Hello! Trying out a new free-form structure here. Also, an update: My book, Ghost Chilli, has a UK launch date – July 4 2024.
Spotify keeps trying to tell me I am sad: sad girl summer, sad girl autumn, sad girl starter pack (made for you). Sure, I have a soft spot for Taylor Swift songs about crying in cars, but something about this ‘sad girl’ coinage bothers me. It both fetishises and downplays female sadness. Yes yes, it’s just a term, can’t I take a joke, etc etc, but it reminded me of how creepy algorithms can be. They pretend to accommodate your taste, then they slowly start to dictate them, and then use that data to sell you wellness journals and mushroom tea that claims to reduce anxiety.
As soon as I had this thought, three songs came into my life not via algorithm, and broke me out of a music rut. They brought me so much joy, I wanted an excuse to talk about them, so:
1: Rainy Dayz by Mary J. Blige & Ja Rule
This song begins with the words ‘Rule baby’, but I will always hear it as ‘rue baby’, as in ‘sorrow baby!’. Which is appropriate: The song is about accepting struggle as a part of life and smiling anyway. Not ‘grin and bear it’ as the Brits say (this is the funniest term ever), but embrace it as a part of life instead of waiting impatiently for good vibes only.
Mary J Blige’s voice is just incredible. She sings, almost howls, with her entire soul. If somebody else sang this song, I could imagine it sounding condescending. But there’s something trustworthy in her delivery; this is not Katy Perry telling you to feel less like a plastic bag.
Rainy Dayz was all over the radio in 2002, shortly after I’d moved to the USA from India, and shortly before I realised I could use my taste in music to build a personal brand. (I never liked Radiohead as much as I pretended to.) The song has a certain romantic, unspoiled quality to me, because for so many years after that, I listened to music with an ulterior motive: make me sound cool, music, make me sound cool. Listening to Rainy Dayz now, free of all that, is why getting older only makes me happier.
2: I Do This All the Time, By Self Esteem
A couple of weeks ago, a friend told me about a man who had an affair with Ayn Rand. Ayn Rand dedicated Atlas Shrugged to him, and they ran an institution together. Then the man’s first wife told Ayn Rand that there was another side piece in the mix, and Ayn Rand got really upset. She took back the dedication and kicked him out of their institute. (Kind of ironic, considering self-interest without care for others was her whole thing.) There’s a lot more to this story, but my friend ended it on the note: ‘This guy is the father of self-esteem.’ (He is.)
I was telling a different friend about Ayn Rand’s paramour, and she recited a single line from the song I Do This All The Time by Self Esteem. That was enough for me to go home and devour Self Esteem’s entire discography. I wish I could quote these lyrics here, but I’m worried I’ll get sued for copyright infringement, so you just have to listen to the song, if you haven’t already. (Because I live in Spotify’s sad girl cave, I am never sure what songs are actually popular. I Do This All The Time could be this decade’s Uptown Funk for all I know. )
I don’t think I would have come across Self Esteem if it wasn’t for Ayn Rand, which I’m not sure is much better than a creepy algorithm.
3: Thunderstruck by AC/DC
Okay this is obviously not a discovery. And I’m sure it’s on every single Spotify classic rock playlist. But ever since I heard it playing in an Uber, I cannot stop listening to it. I’m sure thousands of music critics have more articulate things to say about why it’s a masterpiece, but what I like is how it really takes you on a journey. The song is so intense from the get-go but more elements just keep being added as it progresses. I can’t get enough of it. Music today just doesn’t convey this level of raw energy, and that’s clear from all the YouTube reaction videos showing people who’ve never heard the song before listen to it for the first time.
I Googled ‘thunderstuck ac/dc review’ to see how actual music critics would describe this song, and found this old Vice article with exactly the title I was looking for: An Ode to the Greatest Song Ever: "Thunderstruck". There is a line in it that made me LOL:
Everytime Angus Young plays the blazing finger-tapping intro to “Thunderstruck,” Mozart rises from his grave and makes love to a fighter jet.
What else is there to say, honestly?
More Content:
I cannot recommend The Number Ones series on Stereogum enough. In it, Tom Breihan writes about every single #1 single in the history of the Billboard Hot 100, from the chart’s beginning in 1958.
This Insider video on the making of Toxic by Britney Spears is also very cool. It goes into how Bollywood, California surf rock, James Bond and V.S. Naipaul (🤔) contributed to this absolute banger.
If you have fond memories of the movie School of Rock / appreciate Jack Black, this episode of the podcast You Are Good is worth listening to. I enjoyed it more than the movie rewatch the podcast inspired.