"Crossfire" by Brandon Flowers

Brandon's signature often gets him into trouble at the bank.

If you don't know who Brandon Flowers is, allow me to inform you: he is the lead singer/keyboardist for Las Vegas rock group The Killers. "Crossfire" is the lead single off of his upcoming solo debut "Flamingo", and it is a fantastic song.

It's got a lot of things going for it. The instrumental arrangement is nuanced and intelligent. The production, while a little overstated, is just right for the song. The lyrics paint a compelling portrait of a husband/wife (or comparable) relationship, and Flower's voice has never sounded more full and powerful. However, all this is eclipsed by the music video, which features Charlize Theron. Charlize Theron...fighting ninjas.

Here's the only problem: after making a video like this, Flowers' career has nowhere to go but down. He should have saved the concept for later, and instead made a video based on the album's title:

The one in front is a bit camera-shy.

This sort of video would guarantee future improvement.

"Whataya Want From Me" by Adam Lambert

"...because THIS is what you're getting."

After singing his way to fame on the 8th season of "American Idol", it was clear that Adam Lambert was on the fast track to becoming a huge star. What wasn't clear was what sort of style of music he would pursue. However, now that we've all heard his first major hit "Whataya Want From Me", well, uh, we... we still aren't really sure.

The verse plays out like a 90s alt-rock ballad, with a clean guitar riff underscoring lyrics (actually mostly written by P!nk) about some sort of relationship struggle. The music is subdued, and the tone is decidedly intimate. However, roughly a minute into the track the drums pick up and suddenly we're livin' on a prayer, with Lambert howling "Just don't give up!" like Michael Bay was suddenly hired to produce the track.

Michael Bay: "Make it sound more like THIS."

It's not that any particular part of the song is bad in and of itself (rather the opposite), it's just that the tones of the various sections just don't quite fit with one another. It's like chocolate and steak. I like both of them, but I'm not going to eat a chocolate/steak sandwich. Well, I might, but I digress.

Despite all of these criticisms, I actually like this song quite a lot, and think that Adam Lambert has a lot of potential. He just needs to decide what he wants to sound like, and work on getting top-notch songs to match his top-notch vocal abilities.

Kesha Has No Talent?

One of the funnier things I've heard recently: people saying that pop star Kesha - I'm sorry, "Ke$ha" - has "no talent". These accusations basically come down to one of the following:

1) She Can't Sing

2) She Doesn't Write Her Own Songs

3) She Can't Sing and Doesn't Write Her Own Songs

Now, why is this funny? It is not unrealistic to think that, in our age of industry songwriters and auto-tune, a successful pop star could lack skill in one or both of these departments. However, what exactly is a pop star responsible for? I propose that they essentially have the following three duties:

1) Sing

2) Write Songs

3) Look good

Now, follow this logic. If a label were to choose someone to market as a pop star, and didn't care about 1) and/or 2), which one of the following people would they choose?

"Dance Team 4 Life"

"My last name is literally Fox"

I'm not saying that Ke-dollar-ha is ugly, I'm just saying that she must have some kind of skill in 1) or 2). From what I've been able to gather, she is in fact a talented songwriter and a decent singer. It is true that the overall sonic quality of her tracks has more to do with the talents of her producer Dr. Luke (of whom I am a huge fan) than any particular skill she has, but anyone who calls her talentless has clearly not taken a good, hard look at the facts.

"Alejandro" by Lady Gaga

"Don't call my name, don't call my name, I am sleepy"

An artist of Gaga's aspirations has a lot to live up to with each successive single. For some part, she has delivered truly transcendent pop songs, such as "Bad Romance" and "Paparazzi", each of which featured splendid, expansive melodies and non-derivative harmonic material ("Paparazzi" even features a genuinely effective modulation - a rarity in pop music these days) as well as the vibrant, obsessive lyrics that make up all of the best in pop. "Alejandro" features quite the opposite: a repetitive, claustrophobic melody (at least for the chorus); a derivative progression (IV-I-V-vi for the majority of it) and lyrics that actively reject her object of obsession ("don't call my name"). While the song is catchy and has found some success, I don't believe that it possesses the same durability as Gaga's earlier hits.

This is not to say that the song is without merit. While I have criticized the chorus melody, the verse melody is quite dynamic and possesses a strong originality. It starts off with a fragment of the verse of "LoveGame" ("I wanna kiss you" becomes "she's got both hands...") and then departs into a new, varied series of phrases. The progression (i-III-v) is also striking and facilitates the inventive melody. In contrast, the pre-chorus melody is more static, as to draw attention to the rhythm; this gives the vocals the impression of rap.

While the verse is impressive, the standout moment in this song is the slow buildup of elements beginning at the bridge and continuing until the end. What could have been a one-off chorus and fin becomes an exciting minute and a half of cascading "Alejandro"s. Though this section of the song is very well-done, it could have been even better had it lasted a little longer and incorporated some of Gaga's higher, more powerful register, which is strangely underutilized.

This song fell short of absolute brilliance, but I do believe that Lady Gaga has what it takes to write durable and timeless pop music. She just needs to understand exactly what elements separate her good songs from her great ones, and focus on refining those elements. In the case of "Alejandro", I would say that her harmonizations are the biggest issue - a reharmonization of the chorus could improve this song significantly.

"I like the sound of this...HARMonization. Tell me more"