Are pop stars artists, in the true sense of the word, or are they merely commercial vectors, their pop identity excluding them from a seat at the artistic table, people with the right bone structure to fit a glittery suit which has already been made, the dollar coming before the art, so hence, the music is not art, but a refined, consumable product.
Annoying rejects have been having this conversation at brewpubs and bars for decades now.
I really do not care, but I’ve noticed a political push to characterize Taylor Swift as an artist in the name of Girl Power (Swift is thirty-four years old, making this effort mildly creepy) despite the fact that all of her songs are written by multiple other people, a big chunk of them by a guy named Jack Antonoff, who also writes songs for several other pop stars on the Billboard 100, which points me in the direction of Swift being someone who fits that suit.
One could deconstruct her songs lyrically, musically, or production-wise to argue whether or not she produces a validly artistic product, but that’s too subjective, so I’m going to present, as my evidence, a few of her song titles.
Cruel Summer is a Swift hit currently sitting at number three on the Billboard charts.
If you are of a certain age, or just listen to 1980s era music, have been to a karaoke bar, or have ever seen The Karate Kid, you might recognize the song title Cruel Summer, because it was already the name of a major hit song by a group called Bananarama.
While it seems to smack of plagiarism, this could be an honest mix-up, although to pretend that lawyers haven’t parsed this out and that Swift isn’t aware of the duplication would mean you have an almost QAnon level faith in her as a fan.
But what’s the big deal. It happened once. Or did it?
Swift has another song called Message in a Bottle. If you happen to have any awareness of popular music pre-Swift you’re probably aware of the song Message in a Bottle by The Police, arguably the biggest band of the 1980s, the decade in which Swift was born.
The song was a major hit for The Police, reaching number one on the UK’s Billboard Charts.
This seems beyond coincidence. Why is Swift, or the person writing her songs, ripping off titles of already existing classic rock songs?
Why does she have a song called Superstar, a song made popular by The Carpenters, which reached number two on the US Billboard charts in 1971, and was again a hit for Sonic Youth in the 1990s?
Or a song called Betterman, which was a number one hit for Pearl Jam in 1994?
Not surprisingly, this practice of jacking the song titles of existing hit songs is exceedingly common in the pop world.
Rihanna has a song called Desperado (one of The Eagles’ biggest hits), as well as a song called Dancing in the Dark, which is a Springsteen song through and through, regardless of whether you’re a Jersey longshoreman or a chick who spends her time vaping at 1Oak.
Beyonce has a song called Once in a Lifetime (which she “co-wrote” with five other people, a lifting of a Talking Heads song by the same name, obviously.)
SZA has taken this a step further and has a song called Kill Bill, fenced from the movie franchise, Kill Bill.
She also heisted her name from the Wu-Tang Clan, by the way.
By far the biggest offender of this practice, however, is Lana Del Rey, a woman who never smiles, desperately wants to be perceived as a chain smoking bohemian who lives in the Chelsea Hotel and would be producing her art whether she were earning millions of dollars or day-old bagels from the cafe downstairs.
She’s also excruciatingly boring. Hence the lack of creativity.
She has a song called Cinnamon Girl. This is a Neil Young song, one of his biggest hits.
A song called Superstar, you could argue is generic enough that nobody has rights to it, but Cinnamon Girl is an abstract, original lyric. There is no such thing as a Cinnamon Girl. Nobody else would have thought of it, if Neil Young hadn’t already written the song.
It is stolen.
She also has a song called Lust for Life, ripped off from Iggy Pop, Gloria, a Van Morrison song, and, in an incredibly ballsy move, a song called Guns and Roses, which isn’t lifted from a particular Guns and Roses song, she just took the whole name of one of the biggest bands of all time.
What are my conclusions? If these pop stars are writing their songs, then they are unoriginal at best, plagiarists at worst.
But, I suspect there is a more obvious, if not disappointing explanation: They have little say over their content.
The reason they have a lot of songs with stolen titles is that whoever is in charge of naming these songs is aware of something called SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, meaning, the songs are given familiar titles so that they will get clicks.
You can’t have it both ways, either you’re an artist, or your songs are click-bait.
The verdict is obvious, hike those skirts up and bust out the sequins.
Perhaps you have too much time on your hands Matt. I enjoyed reading the piece, but who gives a flying fuck?