The movie has special relevance to my #2 selection of the Top 500. Our battered protagonist, Rob Gordon (Fleming in the book), has reconciled with is girlfriend and is making a mixed tape for (a tradition of romantic communication):
"I started to make a tape, in my head, for Laura. Full of stuff she'd like. Full of stuff that would make her happy. For the first time I can sorta see how that's done"
....and then the record button is pressed, the volume pumps up, Rob fades out of our lives, replaced by the verse-to-chorus glory of "I Believe (When I Fall in Love It Will Be Forever)". Maybe the best chorus ever penned and performed for a love song. Its not without a significant amount of embarrassment that I admit that I did not become fully cognizant of how great a song this was until High Fidelity. I will avoid details of my relationship to early disco/soul/funk artists, other than to say it came much later in my life. I do not like this song because it appears in my 2nd favorite movie, or because I want to be like Rob Gordon (even if I am like him) -- I love it because it is hands down one of the best love songs ever recorded. Admittedly, it was also well placed in the film.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Sidebar: Evidence that I don't have an artificial and pathetic need to emulate Rob Gordon...
In the movie (actually in a deleted scene) he was asked to select his Top 5 records of all time. This, of course tormented him. A larger list of candidates were anxiously thrown about. Actual songs named in these discussions included:
- Sin City - The Flying Burrito Brothers
- New Rose -The Damned
- Hit It and Quit It - Funkadelic
- Shipbuilding - Elvis Costello
- Mystery Train - Elvis Presley
- Spaced Cowboy - Sly and the Family Stone
- Summertime Blues - Blue Cheer
- The Upsetter - Lee "Scratch" Perry
- Let's Get it On - Marvin Gaye
- Bill Withers - Grandma's Hands
- Sound and Vision - David Bowie
- Omaha - Moby Grape
- Dancing Barefoot - Patti Smith
- Me and Baby Brother - War
- Dirty Water - The Standells
**Whoever picks the correct four will get a free MP3 DVD of the entire Top 500 mailed to them as a prize.
Clearly there is a strange lack of overlap with my taste and fictional Rob's, at least as it applies to his all-time favorites. This is disconcerting in one sense, and comforting in another. But I am getting off topic. End sidebar.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The inclusion of "I Believe" to play out the end scene and credits is an important counterpoint and maybe a conciliatory apology to Stevie Wonder. (Note: you know how upon introducing a person in journalism, it is then safe to use their last name when referring to them? It doesn't work -- or doesn't feel comfortable -- in this case. I can't call Stevie Wonder merely "Wonder". It's weird). Rob is putting this song on Laura's tape and we know his personality is NOT such that he can include a song that he himself does not find brilliant in some way. He will not, for example, include a Simple Minds song ("the #1 band to be shot in the coming musical revolution") merely because she would appreciate it. The intent in this scene is that he is incorporating her tastes, rather than expecting (demanding, almost) that she enjoy old Chess Records blues singles. In addition to the narrative closure that this scene provides, the screenplay also exonerates Stevie Wonder for a crime perpetrated in the 80s and recounted earlier in the movie.
I completely empathize with Barry the indie snob in this scene, although I think he is a total asshole about it and he needs his ass kicked (in this fictional universe). But let's repeat his concern:
"Rob, top five musical crimes perpetrated by Stevie Wonder in the '80s and '90s. Go. Sub-question: is it in fact unfair to criticize a formerly great artist for his latter day sins; is it better to burn out than to fade away?"
And here I thought Nick Hornby was being unique and insightful. To my surprise, Barry’s sentiments had been well articulated long before his verbal abuse of that hapless “middle-aged square”. The now-classic scene precipitated an avalanche of parroting by arm-chair taste critics.
I’m going to be another parrot. But I have a slightly different intent (slightly). I wish to examine Barry’s presupposition more directly:
Stevie Wonder: “Once Great Artist” as represented by “I Believe (When I Fall In Love It Will Be Forever)”
Versus
Stevie Wonder: “Latter Day Sinner” as represented by “I Just Called to Say I Love You”
I have this great need to articulate the differences because recently a friend (it’s you, Sherry McGee) expressed mild disgust (or at least confusion) at my all time #2 selection, “I Believe” . The implication was that “I Believe” was hokey, syrupy, and lame, which is what I think of “I Just Called”. I admit, I immediately got my back up. My argument at the time was thin and unformed -- something like “I Believe” is fucking awesome and “I Just Called” is total garbage. This ate away at me a little bit afterward. I had not heard “I Just Called” for about a decade (I’m guessing). They are both mid-tempo love songs by the same artist. How different could they be? More importantly, how different must they be to warrant one being my SECOND FAVORITE SONG OF ALL TIME and the other responsible for rising bile, spitting, and full-on musical hatred?
[We interrupt this program for a quick list consultation. I had a quick look at my Top 500 just now to see if there are any other examples of this “once great, now shit” chasm. Of course, every band has its share of clunkers (U2 and the Stones have a lot to answer for)....but this is not about comparing great early songs to mediocre later songs. This is about comparing an absolutely amazing song to another song of the same artist that runs completely counter to the artistic integrity of said artist – the result being so fundamentally divergent that one can only shake their head in disbelief. I could find no examples that were as “chasmic” (note this neologism – this should be a word. It is heretofore copyrighted by me) as the Stevie Wonder case study. In fact I had to go all they way down the Top 500 to #168 “Only Son” by Liz Phair before finding anything remotely similar. Liz Phair was the intelligent indie sexpot of the late 90s. She wrote great, incisive pop songs and her indie cred was unassailable. Suddenly, in 2005, Miss Phair has decided to reinvent herself as some sort of late 30s Avril Lavigne. The song "Extraordinary" is the case in point. STILL...the change from Only Son to "Extraordinary" is NOTHING compared to the difference between the two Stevie songs under consideration]
Let's examine them, shall we:
First, "I Just Called". The video might be too biasing, and in fact serves as another fine reason to abhor the song, because he sings into a phone. Close your eyes. Drink it in. Try not to hurl on your keyboard:
Okay...sorry if that ruined your mood, or in some cases, your entire day. If you like the song, you should probably move on to another website, perhaps something to do with crafts or crocheting. Now, let's move back in time, roughly a decade, and compare Stevie's 80's sin to another love song:
As far as pop songs go, I think that "I Believe" is a profoundly moving and authentic piece of work. When I like a song, I often (carelessly, perhaps) throw the term "authenticity" around as a counterpoint to opposing terms, such as "formulaic", "derivative", "banal", or "pile of shit". None of these terms reference any objective or otherwise sensory characteristics of the song in question. On the contrary, calling a song "soulful" (a useful synonym for authentic) or calling a song "cheesy" or "lame" is not referring to any directly apprehendable quality but to the emotional impact on the listener. This is an endemic problem of any art criticism. I might find a painting "transcendent" but saying so has no clear relationship to colour composition, subject matter or even to the symbolic meaning that might be derived from the image. In other words, talking about why a song is "good" is difficult work because it is laborious -- it takes some time to make the interpretive connections between a song's sonic qualities and constituent parts with meaning and history and context and....yeah, all that. That's why so many people don't bother and are happy to just feel it. I can't say I blame them. Why intellectualize something that touches your soul?
Because inquiring minds want to fucking know. How could Stevie Wonder create joyous, glorious, perfect pop in 1972 and then follow up in 1984 with such an abomination? But that's not the real question at all, is it? The real question is Why do I believe that "I Believe" is a great song and why do I believe that "I Just Called" is a terrible song. And in answering that question I am learning something about music (and aligning myself with record snobs like the fictional Barry, and distancing myself from the pop masses, i.e., the gazillions of people who bought and fawned over "I Just Called to Say I Love You").
[Sidebar, dear reader and listener: This second, I am listening to the song "What Would I Want? Sky" by Animal Collective and I think you should all go out and get this song, and play it, and love it, and become enraptured by the simplicity of a single flower, and maybe crab walk for the rest of the day, and......yeah.]
Let's get ready to ramble...the lyrical comparison
I want to start by saying that the lyrical component of these two songs are not as important as you might think (click to enlarge lyrics). In fact, if you somehow were able switch the lyrics of each song to the music of the other, "I Just Called" would be drastically improved by the music and "I Believe" would still be awful, but not quite as awful as before, because the lyrics help the cause.
[Curious observation: The stanzas could TOTALLY be exchanged in terms of rhythm, meter, and phrasing - there are only minor differences due to the number of syllables. This makes our comparison even more urgent. These songs are essentially structured the same way...yet differ fundamentally]
The lyrical differences, however, are obvious. "I Just Called" is bloated with superficial sentiment. "I Believe" is also sentimental, but with a narrative that runs much deeper. The latter's lyrics are not profound (Stevie is no Leonard Cohen) but sweetly dignified. You know, as opposed to nauseating.
Forget the verses of both songs, all you need to know is embedded in the choruses:
I believe when I fall in love with you it will be forever
I believe when I fall in love this time it will be forever
vs.
I just called to say I love you
I just called to say how much I cared
I just called to say I love you
And I mean it (wait for it) from the bottom of my heart
"I Just Called" suffers from a soul destroying mundanity. Interestingly, it is the mundanity of life that Stevie hopes to spruce up with his...his "IDEA". Just call someone, any old day, and say you love them. Why? Because its sweet and unexpected. This is the sort of shit that makes mothers swoon and spinsters slow dance with their Swiffers. This is the Cosby Show ethos. Observe:
The studio audience goes wild. Have you ever witnessed someone - a friend, let's say - call someone else "just to say I love you?" I have too. Its annoying and embarrassing. Mostly. Unless you're really over-the-top fucked up in love, in which case I say it's okay. But Stevie Wonder wants to promote this as best practices in relationships, all relationships, all the time. This is a picture of life enshrined in a mass produced Hallmark Card.
"I Believe" on the other hand is dramatic. This song tells the story of individual who has loved and lost, who is alone, set adrift, who exhibits a mournful emptiness. But there is vindication, there is deliverance from darkness, there is HOPE. And this is the hope we place in love, in the newness...THIS TIME, I have it right, I BELIEVE!! This song is about salvation. (Unfortunately (for me) Stevie takes salvation a bit far and starts talking about God, but never mind that). All this works because the lyrics are supported and driven by some fine songwriting and sonic decisions.
I just called to say I'm singing a really bad song
I would just like to make the quick observation that Stevie Wonder sounds WAYYYY better when there's a bit of angst in his voice -- a bit of loss followed by a bit of redemption. Have you heard "Big Brother?". Stevie is singing about some serious socio-economic, political shit. And it works. There is passion. There is no passion present in "I Just Called" - I could get more worked up over a tepid bowl of oatmeal. In "I Believe", Stevie wears his pain, and then his redemption, on his sleeve. But the power comes from the six or so vocal parts that coalesce as the outro of the song. This is a full-on celebration here and the listener believes, believes, believes, as the vocal lines feed and bounce off each other. I'm inspired every time (and its been a lot of times).
Synthetic beats, 80's Synths, and that annoying Cha Cha Cha
So, no, its not necessary to deconstruct all the specific machinations of both songs. But there are some clear points of divergence that help crystallize the lame-awesome divide. One is the bass. The bass in "I Just Called" starts as a beautiful drone to undergird the darkness of the first verse, but when the song kicks into the chorus the bass up-scales to bright funk-bass notes that jog alongside Stevie's vocals. That sound!! That 70's funk bass sound kills me every time!. We're so used to it chugging along inside an upbeat danceable rhythm but in this case its all mid-tempo and thick and resonant and bouyant -- like you could lie across the notes and they'd keep you afloat and carry you to your lover. I'm fucking serious, stop laughing at me.
Go back now and listen to "I Just Called". I don't even have to go back, I can just switch on my old Kawai 1985 Electronic Keyboard, select "Mersey Beat", and hit the autochord feature. This gives me THE EXACT bass rhythm and chord progression as Stevie. This is deeply disturbing.
Stevie also does not use his gorgeous grand piano sound or his funkadelic Moog synthesizers -- he is using something else, and that something else is embarrassing -- its thin, and chimy and is about as soulful as a vacuum cleaner. To add egregious insult to devastating injury, Stevie uses the dreaded "Cha Cha Cha" device to end the song, where a triplet chord is snugly fit into two beats. Listen - you know what I mean. This is exactly what canned synthesizer rhythms are programmed to do when you push the "end" or "finish" or "shoot me in head" button.
This is what I mean by authenticity - or lack thereof. And I don't really fault Stevie Wonder. The man has enough cred from the 60s and 70s to carry him to his deathbed as far as I am concerned. Something strange happened in the 80s, and Stevie was not the only victim. There was a new technology as analog moved to digital and as MIDI became an accepted way to generate sounds. The new sounds of the day were novel and exciting and different. This is why Howard Jones or the Thompson Twins were taken semi-seriously for exactly 3 years. Because they were on the dull cutting edge of 80's sound generation.
People discovered pretty quick (somehow...it's very mysterious) that these synthetic sounds lacked something. The sounds were thin and invariant. There was no natural resonance, no analog warmth, no....intimacy. Now I would say that this is fine for certain types of songs. It worked for Depeche Mode, or Devo, or Blancmange, because those bands were not about intimacy, they were about detachment and distance and fabrication. Stevie, however, was a soul singer. Match a soul singer with clear, untouched (non-experimental, unironic) synthesizer tones of an 80's pedigree and you have the ULTIMATE shallow and prefabricated pop song -- the perfect recipe for superficiality, the antithesis of authenticity. Stevie didn't mean to do it! The equipment was new. It all seemed like innovation (or at least keeping up with the times). He wasn't the only one, either. "Jump" by Van Halen tells a similar story.
These synthesizer tones also have the unfortunate by-product of clearly dating a song to an era -- its like aural carbon dating that is accurate within 1.5 years. "That keyboard sound...that sounds about 1984". And what do we remember from the 80s? Well that depends on who you ask, but I remember pastels, blazers, REALLY bad hair, and egocentric excesses of the silliest type. This was the "me generation". It was also probably the worst decade of music. This unwelcome imagery makes "I Just Called" all the more insufferable.
"I Believe" in contrast was classically constructed. In addition to the fabulous bass tone you have the rich piano lead and reverbed/flanged electric guitar providing all sorts of lovely harmonics. The drums are understated, but the eighth note "tak tak tak tak" throughout the chorus separates it from the verses and brings an energy that matches the redemptive sentiment. Or something. I can't say enough about it, really.
So what did I learn? Something about lyrics, vocal execution, sonics and production driving authenticity. As in the above conversation. I have to stop now because this has forced me to listen to "I Just Called" far too many times than is recommended. Luckily, I have also listened "I Believe" many, many times to write this, which helped cleanse me as I was dirtied. In fact, I was afraid that the two songs, so close together on my stereo, might annihilate one another.
Okay, I promise future points won't be so drawn out -- got a little crazy this time.
