Ubiquity can kill cool pretty quick. It's tempting to argue that only snobs care about the contexts in which pop music achieves recognition, but I think it's a little more complicated than that. Take Sara Bareilles and her debut single of a few years ago "Love Song." If we're looking at it musically, there isn't much difference between that peppy piano driven ditty and cuts from bands like Bird and the Bee or Beautiful Small Machines. In the no-more-royalties-from-record-sales-age, artists should be free to license their music to the highest bidder because everybody's gotta get their grind and kids need college funds. The risk becomes the degree to which music might get burdened by association. Suddenly, pop music comes packaged with a lot of things that maybe we didn't sign up for (beyond radio formats or annoying fan bases). Things like shitty romantic comedy trailers and Banana Republic tie-ins. And it's those associations that give me more pause when talking about Sara Bareilles than her tunes, which are jams if you're into 70s-ish piano pop.
Anyway, I think I danced around the is-she-cool-enough-to-post-issue-fuck-it-her-new-single-is-a-jam issue long enough. "King of Anything" ladies and gentleman. Coming soon to a Gap near you.
Another discussion entirely, but I think it is interesting that she decided to cover her face on her first LP's album art considering she is stunningly beautiful.
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