Back in Black, Not Really a Hack
A few years ago, Rebecca Black became a viral meme. The Internet rendered her as a spoiled girl with a rich daddy who couldn’t say no to her ludicrously unrealistic wish of becoming a pop star. The result was a relatively expensive-looking music video for “Friday,” an objectively bad (if catchy) track that sounded like it was being sung by an annoying chipmunk. The performances in the video have the feel of avant-garde cringe comedy, but they weren’t trying to be funny.
I’ve been vaguely aware over the years that Rebecca Black has continued making music, but recently, sinking into some weird YouTube black hole, I decided to check out her latest single, “Foolish.” It seriously is a revelation.
Just like before, the music is derivative (there is even a fake Daft Punk member playing bass guitar), the video is close to but not quite what it needs to be, and her look is very attractive but a hair shy of professionally machined.
BUT — the music is no more derivative than any other song on the pop charts. The video is really close to being indistinguishable from top shelf product. And her singing is 100% passable. In short, “Foolish” is absolutely a good pop song, and there is no reason why you should fawn over Selena Gomez and scoff at Rebecca Black. And I say this as someone who likes Selena Gomez. And by that I mean, I like a selection of tracks that have been funneled through Selena Gomez.
Because that’s what pop is. It’s songs that are crafted by songwriting teams and recorded with a very specific sheen, a very specific palette of sounds, according to quite stringent rules — and then the end product is delivered through a vessel that sells the song. The quality of that vessel is measured in a variety of ways that might seem rather alien to someone arriving here in a time machine from a few decades back.
When I tweeted about “Foolish,” one response I got was someone saying (in good fun) that they refused to listen. This was not a surprising response; I think it’s probably how a lot of people would react to hearing there’s a new Rebecca Black song. This is an indication that Black is not a great vessel — she has high negatives, to put it in political parlance. On the other hand, she does have pretty high name recognition, and a large social media following. And she was 13 when “Friday” came out! Few people do their best work at 13. Presumably, most pop stars in the coming years will have embarrassing early performances captured in 4K that will linger on the Internet. Some of them will go on to make brilliant music. Or, at the very least, music that’s as good as other popular music.
The fast forward march of technology is allowing an ongoing revolution in the arts. It used to be that you could only be a fan. Now being a fan often means you’re also creating, and you’re creating at a surface level that is inching ever closer to that of your idols. Great ideas are still hard to come by, but you can be very competitive in pop music without a single great idea. I love the thought that Rebecca Black could one day have a legitimate hit on her hands, giving her the last laugh. Why wouldn’t you root for that?
If the answer is that you want only truly talented artists to have mainstream success, that ship has sailed some time ago. If you don’t like the idea that people can buy their way to success, that ship has not visited a harbor in your lifetime. Lighten up — pop music is a lovely joke, and Rebecca Black is smiling. Let’s smile along with her.
