The (Bad) Romance Is Back at Top 40

This is a guest post by Sean Ross as part of the Ross On Radio series.

“Where has the romance gone?”

The person asking the question was prominent radio consultant Guy Zapoleon. The time was summer 2001. And the song that had provoked the discussion was the group 112’s double entendre-laden “Peaches and Cream,” which ended up prompting an article about whether lyrics had finally gone too far.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6J0zaSGYeHY?feature=oembed&w=540&h=404]

“Peaches and Cream” was one of the more graphic provocations then, if songs about eating, well, peaches bothered you, but it was hardly the only one. At that moment:

• Eminem was a multi-format phenomenon, each hit laden with zingers that you couldn’t believe were on the radio.
• Nelly’s “Ride Wit Me” was not just a hit, but a smash with adult women, despite the implied use of “mother****er.”
• “Lady Marmalade,” the provocative lyric of 1975, was back at №1, bringing Lil’ Kim to pop radio with it.
• Destiny’s Child had just released “Bootylicious,” with its curious attempt to recast that word as something positive.
• Janet Jackson, still several years away from wardrobe malfunction, managed to work the phrase “nice package” into “All for You.”

All of this was happening at a time when top 40 radio’s late ’90s resurgence was giving way to a new period of dominance for R&B/Hip-hop and extreme rock. CHR stations that had been almost modern AC were being pushed out of the format by rap-heavy CHRs playing DMX and Ol’ Dirty Bastard. But even in the softest, poppiest hit of the time, Uncle Kracker’s “Follow Me,” there wasn’t much romance, with its inducement to cheat on one’s spouse and its warning not to expect the narrator to stay around after.

It was always fun to chronicle the new lyrical provocations of pop music. I’d done so in 1990 when the songs in question were Bell Biv Devoe’s “Poison” and Madonna’s “Hanky Panky.” And I happily gave Zapoleon a forum for his concerns in 2001. But I felt pretty certain in two things:

• Each generation would find its own level of lyrical outrageousness that made previous outrages seem pretty tame. When I started reading the trades, it was the Rev. Jesse Jackson complaining about “Shake Your Booty” by KC & the Sunshine Band.
• This discussion would move in only one direction. Today’s pop hits would always seem explicit until something more graphic came along.

But a few days ago, I got another e-mail from Zapoleon, now the senior VP of programming research and strategy for iHeart Radio. This time, he was asking, “Have you written about the new trend toward romance and fidelity that’s starting to emerge with music?”

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-99JEIwZq0?feature=oembed&w=540&h=304]

The songs that had prompted this e-mail were Omi’s “Cheerleader” and Andy Grammer’s “Honey I’m Good.” The former came to America as an international hit, just hit №1 on the Billboard Hot 100, and remains a strong candidate for Song of Summer 2015. “Honey I’m Good” was a harder-fought hit–needing week after week of strong sales to keep from being pigeonholed as an adult top 40 record.

Then we started naming others: Walk the Moon’s “Shut Up and Dance,” almost as gushing a love song as “Cheerleader”; Ed Sheeran’s “Thinking Out Loud”; John Legend’s “All of Me” and Magic!’s “Rude” last year. Was this, Zapoleon asked, the doing of a new generation with different values? With a few days to think about it, what we’re hearing is probably the redefining of romance for this generation.

If you’re still looking for lyrical provocations, you’ll find them. Both Tove Lo hits, for instance. Or David Guetta’s “Hey Mama,” in which Nicki Minaj is ready to take 112 up on their offer of many years ago. Or Maroon 5’s “This Summer’s Gonna Hurt,” which takes Nelly’s one passing “mother****er” and ups the ante considerably.

And you’ll find a lot of romance, but of an edgier sort:

• Zapoleon cited Sam Smith’s “Stay With Me,” but that lyric isn’t so different from “Follow Me.” The romance in that song or “I’m Not the Only One” stems from the narrator’s willingness to accept a bad relationship over no relationship.
• The Weeknd’s “Earned it” and Ellie Goulding’s “Love Me Like You Do” are two lushly romantic ballads that happen to come from the soundtrack of “Fifty Shades of Grey” (which only makes them even more romantic for certain fans).
• Jason Derulo’s “Want to Want Me” is more about late-night lust than romance, but comes off as sweet-natured, perhaps helped by comparison with “Talk Dirty.”
• Fetty Wap’s equally sweet-natured “Trap Queen” is a “ride-or-die chick” lyric that could have been from 2001 (as could the song itself).

Then there’s “All of Me.” It was the most traditional-sounding ballad in years, but it was, if you think about the lyrics, really “Bad Romance” by Lady Gaga, merely made slower and more painfully earnest. Or a slightly less dysfunctional version of “Love the Way You Lie,” the song about a truly bad romance that earned Eminem a place at Hot AC for a while.

What seems to be working is some combination of love and plausible deniability — you can be romantic as long as you’re not all mushy about it. Even Andy Grammer peppered “Honey I’m Good”

with some mild bad grammar (specifically a “damn,” an “ass,” and a “hell”) to give that song a little more edginess than his previous “Keep Your Head Up.”

Having it both ways is very much a strategy borrowed from country. It’s been nearly a decade since “International Harvester,” the Craig Morgan hit that proved you could rock out at country radio, as long as you were singing about a tractor. Critics are eagerly awaiting the last appearance of Daisy Dukes and tailgating, but even when the references change, the formula will likely endure. And if bad romance counts as romantic, there’ll likely be a “Blank Space” at top 40 for the next such song.

The “new generation” theory shouldn’t be discounted entirely. Millennials placed a new premium on love and marriage with the role they played in making marriage equality a reality. But little of the social consciousness credited to that group has made it to the radio. There’s been a heavily documented lack of ‘60s/’70s-style social commentary in music. Which makes it interesting that one of the few exceptions was “Same Love.”

Besides, in top 40’s mother/daughter coalition, moms still hold a lot of sway. If romance matters at top 40, it’s because of the inroads that format has made against adult contemporary radio among 38-year-old women. So why wouldn’t CHR embrace “All of Me” or “Honey I’m Good,” if only eventually?

Finally, it’s worth noting that “This Summer’s Gonna Hurt” is the first Maroon 5 radio song in four years that will not ultimately be a true hit. (It also won’t be the song of summer 2015, while “Cheerleader” might.)

The single that was rushed out to replace it, “Feelings,” is definitely not about fidelity, but the previous single, “Sugar,” was Maroon 5’s most romantic, least cynical hit of recent years. At this moment, it’s receiving the most airplay of the three.