Have you ever sung along to a song only to stop and say “Wait!…What?”. In a world of auto-tuning, image consultants and gigantic record companies pumping out pop like a broken sewage pipe, often the lyrics we hear are complete gibberish. Usually written to be catchy enough that school kids will repeat them ad nauseum, the requirement to make any sense is way down the list of priorities. Any song that does convey a meaning has to be brutally naive and obvious so to effectively reach its target demographic.
Bereft of any meaning or content that would be too long for text message, record companies are all now ruthlessly scrabbling to the lowest common denominator to create songs as simple as nursery rhymes and lyrics with the emotional maturity of a foetus. Mobile phones themselves seem to appear both in lyrics and music videos and lyrics with startling frequency and every phone advert needs some sub-Feist dreamy soundtrack to sell to its hipster market. This means that often the few decent songs we hear are forever affiliated with adverts for phones featuring silhouetted idiots dancing with their headphones against coloured backgrounds.
And this is all exactly how it should be. As someone who’s just reached thirty it’s natural that modern music has become different and scary for me and my contemporaries. This current wave of confusing noise will be swept away by something else eventually that will be radical and exciting to some but terrifying and threatening to me. In the meantime, I’m going to analyse a popular chart hit that the hip cats are grooving to and show just how out of touch, but nonetheless grumpy and amusing I am.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUjdiDeJ0xg
I throw my hands up in the air sometimes
I hear you Taio, who doesn’t do that? Wait, no one ever throws their hands up in the air. Unless they’re in some kind of hostage situation I suppose. Certainly I wouldn’t do it at random. That’s crazy.
Saying AYO
Sorry? Ayo? That means nothing to me. Perhaps saying it means, “People, don’t be alarmed! Although my arms are in the air I am not a hostage at this moment!”
Gotta let go
Ok, this will come up again in future songs, but what does “let go” mean? I guess it implies inhibitions or something? Like, I’m really going to let go and wear no trousers today, or I’m finally going to try and get into heroin. Not good ideas, but hey, I’m letting go here!
I wanna celebrate and live my life
Ok, good for you Mr Cruz. Bonus points because I actually understood that!
Saying AYO
Dammit Taio!
Baby, let’s go
Understood. An indication to an attractive female (the “baby” in question) that Taio is ready to proceed with a course of action.
‘Cause we gon’ rock this club
We will enjoy this club to such an extent that it will appear to physically “rock” with movement.
We gon’ go all night
We have no intention of leaving early to get the last train home.
We gon’ light it up
Like it’s dynamite
The night shall go so well that it will be as if dynamite has been let off. This is to be interpreted as a positive thing, dynamite in this case being more of a celebratory device than an instrument for strip mining or destroying ones battlefield adversaries.
Cause I told you once
Now I told you twice
I have repeatedly tried to explain to you that..
We gon’ light it up
Like it’s dynamite
We shall make this party explode (in a good way).
I’m gonna take it all out
I’m gonna be the last one standing
Ok, you’re losing me again Taio. I shall assume he is going to take out all his frustrations, possibly by starting a fight at a kebab shop on the way home from which he will be the last one standing.
I’m alone and all I
I’m gonna be the last one landing
‘Cause I, I, Believe it
Although Taio has no friends to aid him in these late night fisticuffs, he does not need them as he believes.
And I, I, I
I just want it all
At this point we can imagine Taio is overcome with the prospect of “exploding” the club and fighting at the kebab shop and is having trouble resolving exactly what he wants.
I’m gonna put my hands in the air
Hands in the air
Put your hands in the air
Confused, but sure of one thing: the continued importance of raising ones hands in the air, an endeavour which Taio would like you to join him in.
I throw my hands up in the air sometimes
Yeah, we got that.
‘Cause we gon’ rock this club
We gon’ go all night
We gon’ light it up
Like it’s dynamite
Cause I told you once
Now I told you twice
Actually, now its thrice
We gon’ light it up
Like it’s dynamite
Indeed.
So there we go, an anthem about how Taio rocks the club so much it appears that he has set off “dy-no-mite”. At least this kind of thing isn’t so popular. I’m sure the banality of the song and lyrics means this particular song has very few views on youtube. Let me just check how many……….
we’re all doomed.