#135. Ali Barter - Girlie Bits (#58, 2016)
16th of 2016
In late 2015, triple j were playing the song "Hypercolour" just about once a day. It largely passed me by for weeks until it suddenly clicked with me one day to become one of my favourite songs released that year. Just a really lovely brand of shiny pop rock that manages to ramp up the action upon successive choruses without making a big show of it. It was followed up by "Far Away" in 2016 which I liked even more. Huge soaring vocals and psychedelic rock riffs. I want to link it but it's been partially subbed out online for the album version from 2017. Maybe I'm just too used to the single, but it's never sounded quite right to me, whatever was done to it.
Afterwards, Ali Barter had a pretty big career boon in the form of "Girlie Bits". It mostly proved to be a one-off moment as nothing has come close to matching it since. I feel like she did plenty of note after that. I'm particularly fond of the song "Backseat" which appears to be written in her own younger perspective meeting her husband Oscar Dawson of Dukes of Windsor/Holy Holy fame. He's an active part of her music career with producer credits all over her discography. It couldn't have been planned but the song also mentions Tool within months of them finally releasing their 5th album. In any case, I don't think another hit is coming because Ali Barter appears to have put an end to her music career. She's now a tour guide in India, as I'm sure you expected.
For these purposes, we've just got the one song. It probably isn't that surprising. As we've seen before (#162) and we'll see later on, one solid way to tap into the zeitgeist is to make a song about how sexist the music industry is, whether it's the fans or the labels (who are enabled by those fans). Writing songs about industry stuff can be potentially risky because a lot of the biggest issues faced by musicians are ones behind the scenes that the public aren't necessarily empathetic to. It helps when the statement feels universal.
I'm going to once again lift all my information from an Inspired interview. "Girlie Bits" was written on Ali Barter's honeymoon and in part came from her own self-esteem issues with her body. A big driving factor though was the essay that Bethany Cosentino from Best Coast had recently published (my timeline tells me it was just a few weeks prior). She spoke largely about the double standards experienced by women who are expected to put up with more unreasonable responses while also having much less capacity for response to it. I can't believe she was generous enough to do an AMA on /r/indieheads a few years later given how awful their response was to the essay at the time. The song's most memorable lyric, 'You don't understand what it's like to be a man' is reportedly a real thing said to Ali by an ex-boyfriend. I think about how Ali Barter is another musician who had their big moment of stardom a little bit later than life than usual (she was about to turn 31 when this song was released) and how it adds to the lived-in weariness of it all.
It's a very easy song to like anyway. Maybe despite what I've said before, pop-punk is the universal language. The main points of reference here were The Offspring & Veruca Salt circa 1994, though Ali sounds a bit different with her higher vocal register. That's another part of the process that was important to her, as it felt truer to herself than previous times when she was deliberately trying to escape her choir girl past. An appropriate conclusion to be reached in a song about being yourself against the grain of ridiculous societal expectations.
#134. Lorde - Royals (#2, 2013)
27th of 2013
There aren't many songs that feel so omnipresent, so well worn out that it leaves me at a bit of a loss to try and start a new dialogue on them. "Royals" is absolutely one of those songs. There are songs that were maybe technically bigger hits on raw numbers, but they rarely feel as complete a story as "Royals". It's a song we've all encountered and accepted as part of our lives. Whenever I do Sporcle quizzes relating to music in the 21st century, I can almost guarantee "Royals" will be the most correctly guessed song. It's so instantly recognisable and unmistakeable like that.
Funnily enough, "Royals" didn't even get to #1 in Australia. If you're willing to be extremely pedantic, it didn't even chart in Australia. Potentially as a holdover from when it wasn't quite obviously a big deal, it always charted as part of Lorde's "The Love Club" EP (although ARIA eventually re-credited it as "The Love Club EP Feat. Royals" which is very funny). We don't have a very good picture of how "Royals" actually performed in Australia because the EP was boosting it every single week. There's a week in July where it bolts up to a new peak of #32 before really taking off, but in actual fact, "Tennis Court" (#496) was at #35 and was the most downloaded Lorde single that week. The double-edged sword in all of this is that it's probably Australia's early curiosity that cost Lorde a chance at a #1 single. "Royals" had just done the rounds for so long that by the time it became a global sensation, it didn't have as much juice to give out. 2013 as a chart year felt especially prominent for this because sales were so high that it felt like a genuine struggle to hang around on the charts for particularly long. In any case, "The Love Club" wound up as the 5th biggest hit of the year in Australia, effectively a bigger hit here than in all of those countries that it got to #1 in, apart from New Zealand of course (it was the 2nd biggest hit of the year there).
The main unique insight I have with all of this is just how strange it's all been to watch this unfold. I have to think back to March 2013 when none of the pretence or discourse really existed. It was just a song that was getting played on triple j. If you're of the belief that all hits are destined and they just need the audience, then you have to spend a long time watching this song twiddling its thumbs because it clearly wasn't getting anything more than a glimmer of attention that might see it pop up in the top half of the Hottest 100 if it isn't forgotten about. I liked the song but I saw no aspirations from it, it just sounded like a new triple j Unearthed band getting their moment in the sun. I accept that it's a big part of the music landscape now, but a lot of that reputation has been earned retrospectively as a reaction to its popularity. "Royals", the enormous hit song, says a lot of things that "Royals", the quirky niche indie hit, could never have managed. Even if by all accounts, it's the same song it always was.
The interesting thing about great success is that it brings scrutiny along the way that might never have been anticipated. Relative obscurity allows you a blanket of a shrug for a lot of criticism because the stakes are low and it affects nothing. Nobody is firing up a major think piece because one anonymous internet comment said that rap music is all about parties & bling. If that person was ever taken to task for it, it'd probably be very easy to make them back down. Write it in a hit song though, and all of a sudden it's seen as your primary mantra, and dunking on it with a more sophisticated second opinion is a very lucrative option.
Something that has become abundantly clear to me over the years is how often this batch of discourse is just completely separate to the driving force that makes the songs popular in the first place. The internet becomes a bunch of witless Waldorfs & Statlers who insist on peering over from the balcony to see what's been put on offer, pretending they're the tastemakers even as it's all decided what's going on stage before they've had any input. From this same era, I think of the song "Blurred Lines". You probably remember that one. It was very controversial, because of its music video, its lyrics, its copyright lawsuit and the record pace Robin Thicke set in making sure no one wanted to root for him. You might not remember there was a solid couple of months before any of that was true. "Blurred Lines" was just one of those songs that stood out because people liked it, they quickly made it a hit and it went to #1 everywhere. This song that sounded like nothing else around at the time was so big that it still holds the record for the highest one week audience impressions in America according to Mediabase. The discourse was just so late to the party that the fact feels like an artefact. If they had a chance to do it over, I'd think radio would be just a little bit more hesitant to put all their chips in for the ultimate 'no means yes' anthem.
"Royals" had a similar, if less dramatic fate. It spent a long time as 'cool indie tune, this Lorde might be one to watch'. One of the big musical moments of the year in Australia was when Frank Ocean cancelled his appearance at Splendour in the Grass, and with very little advance warning, Lorde stepped in to take his place, crushed it, and endeared herself to so many people overnight. I don't think anyone was really accusing Lorde of being racist at the time. But anyway, as is often the case, America came late to the party and brought all their baggage with them.
I do not want to diminish the attention of potential racism in the music industry and its fans. There's a storied history going way back of white artists being gifted opportunities over people of colour. These things don't even have to come from racism itself, but from people going about their regular business that through a group summation of activity, produces a gentrified result. 2013 was also the year when the Hip-Hop & R&B charts were dominated by Macklemore, Robin Thicke, Eminem & Justin Timberlake. It's not that these artists don't have their place, but when they're taking it all for themselves, you have to wonder if some of the common rhetoric needs to be challenged in some way.
For many, "Royals" was part of this rhetoric. She doesn't say it out loud, but she does spend the song's pre-chorus listing off cliches she's grown weary of that seem to be exclusively targeting the world of hip-hop. One of those moments of lucidity where I don't think she intended this in her head or heart but subconsciously brought it out, unfettered until an external audience had a reflexive response. Then we got a response to the response where some people did manage to dial it back and remind everyone that we're talking about a teenage girl from New Zealand who wasn't raised on the American way of thinking (just their music videos). There's always more nuance involved and you need to slow down lest you become both a caricature and a net negative on your own activism. There's absolutely a conversation to be had, and I suspect Lorde learnt a lot from the experience, but generally just slamming someone as a racist for potentially unwittingly perpetuating systemic racism won't do any good for anyone.
All this in mind, I don't think that aspect of the song is what made it big. It's just a song that sounds fresh and engaging on the radio. It came out at just about the right time, when there were diminishing returns on club beats, and something this minimal could have a place in the world (something to be said about Adele and/or Gotye setting the stage). The most memorable thing in the song for me are the backing vocals in the chorus. It's giving off a capella harmony group but managing to make it sound like a pop hit instead of a weird gimmick that feels like it's positioning itself above the pop world. Mostly though, the success of this song always felt like a reminder to me that there's a big audience for quirky alternative hits and it's only stifled by reach. I've spent many a time grappling with my own self-assured confidence that this song I like could absolutely be big, but first needs everyone to think that it's big enough that it's worth caring about. Just that bit of hope that in amongst all the astroturfing and payola equivalents, the sway of an undeniably likeable song can always come out on top given the right circumstances. Lorde didn't need to go #1 in Australia or on the Hottest 100 though, that kind of luxe just isn't for her.
#133. The Amity Affliction - Pittsburgh (#22, 2014)
17th of 2014
This song is called "Pittsburgh" because it's about Joel's experience at the Vans Warped Tour in Pittsburgh where he had a near death experience following a seizure. It did have me thinking about what I knew about Pittsburgh. I know it's the home of the Penguins, Pirates & Steelers. It's got three rivers though I can only name one of them (and I can't spell it). People who live there call themselves yinzers. This one time I pulled off a miracle solo get in a mock-up Jeopardy! game in the improbable Final category of Colleges & Universities against two North Americans, because I pulled out my relatively arcane knowledge book for Carnegie Mellon University being in Pittsburgh. The crowd were stunned.
Jeopardy! also taught me about a TV show set in Pittsburgh, in a manner so irregular that it felt like it was paid advertisement. If that's the case, congrats HBO, you got me to watch so many ads for Euphoria in the past 3 weeks on your streaming service. But yes, I'm talking about The Pitt, the medical drama with the gimmick of taking place roughly in real time, with each season taking place across an entire shift in the emergency department. It's very good. It paints a very sympathetic light to the plights of emergency doctors in a way that's been sorely needed in the 2020s. They don't really talk about it but it'll make you think twice before you start saying any amount of positive COVID-19 cases is not a big deal. The big surprise in it all for me though was that it probably has my favourite representation of a neurodivergent character I've ever encountered in media. I spoke about it before I'd known about this (#186). Usually if there's a problem to be had, it's with the way they're treated as a piece of the story. A neurodivergent person is always either a burden, or a burden that turns into a savant, but very rarely a character with their own agency. When I watch The Pitt, I see a character that's just treated and respected like a person and you have no idea how much it means to me. Thank you, Bryan Cranston's daughter.
"Pittsburgh" was an event single. We'd had brief instances of metalcore singles making small splashes on the bottom end of the chart, but I don't think anyone was ready in April 2014 to look at the iTunes chart and see The Amity Affliction up at #3 on downloads. This was before streaming was part of the charts too so it was a freak incident that couldn't be ignored. The only problem was that the song was released on a Monday, so it only had half a week to amass sales. Still, it managed to land at #28 on the ARIA Chart which was unprecedented. Given my current unshakeable association of Pittsburgh with Euphoria, it's appropriate that this was also the single week in history that Zendaya had a top 10 single, with "Replay". The Amity Affliction would course correct a year later when "Shine On" (#935) was released on a Friday and managed to chart at #19 in Australia.
Often times when bands are playing outside of the usual audience of the pop charts, there's a desire to measure it in the same terms. It'll probably be disappointing because the overarching circumstances tend to outweigh the practical reality of 'They're charting high because they've made their big crossover single'. Did you know that Iron Maiden had a #1 single in the UK? It even lasted two weeks at the top. Unless you're very invested in these stats then there's no way you'd be able to name it as it's not remotely one of the band's most famous songs. It's just a random quirk of a 'hit' at the right place and right time. It's possible that by the same token, any song by The Amity Affliction released as a lead single at this point would do something similar to "Pittsburgh".
In spite of this though, I think they absolutely rose to the occasion for this one. I tend to be fascinated by novelties of all sorts in the charts, and The Amity Affliction sitting in the top 30 between "Say Something" and "Free" (#858) is a novelty. I bought into it though. I wasn't opposed to The Amity Affliction on any principle, but if they were to make a crossover single, then it had to be this one. Every time that drum fill comes back in and Ahren belts out that idiosyncratic but memorable hook, it's just that exact release of energy you want from something like this. I wasn't alone in my feeling and the song has absolutely stuck the landing, becoming arguably the band's signature song. The fact that the song also inadvertently got me to discover a new TV show to enjoy over a decade later, it's just the gift that keeps on giving.
#132. Angie McMahon - Missing Me (#49, 2018)
12th of 2018
We don't really get blues music in the Hottest 100 very much anymore, I don't think it's especially hip with the kids. It used to be, or at least there was a large enough contingent of older voters seeing it through. Gone are the days when we'd get a song called "Blues Music". Actually it's always worth noting that John Lee Hooker had the first ever Hottest 100 entry, so there was a brief, pre-Shamen period where the annual Hottest 100 was nothing but blues music. I guess I can't put it past a random resurgence in some capacity, it probably just needs the right song to do it. Given that Hozier recently had a #1 hit with a somewhat bluesy number, I don't think it's impossible.
I don't know if "Missing Me" necessarily meets all the qualifications to be considered blues music, but when I think about the song, it's always that stuttering guitar riff that I think of first. It sounds staggered and haggard. Once Angie chimes in, there's an extra layer of heft behind it all as well. The emphasis she puts on the word 'thrown', like she's heaving it right at us. It's all exemplified in the first minutes of the song where it feels like a series of false starts and half-commitments. It's right around the minute mark where the powder keg finally goes off, that's the moment that might have singlehandedly pushed this song so high up on this list.
Something that's easy to forget with this is that we're literally looking at Angie McMahon's second single. Only "Slow Mover" (#260) comes before this one. I wouldn't say that she sounds obviously unready on that single, but what little naïveté was there is replaced by world-weariness here. It's something I've come to appreciate getting older while following the world of music where it's not part of the agenda. In more ways than one, Angie McMahon is providing some much appreciated variety in this countdown dictated by the nation's youth.
#131. Lorde - Team (#15, 2013)
26th of 2013
I don't know if this proves that a hit song need not be a think-piece magnet in order to be a hit song or not. Realistically, I don't think I've ever heard any discussion that breaks down anything substantial about the song "Team". I've never read a headline on it beyond 'Hey, Lorde's just released a new single called "Team"'. It's a big hit all the same, though obviously not on the same stature as "Royals" (#134). On some level you can consider that not having anyone talking about the song like that will get it less attention, but surely a lot of it is down to the fact that some songs just don't have that ceiling in general. I like "Team" slightly more, but I'm not about to call it some sort of injustice that "Royals" was a bigger hit.
I look now though and "Team" is actually getting more daily listeners on Spotify than "Royals". Perhaps the reverse is true now and it's easier to coast on by if a song doesn't generate attention like that. You hear the start of "Royals", immediately know what it is, and maybe have second thoughts on if you want to go through that all. "Team" just has no baggage attached to it, so it's hard to imagine anyone getting worn down by it. Maybe only back when it was fairly popular and there's a good chance you heard it too often.
It feels weird to say this, but from an American perspective, "Team" has one valuable role in that it definitively locks Lorde out of any consideration from being a one hit wonder. She's obviously had many hits, but when you look at the charts, it's just this and "Royals" that ever felt like they stuck the landing. Everything else tended to debut high and crash out quickly, even if they did well in the long run ("Ribs" is 4xPlatinum in America despite peaking at #99). Its success in America felt inexplicable at the time, like it was running on its own fumes and being overrepresented as a result. This is partially correct in that it was all the radio. "Team" was never a song that song particularly well and most of its global stats were pretty unremarkable. The power of an aggressive radio airplay push meant that it spent over 3 months in the Billboard top 10 where it could have just as easily spent zero weeks there. I suppose it was momentum earned from a recent #1 hit (Iggy Azalea did the same with "Black Widow" less than a year later), but I find myself thinking of all the popular songs that can't chart because of songs like "Team" taking up space by default. Like the rest of Lorde's discography for instance. "Tennis Court" (#496) was going around at the same time and got a half-hearted radio push almost a year late to the party, so it only peaked at #71 in America. In Australia, these were roughly similar sized hits at the time. In any case, it gave the song a rather inflated result of being one of the top 20 biggest hits of 2014 in America, which is another sign of how "Royals" opened up doors because that's just an outlandish result for a song like this.
"Team" is entirely pleasant radio affair. Maybe they'd consider cutting the first 30 seconds because it takes a little while to get going. I want to say in hindsight that it fits perfectly in place but I think it's another step in the way Lorde absolutely changed the pop scene going forward. In the years coming, you'd see artists like Halsey & Alessia Cara who'd owe a lot to Lorde for making their moody pop feel more in vogue. "Team" isn't really a moody song. It does everything it can be sound anthemic. I just think that there's a limit when you've got Joel Little's production that's saturated in drums, claps & discordant synths. It's songs like this that probably phased on the default mood on the radio about throwing your hands up in the air, so yeah.
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