Tag: Rona Rock

Save Us, Miley Cyrus, From Adult Contemporary’s Tyranny


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I don’t know what what’s going on with Miley Cyrus. Even though she wants to scream her songs for some reason, she is obviously searching around for a “new sound.” What’s so weird is she wants to do this within the context of the dreaded Adult Contemporary.

Why can’t we have nice things in music anymore, like regular old pop rock? You can update it anyway you want to, but give me a rock sound that’s got a beat and you can dance to. Here are a few songs that I think, if you modernized them, would serve as a great source for the “New Sound.”

Now, let me point something out. There is plenty of rock music out there, I know, but it’s not pop rock and it’s not Top 40. I want that vibe we used to have of a pop rock Top 40 hit. It makes you wonder if the death of rock is existential or if it’s just that our new Lennon is only 13 and hasn’t gotten his heart broken yet.

Or, it could be that I’m just old and all this talk of a “New Sound” is really just my way of telling Zoomers to get off my musical yard. But I will note that it is…odd…that we’ve suffered under the jackboot of Adult Contemporary for so very fucking long.

I wish Miley Cyrus — of all people — would hook up with Butch Vig and come out with a Garbage-like sound. That would be sooooo cool.

A Note To Finneas — Turn Billie Eilish Into A ‘Rona Rock’ Star


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I love rock music. Or, more specifically, I love American Bandstand rock music. I was there — as the song goes — watching Madonna make her absolute first appearance on network TV on, you guessed it, American Bandstand.

The one modern musician who really rubs my musical clit is Billie Eilish. That someone who sounds so much like Billie Holiday would be a mainstream success with tweeners simply blows my mind. But, to date, she’s stayed safely within the confines of…ugh…Adult Contemporary.

I would suggest to her brother Finneas that the way to take his sister to the next level is to pull a Amy Winehouse and have her embrace the past in a big way. Cover this song:

If you could get tweeners to belt out such a classic rock tune, there would be an earthquake in pop music — the era of Rona Rock would begin. The reason why I suggest this is Janus and Billie have very similar voices (at least in my view.) They both have a deep raspy voice and they can hit high notes really well.

Eilish already has a huge adult following. If they pulled up the “What’s New” feature on Spotify to Eilish of all people belting out Janus, well, you just sold yourself a shit ton of albums. The only people with more disposable income than tweeners is old people with careers.

I leave you with this. Imagine Billie Eilish covering this song. Gives me goosebumps just thinking about it.

My Dream ‘Rona Rock’ Song — Taylor Swift Singing ‘Would I Lie To You?’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have written about this before and, really, for me to keep talking about it, I’m being both “delusional and stupid.” But can you imagine if Taylor Swift did a quickie cover of the Eurythmics “Would I Lie To You?”

Here’s what you do — get Taylor Swift to fucking break something. Get her glammed up and tricked out as a rocker. She gets to scream at the top of her lungs about something very relevant in the Trump Era — lies. Remember, this song’s key is female empowerment. Imagine if it was Annie Clark on lead guitar. She as very distinctive style, so that, in itself, would update this 80s hit.

I love this song. And, really, come to think of it, if you were going to get all “girl supergroup” on us, instead of a trio of R&B backing vocals, you get Billie Eilish to lend her deep, husky sound to the song. So, you’d have Taylor Swift on vocals, St. Vincent on guitar, Billie Eilish as a backup vocalist and, say, Meg White on drums.

That would rock!

The Vision Thing: The ‘New Sound’ Of ‘Rona Rock’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m not a music producer — ha! But I do have an ear for music. It’s easy for me to see connections between sounds and genres. So, if I was in charge of making the “new sound” of Rona Rock, here’s what I would do. I’ve talked about this before, but I’m coming at it from a different angle.

First, start with this song.

Then you spend a few hours studying this song and figuring out what made it a hit. Was it the lyrics? The wall of sound? The moment? What?

Your “in” to modern audiences is the following song. This is a very modern song that if you used as a frame of reference the average person might bob their head to it. Or, put another way, this song gives you the chassis for a monster hit. Remember, the point is that Rona Rock would be pop-rock. It would be popular music that had a beat and you can dance to it. (With a rock guitar and drums.)

Remember, St. Vincent really throws down with her guitar abilities. So, if I was constructing some sort of “Rona Rock” super girl group, she would need to be in it just for the guitar solos, if nothing else. The next step is to find an Adult Contemporary song that people might reference in their minds a they hear the “new sound” of Rona Rock.

I think the song “Don’t Call Me Angel” is just the song you need to pull this off. Notice, while this song is still “Adult Contemporary” it does have a really strong hook and it’s soooo close to being a rock song: all it needs is a guitar and drums. I guess the point is — it’s faster and definitely easy to dance to. I just want something with a bit more edge than we’re used to with the shit that is in Top 40 these days.

Having said all that, here’s the song I want some genius music producer to update and turn into a Top 40 hit.

An Observation About The Proto-‘Rona Rock’ Song ‘Midnight Sky’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I think I may have figured out what it is about Miley Cyrus’ song “Midnight Sky” that makes me think about it so much. Listen to this first:

Then, if you drain the song of the weight of its Adult Contemporary market-required influence, speed it up and make it more obviously rock, you get:

There’s definitely a similar vibe there. So I can go back to hating modern music. I wish someone would do something with the notion of “Rona Rock,” thought. It’s pretty cool.

Constructing The ‘New Sound’ Of Rona Rock


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Absolutely no one listens to me. But I do have an ear for music — and an obsessive personality — so I’m going to rant about this for a little bit until I get this out of my system.

Ok, so, here we are. We have suffered through about 15 years of Modern Adult Contemporary as absolutely dominating pop music. Rock music is dead. It’s relegated to a small corner of the musical world. No longer is rock pop music and pop music, rock. But we are overdue for a change.

We’re overdue for a “New Sound.”

Here’s how I would construct it.

First, you think up a way to make this type of song by The Talking Heads sound more modern.

Then, there are three songs on U2’s Achtung Baby to use as a frame of reference.

These songs are pretty much juiced up Adult Contemporary songs. They’re songs that kind of oldies (ugh) but still modern enough that they fit the conventions of modern music. Next, you throw in the Butch Vig sound that can be found in this song.

And then here’s the crucial aspect of this New Sound. What what I just let you listen to in your mind, draw out what is obviously a “New Sound” in this song to make an entire genre — Rona Rock.

I know that this “New Sound” I’m hearing is simply a producer referencing mid-80s rock. Ok, I get it. But the song does sound very modern to my ears. It’s like I hear something different. I hear potential. Go that way! I wouldn’t mind top 40 music sounding like warmed over Talking Heads. That would be pretty cool, in fact.

And, remember, if the history of pop music is any indication, once you get a New Sound, that changes the dynamic of things so much that some interesting things could happen, like, say….rock n roll? Maybe Rona Rock would be actual rock before it was all over with.

But that’s being delusional.

At best, we we’ll probably just simply Adult Contemporary with a little bit of mid-80s influence.

Advice To Miley Cyrus


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Ok. Here’s the thing. I noticed that Ms. Cyrus covered the New Wave classic “Heart of Glass” recently. Which is great. But here’s what I would have done if I was, say, the producer involved.

First — New Wave is simply Punk for straight edges.

I would suggest she go to something a big more punkish like Romeo Void’s “Never Say Never.” Then, I would tell her not to belt out the song at the top of her lungs. She’s missing the point. She has a uniquely textured voice. No need to scream.

Once she was singing Never Say Never, I would figure out a way to fuse what people know — Adult Contemporary — with something that sounds like Neo-Pop Rock (Rona Rock.) Or, put another way, it needs a little bit of edge to it. It needs some bite.

To get that bite, you need a backbeat. A strong guitar. A strong “wall of sound” provided by someone thrashing around on the drums. Anyway, absolutely no one listens to me.

But the novel seems to be going well, which makes me happy.

Taylor Swift Is So Frustrating


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Ms. Swift is a great singer, lyricist and performer. But I find her exceedingly frustrating. The reason is, she’s at the exact center of pop culture. She’s everywhere and nowhere musically, like pop culture oxygen.

But, I get it. She has a massive fan base. She has absolutely no reason to change. So she doesn’t. What’s so frustrating is I hear stuff from her contemporaries like Miley Cyrus or Dua Lipa and there’s something new there. There’s a New Sound — I call it Rona Rock — that seems just about to pop out. It’s like we might just be about to leave the cultural wasteland of Adult Contemporary for something, something different, something new and modern.

So, I guess I’m really being both “stupid and delusional” to think that someone like Ms. Swift might partner with, say, someone like Butch Vig. What’s more likely to happen, really, is some middle-step. Some album or song that is half Adult Contemporary half Rona Rock.

For all my ranting on this subject, the fundamentals of pop music haven’t changed — people aren’t really buying music. And we’re literally a generation away from people who grew up on that last gasp of rock that showed itself in the States as Grunge and in the UK as Britpop.

It just would be great to have music to believe in again. Music with a backbeat. Music with lyrics that told a story. Music that wanted to change the world. As it stands, Ms. Swift writes gentle pop songs about dudes who have made her sad.

You can’t have everything, I guess.

‘Rona Rock’ — The New Sound


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

We’re overdue for a “new sound” in pop music. The history of pop right now goes something like this:

1955 – 1959 “American Pop Rock”
1959-1963 “Waiting”
1964 – 1970 “The British Invasion”
1970-1979 “Punk, Prog and Disco”
1980 – 1983 “New Wave”
1984 – 1989 “Big Hair & Rock”
1989-2000 “Grunge & Britpop”
2001-2008 “Dance Pop Rock”
2008-Now “Adult Contemporary”

The above is not exactly perfect, but it gives you a rough back-of-the-envelope assessment of things. As you can tell, we’re overdue for a new era in pop rock. In short, we need a New Sound.

The thing is, I can hear faint element of a New Sound in this song by, of all people, Miley Cyrus. The production gives the song just a tinge of mid-80s pop rock to it. And, yet, it sounds rather modern.

I find a similar proto-New Sound in some of the more recent stuff done by Dua Lipa. In a sea of Adult Contemporary crap, anything that sounds different is noteworthy.

But there’s something missing. It needs a bit more rock to it to qualify as a “good” song to my old fart ears. All you would need to do is add a bit of THIS song.

I guess what I’m saying is, I would add a strong rock guitar and drums to this New Sound. It wouldn’t really have to be all that much, just enough for people who grew up on pop rock to sit up and take notice. I even know the producer who could do it — Butch Vig.

If he could somehow manage to rustle up a super girl group, then, well, that would rock. Or, put another way, if pop music is ever-so-subtly drifting towards a New Sound, why not give it a push and bring back the rock sensibilities of guitar and drums?