And I can ride with my baby
June 7, 2015 4:32 PM Subscribe
That is a great essay.
I write this with a painting of Otis Redding hanging above my desk, staring down disapprovingly at me, but no one wants to hear begging anymore. We want don’t want to hear about the love you have to get back, we need to visualize the present love. We need to know that it is possible, even for the worst of us. These are urgent times. Too many people aren’t making it home alive, and so perhaps we are past the age of supplication; we have gotten what we can get, by whatever means we can get it. We’re the generation of coming to terms. Of knowing what it is to keep our heads above water, or perhaps what it is to do whatever is needed to never be near the water again.
James Baldwin could have written such a thing if he'd lived long enough to have to write it. I feel like that's a post-Baldwin paragraph because it's not optimistic; Baldwin is sad but he's still got expectations. You just think about him writing after Malcolm X and MLK were killed - and all the others - but even towards the end of his life he's still before the AIDS crisis really begins to hit, he's still before welfare is dismantled, he's still before Bush and Cheney and 9/11 and those fuckers running Guantanamo, and god knows he's before the LA riots and before Ferguson, before it seems like Jim Crow is just a template for what's going to be repeated and repeated and repeated.
(I would be curious to know what people think is their generation's greatest love song because I have not heard very much popular music.
posted by Frowner at 5:08 PM on June 7, 2015 [7 favorites]
I write this with a painting of Otis Redding hanging above my desk, staring down disapprovingly at me, but no one wants to hear begging anymore. We want don’t want to hear about the love you have to get back, we need to visualize the present love. We need to know that it is possible, even for the worst of us. These are urgent times. Too many people aren’t making it home alive, and so perhaps we are past the age of supplication; we have gotten what we can get, by whatever means we can get it. We’re the generation of coming to terms. Of knowing what it is to keep our heads above water, or perhaps what it is to do whatever is needed to never be near the water again.
James Baldwin could have written such a thing if he'd lived long enough to have to write it. I feel like that's a post-Baldwin paragraph because it's not optimistic; Baldwin is sad but he's still got expectations. You just think about him writing after Malcolm X and MLK were killed - and all the others - but even towards the end of his life he's still before the AIDS crisis really begins to hit, he's still before welfare is dismantled, he's still before Bush and Cheney and 9/11 and those fuckers running Guantanamo, and god knows he's before the LA riots and before Ferguson, before it seems like Jim Crow is just a template for what's going to be repeated and repeated and repeated.
(I would be curious to know what people think is their generation's greatest love song because I have not heard very much popular music.
posted by Frowner at 5:08 PM on June 7, 2015 [7 favorites]
I would be curious to know what people think is their generation's greatest love song because I have not heard very much popular music.
If “my generation” includes not just age, but also geographical region and subculture, i won’t say this is the best, but hey: Rose Melberg, “The Orchard”.
(That probably should be paired with Elliott Smith, if you can find a good song that isn’t one of his great lost love songs.)
posted by D.C. at 6:37 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
If “my generation” includes not just age, but also geographical region and subculture, i won’t say this is the best, but hey: Rose Melberg, “The Orchard”.
(That probably should be paired with Elliott Smith, if you can find a good song that isn’t one of his great lost love songs.)
posted by D.C. at 6:37 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
I love articles like this and he has some intriguing points but that song is bad. It is not good. And this generations greatest love song is probably Video Games by Lana Del Rey.
i'm sorry, but Trap Queen is astounding. this is a popular, catchy song about domestic bliss. this song has the line "I be in the kitchen cookin' pies with my baby." this song has fetty wailing "YAHHH" like his love depends on it. this song is fucking gorgeous, in a 2015 way. video games is gorgeous in a much less modern, and to me, less interesting way. i will never quite understand the internet's fascination with del ray's half hearted pastiche of better music.
anyway the greatest love song of my generation (i am 22) is Such Great Heights. i prefer the original version but i have also never heard a cover of it that didn't win me over. there is no competition, nothing even close.
posted by JimBennett at 6:56 PM on June 7, 2015 [6 favorites]
i'm sorry, but Trap Queen is astounding. this is a popular, catchy song about domestic bliss. this song has the line "I be in the kitchen cookin' pies with my baby." this song has fetty wailing "YAHHH" like his love depends on it. this song is fucking gorgeous, in a 2015 way. video games is gorgeous in a much less modern, and to me, less interesting way. i will never quite understand the internet's fascination with del ray's half hearted pastiche of better music.
anyway the greatest love song of my generation (i am 22) is Such Great Heights. i prefer the original version but i have also never heard a cover of it that didn't win me over. there is no competition, nothing even close.
posted by JimBennett at 6:56 PM on June 7, 2015 [6 favorites]
yeah, it's a lovely essay but I'm just not getting it. Maybe I'm already too old to get it? (That thought has been gaining frequency at an alarming rate.)
posted by Vic Morrow's Personal Vietnam at 7:07 PM on June 7, 2015
posted by Vic Morrow's Personal Vietnam at 7:07 PM on June 7, 2015
this is a popular, catchy song about domestic bliss. this song has the line "I be in the kitchen cookin' pies with my baby."
Yeah! I love how "kitchen" and "pies" are drug slang, but also just good ol' fashioned pies. In the video he's making pies in a literal kitchen with this girl. The song gets to be both a drug-dealing anthem and something really heartwarming and generous in the context of that, an ode to his partner - and she is his partner in every sense, something rare to see from men in the hip-hop/r&b charts.
posted by naju at 7:15 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
Yeah! I love how "kitchen" and "pies" are drug slang, but also just good ol' fashioned pies. In the video he's making pies in a literal kitchen with this girl. The song gets to be both a drug-dealing anthem and something really heartwarming and generous in the context of that, an ode to his partner - and she is his partner in every sense, something rare to see from men in the hip-hop/r&b charts.
posted by naju at 7:15 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
I would be curious to know what people think is their generation's greatest love song because I have not heard very much popular music.
Call Me Maybe?
posted by Itaxpica at 7:48 PM on June 7, 2015
Call Me Maybe?
posted by Itaxpica at 7:48 PM on June 7, 2015
(all jokes aside, Such Great Heights is a pretty solid candidate for the title)
posted by Itaxpica at 7:48 PM on June 7, 2015
posted by Itaxpica at 7:48 PM on June 7, 2015
damn those kids and their hippity-hop this is so dumb they're so illiterate maybe they'd get into college if they just listened to Florence and the Machine p.s. here is my favorite Coldplay song
posted by Anonymous at 8:26 PM on June 7, 2015
posted by Anonymous at 8:26 PM on June 7, 2015
not that I know who Florence and the Machine or Coldplay are because I don't listen to anything that falls inside Billboard's Top 50
posted by Anonymous at 8:27 PM on June 7, 2015
posted by Anonymous at 8:27 PM on June 7, 2015
I listen to a lot of pop music and a lot of rap music but this song is bad. I'd rather listen to 4 auto tuned hours of Future making out with Lil B into a iPhone than another mediocre "Drug girlfriend" grunter. But I appreciate the sentiment. And Actaully nvm the greatest love song is probably either Wrecking Ball or Umbrella.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 8:47 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Potomac Avenue at 8:47 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
remember Switchfoot? This question is absurd.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 8:49 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Potomac Avenue at 8:49 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
not that I know who Florence and the Machine or Coldplay are because I don't listen to anything that falls inside Billboard's Top 50
Was this aimed at me? I literally haven't heard much pop music - my parents really restricted what I could hear until my late teens, I went to college far from home and fell in with a bunch of punk rockers and now I'm an Old. So I missed the window on a lot of stuff and don't always understand what's good or interesting about it - which was part of why I liked this essay.
posted by Frowner at 8:55 PM on June 7, 2015 [2 favorites]
But I appreciate the sentiment. And Actaully nvm the greatest love song is probably either Wrecking Ball or Umbrella.
this is, well, let's just say we're clearly not going to see eye to eye on what a great song is.
posted by JimBennett at 9:06 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
this is, well, let's just say we're clearly not going to see eye to eye on what a great song is.
posted by JimBennett at 9:06 PM on June 7, 2015 [1 favorite]
also, i mean, this is a pet peeve, can we not call music "bad"? like, this is a song that has evoked emotion in literally millions of people, there is obviously some merit to it, some spark behind it, even if it is not a song that you enjoy listening to.
posted by JimBennett at 9:15 PM on June 7, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by JimBennett at 9:15 PM on June 7, 2015 [6 favorites]
Kip Moore's Hey Pretty Girl is a political mess and unredeemable and beautifully sung and as much as this essay was perfect, and as much as I cannot defend it, I think it is a great love song.
posted by PinkMoose at 10:43 PM on June 7, 2015
posted by PinkMoose at 10:43 PM on June 7, 2015
I'm 60 this year, and Trap Queen has definitely been my favourite song of the last 12 months.
I couldn't make it through the first verse of Such Great Heights though.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 10:46 PM on June 7, 2015 [7 favorites]
I couldn't make it through the first verse of Such Great Heights though.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 10:46 PM on June 7, 2015 [7 favorites]
yeah i get that. for me, such great heights makes me feel like i'm 14 again every time i hear it. it has soundtracked every major courtship of my life. it's important to me. it is twee as all hell, though.
posted by JimBennett at 12:08 AM on June 8, 2015
posted by JimBennett at 12:08 AM on June 8, 2015
Annotated "Trap Queen" lyrics from Genius.com
posted by chavenet at 1:50 AM on June 8, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by chavenet at 1:50 AM on June 8, 2015 [1 favorite]
"our generation's greatest love song" includes the lyric: "I'll run in ya house, then I'll fuck your ho"
posted by exogenous at 4:27 AM on June 8, 2015
posted by exogenous at 4:27 AM on June 8, 2015
It's a recent song, so not of my generation (I'm 40), but I think Earned It by The Weeknd is a great love song. Counterpoint: it's on the 50 Shades of Grey soundtrack.
posted by desjardins at 7:07 AM on June 8, 2015
posted by desjardins at 7:07 AM on June 8, 2015
Counterpoint: it's on the 50 Shades of Grey soundtrack.
See, this is what's interesting - like, "I Will Survive" is a great popular song (or I think it's a great song, anyway - it's not one of my actual favorites, but I recognize greatness in it) and Donna Summer's "I Feel Love" is a great song (that is one of my favorites)....and they're great songs that dance on the edge of cliche. ("I Feel Love" is sort of structurally cliched.)
I think it's entirely likely that a great popular song would end up on the 50 Shades of Grey soundtrack, personally.
This is where I feel like I missed out in not getting a good grounding in generic popular music (boy band kinds of music, for instance, that I have no enthusiasm for now). Because I think that once you're familiar with pop idiom you can perceive greatness and charm and stuff - I mean, I'm absolutely no use at classical either, funnily enough, because there too I don't have enough of the idiom to differentiate among any pieces that are above the level of dentist's office waiting room music.
posted by Frowner at 7:26 AM on June 8, 2015 [1 favorite]
See, this is what's interesting - like, "I Will Survive" is a great popular song (or I think it's a great song, anyway - it's not one of my actual favorites, but I recognize greatness in it) and Donna Summer's "I Feel Love" is a great song (that is one of my favorites)....and they're great songs that dance on the edge of cliche. ("I Feel Love" is sort of structurally cliched.)
I think it's entirely likely that a great popular song would end up on the 50 Shades of Grey soundtrack, personally.
This is where I feel like I missed out in not getting a good grounding in generic popular music (boy band kinds of music, for instance, that I have no enthusiasm for now). Because I think that once you're familiar with pop idiom you can perceive greatness and charm and stuff - I mean, I'm absolutely no use at classical either, funnily enough, because there too I don't have enough of the idiom to differentiate among any pieces that are above the level of dentist's office waiting room music.
posted by Frowner at 7:26 AM on June 8, 2015 [1 favorite]
I'm 47. Some of my generation's best love songs are:
Kiss, Prince
Avalon, Roxy Music
Fade into You, Mazzy Star
Misguide Angel, Cowboy Junkies
Autumn Sweater, Yo La Tango
Weather With You, Crowded House
Because the Night, Patti Smith
posted by Chrischris at 9:54 AM on June 8, 2015 [1 favorite]
Kiss, Prince
Avalon, Roxy Music
Fade into You, Mazzy Star
Misguide Angel, Cowboy Junkies
Autumn Sweater, Yo La Tango
Weather With You, Crowded House
Because the Night, Patti Smith
posted by Chrischris at 9:54 AM on June 8, 2015 [1 favorite]
Trap Queen is an amazing song. The only bad part is that horrible talking part at the end by that guy who is not Fetty and is also not a rapper.
posted by Bookhouse at 11:02 AM on June 8, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by Bookhouse at 11:02 AM on June 8, 2015 [4 favorites]
The Prince song I'd pick is Forever In My Life (couldn't find the album version).
posted by not_that_epiphanius at 11:02 AM on June 8, 2015
posted by not_that_epiphanius at 11:02 AM on June 8, 2015
Was this aimed at me? I literally haven't heard much pop music - my parents really restricted what I could hear until my late teens, I went to college far from home and fell in with a bunch of punk rockers and now I'm an Old. So I missed the window on a lot of stuff and don't always understand what's good or interesting about it - which was part of why I liked this essay.
No, I just get tired of rap/hip-hop-related posts attracting a wave of commenters who tumble over themselves to proclaim how terrible [X] is and how much better [Y] is, where [X] = "music that's more popular in Black American communities" and [Y] = "music that's more popular in White American communities".
posted by Anonymous at 11:11 AM on June 8, 2015
No, I just get tired of rap/hip-hop-related posts attracting a wave of commenters who tumble over themselves to proclaim how terrible [X] is and how much better [Y] is, where [X] = "music that's more popular in Black American communities" and [Y] = "music that's more popular in White American communities".
posted by Anonymous at 11:11 AM on June 8, 2015
If anyone would like to figure out visually what being a trap queen may entail, I advise you to watch Vice's excellent 10 part series on the Atlanta trap scene. Welcome to the trap house.
posted by gucci mane at 1:31 PM on June 8, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by gucci mane at 1:31 PM on June 8, 2015 [3 favorites]
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