Good musicianship, playing from the heart, powerful lyrics, ear-catching tunes... All these are great ways to make a good song/album. But I always find it interesting when bands try some gimmick, a tweak on what is expected and would usually sound a little bit cheesy if you were to describe it. Sometimes it works, and other times...
Gimmicks That Worked
1. Your Song- Elton John All right. I realize that Elton John represents everything lame since his Candle song to the Princess. But don't forget that pre-Diana, he was just known as a classic rock guy with funny glasses. And "Your Song" is a really strange song when you think about it. The story goes that
Elton and Billy Jean King were riding together in a Limo and he told her that he liked and respected her so much, that he would write a song about her. Not too unusual there. But instead of a song about her sweet serve, or her out-of-the-closet pride, or her ass-kicking of the male chauvinist, he just sings the entire time about how it's her song. Tres post modern.
2. Stan- Eminem An epistle story where a fan writes increasingly obsessed fan letters to a his favorite rapper? If Marshall matters had turned this in for his high school creative writing class, he'd have received a C+ at best. But somehow it worked and came off as creative and interesting. He loses points though for performing it with the aforementioned Elton John in another attempt to show the world just how complicated and unpredictable he was.
3. Concept Albums- Sgt Peppers, The Wall, Tommy Sergeant Pepper's changed the entire concept of the album (that is now being ruined by I-tunes) and was a great album to boot. The Wall might not seem all that deep now, but in high school? And I can't really remember much about Tommy other than Pinball Wizard, but seemed solidly ambitious nevertheless. They all brought us the concept album, a great gimmick
for attracting attention to the whole work.
4. Weird Al I realized just how universal he was when I worked in an inner-city school and one of the kids was cracking everybody up by singing "Amish Paradise". This man is a genius (Taco Grande for Rico Suave?), and he's really used the same gimmick for his entire career.
5. Grateful Dead Hmmm... Mediocre music, but like to travel and do drugs... How can we keep this up? Got it! We will actually encourage people to tape us, make every concert different, and play 25 minute songs that only someone on Acid could endure. Viola. Twirly dancers unite. A gimmick that created an entire subculture.
Gimmicks That Didn't Work
1. All Other Concept Albums Are there any other good ones? And don't tell me about that Radiohead one about cloning and computers and shit (or maybe that's a couple of them). LAME!
2. Every Flaming Lips Song They are just so quirky and weird! How did they get to be so crazy and whacky! Gimmicks should be done in small doses, not used to liven just about every so-so song you write.
3. Drive My Car BEEP BEEP BEEP YEAH! Worst Beatles song ever recorded. I still get a little embarrassed when I hear it.
4. "Positive" Rap Do you remember when everyone seemed to be on the search for rap that was "good"and wholesome? And when one was found critics overrated it and everybody jumped on board? But where have you gone Arrested Development? Now rap is so mainstream people have finally stopped doing this, but any attempt to make any form of music "positive" is always a mistake. The real challenge is continually trying to shock the masses, and gangster rap was handling itself just fine in that department. The whole thing seemed vaguely racist, like why weren't people pushing for wholesome heavy metal?
5. Stryper Speaking of wholesome heavy metal, Stryper was a gimmick that should have worked, but failed. Anyone who's seen Behind the Music knows the common rock star life curve - discovered to fame to drugs to falling apart to Jesus. Well, Stryper went the exact opposite direction. They started as a Christian heavy metal band with albums like "To Hell With The Devil" and then became a hard partying devil band. But alas, redemption found in Satan just didn't sell that well.
Side note, some friends of mine in middle school went through a Christian Rock faze where they liked Stryper and The Altar Boys. They went to a Stryper show and the band actually threw bibles out to the crowd. Sorry, I know I'm getting off-topic, but Christian genres of music really fascinate me. Does anyone know if there's ever been any successful Christian Gangster Rap? Christian Salsa? Christian Death Metal...
