Topic #31 – Taylor Swift Is Not Pop

I do my very damndest not to listen to ‘terrestrial’ radio.  I prefer Sirius.  I prefer CD’s.  I prefer my iPod.  I prefer anything other than the mindless prattling of 7 songs replayed on 4 stations hour after hour with some acne-faced DJ with a fake-human voice claiming their station “only plays the hits with less commercials”.  No you don’t.  You play the same 7 songs the other 3 stations play and often times 2 of you are playing the same song at the same time.  This is variety?  I actually heard a Justin Bieber song on 105.9 here in LA the other day.  For the uninformed, Justin Bieber is a mid-teen-aged white kid and 105.9 is essentially an R&B/black-pop/rap station.  Chicago people:  it’s like hearing a Jonas Brothers song on 107.5.

But at least he’s a pop artist on a station that more than anything plays pop music.  Taylor Swift supposedly had a hit with the song about being the right girl for some dude who was seeing someone else.  In actuality the song sucks and the talent it took to sing it is roughly a half-step higher than what it takes someone to sound good singing a Depeche Mode song on karaoke night.  However, because that big scary black guy, Kanye west scared the poor defenseless white girl at an award show, we all have to suck at her non-existent teat.  Every song she puts out now must be played on every pop radio station as well as classic jazz, classic rock, old-school hip-hop and NPR.  Seriously – this girl has made nary a pop song.  She sings country-western music and is fair to middling when compared to the talent in that category.  I’ll take a Carrie Underwood to her any day.  Swift doesn’t dance, doesn’t have a funky wardrobe and looks completely unreinventable.  Kudos to her and her people for boosting her up on the shoulders of public embarrassment, but shame on those that have somehow embraced her simply because of it.  If you’ve been fooled into thinking that Taylor Swift is actually a pop singer, YOU AM DUMB.