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“Take Me Home, Country Roads” is a song about West Virginia, but its message of homecoming has resonance far beyond Appalachia. Songwriter and producer Ian Fitchuk found this out when he was requested to perform Denver’s music at a music festival in Tibet. Fitchuk discovered that Denver has a huge following in East and South East Asia, where Denver toured multiple times from the 70s through the 90s. Denver’s songs first came to the region through the US Armed Forces Network radio as well as a diplomatic performance for China’s leader Deng Xiaoping at the Kennedy Center in 1979. Denver performed alongside the Harlem Globetrotters and the Joffrey ballet, and he left such an impression, the show led to an invitation to be one of the first western musicians to tour China. To better understand Denver’s meaning in the region, Switched On Pop co-host Charlie Harding speaks with Ian Fitchuk about his performance and interviews journalist Jason Jeung who wrote about “Country Roads” in The Atlantic.

Songs Discussed

• John Denver - Take Me Home, Country Roads
• Kacey Musgraves - Oh, What A World
• The East Is Red
• John Denver - Rocky Mountain High
• Creedence Clearwater Revival - Fortunate Son
• James Taylor - Carolina in My Mind
• Carpenters - (They Long To Be) Close To You
• John Denver - Thank God I'm a Country Boy

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Currently on Billboard’s hot 100 there is an unexpected UK Garage / Jersey House mashup, a disgraced country star making a questionable comeback, and an out of nowhere fifties ballad all jockeying for their moment on the charts. This week, we take a listen to the FEBRUARY 25, 2023 Hot 100, looking for triumphs, fumbles, and oddities.

Songs Discussed

• PinkPantheress, Ice Spice - Boy's a liar Pt. 2
• Ice Spice - Munch (Feelin’ U)
• Drake - Currents
• Lil Uzi Vert - Just Wanna Rock
• Sweet Female Attitude - Flowers - Sunship Edit
• Todd Edwards - Wishing I Were Home
• Ice Spice - In Ha Mood
• Morgan Wallen - You Proof
• Morgan Wallen - Last Night
• Tyler Childers - Way of the Triune God - Jubilee Version
• Mac DeMarco - Heart To Heart
• Miguel - Sure Thing
• Metro Boomin, The Weeknd, 21 Savage - Creepin' (with The Weeknd & 21 Savage)
• Mario Winans - I Don't Wanna Know
• Fugees, Ms. Lauryn Hill, Wyclef Jean, Pras - Ready or Not
• Enya - Boadicea
• Stephen Sanchez - Until I Found You
• The Everly Brothers - Let It Be Me
• Ritchie Valens - We Belong Together
• The Righteous Brothers - Unchained Melody
• Patsy Cline, The Jordanaires - Crazy
• Ray Charles - Georgia on My Mind - Original Master Recording
• The Beatles - In My Life - Remastered 2009

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Five years ago, Los Angeles rapper Nipsey Hussle released Victory Lap, his only full length album. It was the high point of a career stretching back to the mid 2000s, when Hussle started releasing mixtapes on his own record label — mixtapes that brought him respect from artists like Jay-Z and Kendrick Lamar, but were not widely heard. 

Victory Lap brought him both the critical acclaim and commercial success he deserved — It hit #2 on the Billboard 200, and was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rap Album. But only a little over a year after its release, Hussle was shot to death outside his clothing store and community center in Crenshaw. In some ways, Hussle’s tragic end has overshadowed his incredible life as a musician and community activist.

In this conversation with Justin Tinsley, host of the podcast King of Crenshaw, we listen deeply to Victory Lap to hear Nipsey’s identity as an artist and consider the legacy of his debut album on its 5th anniversary.

Songs Discussed

Nipsey Hussle - Victory Lap, Dedication, Hussle and Motivate, Last Time That I Checc'd, Real Big

Arctic Monkeys - Knee Socks

Jay-Z - Hard Knock Life

Snoop Dogg - Y'all Gone Miss Me

More

Listen to the King of Crenshaw podcast.

Check out more of Justin's work

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“Flowers” by Miley Cyrus is spending another week on top of the Billboard 100 – quite fitting for Valentine’s Day.

The disco-country track has gotten people talking for a few reasons, but most notably, Cyrus invokes Bruno Mars’ classic “When I Was Your Man” in both lyrical and melodic allusions. The connection between the two songs is not one of interpolation, but rather, Miley is responding to Bruno’s hit through her own words: making “Flowers” an answer song. 

This episode of Switched On Pop, we take a deeper look at “Flowers” and how it fits in the canon of response songs throughout history, from classics like “This Land is Your Land” to Nicki Minaj’s “Anaconda.” 

Songs Discussed: 

• Miley Cyrus – Flowers
• Kacey Musgraves – High Horse
• Gloria Gaynor – I Will Survive
• Dua Lipa – New Rules
• Bruno Mars – When I Was Your Man
• Ed Sheeran – Shape of You
• TLC – No Scrubs
• Katy Perry, Snoop Dogg – California Girls
• JAY-Z, Alicia Keys – Empire State of Mind
• Big Mama Thornton – Hound Dog
• Rufus Thomas – Bear Cat
• Hank Thompson – The Wild Side of Life
• Kitty Wells – It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels
• Ray Charles – Hit the Road, Jack
• Nina Simone – Come on Back Jack
• The Chantels – Well, I Told You
• UTFO – Roxanne, Roxanne
• Roxanne Shanté – Roxanne’s Revenge
• UTFO – The Real Roxanne
• New Edition – Candy Girl
• The Jackson 5 – ABC
• Sir Mix-A-Lot – Baby Got Back
• Nicki Minaj – Anaconda

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In case you missed it, “Rihanna Is The 21st Century’s Most Influential Musician” according to NPR. Millions and millions of fans the world over agree, and while we try to avoid overt expressions of pop favoritism, we think they’ve got a strong case. It’s for that reason and a dozen others that we were thrilled to welcome Gina Delvac of the hit podcast Call Your Girlfriend back to the show to discuss the legendary career of one Ms. Robyn Rihanna Fenty. As we all await her ninth studio album (R9), join us for a virtual* blunt-smoke-laced tour through the hit songs that defined her early sound, and a delectable deep dive into her most recent album, ANTI.

MORE CONTENT

Check out Jenny Gathright’s NPR article “Rihanna Is The 21st Century’s Most Influential Musician.”

And find even more work from our wonderful contributors this week down below:

• Gina
• Ivie
• Zoe
• Cate

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In 2010, a photographer named Reuben Cox moved to Los Angeles to start Old Style Guitar Shop. In the years since, the instruments that he continues to repair and sell have come to define the sound of the LA indie folk scene among artists like Blake Mills, Andrew Bird, Madison Cunningham, Ethan Gruska and Phoebe Bridgers.

Reuben’s guitars are Frankenstein-esque creations, cobbled together from spare parts and neglected guitar bodies found in flea markets and estate sales. The sounds that these make, though, are as eccentric as their source: the strings are laid on top of Reuben’s signature, a rubber bridge.

This sound, and the mythos of the rubber bridge guitar, has turned Reuben into a local celebrity and put Old Style at the center of Los Angeles’s indie music scene. In this episode of Switched on Pop, host Charlie Harding explores that sound and the man behind it all.

Songs Discussed (playlist)

• Taylor Swift - champagne problems
• Olivia Rodrigo - hope ur ok
• boygenius - Emily I’m Sorry
• Jenny Owen Youngs - Vampire Weeknight
• Andrew Bird - The New Saint Jude
• Marcus Mumford - Only Child
• Perfume Genius - Slip Away
• Andrew Bird - Underlands
• Madison Cunningham - Anywhere
• Madison Cunningham - Life According to Raechel
• Phoebe Bridgers - Garden Song

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It's Grammys weekend and Sam Sanders, host of Vulture's Into It podcast, is ready for disappointment! Sam is joined by Switched on Pop's Charlie Harding and Reanna Cruz to break down the Grammys' history of tone deafness when it comes to the night's biggest awards. Will Beyoncé lose Album of the Year again... or will the voting body finally give her her due?

Subscribe to Into It: https://link.chtbl.com/intoit?sid=stw

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In 1988, Bobby McFerrin recorded a song a cappella with a simple message: not to worry, and just enjoy life. That song, aptly titled “Don’t Worry, Be Happy,” topped the charts and become one of the most well known one-hit wonders of all time. 

In doing so, it also propelled McFerrin into the spotlight, winning him three Grammy awards and an eternal place in pop culture. His career, though, is more than just the Big Mouth Billy Bass: a deep dive reveals an incredible career in jazz, folk, and classical music as well as a remarkable command of his own voice. This episode of Switched on Pop, we explore the history behind "Don't Worry, Be Happy" and the ensuing legacy of Bobby McFerrin.

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Six years after their last record, Paramore is back with new music, and their upcoming record seems to have an uncanny connection to the era of new wave. But what is “new wave” anyway? Is it just a period of time in music or something more? 

In this episode of Switched on Pop, we explore some of the tracks from This is Why, out February 10th, and connect them to the works of everyone from Talking Heads to Joy Division.

Songs Discussed

• Paramore – C’est Comme Ça
• Olivia Rodrigo – good 4 u
• Paramore – Misery Business
• Paramore – Ain’t It Fun
• Paramore – Pool
• Paramore – This Is Why
• Talking Heads – I Zimbra
• Talking Heads – Once in a Lifetime
• Siouxsie and the Banshees – Happy House
• The B-52’s – Dirty Back Road
• Gang of Four – Cheeseburger
• Oingo Boingo – Just Another Day
• DEVO – Uncontrollable Urge
• Paramore – Hard Times
• Les Rita Mitsouko – C’est comme ça
• Talking Heads – Psycho Killer
• Selena Gomez – Bad Liar
• Paramore – The News
• Joy Division – Disorder
• Blondie – The Thin Line
• Blondie – The Tide Is High
• The Police – So Lonely
• Paramore – Pressure
• Paramore – Told You So
• Boy Harsher – LA 

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Streaming feels like it's both at its height and on a precipice. Musicians are fed up at getting paid fractions of a penny, and the whole business model seems precarious. Switched On Pop co-host Charlie Harding was talking about the challenges for streaming future with my friend Nilay Patel, editor in chief of The Verge and host the podcast Decoder - a show about big ideas. And they taped a conversation about what’s next for streaming through the case study of Taylor Swift who has deftly navigated the transition from CDs to streaming, and whose era tour may mark the end of an era in music. 

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Why does SZA's latest album SOS hit different? It's the way her melodies don't repeat where you expect them to, defying all the rules of pop songwriting. We break down how her endless melodies echo the intimate themes of her most recent release, and how they connect to genres ranging from gospel to Wagnerian opera.

Songs Discussed

SZA - Kill Bill, SOS, Shirt, Notice Me, Seek & Destroy, Gone Girl, Low, Smoking on My Ex Pack, Ghost in the Machine (ft Phoebe Bridgers), F2F

Sam Smith & Kim Petras - Unholy

Taylor Swift - Anti-Hero

Jazmine Sullivan - Girl Like Me (ft H.E.R.)

Summer Walker - No Love (ft. SZA)

Jessye Norman - Isoldes Liebestod

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Over the past few months, you may have heard your favorite song pop up on the Internet – just slightly faster. You’re not alone: the phenomenon of the “sped-up” remix has taken over social media, with everyone from Lady Gaga to Thundercat getting the tempo treatment. The popularity of the craze has led to millions of TikTok videos, Billboard number ones, and songs becoming relevant again, decades after release. Ever since the proliferation of these “remixes,” the big questions remain: where did these songs come from and why are they here? 

On this episode of Switched on Pop, we explore this exact phenomenon, tracing its roots from Thomas Edison to Cam’ron to vaporwave to nightcore.

Songs Discussed:

• “Dream On” – Aerosmith (sped up)
• “Escapism” – RAYE, 070 Shake (sped up)
• “Bad Habit” – Steve Lacy (sped up)
• “Miss You” – Oliver Tree (sped up)
• “Say It Right” – Nelly Furtado (sped up)
• “Bloody Mary” – Lady Gaga (sped up)
• “Heat Waves” – Glass Animals (slowed down)
• “Juicy” – Notorious B.I.G. 
• “Juicy” – DJ Screw
• “Jolene” – Dolly Parton (slowed down)
• “リサフランク420 / 現代のコンピュー |” – Macintosh Plus
• “In Da Club Before Eleven O’ Clock” – DJ Rashad
• “Monster [Nightcore]” – Meg & Dia, remixed by Barren Gates 
• “Concrete Angel” – Hannah Diamond
• “Witch Doctor” – David Seville
• “Oh Boy” – Cam’ron, Juelz Santana
• “Cool for the Summer” – Demi Lovato (sped up)
• “Them Changes” – Thundercat (sped up & Chopnotslop remix)
• “That’s All” – Genesis

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Matt Daniels, editor of the publication The Pudding, wanted to find out what songs from his youth would last into the future. So he designed a study that would test if Gen-Z had a grip on 90s culture. Hundreds of thousands of participants provided over 3 million data points. Daniels parsed through the data for insights. Sadly, the majority of his most beloved songs have not survived even one generation. Though most had been forgotten, he found that just a few songs had staying power across generations — what he defined as the emerging 90s music canon. Find out what songs make it and which have fallen to the wayside. 

MORE

The Pudding’s study on Defining the 90s Canon

Take The Pudding’s quiz yourself

SONGS DISCUSSED

Spice Girls - Wannabe 

Mariah Carey - Fantasy!

Lou Bega - Mambo #5

Los Del Rio - Macarena

Boys II Men - Motown Philly

Whitney Houston - I Will Always Love You

Savage Garden - I Want You

The Barenaked Ladies - One Week

Jewel - You Were Meant For Me

Jennifer Lopez - If You Had My Love

Celine Dion - My Heart Will Go On

Britney Spears - Baby One More Time

Smash Mouth - All Star

Nirvana - Smells Like Teen Spirit

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The number one song on the charts is a bit of a mystery. “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” is the unlikely hit from Disney’s sleeper animated musical Encanto. Set in a mountainous village in Colombia, the film was a middling commercial success when it was released in Nov 2021. But in recent months it has become a pop culture phenomenon for a confluence of reasons: an expansive discourse on Colombian representation in media, fan videos on TikTok, and of course it's ear-wormy hits. 

The musical is yet another notch in the belt for Lin Manuel Miranda (the auteur behind Hamilton and In The Heights) who wrote the now chart-topping song book. While Disney certainly commands vast commercial success, its musicals rarely see such crossover attention. The last #1 Disney musical number was “A Whole New World” from the animated Aladdin back in 1993. Where that song was literally uplifting, “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” is quite the opposite. 

Bruno is the uncle of the Madrigal family, whose skill for seeing the future portends gloom and sends him into exile. In his namesake song “We Don’t Talk About Bruno,” an ensemble cast trade verses about his ghostly presence (Bruno haunts the family home, living inside its walls). It is an odd ball song, with dark and bizarre lyrics. Sure it starts with a story about rain on a wedding day (which is not ironic), but then it takes a hard left into tales of dead fish, middle aged weight gain, and creeping rats. So then what makes it a hit? A distinctive concoction of salsa piano rhythms, familiar Lin Manuel Miranda-isms, and contemporary pop connections to Camila Cabello, Britney Spears, J Balvin, Bad Bunny and Cardi B. 

Listen to Switched On Pop to solve the mystery of what makes “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” a hit. 

SONGS DISCUSSED

Lin Manuel Miranda - We Don’t Talk About Bruno, In The Heights, Helpless, Satisfied, My Shot, Wait For It, Say No To This

Cardi B, J Balvin, I Like It

Luis Fonsi, Daddy Yankee - Despacito

Camila Cabello, Young Thug - Havana

Britney Spears - Baby One More Time

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When it comes to distinguishing what exactly Latin music is, what makes the cut? To some, it’s simply music from the Latin American region, and to others, it’s any music that is sung in Spanish – but much like the pop canon, the phrase encapsulates so many different eras, styles, and genres.

Like any distinction, there’s also music on the periphery: specifically, the music of Brazil, where the sounds are similar but the main language is different, and Spain, where the history of colonization looms over the country’s relationship with Latin America, raising controversial questions of appropriation. 

Nonetheless though, music from both countries has made big waves amongst U.S. listeners on Latin radio stations and at award shows. Anitta’s record Versions of Me has been finding success on streaming and the radio, while Rosalía’s MOTOMAMI has become one of the most acclaimed records of the year, winning this year’s Album of the Year award at the Latin Grammys. This episode of Switched on Pop, we take a look at these artists and how they incorporate both native and Latin sounds in their tracks.

Vote for the Signal Awards: https://vote.signalaward.com/PublicVoting#/2022/shows/general/music

SONGS DISCUSSED: 

• Anitta – Girl From Rio
• Rosalía – DESPECHÁ
• Anitta, Ty Dolla $ign – Gimme Your Number
• MC Marcinho, DJ Marlboro – Glamourosa (Rap Glamurosa)
• M.I.A. – Bucky Done Gun
• Anitta, Papatinho, MC Kevin o Chris, Mr. Catra, YG – Que Rabão
• Anitta – Envolver
• Karol G – PROVENZA
• Rosalía – MALAMENTE - Cap.1: Augurio
• Rosalía – BULERÍAS
• Rosalía – DELIRIO DE GRANDEZA
• Justo Betancourt – Delirio De Grandeza
• Tego Calderon – Al Natural
• Rosalía – SAOKO
• Wisin, Daddy Yankee – Saoco
• Rosalía – CHICKEN TERIYAKI
• Rosalía – DIABLO
• Rosalía, TOKISCHA – LA COMBI VERSACE
• Rosalía, The Weeknd – La Fama

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For Switched On Pop’s end of year coverage, we just have one superlative: who won 2022? The answer, of course, is Bad Bunny. This year alone, the prolific Puerto Rican artist has topped charts worldwide, became Spotify’s most streamed artist globally, and his record Un Verano Sin Ti has obtained many accolades including being the first Spanish-language album nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammys.

The record itself serves as a textbook to the sounds of Latin America: over the course of 23 songs, we’re introduced to bachata, dembow, cumbia, merengue, bomba, and of course, reggaeton. This episode, alongside LA Times journalist Suzy Exposito, we unpack Un Verano Sin Ti and why the album is so important, both for Bad Bunny and the Latin diaspora.

Vote for the Signal Awards: https://vote.signalaward.com/PublicVoting#/2022/shows/general/music

Songs Discussed:

• Bad Bunny – Callaita
• Bad Bunny – Diles
• Cardi B, Bad Bunny, J Balvin – I Like It
• N.O.R.E., Daddy Yankee, Nina Sky, Gemstar, Big Mato – Oye Mi Canto
• Ruben Blades – Plástico
• Bad Bunny – Después de la Playa
• Bad Bunny – Tití Me Preguntó
• Bad Bunny – El Apagón
• Héctor Lavoe, Fania All Stars – Mi Gente - Live
• Omega – Si Te Vas
• Aventura, Don Omar – Ella Y Yo
• Nando Boom – Ellos Benia Dem Bow
• Daddy Yankee – Gasolina
• El General – Tu Pun Pun
• Shabba Ranks – Dem Bow
• El Alfa, CJ, Chael Produciendo, El Cherry Scom – La Mamá de la Mamá
• Bad Bunny – Me Fui de Vacaciones
• Bad Bunny, Bomba Estéreo – Ojitos Lindos
• Stan Getz, João Gilberto, Astrud Gilberto – The Girl From Ipanema
• Bad Bunny – Si Veo a Tu Mamá

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Through crafting a unique, cross-cultural sound, Kali Uchis has emerged as one of indie music’s most promising talents. From playing in jazz band as a kid to collaborating with Bootsy Collins and Kaytranada, the Grammy Award-winning artist has managed to take her bilingual, one-of-a-kind music to the Billboard charts while still keeping her DIY ethos. At this year’s Vulture Fest live in Los Angeles, host Charlie Harding talked with Uchis about her career, her songcraft and her two upcoming albums: one in Spanish and one in English. 

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In case you missed it last year: why are there no new Christmas songs? One one hand, there's more holiday songs than we’ll ever need. Every year pop stars drop countless holiday-themed album.

But despite the annual glut of Christmas releases, few of these new songs join the rotation of holiday classics. On Billboard's Holiday Hot 100 chart right now, there's only four songs from the past ten years that have made it to the top fifty.

We listen to each of these holiday hits—from Kelly Clarkson, Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber, and the Jonas Brothers—and and ask if these songs can go the distance and become the 21st century members of the Christmas music canon.

Songs Discussed - Playlist

Kelly Clarkson - Underneath the Tree

Ariana Grande - Santa Tell Me

Justin Bieber - Mistletoe

Jonas Brothers - Like It's Christmas

The Bird and the Bee - You and I at Christmas Time

Loretta Lynn - White Christmas Blue

Woody Goss - One for One

Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings - 8 Days of Hannukah

Jenny Owen Youngs, Tancred, John Mark Nelson - Fireside

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In hip-hop, what draws us to an artist is not just the content of their lyrics but how they deliver them. Along with tapping your foot to the rhythm, understanding something called “flow” is essential to understanding hip-hop as a whole.

In this episode of Switched On Pop, we interview genre icon DJ Jazzy Jeff on the concept of flow: what it is, how it applies to all music – not just hip-hop – and how any rapper’s flow can be analyzed under his guidelines. Taking his word for it, we put our magnifying glasses on to look at the bars of our favorite rappers, from Megan thee Stallion to Babytron.

Songs Discussed:

• The Notorious B.I.G. - Big Poppa
• Mary J. Blige - Family Affair
• A Tribe Called Quest - The Hop
• Danger Mouse, Black Thought - Aquamarine
• BabyTron - Crocs & Wock’ 
• RXKNephew - Take Three
• JID - Better Days (feat. Johnta Austin)
• Megan Thee Stallion - Not Nice
• Megan Thee Stallion - Cocky Af

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Coping Mechanism, Willow's new album, is her heaviest music yet. Charlie and Willow chat about the making of the new record and the many multitudes of rock music.

Music Discussed

• The Anxiety - Meet Me At Our Spot
• Willow - Maybe It's My Fault, UR Town, Human Leach, PrettyGirlz, Lipstick, Why, Breakout, Hover Like a Goddess, Curious/Furious, Ur A Stranger
• Yungblood - Memories (with Willow)
• Deftones - Sextape
• Radiohead - I Will
• Straight Line Stitch - What You Do To Me
• Killswitch Engage - My Curse
• Lamb of God - Redneck
• Primus - Lacquer Head

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Tegan & Sara and King Princess have found themselves placed under the banner, "sapphic pop," a term recently coined referring to music by and/or for sapphics (a.k.a. women or femme folks attracted to other femme folks). Journalist Emma Madden defines the folk-inspired sound as having a “soft tactile approach” that’s “more sensual than it is sexual.” This umbrella folds in everyone from indie pop veterans Tegan & Sara to nonbinary artists like King Princess; even artists like Hozier and Sufjan Stevens are, improbably, considered sapphic pop, with their music having the same sonic qualities of other songs dedicated to feminine yearning.

From articles popping up in multiple news outlets to the majority of Taylor Swift’s openers for this upcoming tour (looking at MUNA, girl in red, and Phoebe Bridgers, specifically), the terminology of “sapphic pop” has come to define a scene almost out of nowhere.

This week on Switched On Pop, we explore exactly what sapphic pop is, where it came from, and how artists feel about it – even asking Tegan & Sara and King Princess directly. You can listen wherever you get podcasts.

Songs discussed

• Clairo – Sofia
• King Princess – Talia
• girl in red – i wanna be your girlfriend
• Hozier – Cherry Wine (live)
• Alex G – Sarah
• The Velvet Underground – I Found A Reason
• Sufjan Stevens – To Be Alone With You
• Cris Williamson – Shine On Straight Arrow
• Jaylib, Madlib, J Dilla – The Red
• Taylor Swift – betty
• Brittany Howard – Georgia
• MUNA, Phoebe Bridgers – Silk Chiffon
• Tegan & Sara – Call It Off
• Tegan & Sara – Smoking Weed Alone
• King Princess – 1950
• King Princess – I Hate Myself, I Want To Party
• King Princess – Pussy is God
• Kate Bush – Why Should I Love You?

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Scary Pockets is the musical collective that has been transforming pop classics into funk anthems for over half a decade. Each week they release a new cover on YouTube featuring razor-sharp instrumentalists and a rotating cast of virtuosic lead singers. Amazingly, each of their 200-plus covers is arranged on the fly, in a span of about 90 minutes—capturing the talent and spontaneity of a group of musicians at the top of their game. We here at Switched on Pop were struck by the band's ability to infuse familiar songs with syncopation and backbeat, and rack up millions of views in the process, so we reached out to Scary Pockets's leaders—guitarist Ryan Lerman and keyboardist Jack Conte—to arrange for Nate and Reanna to be flies on the wall during their creative process. After documenting the behind-the-scenes dialogue that led to a slow-burning interpretation of the Bee Gees's 1977 classic "Staying Alive," we called up Ryan, Jack, and the song's lead vocalist, Lizzy McAlpine, to hear their insights on making a song that everyone knows sound fresh and unfamiliar 

Songs Discussed

Bee Gees - Staying Alive (Scary Pockets Cover)

Paul McCartney and Wings - Arrow Through Me (Scary Pockets Cover)

Beatles - Maxwell's Silver Hammer

Coldplay - Fix You (Scary Pockets Cover)

Parcels - Tieduprightnow

Bill Withers - Just the Two of Us (Scary Pockets Cover)

Justin Bieber - Peaches (Lizzy McAlpine Cover)

More on Scary Pockets

Watch the video of Scary Pockets and Lizzy McAlpine covering "Staying Alive"

See them LIVE with David Ryan Harris & John Scofield, November 16 at Echoplex in Los Angeles! Tickets

Subscribe to their YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/scarypockets

Merch Store: https://www.scarypocketsfunk.com

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scarypockets

Listen on Spotify: Scary Pockets

Instagram: @scarypockets 

Musician Credits:

Vocals: Lizzy McAlpine

BGVs: Sophia James, Arielle Kasnetz

Guitar: Ryan Lerman, Will Graefe

Wurlitzer & Synth: Jack Conte

Bass: Travis Carlton

Drums: RJ Kelly

Audio: Engineered & mixed by Caleb Parker

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 A Taylor Swift album is just not a collection of new music, it’s an exploration of a theme. For the last eight years, each release has embodied a single idea. Reputation marked a turn to the dark side, Lover a return to the light, and her pair of albums Folklore and Evermore painted acoustic, fictional landscapes. Each album propels fans to find covert lyrical connections to her personal life, and easter eggs to past compositions.

Whereas Swift's pop star contemporaries have focused their energies on becoming business moguls, Swift has gone deeper into songwriting and receiving accolades in the process. In September 2022, the Nashville Songwriting Association International awarded Swift the Songwriter of the Decade award. In her acceptance speech she says, “writing songs is my life’s work and my hobby and my never-ending thrill.”

Now she continues that thrill collaborating with her frequent producing partner and friend of the show, Jack Antonoff, on Midnights, her 10th studio album (not counting her recent “Taylor’s version” re-recordings of past releases). On Midnights Swift builds a lyrical and sonic world that takes place across “13 sleepless nights.” Nate and Charlie listen closely to hear how she constructs this late night feeling.  

More

• Nate’s article on “Taylor Swift and the Work of Songwriting” for the Contemporary Music Review Journal
• John Hull's Soundfly course on Advanced Synths and Patch Design for Producers

Music Discussed:

• Taylor Swift - Anti-Hero, Lavender Haze, Maroon, Question, Snow On the Beach, Mastermind, Bejeweled, Vigilante Shit, Labyrinth, Midnight Rain, You’re On Your Own Kid, You Belong With Me, Stay
• Kevin “Reese” Saunderson - Just Want Another Chance
• Ray “Renegade” Keith - Terrorist P.A. Mix
• Burial - Archangel 

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It’s the song that launched a thousand TikTok videos – or over 500,000 to be exact: Steve Lacy’s “Bad Habit.” 

The track is a smooth, psychedelia tinged ode to yearning, currently spending its third week on the top of the Billboard Hot 100. Lacy is an artist dedicated to shifting form and convention, from his records with alternative R&B band The Internet to his productions for artists like Mac Miller and Vampire Weekend. Even in his solo work, his songs are unpredictable, deftly moving through genre in the vein of artists like Prince and Stevie Wonder. 

“Bad Habit” specifically, though, is rooted in the genre of bedroom pop, a scene slowly gaining mainstream traction. With this track, Lacy is taking the sound that’s seeped through TikTok and Spotify to the top of the charts. On this episode of Switched On Pop, we dig deep into Lacy's career and his ability to craft immaculate melodies.

Songs Discussed:

• Steve Lacy, “Bad Habit”
• Sam Smith, Kim Petras, “Unholy”
• The Internet, “Dontcha”
• The Internet, “Special Affair”
• The Internet, “Palace/Curse (feat. Tyler, The Creator & Steve Lacy)
• Steve Lacy, “C U Girl”
• Steve Lacy, “Dark Red”
• Steve Lacy, “Only If”
• Steve Lacy, “Like Me”
• Steve Lacy, “Playground”
• Steve Lacy, “Static”
• Stevie Wonder, “Signed, Sealed, Delivered”

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Earlier this year, the members of Sylvan Esso took a gamble, making their "most free and wild and strange" album yet: No Rules Sandy. And to add to the overall theme of lawlessness, Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn decided to do something equally as free and radical: they decided to forgo the typical multi-year album cycle as well as a standard promo campaign. While wrapped in what Amelia calls a “PR cocoon,” she began to think about the less tangible aspects of the album rollout process, and wanted to enlist other musicians (as well as Switched On Pop) in exploring certain aspects of what it means to be an artist to answer the question: why does it hurt to release records?

Songs Discussed

• Sylvan Esso - Your Reality
• Sylvan Esso - Cloud Walker
• Sylvan Esso - Didn’t Care
• Sylvan Esso - Look At Me
• Sylvan Esso - How Did You Know
• Sylvan Esso - Sunburn
• MUNA - Number One Fan
• MUNA - Silk Chiffon
• MUNA - What I Want
• Bartees Strange - Heavy Heart
• Bartees Strange - Co Signs
• Bartees Strange - Hennessy
• Wilco - Cruel Country
• Maggie Rogers - Alaska
• Maggie Rogers - That’s Where I Am
• Maggie Rogers - Anywhere with You
• Maggie Rogers - Want Want
• Maggie Rogers - Begging for Rain

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After a four-year hiatus – and a name drop on a Beyoncé remix – musical polymath Santigold is back with a brand new album. Known for her signature blend of genre-defying songcraft, the artist’s fourth studio album Spirituals is one of her most artistically challenging projects yet. It’s another venture into what she does best: addressing heavy themes through toe-tapping melodies. From Nate’s personal favorite, 2016’s “Can’t Get Enough of Myself,” to “My Horror,” a pan-genre sonic vision has always been present in her career. On this episode of Switched On Pop, Santigold speaks about her new record, being a mother, and the emotions that went into making Spirituals. 

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In part 1 of our Vergecast: Future of Music series, Alex Cranz talks with Switched on Pop's Charlie Harding about the trends in music today that make new songs out of old material, and whether it's foreshadowing the future of pop.

Further reading:

Selena Quintanilla Will Sound Older on Her New Posthumous Album

Michael Jackson songs removed from streaming services to 'move beyond' fake vocals controversy

Shred with Green Day, with some help from AudioShake

Invasion of the Vibe Snatchers

Music discussed:

Como Te Quiero Yo A Ti - Selena

My Way - Frank Sinatra

I'll Be Seeing You - Billie Holiday

We Can't Stop - Miley Cyrus

bad guy - Billie Eilish

Through The Wire - Kanye West

Breaking News - Michael Jackson

Real Love - The Beatles

Free As A Bird - The Beatles

2000 Light Years Away - Green Day

Betty (Get Money) - Yung Gravy

Genius of Love - Tom Tom Club

Fantasy - Mariah Carey

Big Energy - Latto

I'm Good (Blue) - David Guetta, Bebe Rexha

Bang Bang - Rita Ora, Imanbek

Higher Love - Kygo, Whitney Houston

Don't Start Now - Dua Lipa

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After an enlightening experience at Lady Gaga's Chromatica Ball, producer Reanna Cruz takes a look at the connection between Gaga's music and the Latin sounds she's engaged with over the years, from traditional rancheras to the rhythm of reggaeton.

Songs discussed:

• Lady Gaga, “Alejandro”
• Ace of Base, “Don’t Turn Around”
• ABBA, “Chiquitita – Spanish Version”
• Madonna, “La Isla Bonita”
• Rihanna, “Te Amo”
• Vittorio Monti, Sarah Nemtanu, Chilly Gonzales, “Csárdás”
• Lady Gaga, “Americano”
• Rosemary Clooney, The Mellomen, “Mambo Italiano (with the Mellomen)”
• Luis Fonsi, Daddy Yankee, “Despacito”
• La Flavour, “Mandolay”
• Lady Gaga, “Dancin’ In Circles”
• Alejandro Fernández, “Como Quien Pierde una Estrella”
• Pedro Fernández, “Yo…El Aventurero”
• Lola Beltran, “Cucurrucucu Paloma”
• War, “Cinco de Mayo”
• Santana, The Product G&B, “Maria Maria (feat. The Product G&B)”
• Lady Gaga, “Dancin’ In Circles”
• Justin Bieber, “Sorry”
• French Montana, Swae Lee, “Unforgettable”
• Tego Calderon, “Pa’ Que Retozen”
• Rosalia, J Balvin, “Con Altura”
• Juan Gabriel, “Abrázame Muy Fuerte”
• Lady Gaga, Ariana Grande, “Rain On Me”
• Lady Gaga, Ariana Grande, Arca, “Rain On Me – Arca Remix”
• Lady Gaga, “Fun Tonight”
• Lady Gaga, Pabllo Vittar, “Fun Tonight – Pabllo Vittar Remix”

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Why do so many songs sound familiar? Because the number of chart topping interpolations — songs built off of old hits — has roughly doubled in the five years. It’s everywhere, you can’t escape because many people are embracing it.

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Who had the song of the summer? Sam Sanders chats with Switched on Pop's Charlie Harding and Reanna Cruz about whose song (and album) is in the running: Beyoncé, Bad Bunny, Lizzo, or Kate Bush? 

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Are you like Nate? Is there one artist that, every time you hear them, you can't help it—you start to grimace, sweat, seethe. You can't explain it, but there's something about them that you just. can't. stand. For Nate, that band is the Killers. Lots of people love this band, they've been around for almost two decades, they're practically an institution! So why can't he get past his hang up? Charlie and Reanna step in to help break down what it is about the Killers that rankles their normally open-eared colleague so, and then step back to consider what it is that makes us think we hate the bands we do—and whether we can change those opinions.

Songs Discussed

The Killers - Human, All These Things That I've Done, When You Were Young, Mr. Brightside, Deadlines and Commitments, Where the White Boys Dance, boy, Shot at the Night, The Man, Tranquilize

Ariana Grande and Zedd - Break Free

Erasure - A Little Respect

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A lot has happened in the world of Kpop this summer, from Girls’ Generation sugar coated banger “Forever 1” marking a triumphant return from a five year hiatus, to the ascendance of newcomers NewJeans, whose R&B infused sounds have quickly taken over the charts. But it's the return of BLACKPINK that has lit up the world literally in pink. Get a full deep dive on the songs at the top of the Kpop charts on the latest episode of Switched On Pop, where hosts Charlie Harding and Nate Sloan speak with journalist Kristine Kwak.

Songs Discussed

• Psy, SUGA - That That
• J-hope - MORE
• BLACKPINK - Pink Venom
• Girls’ Generation
• IVE - LOVE DIVE
• NewJeans - Attention
• SWV - I’m So Into You
• Rihanna - Pon De Replay
• Missy Elliot - Work It
• 50 Cent - Just A Lil Bit
• Taylor Swift “Look What You Made Me Do”
• Panjabi MC, JAY-Z - Mundian to Bach Ke
• Britney Spears, Madonna - Me Against the Music
• Justin Timberlake - What Goes Around Comes Around
• Snoop Dogg - Drop It Like It’s Hot
• Snoop Dogg - I Wanna Rock
• The Notorious B.I.G. - Kick in the Door
• 
  

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Demi Lovato has found herself in many avenues over the past few years – from releasing a tell-all documentary to uncovering extraterrestrials – but 2022 finds them traveling back in time to the sound of the late 90’s and early 2000’s: pop-punk. On this episode of Switched On Pop, we check out her two latest singles, “Skin of My Teeth” and “Substance,” and through focusing on the latter, pull out what, exactly, pop-punk is, and how Demi embodies the genre’s ever-evolving sound in their new track.

Songs Discussed:

• Demi Lovato - Substance
• Demi Lovato - Skin of My Teeth
• Demi Lovato - Sorry Not Sorry
• Demi Lovato - La La Land
• Demi Lovato - Heart Attack
• Turnstile - MYSTERY
• Bring Me The Horizon - Chelsea Smile
• Blink-182 - Dysentery Gary
• Misfits - Astro Zombies
• My Chemical Romance - Astro Zombies
• Blink-182 - What’s My Age Again
• WILLOW, Travis Barker - t r a n s p a r e n t s o u l
• Yellowcard - Ocean Avenue
• Machine Gun Kelly - bloody valentine
• Citizen - Stain
• La Dispute - Such Small Hands
• Mom Jeans - Edward 40hands
• Rise Against - Savior
• NOFX - Whoa on the Whoas
• Jarrod Alonge, Sunrise Skater Kids - Pop Punk Pizza Party
• Paramore - For A Pessimist, I’m Pretty Optimistic
• Fall Out Boy - Of All The Gin Joints In The World
• Soundgarden - Black Hole Sun
• The Police - Message in a Bottle
• Modern Baseball - Tears Over Beers
• Jimmy Eat World - Sweetness
• Good Charlotte - The Anthem
• The Offspring - The Kids Aren’t Alright

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Beyoncé’s new album Renaissance is one of her most ambitious albums yet. On this week’s episode of Switched On Pop, we discuss Renaissance with beloved guest Sam Sanders, host of the new Vulture podcast Into It. In Sanders’ words: “it’s trying to do a lot” – but in the best way. The album incorporates seemingly every decade of contemporary popular dance music from Chic’s “Good Times” to Right Said Fred’s “I’m Too Sexy.”

Much of the early discourse surrounding the album was marred by a confusing controversy over a small sample (we try to resolve the issue musicologically) – but the references on Renaissance are worth listening closely to, acting as a guide through essential dance music. The album is an homage to the black and queer innovators of dance; with samples and interpolations of songs both niche and mainstream flying by, like a DJ set curated by house music pioneers. 

On Renaissance, Beyoncé goes out of her way to cite, credit and compensate her influences, resulting in a triumph of musical curation. Just look at “Alien Superstar”: the song credits twenty-four people, largely due to Beyoncé’s musical nods, rather than an exercise in boardroom style songwriting. Sanders says “the liner notes themselves are showing you that this woman and her team have a PhD in music history.”

Listen to Switched On Pop to hear how Renaissance honors dance music innovators and finds new modes of expression in the genre. 

Subscribe to Into It with Sam Sanders

Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/3vE4jqf

Listen on Spotify: https://bit.ly/3bB7Vmf

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Subscribe to Into It with Sam Sanders

Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://bit.ly/3vE4jqf

Listen on Spotify: https://bit.ly/3bB7Vmf

Listen elsewhere: https://bit.ly/3BI0Nz0

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In the middle of a long, hot summer 2022, the people have spoken, and the people want to dance. Lizzo's "About Damn Time" just replaced Harry Styles's "As It Was" to become the top song on the Billboard Hot 100. Powered by retro instrumentation, a propulsive groove, meme-worthy lyrics, and a generous dose of slash chords (not the Guns 'n Roses guitarist, the harmonic voicing), Lizzo's hit song marks a deepening of the sound she established in past tracks like "Juice." But on other tracks from her latest album Special, Lizzo aims for new aesthetics. "Coldplay"—featuring a rare Chris Martin vocal sample—opts for emotional honestly over pithy affirmations. With the upbeat "Grrrls," Lizzo found herself in an online controversy: she had used a ableist slur in the song's lyrics. Taking the criticism as an opportunity to learn, Lizzo chose to replace the offensive line—but have other artists of pop's past always followed suit when met with fan feedback?

Songs Discussed

Lizzo - About Damn Time, Juice, Coldplay, Grrrls

Daft Punk, Pharrel Williams - Lose Yourself to Dance

Michael Jackson - Rock With You, They Don’t Care About Us

Quelle Chris, Chris Keys - Sudden Death

Coldplay - Yellow

Beastie Boys - Girls, Sure Shot

Taylor Swift - Picture to Burn

Lady Gaga - Born This Way

Orville Peck - Born This Way

Ella Fitzgerald - How Long Has This Been Going On

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Baz Luhrmann’s hit box office hit biopic Elvis has spurred new interest in the music of The King. Elvis Presley’s streaming subscribers has grown by two million listeners on Spotify since the film’s release according to ChartMetric, and if you’re hearing a lot more “Hound Dog” these days, it might be partially due to the success of Doja Cat’s hit song “Vegas,” which updates – and interpolates – the song for contemporary listeners. 

Doja Cat’s version samples from the original 1953 “Hound Dog,” sung by Big Mama Thornton and written by acclaimed songwriter team Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller (whose credits also include Presley’s “Jailhouse Rock” and Ben E. King’s “Stand By Me”). The original is a sauntering blues song with a raunchy tale about a two timing man; Presley, who is frequently said to have stolen the song from Thorton, instead sings a tepid lyric about an actual dog, and radically changes the groove. 

But in an interview with Rolling Stone, Stoller says Presley didn’t steal the song at all. Rather, he adapted one of many covers of the song, specifically the version performed by the Las Vegas lounge act Freddie Bell and the Bellboys. Their “Hound Dog” borrows its upbeat rhythm from a song responding to the original “Hound Dog,” titled “Bear Cat.” It’s a similar rhythm to the one we hear on the contemporary Doja Cat version, “Vegas,” which heavily features samples of Thornton’s original vocals: listening closely reveals a song that synthesizes a complicated music history by uniting the best parts of the many versions of “Hound Dog.” 

Listen to the latest episode of Switched On Pop and uncover the long legacy of “Hound Dog.”

Songs Discussed

• Big Mama Thorton - Hound Dog
• Elvis - Hound Dog
• Doja Cat - Vegas
• Esther Phillips - Hound Dog
• Jack Turner - Hound Dog
• Rufus Thomas - Bear Cat
• Freddie Bell and the Bellboys
• T.L.C. - No Scrubs
• Sporty Thievz - No Pigeons 
• W.C. Handy - St. Louis Blues
• Duke Ellington - Conga brava
• Sister Rosetta Tharpe - Didn’t It Rain
• Fats Domino - Mardi Gras in New Orleans
• Dave Bartholomew - Country Boy
• Little Richard - Slipping’ And Sliding’
• Jack Harlow - Dua Lipa
• Future - Puffin on Zootiez
• Hitkidd, Gorilla - F.N.F. (Let’s Go)
• Bad Bunny - Después de la Playa

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On June 24th 2022 the Supreme Court decided Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization, overturning Roe v Wade and asserting that the Constitution of the United States does not confer a right to abortion.

The decision marked a seismic moment in politics and culture that has affected everyone’s lives, and the world of pop music is no exception. Musicians started responding immediately, from Cher to Olivia Rodrigo: on social media, at their shows, and in their music. Critic Ann Powers has been chronicling the reactions in a running list at NPR, and she joins in the second half of the episode to talk about the long history of artists speaking out—and singing—about reproductive rights. 

One artist who wasted no time responding to the Dobbs decision is the singer and songwriter Connie Lim, aka MILCK. Her song “We Won’t Go Back,” composed with Biianco, Autumn Rowe, and Ani DeFranco, came about after Politico published an article in May with the leaked draft of the Dobbs decision, telling the world in no uncertain terms that the Supreme Court was considering striking down Roe. MILCK found herself protesting in D.C., this time with her camera ready. The chants she heard there became the first sonic element of “We Won’t Go Back.”

Songs Discussed

MILCK, Biianco, Autumn Rowe, Ani DeFranco - We Won’t Go Back

MILCK - Quiet

Ani DeFranco - Play God 

Poison Girls - Mandy Is Having a Baby

Cyndi Lauper - Sally’s Pigeons

Leslie Gore - You Don’t Own Me

Robyn - Giving You Back

Joni Mitchell - Little Green

L7 - Pretend We’re Dead

Everlast - What It’s Like

Madonna - Papa Don’t Preach

Lauryn Hill - To Zion

Megan Thee Stallion - Plan B

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As we hit the dog days of summer, the artist that’s started to soundtrack pool parties across the country is former One Direction bandmate and contemporary sex symbol Harry Styles.

In May, Styles released Harry’s House, an album propelled by the number one hit “As It Was.” Despite having critical and commercial success, a barb often thrown at the album is the idea of it being inoffensive: pleasant, “easy listening” music apt for an elevator, grocery store or, perhaps, a sushi restaurant. 

Fans of Styles have warmly accepted this, and have come to love his sly appreciation of different decades of pop music history. This latest album reveals an interesting connection to one era in particular: the 1980s and the percussive, full-bodied horn sections that came with it. 

The first track on Harry’s House, “Music for a Sushi Restaurant,” offers a whole chorus of just horns, in an homage to one of Styles’s musical touchstones, Peter Gabriel. These 80s “sledgehammer horns” connect to a deep well of 80s grooves—from Lionel Richie's "Up All Night" to Janet Jackson and Herb Alpert's "Diamonds," —as Styles's strives to achieve the same effortless funk and propulsion of his brassy icons.

MORE

Sledgehammer Horns playlist

Every Olivia Wilde reference Vulture found on Harry’s House

Songs Discussed

Harry Styles - As It Was, Music for a Sushi Restaurant, Daydreaming

Peter Gabriel - Sledgehammer

Lionel Richie - Up All Night

Donna Summer - She Works Hard for the Money

Sheila E. - The Glamorous Life

Steve Winwood - Higher Love

Janet Jackson and Herb Alpert - Diamonds

Herb Alpert - Rise

Notorious B.I.G. - Hypnotize 

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In 1999 filmmaker Baz Luhrmann released the song “Everybody’s Free To Wear Sunscreen,” a 7-minute-long graduation speech set to downtempo electronic music. It was a highly unlikely hit that made its way across continents and eventually into the ears of a young Avery Trufelman via the album NOW That’s What I Call Music Volume 2. For over 20 years, Trufelman has applied the song’s advice to her daily life: “wear sunscreen… be nice to your siblings… do one thing every day that scares you.” This unusual song has left a lasting impression, and yet for Trufelman, it makes no sense that “The Sunscreen Song” was commercially successful. We investigate the song’s many architects — novelist Kurt Vonnegut, Chicago Tribune columnist Mary Schmich and Baz Luhrmann himself — to unpack one of the internet’s first conspiracy theories that turned into Billboard’s greatest outlier. 

We need your help. We are conducting a short audience survey to help plan for our future and hear from you. To participate, head to vox.com/podsurvey, and thank you!

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The world stops with a Beyoncé drop. On Monday, June 20th, our prayers were answered with “Break My Soul,” the lead single off of her upcoming album, Renaissance. The song draws from several places of inspiration: lyrically, it’s a cathartic dance-floor ode to liberation, soundtracking the current cultural moment that some have called the “Great Resignation.” Sonically, though, “Break My Soul” is Beyoncé’s foray into house music – a genre that the chair of the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, Jason King, summarizes as “a highly rhythmic dance music created by mostly Black and brown artists in the late 1970s and early 1980s,” propelled by a fanbase of queer and trans communities of color. There’s been an undeniable buzz that Beyoncé is “bringing house music back.” And from Charli XCX to Drake, it does feel like house music is currently having a moment in mainstream pop music, paralleling the original rise of the subculture from the ruins of disco. But the genre “has always been here,” in King’s words, and has decades of history. In this episode of Switched On Pop, we unpack house music – and how Beyoncé’s “Break My Soul” fits into the genre.  

Songs Discussed

Beyoncé - “BREAK MY SOUL”

Beyoncé - “Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)”

Drake - “Falling Back”

Thelma Houston - “Don’t Leave Me This Way”

Robin S - “Show Me Love”

Bob Sinclair, Steve Edwards - “World Hold On (Children of the sky)”

Katy Perry, Nicki Minaj - “Swish Swish”

Charli XCX - “Used To Know Me”

Livin’ Joy - “Don’t Stop Movin’”

Mr. Fingers - “Can You Feel It”

Madonna - “Vogue”

Black Box - “Ride on Time”

CeCe Peniston - “Finally”

Aqua - “Barbie Girl”

Big Freedia - “Explode”

Beyoncé - “Formation”

Drake - “Nice For What”

Daft Punk, Pharrell Williams, Nile Rodgers - “Get Lucky”

Destiny’s Child - “Say My Name - Maurice’s Last Days Of Disco Millennium Mix”

Beyoncè - “FIND YOUR WAY BACK”

Madonna - “Deeper and Deeper”

Janet Jackson - “Together Again”

C & C Music Factory - “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)” 

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Robert Glasper is the only artist to have an album debut in the top 10 of 4 different Billboard charts. He's a musical polymath whose resume ranges from Kendrick Lamar to Herbie Hancock. At the piano, he serves up jazz licks worthy of Mary Lou Williams before segueing into a Nirvana cover. Glasper brings his diverse skill set to bear on his latest project, the score for the HBO series Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty, composed in collaboration with "Succession" soundtracker Nicholas Britell. It's not just Glasper's musical chops that made him the perfect candidate for the gig: in a past life, he was a baller himself. Nate spoke with Glasper about crafting the sound of the 1980s, improvising soundtrack themes on the spot, and what jazz and basketball have in common.

Songs Discussed

Robert Glasper - Over, FTB, "Winning Time" and "The Photograph" Themes

Nicholas Britell - "Succession" and "Moonlight" Themes

Morris Day and The Time - Get It Up

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We recently deconstructed how Kate Bush’s 1985 song “Running Up That Hill” has found itself at the center of culture due to a placement in the Netflix, eighties, horror, sci-fi show, Stranger Things. For that episode we excerpted an interview with the composers of the show who shared great insights on how they created the iconic theme song and spooky soundscape for the most streamed show of 2022. But we want to share the full conversation with you because they have equally cheeky as well as valuable musical offerings to share. Surprisingly, this show steeped in 80s nostalgia, has a more contemporary soundtrack than you you might think. 

Songs Discussed

• Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein - Stranger Things, Photos in the Woods, He’s Here, Soldiers, Agents, Starcourt
• Kate Bush - Running Up That Hill
• Tangerine Dream - Sorcerer Theme Song
• John Carpenter - Night
• Vangelis - Main Titles (Blade Runner)
• S U R V I V E - A.H.B.
• S U R V I V E - High Rise 
• Merzbow - Woodpecker No.1

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Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill” enters the latest season of Stranger Things during a brooding high-school hallway scene right out of the John Hughes playbook, and it has since bounded up the charts, hitting No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and performing better now than when it peaked at No. 30 upon release. Stranger Things, whose latest season has logged more viewer minutes for Netflix than any other English-language release to date, has leaned heavily on ’80s nostalgia since its premiere in 2016: Its iconic theme song is reminiscent of John Carpenter B-movies, and, in an email, used-instrument resale site Reverb.com tells us the show has boosted interest in analog synthesizers.

“Running Up That Hill,” then, is a natural fit for the show, and it plays a pivotal, spoiler-ridden plot point in the show, requiring us to hear the hook multiple times throughout the season — a perfect earworm. But its success is owed to more than just repetition. It waffles between major and minor, and the show’s composers, Kyle Dixon and Michael Stein, told Switched on Pop that both it and the rest of the Stranger Things score have “moments of darkness and lightness in it, constantly trading places.” Plus, they’re composed from the same set of instruments: classic synthesizers and drum machines like the LinnDrum. The song is part and parcel with the soundtrack itself: “There’s these little melodies that we always refer to as ‘And then the Kate Bush part comes in,’” Dixon says.

Listen to Switched On Pop to hear how Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill” is an exquisite song placement and hear how it blends seamlessly with the Stranger Things soundtrack.

MORE

Check out Reverb Machine’s sounds of Kate Bush

Reverb.com made a tutorial on the synth sounds of Stranger Things

The story of the Kate Bush renaissance from The Ringer

Songs Discussed

• Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein - Stranger Things
• Kate Bush - Running Up That Hill
• Dead Or Alive - You Spin Me Round
• Talking Heads - Psycho Killer
• Musical Youth - Pass the Dutchie 
• Carly Rae Jepsen - Cut To The Feeling
• The Weeknd - Blinding Lights 
• Prince - When Doves Cry
• Phil Collins - Sussudio
• Tangerine Dream - Sorcerer Theme Song
• John Carpenter - Night
• S U R V I V E - A.H.B.
• S U R V I V E - High Rise 
• Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein - Eggo in the Snow
• Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein - She Wants Me to Find Her
• Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein - Starcourt
• Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein - Eight Fifteen
• Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein - Boys and Girls
• Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein - The Ceiling is Beautiful
• Kate Bush - Waking the Witch
• Kate Bush - Hammer Horror

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On TikTok, pop stars — Halsey, FKA Twigs, and Florence Welch among them — have been complaining a lot lately about their labels forcing them to make TikToks. As people spent the early part of the pandemic staring at their phones instead of flocking to concerts, the short-form-video social-media platform upended music discovery. In many cases, it gave unknown musicians a pathway to enormous audiences and allowed them to burst into the mainstream on the backs of their TikTok hits.

It’s a story as old as the music industry itself: No-name musician gets big overnight and lands a record deal. But until recently, it’s been hard to say just how big and how overnight, so Estelle Caswell from Vox and Matt Daniels from The Pudding spent seven months manually compiling and interrogating the data of who went viral, who got signed, and whose careers dropped off. Their resulting short documentary, We Tracked What Happens After TikTok Songs Go Viral, is a definitive dive into the 2020 class of viral TikTok stars.

Although the platform is clearly a dominant force in new-music discovery, they found that streaming music is still overwhelmingly dominated by legacy artists. And since these established acts are now competing for the same eyeballs as their lesser-known colleagues on TikTok, it’s getting harder and harder for the latter to break out. So what happens after you go viral on TikTok? Listen to Switched On Pop to find out.

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If you've heard Latto's swaggering track "Big Energy"—and after 30 weeks on the Hot 100, you probably have—you may have heard a resemblance to Mariah Carey's 1995 hit "Fantasy." That's because both songs borrow a groove from the 1981 hit "Genius of Love," a genre-defying smash made by Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth. "Genius of Love" was made when Frantz and Weymouth took a break from playing in the band Talking Heads to let loose at the Island Records studio in the Bahamas with the help of some reggae luminaries. The original "Genius of Love" mashed up funk, new wave, disco, and rap, capturing the diverse sounds of 1980s downtown New York City, shouting out their musical influences in the process. From there, the song wended its way through hit after hit, from Grandmaster Flash to "Return of the Mack." Why does "Genius of Love" continue to spark musicians', and audience's, imaginations forty years after its release? Tune in to find out.

Songs Discussed

Latto - Big Energy

Mariah Carey - Fantasy

Mariah Carey ft Ol Dirty Bastard - Fantasy (Remix)

Tom Tom Club - Genius of Love

Grandmaster and the Furious Five - It's Nasty

Busta Rhymes and Erykah Badu - One

Mark Morrison - Return of the Mack

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It’s been five years since Kendrick Lamar released his Pulitzer winning album DAMN. Having established himself as a modern rap virtuoso whose songs have become anthems fueling social movements, expectations run high for his latest release. So when he dropped his new album Mr Morale and the Big Steppers, people tuned in - it is the biggest album drop of 2022 so far. Lamar moves his focus presumably from the societal to the personal on the double LP. His words arrive seemingly from therapy sessions meditating on family, infidelity, and the healing power of nature. The album has some bumps: platforming artists with a problematic past and an inelegant attempt at LGBTQ+ allyship. But nothing on the record is quite straight forward. Lamar doesn’t always say exactly what he means. He frequently shifts voices and puts on different characters. In musical interludes on the record, the sound of tap dancers points to the performative nature of recored music. Rather than give us direct meaning Kendrick leaves breadcrumbs for us to follow. To unravel his lyrics its necessarily to also examine the underlying production. The samples on Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers aren’t used just for their sound, in many cases they unlock the song’s meaning. Switched On Pop picked six stand out samples for close listening to hear the intent hidden in the music. 

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On all of his projects — Grammy-winning albums, playing keys with Maroon 5, fronting a full string section in his NPR Tiny Desk Concert — PJ Morton evinces his mastery at updating classic soul and R&B with modern sounds. His latest full-length release, Watch the Sun, sees him joined by some of his own sources of inspiration, Stevie Wonder and Nas. The three combined forces on Morton’s track “Be Like Water,” which recites an uplifting mantra over unsettled harmonies. The effect is hypnotizing. Morton spoke with Switched on Pop about what it was like to work with his heroes and to share overlooked modern classics from Wonder’s and Nas’s catalogs.

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Greece, Spain, UK, Sweden, Italy and Ukraine are the frontrunners in the 2022 Eurovision competition. Switched On Pop analyzes the top six songs as well as some of the more oddball picks.

Songs Discussed

• Amanda Tenfjord - Die Together
• Chanel - SloMo
• Britney Spears - Work Bitch
• Sam Ryder - SPACE MAN
• Elton John - Rocket Man
• Cornelia Jakobs - Hold Me Closer
• Zdob și Zdub - Trenulețul 
• Citi Zēni - Give The Wolf A Banana
• Mahmood, BLANCO - Brividi
• Bad Bunny, Jhay Cortez - DÁKITI
• Kalush Orchestra - Stefania
• Stephane & 3G - We Don't Wanna Put In
• Піккардійська Терція - Гей, пливе кача

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Belle and Sebastian released the first album Tigermilk in 1996, and they’ve released eight more since—a catalog that helped define the sound of rock and indie in the new millennium through buoyant melodies and verbose lyrics. 

Their new album, A Bit of Previous, continues to refine their unique sound but also embraces new musical directions. We spoke to Stuart Murdoch, leader of the 7-piece band hailing from Glasgow, Scotland, about their latest project.

Songs Discussed

Belle and Sebastian - Young and Stupid, Unnecessary Drama, If They're Shooting at You

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Last month, Nirvana entered the Billboard Hot 100 chart for the first time in nearly two decades — only their fifth time in history — thanks to a comic-book movie. The band’s 1991 track “Something in the Way” was heavily featured in The Batman, whose director, Matt Reeves, said Nirvana front man Kurt Cobain inspired Robert Pattinson’s brooding performance as the caped crusader. Plus, Cobain’s music influenced the film’s score: Michael Giacchino references the dirge-like chords of “Something in the Way,” borrowed from Chopin’s famous funeral march, throughout The Batman’s soundtrack. While these musical motifs obviously pair well with the inner turmoil of a fledgling Batman, the sound is part of a larger revival of “alternative” music.

The DIY aesthetic of ’90s alternative, heard in the music of young stars like Olivia Rodrigo and Willow, is a pendulum swing from electronic-laden sounds of the last decade. And the genre’s anti-corporate perspective, which developed out of the excesses of the ’80s, is a fitting backdrop to contemporary activist attitudes. From the nostalgia of Beabadoobee, to the post-rock sounds of Wet Leg, to the industrial sonics of Halsey’s latest project, new artists are using alternative’s old sounds to shape the sound of contemporary pop. On the latest episode of Switched on Pop, Nate and Charlie scan the alternative radio and streaming charts for standout songs that trace this umbrella genre’s myriad sounds and influences.

More

Read Justin Curto's article 2021 Killed the Myth that Rock Ever Died

Songs Discussed (playlist)

• Nirvana - Something In The Way, Heart-Shaped Box
• Frédéric Chopin, Leif Ove Andsnes - Chopin: Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-Flat Minor, Op. 35 “Funeral March”
• Michael Giacchino - Can’t Fight City Hallowwen
• Beabadoobee - Care
• Hole - Celebrity Skin
• Tracy Bonham - Mother Mother
• Wheatus - Teenage Dirtbag
• Blink-182 - I Miss You
• Wet Leg - Chaise Longue
• The Slits - Typical Girls
• Halsey - I am not a woman, I’m a god
• Nine Inch Nails - Closer
• Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross - Intriguing Possibilites
• Machine Gun Kelly, Lil Wayne - ay!
• Lil Wayne, Nicki Minaj - Knockout
• Willow ft. Siickbrain - PURGE
• Evanescence - Bring Me To Life
• Deftones - My Own Summer (Shove It)

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Allison Ponthier knows the hardest part of making anything is getting started. When she was young, she “always wanted to write songs,” fanatically scribbling rhymes in a diary, but gave it up — the prevailing narratives of natural talent, artistic genius, and spontaneous inspiration put the brakes on her songwriting aspirations. She didn’t pick it up again until she turned 19: “It just took me that long to build the confidence.”

Now, after a short stint in jazz school, a scholarly approach to YouTube song tutorials, and consistent writing practice, the 26-year-old Ponthier has crafted a songwriting method that reliably turns the mundane into the profound. Her 2021 EP Faking My Own Death shows the hand of a seasoned artist, with lyrics that mine her personal life for unexpected twists and turns. (“It took New York to make me a cowboy,” says the Texas-born, New York–based singer on “Cowboy.”) It helps that she has the backing of songwriting heavyweights such as recent collaborators Lord Huron, Semisonic’s Dan Wilson, and Ethan Gruska (whose productions with Phoebe Bridgers soundtracked the pandemic).

To provide a closer look at her process, Ponthier gave us a tour of her songwriting notebook — but not before noting that “no one looks at this, by the way.” The details it contained on the making of her single “Autopilot” is a master class for anyone looking to break through creative barriers.

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The recorded version of Justin Bieber’s “Peaches” opens with a full-blast chorus alongside driving percussion and ringing guitars. But when he performed the song at this year’s Grammys, the song’s instrumentation was stripped down, with Bieber alone at a grand piano, crooning into the mic. Slowly, a band built up, and in came guest verses from Daniel Caesar and Giveon between seven repetitions of the chorus. Each time the chorus returned, the band got louder, the music pointing upward until a high-flying synth solo closed the song. It may have been a surprisingly churchy arrangement of Bieber’s hit, but it was the same sort of slow climb heard earlier in the night when Maverick City Music, the first Christian group to perform at the Grammys in 20 years, gave an uplifting performance of their song “Jireh,” off their award winning album Old Church Basement. 

In the church tradition, the slow build is a common feature, beginning as a quiet prayer that expands outward as more voices join in. Naomi Raine, one of Maverick City Music’s members, describes this kind of slow build as a “common and underlying structure” that feels “supernatural and spiritual.” But it’s clearly not restricted to the church. “We are called to blur the lines as far as what is Christian and what is gospel — those two have been segregated for too long,” says the group’s leader, Chandler Moore. The expansiveness of the music is represented in Maverick City Music’s diverse makeup. The seven core members invite dozens of songwriters from countless backgrounds to songwriting camps to explore the traditions constraining boundaries. Having only started putting out music in 2019, Maverick City Music has since released more than 17 combined LPs and EPs in multiple genres, including worship, gospel, R&B, and Latin pop. Consistent across all those records is the transcendent slow build.

After exploring the discography of Maverick City Music, one starts to hear the slow build all over pop music. In the case of Bieber, who is both friends with the group and has a religious background, previous hit songs like “Holy” and “Anyone” also use the technique. Even the reworked “Peaches” Bieber performed at the Grammys makes sense, given the chorus’s final line: “I get my life right from the source.” There has been a long history of stylistic exchange between the religious and secular world. There would be no rock and roll without gospel, and Christian Contemporary draws its sounds from the ’60s folk movement. Today, songs made for worship share qualities with power ballads, the former elevating the spirit, the latter coaxing out emotions. On the latest episode of Switched on Pop, hosts Charlie Harding and Nate Sloan speak with Maverick City Music and listen to songs both religious and secular that lift us up.

Songs Discussed

• Justin Bieber - Peaches (feat. Daniel Ceasar & Giveon), Holy (feat. Chance The Rapper), Anyone
• Maverick City Music - Old Church Basement, Jireh, Same Blood, Used To This, Nadie Como Tú
• Coldplay - Fix You
• Céline Dion - Because You Loved Me
• Luther Vandross - Endless Love (with Mariah Carey)
• But, Honestly - Foo Fighters

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We love listening to music at a ridiculous level of detail. But the other day we heard a podcast that made us fundamentally question the accuracy and reliability of our own listening skills. In it they played a familiar melody, “Yankee Doodle,” in such a way that we couldn’t recognize it at all. Our brain plays so many auditory tricks on us — some truly spectacular and unexplainable. In fact that’s the name of the show: Unexplainable. It’s hosted by Noam Hassenfeld, who in addition to being a fantastic reporter, is also a remarkable composer. So today we’re sharing Unexplainable’s episode on hearing. It’s the 1st in a 6 part series called Making Sense. We think you’re going to really dig this one. 

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There’s no more iconic Britney lyric than the opening of “Gimme More.” It's 2007, four years since her last album In The Zone was released, and Britney is affirmatively back with the uptempo track leading off her album Blackout: “It’s Britney, Bitch.” The song echoes the dance-pop Neptunes sound of “I’m A Slave 4 U.” It's built around a driving riff and off-kilter drums produced by Floyd Nathaniel Hills AKA Danja. Each time Britney sings “more” her voice is pitched down to a devilish growl. This disturbing vocal processing mirrors the vulgar paparazzi and public scrutiny in her personal life. On the fourth and final episode of our series Listening to Britney, we want to once again focus on her voice, how it's manipulated, how it’s evolved, and where it might be going.

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In 2003 Britney Spears released “Toxic,” a song that would make converts out of pop skeptics, be named one of the greatest tracks of the 21st century by multiple publications, and become a personal favorite of Switched on Pop.

Despite its success, when “Toxic” was released as the second single from Spears’s fourth album, In the Zone, even the song’s writers thought it was too “weird” to become a hit. But thanks to the new iTunes platform, which was just gaining traction in 2013, audiences kept buying the track and helped push it to the top of the charts. 

For many listeners, your hosts included, hearing “Toxic” for the first time was a moment of epiphany, an opportunity to rethink one’s views on the expressive power and musical invention of Top 40 pop. And almost twenty years after its release, “Toxic” is still rippling through the culture. It’s been covered as a jazz-noir ballad by Yael Naim, a screamo anthem by A Static Lullaby, and a bluegrass burner by Nickel Creek. In 2022, the song enjoyed yet another revival in the form of DJ duo Altego’s viral TikTok mash-up of the song with Ginuwine’s “Pony.”

What makes “Toxic” so enduring? For one, it’s the pull of Spears’ voice, as she moves from her chest voice in the verse to an eloquent falsetto in the pre-chorus, then combines the two techniques in the chorus. It’s the way the song’s producers, Bloodshy and Avant, combine a matrix of sounds that should not go together—a 1981 Bollywood love song, electric surf guitar, and funky synthesized bass—into an unforgettable melange. And it’s the lasting power of Cathy Dennis’s lyrics, which spins a universal tale of trying to resist temptation…and ultimately failing.

Songs Discussed

Britney Spears - Toxic

Lata Mangeshkar and S. P. Balasubrahmanyam - Tere Mere Beech Mein

Kylie Minogue - Can’t Get You Out of My Head

Katy Perry - I Kissed A Girl

Yael Naim - Toxic

A Static Lullaby - Toxic

Nickel Creek - Toxic

Mark Ronson - Toxic

Altego - Toxic/Pony Mashup

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In the first three years of Britney Spears’ pop music career, she released annual, consecutive albums. In 1999 we got Baby One More Time – its lead single was #5 on the Billboard year-end Hot 100 chart. In 2000, Oops… I Did It Again generated multiple hits. It’s eponymous single reached the #1 spot on Top 40 radio but only ascended to #55 on the year-end chart — the single was only released on vinyl, not CD, to boost album sales. Destiny's Child, Aaliyah and Janet all outperformed “Oops” on the year end chart. CD era marketing tactics aside, these artists were harbingers of what’s to come. The sound of pop music was changing and Britney needed to change with it. So in 2001, she released her self-titled album Britney. When we hit play on our metaphorical discman, the skittering beats of “I’m A Slave 4 U” suggests a significant musical transformation. Enter Spears’ Virginia Beach era.  

Britney signaled that she’s moved beyond the Swedish-produced pop polish for an entirely new sonic identity just as she left behind the ingenue character for the first two albums. Working with the Virginia Beach-based duo The Neptunes (Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo), on “I’m A Slave 4 U” Spears evolved her sound to sit aside the the R&B sounds of her chart peers. Now with a soundtrack of off-kilter beats and harmonic dissonance, Spears needed a new vocal approach. 

We hear this transformation in the opening line: “I know I may be young.” She begins with a breath and a half-whispered vocal. As she propels into the verse, we hear some of Britney's unforgettable tone: controlled vocal fry and rhythmic percussiveness. But there's no sign of the ballad-style singing from her earlier hits. Instead, she sing-speaks through the song. The melody is loose because as she says, “dancing’s what I love - now watch me.” This is not a sing-a-long, this is a dance song and the introduction of a whole new musical era for Spears. 

Songs Discussed

• Britney Spears – I’m A Slave 4 U, Overprotected, Don’t Go Knockin’ on My Door, Overprotected (Darkchild Remix), Boys
• Destiny’s Child - Say My Name; Bills, Bills, Bills
• Aaliyah - Try Again
• Janet Jackson - Doesn’t Really Matter, Son Of A Fun
• Mase, Diddy - Lookin’ at Me
• Mystikal - Shake Ya Ass
• JAY-Z I Just Wanna Love U
• Nelly - Hot In Herre
• Selena Gomez, A$AP Rocky - Good For You
• Lorde - Ribs
• Kesha - Die Young
• FKA Twigs - Lights On

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On a crisp Autumn morning in 1998, the world was introduced to the voice of Britney Spears, and pop would never be the same. Britney’s mix of vocal fry, percussive pronunciations, and timbral play on “...Baby One More Time” hadn't been heard before. As successful as they were, these techniques were derided by critics as parts of her manufactured “baby voice." Listening in 2022, we can hear Britney with more clarity: as a radical new artist.

"...Baby One More Time" was not Britney's first turn in the spotlight. She had been cast on the Mickey Mouse Club in 1992, when she was 12 years old, executing immaculate vocals and choreography. But the voice on her first single represents a different side of the singer, and a new sound on the pop landscape. With Britney's ferocious vocals at the center, "...Baby" rocketed to number one and broke sales records. On her next release, "Oops!... I Did it Again," Spears upped the ante. Working again with producers Max Martin and Rami Yacoub, "...Oops" borrowed liberally from music across the radio dial, and added a dash of 16th-century harmony into the mix.

Between her first two albums, Britney had taken hold of audiences by sheer force of personality and artistry, fought for in every syllable she sang. The stardom that followed was as unprecedented as her sound. But for someone as scrutinized as Britney has been, the artistry behind her celebrity has often been ignored. On the first episode of the four-part series Listening to Britney, we focus on Britney's voice in order to hear a pop icon with fresh ears.

Songs Discussed

Britney Spears - ...Baby One More Time, Oops!... I Did it Again, Stronger, Don't Let Me Be the Last to Know, Email My Heart

Backstreet Boys - Larger than Life

Jean-Baptiste Lully - Les Folies d'Espagne

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Presenting Chartbreakers, in which Nate and Charlie listen to the Billboard Hot 100 chart from top to bottom and discover a TikTok controversy, a Nashville music mystery, a rogue duck-billed platypus, and Megan Thee Stallion's debut piano concerto.

Songs Discussed

Gayle - abcdefu

Muni Long - hrs and hrs

Ckay - Love Nwantiti (Ah Ah Ah)

Dustin Lynch featuring Lauren Alaina or Mackenzie Porter - Thinking 'Bout You

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Black Summer

Megan Thee Stallion - Megan's Piano

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Leon Bridges is the soul singer hailing from Fort Worth, Texas, who burst onto the music scene in 2015 with the album Coming Home. Since then he’s established himself as an adventurous musician whose latest album Gold Diggers Sound combines retro sounds with contemporary production. Khruangbin is the Houston-based power trio——Mark Speer on guitar, Laura Lee on bass, and DJ Johnson on drums—who also debuted in 2015 with the album The Universe Smiles Upon You, which introduced their unique brand of funky, dreamy, psychedelia. 

In 2020, Bridges and Khruangbin teamed up to release the EP Texas Sun, whose title track managed to channel both spaghetti western soundtracks and classic soul at the same time. Now, the quartet is back with another collaborative EP, Texas Moon, which continues the musical palette of their first release while inverting its lyrical themes. 

We spoke with Leon Bridges and Khruangbin about their new EP, the Texas songs that connect them to their home state, and why they chose to go lunar for their latest project. 

Songs Discussed

Leon Bridges and Khruangbin - Texas Sun, B Side, Chocolate Hills

Mel Waiters - Got My Whiskey

Townes Van Zandt - Columbine

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The last proper, blowout concert Charlie attended was devastatingly long ago, back in the winter of 2019. Bringing some funk to buttoned-up Walt Disney Concert Hall, the duo Sylvan Esso rocked Charlie’s world with epic performances of songs like “Die Young.” When live music, and the world, shut down shortly after—well, it was a great note to go out on. 

Now, that moment comes full circle, as Sylvan Esso’s Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn join Charlie to discuss their album, Free Love, one of the bright spots during a dark time—an album which is now nominated for best electronic/dance album in this year's Grammy cycle. 

Free Love is a testament to Sylvan Esso’s unique sound. If you choose, you can just listen to the intoxicating textures and move your body unconsciously. But if you listen in close, you’ll find the duo blending the inquisitiveness of folk lyrics with danceable electronic beats. Each song offers layers of sounds and text to ponder, so we dove deep through Sylvan Esso's latest to better understand the secrets behind their musical alchemy. 

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The number one song on the charts is a bit of a mystery. “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” is the unlikely hit from Disney’s sleeper animated musical Encanto. Set in a mountainous village in Colombia, the film was a middling commercial success when it was released in Nov 2021. But in recent months it has become a pop culture phenomenon for a confluence of reasons: an expansive discourse on Colombian representation in media, fan videos on TikTok, and of course it's ear-wormy hits. 

The musical is yet another notch in the belt for Lin Manuel Miranda (the auteur behind Hamilton and In The Heights) who wrote the now chart-topping song book. While Disney certainly commands vast commercial success, its musicals rarely see such crossover attention. The last #1 Disney musical number was “A Whole New World” from the animated Aladdin back in 1993. Where that song was literally uplifting, “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” is quite the opposite. 

Bruno is the uncle of the Madrigal family, whose skill for seeing the future portends gloom and sends him into exile. In his namesake song “We Don’t Talk About Bruno,” an ensemble cast trade verses about his ghostly presence (Bruno haunts the family home, living inside its walls). It is an odd ball song, with dark and bizarre lyrics. Sure it starts with a story about rain on a wedding day (which is not ironic), but then it takes a hard left into tales of dead fish, middle aged weight gain, and creeping rats. So then what makes it a hit? A distinctive concoction of salsa piano rhythms, familiar Lin Manuel Miranda-isms, and contemporary pop connections to Camila Cabello, Britney Spears, J Balvin, Bad Bunny and Cardi B. 

Listen to Switched On Pop to solve the mystery of what makes “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” a hit. 

Songs Discussed

• Lin Manuel Miranda - We Don’t Talk About Bruno, In The Heights, Helpless, Satisfied, My Shot, Wait For It, Say No To This
• Cardi B, J Balvin, I Like It
• Luis Fonsi, Daddy Yankee - Despacito
• Camila Cabello, Young Thug - Havana
• Britney Spears - Baby One More Time

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Elvis Costello burst onto the music scene in 1977 with the album My Aim Is True. Songs like “Alison” established him as a powerful new voice in rock. His next album, This Year’s Model, introduced hits like “Pump it Up,” which has resounded through stadiums and arenas across the country ever since. 

From then on he released album after album, decade after decade, becoming a force to be reckoned with in pop music. Now, Costello has released his 32nd studio album, The Boy Named If, and it's a kaleidoscopic journey through many of the sounds and styles that he's experimented with over the years.

We spoke with Elvis about his wrong notes and open-ended lyrics, his much-publicized defense of Olivia Rodrigo, and why he turned down working with Adele

Songs Discussed:

Elvis Costello - Farewell, OK, Magnificent Hurt, Alison, Pump It Up

Richie Barrett - Some Other Guy

Olivia Rodrigo - Brutal

Chuck Berry - Too Much Monkey Business

Bob Dylan - Subterranean Homesick Blues

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Eric Nam is an accidental K-pop star. Growing up in Atlanta, and graduating from college in Boston, he did not expect that in his twenties he’s sign to a K-pop label, be named 2016 Man of the year by GQ Korea, and become a go-to television personality in South Korea. His music, imbued with his charisma and charm has charted globally. As fun as it is, the K-pop machine can be a real grind — it churns through young people not unlike the NFL draft. Nam is unusually candid about this experience, likely because he decided to quit the label system, and take his blossoming music career independent. On his second all English full length album There And Back Again Nam has full creative control, and all the burdens of sustaining a solo music career. Nam spoke with Switched On Pop co-host Charlie Harding about what it is like to go from K-pop star to indie musician.

SONGS DISCUSSED

Eric Nam - Ooh Ooh, Heavens Door, Good For You, Honestly, Can’t Help Myself (feat. LOCO), Lost On Me, I Don’t Know You Anymore, Wildfire, Love Die Young

Lee Hyori - 10 Minutes

MOMOLAND - BBoom BBoom

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Dawn FM is The Weeknd’s most narratively compelling album yet. More than just a collection of eighties-nostalgia single bait, Dawn FM is a concept album that picks up on a multi-year meta narrative. Abel Tesfaye, seemingly killed off his character at the end of his last album, After Hours. Getting caught up in the “Blinding Lights” of fame and excess, the narrator ends up overdosing in the back of an ambulance. On the final song “Until I Bleed Out” he sings “I can’t move, I’m so paralyzed.” Dawn FM picks up where After Hours left off. The album opens with pastoral winds and bird sounds, with The Weeknd driving down the road searching for a light at the end of a tunnel. His radio is turned to a fictional radio station: 103.5 Dawn FM hosted by The Weeknd’s real life neighbor, the actor Jim Carrey. Channeled through the Vaporwave inspired production of Oneohtrixpoint Never, Dawn FM is the sound of purgatory.

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Why are there no new Christmas songs? One one hand, there's more holiday songs than we’ll ever need. Every year pop stars drop countless holiday-themed album.

But despite the annual glut of Christmas releases, few of these new songs join the rotation of holiday classics. On Billboard's Holiday Hot 100 chart right now, there's only four songs from the past ten years that have made it to the top fifty.

We listen to each of these holiday hits—from Kelly Clarkson, Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber, and the Jonas Brothers—and and ask if these songs can go the distance and become the 21st century members of the Christmas music canon.

Songs Discussed - Playlist

Kelly Clarkson - Underneath the Tree

Ariana Grande - Santa Tell Me

Justin Bieber - Mistletoe

Jonas Brothers - Like It's Christmas

The Bird and the Bee - You and I at Christmas Time

Loretta Lynn - White Christmas Blue

Woody Goss - One for One

Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings - 8 Days of Hannukah

Jenny Owen Youngs, Tancred, John Mark Nelson - Fireside

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Whether you’re a TikTok fanatic, or the app’s K-hole-inducing stream of content has forced you to delete it from your phone, its influence on music is undeniable. In 2020 the platform bragged that over 70 artists on the platform signed with major labels. TikTok’s success was linked to pandemic-related stay-at-home orders -- people were stuck at home and musicians couldn’t tour. And while trending dances and songs on TikTok may turn over weekly, with a billion monthly users, the social media platform has industry power. In 2021, Billboard’s Hot 100 was overflowing with TikTok hits -- over 175 according to the company -- more than twice that of last year. 

While major artists like J Balvin and Taylor Swift use the platform, TikTok’s algorithm is surprisingly good at exposing aspiring artists. Take Tai Verdes for example. While working his day job at the Verizon store. Ty set his mind on using TikTok to launch his musical career. When he released a video singing his song “Stuck In The Middle” in his Prius, millions saw him for the first time. Tai’s music has since been heard at Lollapalooza and on Top 40 radio. But like so many overnight successes, he built it up over years of practice and creative releases. If you want to know how social media has fundamentally changed music, you need to hear Tai’s Verdes tell his story to Switched On Pop’s Charlie Harding.

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Robert Plant is in his own words “cold” and “prickly” while speaking about his new album with Alison Krauss, Raise The Roof. First thing upon joining the Zoom call from London, Plant jovially launches into the much misattributed quote “talking about music is like dancing about architecture.” But he is neither callous, nor coy. For Plant the music is ineffable, a joyous celebration of friendship, and a kindred love of song that he shares with Krauss and producer T-Bone Burnett. Their album follows up from their 2007 Grammy award winning album Raising Sand. Both albums are steeped in americana and roots music, favorites that the trio traded across the Atlantic over many years of friendship. There are few hints of Plant’s Led Zeppelin or Krauss’ Union Station. Instead their collaboration sounds timeless, haunting and melancholic. Their idiosyncratic sound emerged from an entirely organic process, a method that both parties are happy to share, but reticent to analyze. Switched On Pop’s co-host Charlie Harding spoke with Plant and Krauss about the making of Raise The Roof.



SONGS DISCUSSED - Spotify Playlist

• Robert Plant, Alison Krauss - Quattro (World Drifts In), The Price of Love, Go Your Own Way, Trouble With My Love, Can’t Let Go, It Don’t Bother Me, You Led Me To The Wrong, Last Kind Words Blues, High and Lonesome, Going Where The Lonely Go, Somebody Was Watching Over Me
• Calexico - Quattro (World Drifts In)
• The Everly Brothers - The Price of Love
• Anne Briggs - Go Your Own Way
• Bert Jansch - Go Your Own Way
• Sandy Denny - Go Your Own Way
• Led Zeppelin - The Battle of Evermore
• Betty Harris - Trouble With My Love
• Lucinda Williams - Can’t Let Go
• Bert Jansch - It Don’t Bother Me
• Ola Belle Reed - You Led Me To The Wrong
• Geeshie Wiley - Last Kind Words Blues 
• Merle Haggard - Going Where The Lonely Go
• Pops Staples - Somebody Was Watching 

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2021 marks the 50th anniversary of the release of the Beatles’ final album, Let it Be. To commemorate the occasion, the remaining members of the band have remixed the album and unleashed an eight-hour-plus documentary directed by Peter Jackson that lays bare the making of the record. For super-fans this video memoir reveals a lot about the messiness of the creative process: The Beatles nearly broke up while making it! Author Tim Riley says that the band approached Let It Be with an aesthetic challenge: to get back to playing as a live band. But the original release of the album deviated from that mission and received mixed reviews. Over the decades, The Beatles have revisited this work with multiple mixes and alternative takes that try to show the original spirit of this direct-to-tape, live album. Charlie and Nate listen back, warts and all, to get to the heart of this enigmatic project.

Songs Discussed

The Beatles - I Saw Her Standing There, I Want To Hold Your Hand, Strawberry Fields, Dig A Pony, Good Golly Miss Molly, I’ve Got A Feeling, One After 909, Get Back, Two Of Us, The Long & Winding Road, Let It Be, I Me Mine

Little Richard - Tutti Frutti

More

Read Tim Riley's works on The Beatles

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This week we are having a blast feeling really sad. Guest Brittany Luse, cohost of the acclaimed podcast For Colored Nerds, joins Nate and Charlie to dig into this fall's slate of breathtaking breakup albums from Adele, Kacey Musgraves, Summer Walker, and Mitski.

Some have been calling this confluence of releases, "sad girl autumn," but the melancholy moment goes beyond gender, with even Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak's leaning into the lachrymose on their album An Evening With Silk Sonic.

On top of all this, Taylor Swift has stormed the charts with her re-recording of her hit album Red and the ten-minute version of fan-favorite breakup song "All Too Well."

We take the opportunity to mine this gold rush of emotions and diagnose every type of heartbreak on the radio dial.

Songs discussed:

Taylor Swift - All Too Well (Taylor's Version)

Summer Walker - Throw it Away

Silk Sonic - Put On a Smile

Adele - Easy On Me

Mitski - The Only Heartbreaker

Kacey Musgraves - Justified

More

Listen to Brittany's podcast For Colored Nerds

Watch Guy Winch's talk How To Fix a Broken Heart

Weep along to our playlist of breakup albums

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Merging hip hop and Indigenous culture, rap duo Snotty Nose Rez Kids are creating a sound that goes hard for a cause. On tracks like “War Club” with DJ Shub, Yung Trybez and Young D connect Indigenous protests to the Black Lives Matter movement, and on “Boujee Natives,” Snotty Nose Rez Kids celebrate traditional culture through a modern lens. But as much as this music has a message, it also bangs, and SNRK’s new album After Life runs the gamut of emotions; from tackling police brutality on “Red Sky at Night” to celebrating their community on “Wild Boy.”

Their first tour since COVID brought them to Los Angeles, where Nate talked to the band repping the Haisla Nation about pipeline protests, reclaiming the term “savage,” and how the hell the Disney movie Pocahontas ever got greenlit.

Songs Discussed

Snotty Nose Rez Kids - Red Sky At Night, War Club, Creator Made An Animal, Sink or Swim, Boujee Natives, Wild Boy, Northern Lights, Something Else

Megan Thee Stallion - Savage

Jay Z and Kanye West - Otis

Kendrick Lamar - Alright

Check out a playlist of our favorite SNRK tracks

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From time to time, it is our constitutional duty to provide an update to the people on the current state of pop. What are the sounds? Who’s making the hits? What are they singing about? We take the musical temperature by consulting the charts, the platforms, and the people.

MORE

Cat Zhang’s review of PinkPantheress’ “Passion”

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Swedish supergroup ABBA is releasing their first album in forty years, making this the perfect time for Nate and Charlie to investigate what makes their music so beloved and reviled in equal measure. For every ABBA stan, there’s a hater lurking, like legendary pop critic Robert Christgau, who once said of the group: “We have met the enemy, and they are them.” That suspicion was earned through ABBA’s musical catchiness and lyrical earnestness, but regardless of how you feel about their music, their compositional acumen cannot be denied.

The longevity of their songs is testament to that musical brilliance. So after breaking down the vocal contrast, musical maximalism, and studio wizardry used to concoct world-beating hits like “Super Trouper,” “Mamma Mia,” and “Dancing Queen,” Nate and Charlie turn their ears to the band’s latest singles, “Don’t Shut Me Down” and “I Still Have Faith in You,” to determine whether the newest releases represent a return to classic form or a departure into new sonic realms.

Songs Discussed

ABBA - Super Trouper, Mamma Mia, Dancing Queen, Don’t Shut Me Down, I Still Have Faith in You

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It. Has. Been. A. Year. We’ve felt it; you’ve felt it. Sometimes, it’s comforting to consider how universal that overwhelming sense of blah is. Other days, woof, it can be tough to see the light. That’s the subject of today’s episode, brought to you by our producer Megan Lubin.

When Megan hit an especially low point earlier this year, she noticed something in the music she was listening to: Über-popular artists making explicit references to the state of their mental health and the things they do to cope with it. It made her want to know more about the impact of those lyrics, so she dug around and found an academic who studies that very thing: Alex Kresovich, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of North Carolina’s Hussman School of Journalism and Media who has authored a bunch of studies on mental health and popular music. In today’s episode, we walk through one of those studies with him and learn how influential lyrical content can be — even when you’re not paying super-close attention. Alex’s research, and research like it, opens up the possibility that pop artists are an underestimated asset when it comes to mental-health messaging. “People like to point at pop music as a source of problems, not a source of solutions,” he says. Alex sees his job as guiding the scientific community toward new data that could change how we understand the value of pop-music lyrics — “laying the railroad ties,” as he puts it.

In the second half of today’s episode, we talk to an artist who has taken the concept of music as medicine to a whole new level. Over the course of her career, Esperanza Spalding has reimagined the music-making process — transforming it from one designed to meet her label’s commercial needs to one designed to meet the mental-health needs of her immediate community. With her new album Songwrights Apothecary Lab, Spalding offers up a collection of songs for “releasing the heaviness of a seemingly endless blue state,” for “steadying the vast-spinning ‘potential hurt’ analysis triggered by the bliss of new romance,” and for “slowing down and remembering to make space/time for your elders.” Spalding made clear that this way of “musicking” is nothing new:

It’s like the oldest thing ever….we’re playing with the origin of music. The origin of music being: a response to others in your community, in your surroundings. And the response is intuitive! When you hum for a baby or when you’re sitting with somebody who is grieving and you, you feel compelled to hum, or when you’re excited and go, “Wow!” That’s music!

Spalding’s view of music these days opened our eyes wide to the true healing power of individual songs and just how accessible music is when we need it.

Songs Discussed

girl in red - Serotonin

Billie Eilish - Getting Older

Julia Michaels ft. Selena Gomez - Anxiety

J. Cole ft. kiLL edward - FRIENDS

Lil Nas X - VOID

Kehlani - 24/7

Kendrick Lamar - u

Juice WRLD - Lucid Dreams

Panic! At the Disco - King of the Clouds

Shawn Mendes - In My Blood

Ariana Grande - breathin

Logic, Alessia Cara, Khalid - 1-800-273-8255

Billie Eilish ft. Khalid - lovely

Lil Uzi Vert - XO Tour Llif3

Esperanza Spalding - Formwela 3

Esperanza Spalding - Formwela 6

Esperanza Spalding - Formwela 10

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Sam Sanders is one of our favorite friends of the podcast. His NPR show, It's Been A Minute, has released an outstanding three part series exploring crossover in pop music. We want to share with you the 2nd episode form that series on the legacy of Janet Jackson.

From It's Been A Minute

On the 35th anniversary of Janet Jackson's first No. 1 Billboard Hot 100 hit, we look back at Control, her career-defining album that changed the trajectory of pop music in the late '80s and '90s. In the second episode of a three-part series exploring crossover in pop music, we look at Jackson's musical and cultural legacy over the years. We also reconsider how Jackson was vilified after her Super Bowl XXXVIII appearance, and why. Episode art by Blake Cale for NPR

All episodes in the series

1. There Was Nothing Like 'Soul Train' On TV. There's Never Been Anything Like It Since
2. Janet Jackson Once Had 'Control' of the Charts. We Don't Give Her Enough Credit
3. 1999's 'Latin Explosion' chased crossover hits. Today, Latino artists don't need them

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The latest installment of the James Bond franchise, No Time To Die, closes the book on the Daniel Craig era of the international superspy. The film’s theme song, “No Time to Die,” by Billie Eilish, Finneas, and Hans Zimmer, also marks the conclusion of one of the great musical sagas in recent cinema. Monty Norman’s and John Barry’s now-iconic “James Bond Theme,” written for 1962’s Dr. No, has remained a constant across six decades of espionage and one-liners. But every new Bond theme has also developed subtle variations on the original that reflect the character’s changes over time. On this episode of Switched On Pop, we uncover what inspired the theme, how it’s changed, and why it almost never happened.

FURTHER JAMES BOND THEME READING

The James Bond Songs: Pop Anthems of Late Capitalism by Adrian Daub and Charles Kronengold

The Music of James Bond - Jon Burlingame

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For a decade James Blake has crafted an idiosyncratic sound. His early work as a minimalist electronic producer fused lush R&B chords with lyrical collage and unfiltered synthesizers. He describes his hit 2013 song “Retrograde” as apocalyptic yet also romantic. This single was in stark contrast to the bubblegum pop of the early 2010s. But other artists recruited him to spread his subversive sonics. He produced on three of the most seminal albums in recent history: Beyoncé’s Lemonade, Kendrick Lamar’s DAMN and Frank Ocean’s Blonde. Before Blake, it sounded like pop was caught in the same four chord loop. But gradually Blake’s vision of harmonic melancholy has infused popular music. On his new album “Friends That Break Your Heart,” Blake has written his most compelling songs yet, but underneath are those his familiar wandering chords and emotional suspense.

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On this week’s episode we're sharing a story fromThe Cut where senior writer Angelina Chapin and co-host Jazmín Aguilera talk about and talk with Sparkle (born Stephanie Edwards), who first reported R. Kelly to the police for allegedly sexually abusing her 14-year-old niece. Back then, no one believed her, but following the explosive documentary Surviving R. Kelly and the R&B artist’s trial, at the end of which he was found guilty of nine federal sex crimes, she’s been vindicated. Angelina spoke with Sparkle a few times during and after R. Kelly’s most recent trial to hear about the monumental costs she has paid for coming forward.

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Lil Nas X has a talent for creating productive controversy. First with “Old Town Road,” he challenged expectations about blackness in country music. Now with “Montero (Call Me By Your Name),” he takes aim at anti LGBTQ+ messages propagated by the religious dogma from his youth (he came out as gay during Pride 2019). The song describes a romantic encounter without innuendo. Sure it’s raunchy, but the song doesn’t especially stand out on Billboard where explicit sexual fantasy is commonplace. But his use of religious iconography in his video and merchandise created an immediate backlash. In the video to “Montero,” Lil Nas X rides a stripped pole into hades where he gives a lap dance to Satan (also played by Lil Nas X). Despite the obvious commentary on repressive orthodoxy, religious conservatives failed to see the subtext. The song became a lightning rod. But as pundits fought on social media about the song's meaning, most critics failed to look into the song’s musical references. Produced by Take A Daytrip, the duo behind Shek Wes’ “Mo Bamba” and Lil Nas X’s “Panini,” “Montero'' mashes up genres that take the listener on a global journey, sharing his message of acceptance across cultures.

Music

Lil Nas X — Montero, Old Town Road, Panini

24kGoldn, iann dior - Mood

Dick Dale and his Del-Tones - Misirlou

Tetos Demetriades - Misirlou

Aris San Boom Pam

Silsulim - Static & Ben El

Shek Was — Mo Bamba

Lehakat Tzliley Haud

Bouzouki recording from xserra from FreeSound under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License

More

Listen to Gal Kadan’s project: Awesome Orientalists From Europa on Bandcamp

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In the last few years music copyright claims have skyrocketed. More and more artists are giving songwriting credits away. Frequently, credits are given retroactively to avoid the cost of long jury trials like when Sam Smith credited Tom Petty. Smith’s melody for “Stay With Me” clearly drew from Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down.” On rare occasions these cases go to court, where music litigation is at an all time high. In the last ten years there have been 190 public cases, up over 350% from the prior decade, according to The George Washington University & Columbia Law School Music Copyright Infringement Resource.

This story has come in and out of the news cycle in closely watched jury trials including artists like Marvin Gaye, Led Zeppelin, and Katie Perry. Historically, courts have extended copyright to only unique combinations of words and music, not rhythms, chords, instruments. But recent cases increasingly litigate the core building blocks of music. Many artists fear that a bad court outcome could let an artist copyright a “vibe” using commonly used musical language.  

The question of whether someone can borrow a vibe resurfaced when Olivia Rodrigo shared songwriting credits on her hit 2021 album Sour with Taylor Swift, and comparisons have been made to the art of Courtney Love and music of Elvis Costello. Many listeners have commented on Rodrigo’s more obvious influences on social media. Viral TikTok videos compared Rodrigo’s “Good 4 U” to Paramore’s “Misery Business,” which share a common chord progression and vibe. This online campaign likely contributed to Rodrigo handing songwriting credits, also known as publishing, to Hayley Williams and Josh Farro of the band Paramore. 

This week we are airing the conversation Switched On Pop’s Charlie Harding had on the podcast Decoder with host Nilay Patel who is also editor and chief of The Verge. Together we try to understand how the byzantine music copyright system works, and how its rules affect the sound of pop music today and in the future. 

SONGS DISCUSSED - Spotify Playlist

• Sam Smith - Stay With Me
• Tom Petty - I Won’t Back Down 
• M.I.A. - Paper Planes
• The Clash - Straight To Hell
• Olivia Rodrigo - deja vu
• Taylor Swift - Cruel Summer
• Olivia Rodrigo - good 4 u
• Paramore - Misery Business
• Robin Thick, T.I., Pharrell Williams - Blurred Lines
• Marvin Gaye - Got To Give It Up
• Katy Perry, Juicy J - Dark Horse
• FLAME , Lecrae, John Reilly - Joyful Noise
• Led Zeppelin - Stairway to Heaven
• Spirit - Taurus
• Michael Bolton - Love Is a Wonderful Thing
• The Isley Brothers - Love Is A Wonderful Thing
• Taylor Swift - Look What You Made Me Do
• Right Said Fred - I’m Too Sexy
• Doja Cat, SZA - Kiss Me More
• Olivia Newton-John - Physical
• Anne-Marie - 2002

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CHVRCHES is well-known for their comprehensive use of synthesizers and their updated take on “synthpop”, a subgenre of pop we most closely associated with the 1980s. While gearing up to make their second album in 2015, CHVRCHES members Iain Cook and Martin Doherty spent much of the recording budget buying up many of the original synthesizers used to make those iconic 80s dance tracks. Contemporary replicas of those synth sounds are now commonplace with pop acts like Dua Lipa and The Weeknd. But CHVRCHES has been wielding these sounds for more than a decade, and their newest project is a great reminder of how closely we link that synth sound with not just to a bygone era, but specifically to the eerie sound of horror film. 

Screen Violence is their new album. It draws inspiration from classic horror films like John Carpenter's Halloween. With its horror frame, the lyrics explore dark themes, like the violent online abuse CHVRCHES lead singer Lauren Mayberry has endured for much of the band’s existence, a hyper consciousness of her own mortality brought on by that abuse, and fears of losing her grip on reality. Switched On Pop’s co-host Charlie Harding spoke with Lauren, Ian, Martin from CHVRCHES about the making and meaning of Screen Violence.

MORE

Chvrches' Lauren Mayberry: 'I will not accept online misogyny'

SONGS DISCUSSED

• CHVRCHES - Never Ending Circles
• Dua Lipa - Physical
• The Weeknd - Blinding Lights
• CHVRCHES - California
• CHVRCHES - Lullabies
• CHVRCHES - Final Girl
• CHVRCHES - Violent Delights
• CHVRCHES - He Said She Said
• CHVRCHES - Asking For A Friend 
• John Carpenter - Halloween Theme
• Suspiria - Markos
• John Carpenter - Christine
• John Carpenter - Turning The Bones (CHVRCHES Remix)
• CHVRCHES - Good Girls (John Carpenter remix)
• CHVRHCES - How Not To Down (with Robert Smith)

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On August 27th Big Red Machine, the joint musical project of Justin Vernon and Aaron Dessner - artists known for their work as Bon Iver and in the rock band The National, respectively - returned with new music. You’ve most definitely heard Dessner’s production work elsewhere, like on Taylor Swift’s pandemic albums evermore and folklore. The Big Red Machine album, titled How Long Do You Think it's Going to Last, celebrates the fruits of creative partnership and the importance of family and community. At least, that’s what we took from our conversation with Dessner. “A lot of my favorite music - usually there's something elusive about it, in that whatever is elusive is coming from this weird cocktail of different people's input. There's just this weird, swampy alchemy, and you can't easily put your finger on why it's so moving.” 

Dessner told us he draws much of his creative inspiration from the kinetic energy generated by multiple musical brains working in tandem, which makes sense given the list of features on this album - everyone from Swift to Sharon van Etten to Anaïs Mitchell to The Fleet Foxes’ Robin Pecknold. “I'm such a born collaborator. I'm definitely interested in this exchange where you make something and you send it out into the ether and then it comes back slightly changed or radically changed. Then you work on it and send it again. I like this handoff, this communal approach to music making.”

The musical collective fostered by Vernon and Dessner on How Long Do You Think It's Going to Last is a testament to the power of musical communities in a year of intense isolation. We’re so pleased to bring you Nate’s conversation with Aaron Dessner in this week’s episode.

Songs Discussed

• Big Red Machine - Birch, feat. Taylor Swift
• Big Red Machine - Phoenix, feat. Fleet Foxes & Anaïs Mitchell
• Big Red Machine - Magnolia
• Big Red Machine - Renegade, feat. Taylor Swift
• Big Red Machine - Mimi, feat. Ilsey
• Big Red Machine - The Ghost of Cincinnati

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Recently the hosts of Switched on Pop kept seeing the same byline next to their favorite pieces of music writing. A moving profile of Bad Bunny? There was the name. A searing critique of West Side Story? There it was again. An elegy on love, loss, and an Aretha Franklin and Smokey Robinson duet? By now it was committed to memory: writer and translator Carina del Valle Schorske. So we knew we had to invite Carina to participate in our Modern Classics series and learn what this brilliant writer would place in her modern pop pantheon. 

Carina’s pick, the 2012 song “Manhattan” by Cat Power, presents an opportunity to analyze an artist we’ve never discussed on the show before, and a song that sparks associations with New York City’s rich musical history. Cat Power, aka Chan Marshall, released “Manhattan” on her 2012 album Sun, and the song—on which Marshall recorded every instrument herself—has become an unlikely sleeper hit in the Cat Power catalog. Perhaps that’s because, as Carina tells it, the song is a celebration and elegy at once, trying to capture the beat of a city that is constantly in flux, but with an inescapable iconicity. 

“Manhattan” isn’t the only piece of urban musical alchemy Carina brought to the show. Cat Power’s ode to the borough syncs up in surprising ways with the 1978 salsa track by Willie Colón and Rubén Blades, “Buscando Guayaba.” Together, the songs stake out a twisting path across genre, time, and language, but along on the same streets.

Songs Discussed

• Cat Power - Manhattan
• Rubén Blades and Willie Colón - Buscando Guayaba, Pedro Navaja
• Ella Fitzgerald - Manhattan
• Stevie Wonder - Livin’ for the City
• Alicia Keys and Jay Z - Empire State of Mind

Check out Carina’s profile of Bad Bunny, her essay on Aretha Franklin and Smokey Robinson, and more writing at her website.

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