My confession: Teen Singers you SECRETLY like?

[abrocks22]

okay now i a know i am not the only one so i wanna hear your..as i would say...secret guilty pleasures.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Mitchel Musso...his new cd is really catchy and i have had that song "HEY" stuck in my head for legitimately daysss. Here is a link to his cd if any of you are interested...   [link removed by moderator]

Anyways..just wondering if any one else has "those singers" that you are embarrassed to like...and more importantly..any Mitchel Musso junkies like me??

[murlough23]

I think any teen singers I once liked have now grown out of their teenage years. But here are some artists I listened to when they were in their teens:

Bethany Dillon (first album was good and no guilt involved in liking that one; don't really care for her music after that)

Eisley (Stacy was a teen when I first got into the band - definitely no guilt involved here!)

Jaci Velasquez (I had a huge crush on her when she first started out; didn't like her from about 2003 until last year, but her latest album's not bad, definitely a bit of a guilty pleasure, though)

Michelle Branch (was a teen when her first album came out; she was better later on as a member of The Wreckers)

Out of Eden (I'm not normally an R&B guy, but this was when I was first getting into Christian music, and I'll admit it, I thought they were cute)

Plus One (Their first album that made them so huge was HORRIBLE, but they graduated to average with a few good songs when they took a little more creative control - still definitely a guilty pleasure, though)

Rachael Lampa (A guilty pleasure except for her third album, which was a solid and reasonably respectable pop/rock disc; I kind of wonder what she's up to nowadays)

Rebecca St. James (another teen celebrity crush from back in the day; I still enjoy her old stuff, but her more recent albums don't really do it for me)

Relient K (guilty pleasure at first and I can barely stand their first album now, but they've become one of my all-time favorite bands as they've matured)

Other artists who aren't teenagers but whose music is mostly aimed at a teenage crowd:

Meg & Dia (were barely out of their teens when I got into 'em; I still enjoy them a great deal but they are a semi-guilty pleasure)

ZOEgirl (yeah, totally not for my demographic, but their middle two albums were pretty good for the kind of music that they did)

As with any of the cheesy music that I liked back in the day, the songs that I really loved back then, I still enjoy for nostalgia's sake and I think there's some redeeming value to it even if I'd be embarrassed to have it playing with someone else in the room (other than my wife, at least). I rarely turn my back on old favorites, but that doesn't mean I'm necessarily excited about new stuff from some of these artists in the here and now, unless I've noted them as non-guilty pleasures here.

[Ian]

Relient K were quite good on albums 2, 3 and 4.  Not too many teen singers I even secretly like though.  Actually I can't think of any. ;_;  There are a few teen singers I like that I don't feel guilty about, such as Laura Maurling.

[murlough23]

Relient K were quite good on albums 2, 3 and 4.

Those albums being Anatomy, Two Lefts, and Mmhmm? You didn't like Five Score? (Mmhmm is my favorite, but Five Score is pretty darn close. I still think the album that fully displays their potential has yet to be released.)

Not too many teen singers I even secretly like though.  Actually I can't think of any. ;_;

I don't "secretly like" anything. Even if it's a guilty pleasure, I'll just own up to liking it. I have nothing to hide. (Except maybe the Play Count in iTunes. But you can't see that anyway.)

Plus, if you admit something, it's kind of no longer a secret, so this thread, if taken literally as it's titled, sort of closes the loop on itself.

NP: "Squirm", Dave Matthews Band

[spacebrat311]

I guess Beirut could count since he was 19 when Gulag Orkestar was recorded. I have no love for Relient K or anything like that though.

Does Jackson 5 era Michael Jackson count?

[murlough23]

Does Jackson 5 era Michael Jackson count?

Was he even a teen yet?

[Ian]

Five Score is a piece of shit.

[murlough23]

Five Score is a piece of shit.

That's surprising if you liked Mmhmm. Stylistically and songwriting-wise, they're pretty much the same.

[spacebrat311]

That's surprising if you liked Mmhmm. Stylistically and songwriting-wise, they're pretty much the same.

Kind of. While I don't enjoy listening to MMHMM I can at least appreciate that if someone wanted to make a pop-punk album (for some reason I would never understand in a million years), it is a reasonably well-crafted one. Lyrically and musically, the only reaction I get from listening to Five Score is an epic facepalm.

[bloop]

It's "The Jackson 5", so even if he wasn't, his siblings may have been.  At any rate, I think he was a teen for at least part of it.

I can't name any off the top of my head.  I mean, I like some of the ones listed so far, but not when they were actually recording as teens.

[Vlad!]

Somewhat off-topic comment:

Due to some investigative work by supermod Schil in response to the original poster setting off my spam sensors, we have determined that 'abrocks22' is most likely a professional spammer for Universal Music Group. They follow the pattern of "sign up for an account, post a couple inane things to blend in, then hawk some possibly up-and-coming artist in an attempt to garner grass-roots support". Perhaps it would be more appropriate if she were to post in the Record Labels thread on this board.

Obviously this thread is generating enough interesting discussion that it would be silly to close it just because it got started with spammy intent. I will leave it to the Music mods to decide what, if anything, will be done. I just figured you pholks should be aware of this.

abrocks22, assuming you're even still following this thread, please tell your corporate overlords that these halfhearted attempts at generating a fanbase are disingenuous and unlikely to succeed. You are welcome to contribute--or at least, you're welcome to contribute unless the powers-that-be decide to ban you and the rest of your corporation just out of spite--but you're not welcome to spam.

Please continue your discussion, and I apologize for the interruption.

[murlough23]

Due to some investigative work by supermod Schil in response to the original poster setting off my spam sensors, we have determined that 'abrocks22' is most likely a professional spammer for Universal Music Group. They follow the pattern of "sign up for an account, post a couple inane things to blend in, then hawk some possibly up-and-coming artist in an attempt to garner grass-roots support". Perhaps it would be more appropriate if she were to post in the Record Labels thread on this board.

Ironic, 'cause I was just suggesting in that other thread that record labels are going to need to tame the social networking beast if they want to stay relevant in the 21st century.

Though spamming the forum isn't the way to do it. it will be read by what, all 10 of us? Unless someone has the time and effort to span a lot of forums... I think think of much better ways to spend your PR dollars, honestly.

NP: "Collect Call", Metric

[ajyouthguy]

Five Score is a piece of shit.

wow, i completely disagree.

[dgp11776]

wow, i completely disagree.

All I had to do was look at his music journal to figure out that opinion, though.  Predictably, I'm sure I would feel the same about 90% of what he listens to.

[murlough23]

All I had to do was look at his music journal to figure out that opinion, though.  Predictably, I'm sure I would feel the same about 90% of what he listens to.

It was just surprising coming from someone who had liked the band for a while before that. If someone didn't think RK was that great all along, I could understand that reaction. It's not like Five Score was a radical departure, and even if you're tired of them doing the same stuff as the previous album, that's still a bit of an extreme reaction.

NP: "Foreground", Grizzly Bear

[spacebrat311]

ahem:

"We should get jerseys
cause we make a good team
but yours would look better than mine
cause you're out of my league"

But then, I was never big on them.

[murlough23]

ahem:

"We should get jerseys
cause we make a good team
but yours would look better than mine
cause you're out of my league"

But then, I was never big on them.

That's the opening stanza from a single song. It's not one of my favorites, and not indicative of the entire album. Though I think those particular lines are kinda clever. But the song in question goes downhill from there. Most of the rest of the album fares better.

[spacebrat311]

But the song in question goes downhill from there. Most of the rest of the album fares better.

I don't think there is a downhill from there. But anyways, for me this line is very emblematic of the album's attempts at cleverness. This "cleverness" is far from it's only lyrical flaw, however. This is an album that tends to be lyrically, either over-direct:

"Why don't you come right out and say it?
Even if the words are probably gonna hurt,
I'd rather have the truth than something insincere"

steeped in high school angst-imagery:

"The voice of who I used to be
Screaming out, "Someone, someone please
Please shine a light into the black
Wade through the depths and bring me back""

Or conceptually trite:

(See the entire song entitled "Faking My Own Suicide.")

The lyrics on Mmhmm weren't particularly better, but the musical hooks were undeniable. Five Score is an almost hookless album, trading in the simple but catchy full sounding guitars of Mmhmm for something a lot more riff and texture driven... if by texture I mean aping sub-Jimmy Eat World (possibly sub-Cartel) pianos and keyboard pads.

[murlough23]

Yeeeeeeeahhhh... not hearing that at all.

[Aaron]

Five Score is a piece of shit.

And you liked Two Lefts?  Hahahahaha

[spacebrat311]

Musical low points:

The pianos on "The Best Thing" - Who the hell do you think you are? Augustana? Why ape bands that suck?
The intro of "Devastation and Reform"...scratch that, the entire song is a low point. But the intro guitars are a perfect example of wanting to sound way too serious for themselves and their genre.
"Deathbed"- Seriously, I am not going to be impressed just that you layered in as many instruments as you had heard of if the melodies and piano parts you're wrapping those layers around are banal as hell.

[Aaron]

Musical low points:

The pianos on "The Best Thing" - Who the hell do you think you are? Augustana? Why ape bands that suck?
The intro of "Devastation and Reform"...scratch that, the entire song is a low point. But the intro guitars are a perfect example of wanting to sound way too serious for themselves and their genre.
"Deathbed"- Seriously, I am not going to be impressed just that you layered in as many instruments as you had heard of if the melodies and piano parts you're wrapping those layers around are banal as hell.

It might not be great but it's definitely not close to being as crappy as Two Lefts.

[spacebrat311]

That's like saying digested hamburger smells less than digested Indian food. Poo is poo.

[murlough23]

And you liked Two Lefts?  Hahahahaha

Two Lefts is inconsistent, but some of their best songs are on that record (it's also their last record to feature any good "joke songs"). Between "Mood Ring", "College Kids", "Gibberish", and "Silly Shoes", which all still make me chuckle, sometimes I forget that there are serious songs on that record. (But there are. I still love "Forward Motion" and "Trademark" and "Over Thinking" a great deal.)

But The Anatomy of the Tongue in Cheek is a better album, which puts Two Lefts at second to last. Still, it's a pretty sharp drop-off from there to the self-titled.

Regarding Two Lefts... man, that album has some MONSTER hooks. I just don't get how a person could appreciate that about previous albums and not hear them here. Maybe it's because I'm more of a pop guy, so I don't care how legit it is as "punk rock" or whatever, so it doesn't faze me if a song's guitar-driven or piano-driven or synth-driven or whatever, so long as it's a good performance. ("Forgiven" is the best marriage of the two lead instruments.) I like that they're becoming more piano-driven and not anchored to the chugga-chugga so much - that sort of adaptation is the only way for a savvy pop/punk band to survive now that the genre is reaching its sell-by date. (I feel similarly about Green Day.)

[spacebrat311]

See I appreciate in concept the idea that since pop-punk is essentially a novelty genre these bands need to adapt. But the problem is that it seems to me that they are doing the same thing they always have been, but are trying to slap a new paint job on it and call it a new thing. I can't take it seriously, as it's roots are still so firmly planted in pop-punk territory, but I can't just turn my brain off and get lost in the smiles of it all, because the band is deliberately trying to make me take them seriously. It ends in a no-win.

[Ian]

Two Lefts is their best album.  It has perfect blend of goofiness and seriousness that I want out of a fun highschool punk band, and it's excecuted very well.  I haven't listened to it in a couple years and I still remember most of the songs.  Anatomy is expectedly not as mature, but is still very fun and for the most part pretty memorable.  Mmhmm is good, but begins to slip.  Five Score is one of the most boring, unmemorable pop-punk albums I've ever heard.  RK seemed to have lost any spark of creativity.  No song stands out from it's peers unless it's because of its unusual level of suck: see Suicide.  The last song is pretty good, but unfortunately they decided to make it long just for the sake of having that "epic" last track.

[Aaron]

Two Lefts is their best album.  It has perfect blend of goofiness and seriousness that I want out of a fun highschool punk band, and it's excecuted very well.  I haven't listened to it in a couple years and I still remember most of the songs.  Anatomy is expectedly not as mature, but is still very fun and for the most part pretty memorable.  Mmhmm is good, but begins to slip.  Five Score is one of the most boring, unmemorable pop-punk albums I've ever heard.  RK seemed to have lost any spark of creativity.  No song stands out from it's peers unless it's because of its unusual level of suck: see Suicide.  The last song is pretty good, but unfortunately they decided to make it long just for the sake of having that "epic" last track.

No offense, but you're out of your damn mind.   

RK didn't want to be stuck in that "we sing immature pop-punk songs" rut and they succeeded in getting out of it.  Who wants to have a career of making shitty songs like "Chap Stick, Chapped Lips, and Things Like Chemistry"?

[spacebrat311]

Success is such a relative concept... I'll give you that they started wanting to be taken seriously, and unlike Ian, I don't find their Two Lefts era antics particularly amusing, but I just don't see how trading shitty joke songs for shitty serious songs is really a step up.

[murlough23]

See I appreciate in concept the idea that since pop-punk is essentially a novelty genre these bands need to adapt. But the problem is that it seems to me that they are doing the same thing they always have been, but are trying to slap a new paint job on it and call it a new thing. I can't take it seriously, as it's roots are still so firmly planted in pop-punk territory, but I can't just turn my brain off and get lost in the smiles of it all, because the band is deliberately trying to make me take them seriously. It ends in a no-win.

That sounds like an issue of not being able to take the genre seriously regardless, so for you anything they do is gonna be a no-win. Which is fine. You're not a fan of any of their albums, it seems, so I'm not worried about winning you over.

[murlough23]

Two Lefts is their best album.  It has perfect blend of goofiness and seriousness that I want out of a fun highschool punk band, and it's excecuted very well. I haven't listened to it in a couple years and I still remember most of the songs.

So basically it sounds like you didn't want the band to "grow up", given your criticisms of anything they've done later on that attempts to be "serious".

Anatomy is expectedly not as mature, but is still very fun and for the most part pretty memorable.

So is that the only measuring stick - how much fun it is? I appreciate a band with a good sense of humor, and I do miss some of their early stuff that was intended to be humorous and little more. But I think it's a bit unfair to keep expecting them to do only that. Even on those early albums, they had something serious to say from time to time (how well stated it was might be another question - see "My Way or the Highway". Ugh.)

Mmhmm is good, but begins to slip.

Why, because it's less "high school"?

Five Score is one of the most boring, unmemorable pop-punk albums I've ever heard.  RK seemed to have lost any spark of creativity.

Seems pretty creative from where I sit. Normal pop/punk bands don't take the many different musical routes that a lot of those songs take (the intro track alone shows that much).

No song stands out from it's peers unless it's because of its unusual level of suck: see Suicide.

"Faking My Own Suicide" sucks. I'll give you that. That whole track plays as a joke that just doesn't work because it doesn't make logical sense, but then I have that nagging feeling that Matt Thiessen was halfway serious here, like that was something he actually thought of doing back when he was a heartbroken teenager. Either way, bad idea for a song. That and "Must Have Done Something Right" (which doesn't suck, but isn't great either) are the main reasons I don't think Five Score tops Mmhmm.

The last song is pretty good, but unfortunately they decided to make it long just for the sake of having that "epic" last track.

I'm glad you could be present in the studio during their decision-making progress. Must be great to know a band's exact motivation for making a decision that you disagreed with.

To me, it's as long as it needed to be to fully tell its story and to make the impact it needed to make. What you see as extra stuff thrown in there just to try to impress people, I imagine as a band experimenting outside of the predefined "box" of their chosen genre, and asking themselves what if this doesn't fit into a three-minute pop song? What if it's not guitar-driven at all? What if we have guys in the band who know how to play a lot of different instruments and we'd like to put them to good use? What if we had a repeated musical idea that bookends the album in a subtle way most people might not notice? (See "Pleading the Fifth". The same chord progression shows up during the instrumental break in "Deathbed." I think it's brilliant.)

I can understand not liking any or all of these songs, but how suddenly you seem to have gone from liking them to writing them off is frankly rather alarming. I can more easily understand spacebrat's position of just not liking them at all, or Wanderer's position of saying, "I don't think they're the greatest but I can see how they've grown over the years". You're just treating them like you want them to stay in a state of arrested development for the sake of your own youthful nostalgia.

[murlough23]

RK didn't want to be stuck in that "we sing immature pop-punk songs" rut and they succeeded in getting out of it.  Who wants to have a career of making shitty songs like "Chap Stick, Chapped Lips, and Things Like Chemistry"?

I'm not sure what makes that particular song shitty more so than others. It's not my favorite, but I enjoy it, at least up until the abrupt tempo change that seems to come out of nowhere.

[spacebrat311]

That sounds like an issue of not being able to take the genre seriously regardless, so for you anything they do is gonna be a no-win. Which is fine. You're not a fan of any of their albums, it seems, so I'm not worried about winning you over.

True. To me, if pop-punk means something different than just punk, than it must be somehow injecting a sense of pop; of fun, of witticism, of silliness and absurdity or else it would just be a punk band. To want to be a serious pop-punk band seems like an oxymoron to me. If a band wants to "grow up" as it were, it seems to me that it might be necessary to leave the pop-punk genre to do it, even if the journey is just the short hop from pop-punk to punk.

[murlough23]

True. To me, if pop-punk means something different than just punk, than it must be somehow injecting a sense of pop; of fun, of witticism, of silliness and absurdity or else it would just be a punk band.

That's interesting, because I feel like pop/punk by default tends to already come with these characteristics (though that depends on the artist's skill for writing witty lyrics and coming up with good hooks - something you're gonna need to make fun music in any genre). RK has been pop/punk since day one (they sure as hell haven't been pure punk, because pure punk isn't poppy, and poppy stuff pisses off punk purists - try saying that five times fast!), but on more recent records (and really, as far back as individual songs such as "Less Is More" from Anatomy), they've experimented with songs that aren't "punk" at all. Their most radio-friendly stuff veers closer to modern rock... you might still detect the punk origins in the way the guitars are played, but that influence has been minimized in newer tracks like "Forgiven" or "The Best Thing".

To want to be a serious pop-punk band seems like an oxymoron to me.

I think you can be silly or serious in any genre of music if you want to; it just takes more effort with certain genres than others. But "serious" is not an all-or-nothing deal... the band may no longer record full songs like "Gibberish" or "May the Horse Be with You" that are just for the lolz, but the songs that do try to "make a point" still have their witticisms and wordplay. "Deathbed" is a good example, and it's why I love the song so much - another band could compose a 100% serious song on the same subject and I probably wouldn't like it nearly as much. I think it takes talent to make a person chuckle and get misty-eyed during the same song.

If a band wants to "grow up" as it were, it seems to me that it might be necessary to leave the pop-punk genre to do it, even if the journey is just the short hop from pop-punk to punk.

I see it as more "growing out" than "growing up". You can try new things without having to disown your old style completely. I think it's been a gradual shift for them just because of the kinds of music they've been exposed to and realized they've enjoyed - why limit themselves to one genre if they enjoy others? (Especially when that old genre is growing stale due to the proliferation of young bands doing the same thing anyway.) It's probably my fault for saying "growing up", which implies becoming more adult and more serious and no longer having any childlike or goofy aspects to the music. They wouldn't be RK without their goofy fun side - whatever form that takes, it's still there, and the silliness and seriousness have really coexisted in their music since album #1, just with varying levels of success.

But a journey from pop-punk to pure punk, for this band, would be the opposite of growing up. It would mean ditching any development they've experienced so far in favor of fitting into a genre box. Existing fans wouldn't like it and I'm pretty sure that fans of "real punk" music would see right through it.

[spacebrat311]

I don't disagree that going "real punk" would be a bad move for them. But the other option for me is just ditching pop-punk altogether. I don't see the pop-punk aesthetic as anything but a hinderance to what they seem to want to accomplish these days, musically.

As we talk about them being high-schoolish on Anatomy and Two Lefts, and perhaps growing out of that, I realize that to me, pop-punk goes hand in hand with a very adolescent outlook. This is not a bad thing- great records detailing the high school experience are just as necessary as great records detailing other parts of life. But if Relient K want's to be a band of grown-ups for grown-ups, which seems to be their aim with their newer material, then the pop-punk flourishes are doing them no favors. I can appreciate if not relate to Mmhmm, because it does feel like a record that really resonates with a high school experience and state of mind, and I can at least put myself back in that place while listening to it. Five Score just feels like it has no idea who it wants to relate to, and ends up nowhere.

[murlough23]

I don't disagree that going "real punk" would be a bad move for them. But the other option for me is just ditching pop-punk altogether. I don't see the pop-punk aesthetic as anything but a hinderance to what they seem to want to accomplish these days, musically.

This idea of "what they want to accomplish" is what's hindering you, I think. You're making assumptions that they're trying to be something or trying to prove something, and to me, they're not. They're just making music that they like making, and if that music takes an ingredient from here and another from there, then that's what fits their personality and they go for it.

As we talk about them being high-schoolish on Anatomy and Two Lefts, and perhaps growing out of that, I realize that to me, pop-punk goes hand in hand with a very adolescent outlook. This is not a bad thing- great records detailing the high school experience are just as necessary as great records detailing other parts of life.

I think it's a style that one will naturally start to grow beyond as one transitions into adulthood. I think their albums have mirrored this gradual process while still keeping a "young at heart" element that says, "Pop-punk isn't all we are any more, but we're not ashamed of those roots and we do still enjoy that kind of music." This seems reasonable to me. I'm in my 30's but I don't automatically shun music just because its core audience seems to be a younger demographic.

But if Relient K want's to be a band of grown-ups for grown-ups, which seems to be their aim with their newer material, then the pop-punk flourishes are doing them no favors.

They don't get to choose whether they want to be a band of grown-ups. They're all over 21. As for who they want to make music for, I don't think they define a cutoff point the way you're assuming they do. I see that more of their music now has a bit of adult appeal, but honestly, their core audience is still very young. Their older fans are likely people like me who have aged with them over the last decade. (Their first album came out in 2000. I was just a year out of college. I know I'm only a few years older than those guys.)

I can appreciate if not relate to Mmhmm, because it does feel like a record that really resonates with a high school experience and state of mind, and I can at least put myself back in that place while listening to it. Five Score just feels like it has no idea who it wants to relate to, and ends up nowhere.

Why get hung up on identifying the person that it "wants" to relate to? I relate to some of it and don't relate to other parts of it, because not all of those experiences are things I've been through. But then, I don't have to relate to something to appreciate it - I've certainly never been old and about to die, nor have I been so torn up over unrequited love that I wanted to fake my own suicide. (That last one's a bad example 'cause it's a dumb song, but my lack of relating to it is not what makes it dumb.)

I figure as these guys grow older, they're going to have more diverse experience and song ideas and different band members contributing different ideas. I don't think it's fair to expect these things to uniformly conform to "adults only" tastes or to "kids only" tastes or whatever. It's going to be an amalgamation. Maybe that'll make their music hit-or-miss for people like you who expect a more unified purpose and statement or else you can't take a band seriously, but honestly, that's a bit of a rigid requirement. For the most part, even with the "serious" messages here and there, I still consider RK a "mostly for fun" type of band.

[Ian]

So basically it sounds like you didn't want the band to "grow up", given your criticisms of anything they've done later on that attempts to be "serious".

I don't expect them to stay a highschool band forever.  What I do expect, or at last hope for, is that they carry over the same creativity they displayed into whatever new direction they might take.  They failed to do that almost entirely on Five Score.  I liked the intro track a lot, and Deathbed is really a pretty good song even if I do find it a bit long winded.  However, the remainder of the album just lacked the same spark of fun and creativity present in their earlier albums.  And fun =/= goofiness.  I don't expect them to keep making silly mini-tracks their entire career by any means.

I'm glad you could be present in the studio during their decision-making progress. Must be great to know a band's exact motivation for making a decision that you disagreed with.

u_u