Whatever You Like

[DonnaNoble]

I agree!!!!

I like hearing Al's purdy voice


*listens to this song for the wazzilinth time*

[kyky27]

Agreed. I love his voice in this song!

[TheLazenby]

The Doctor, don't you dare Billie Roll us!

(Bird Rolling is okay though :-P)

[wayword]

Oh i dont doubt its #27 in the US i-Tunes d/l list... but not on the BRITISH chart which was the one i found. It was faulty. according to i-Tunes uk hes not in the top 100 at all

Aw, it's more of the UK lack of Al awareness and love. I understand he's just not very well-known over there-- as opposed to Canada and Australia, where he's got a good following.

Do let me know if he charts, but I won't expect it. I want him to keep drifting upwards here. Cheers!

[Theguyoverthere]

Dang nabit, just as I started really liking this song, someone had to point out the long distorted bass note constantly in the background. I never noticed it before, but now I do

Ah well, a couple dozen more listen throughs should fix it up.

[CatraDhtem]

Who wants a rambling and somewhat unclear review of the new song? Sure, we all do!

In writing this review, I'm trying not to let "new Al material euphoria" cloud my judgment, which is something I think we've all been guilty of at one point or another around here. And at the same time, I'm not going to let my disappointment at the selection of the T.I. song dampen my spirits. For the record, I would have much preferred a parody of either "I Kissed a Girl" or "So What," as not only is it about time for Al to again do a "whiny rock girl" parody but also because musically they're simply much more enjoyable songs, and I hope that they are both on Al's radar for this next album, even if just for polka inclusion (heck, I think Pink is long overdue for the Al treatment, and if she hadn't released anything new this year, then I would have been annoyingly vocal about wanting to see "U + Ur Hand" turn up in the polka). But I've long stopped second-guessing Al when it comes to picking songs to tackle...the man's been doing this for three decades.

I've never really been crazy about when people refer to songs on an album as "filler" only because it sort of denigrates the songwriting and recording process. It implies a lack of genuine effort or as much drive as the recording of the singles (and really, in a lot of cases, the artist doesn't know during the early production process which songs will be the album's singles). Professional music critics like to use the word "filler" a lot, as if only their golden ears will be able to pick out what will be the "hits" off the album.

When it comes to Al, I think the word has even more of a negative connotation because it suggests that Al is just throwing together some mildly humorous crap for you to hear until you get to the next "big" song on the album. Granted there have been cases, such as "She Never Told Me She Was a Mime," when one could be left asking, "Why does this exist?", but to say that Al's only looking to fill twelve slots on an album is a little unfair to him as both a musical artist and as a humorist. I mean, can anyone who watched, for example, the behind the scenes mini-doc on "Straight Outta Lynwood" honestly say that Al doesn't put an equal amount of tremendous effort into his songs?

So I tend to avoid using the word "filler" when describing Al's non-single songs. I don't know if I read this elsewhere and it just stuck with me, but I like to use the phrase "basic album track," as hopefully it doesn't sound nearly as negative or unimportant as "filler."

Having said that, I think "Whatever You Like" is just okay, but it's only because Al's standard had been getting higher with each new album. For example, on SOL I don't think there's a stinker on the entire album, and even the basic album parodies, such as "Canadian Idiot" and "Confessions Part III," are all home runs. Al really did a phenomenal job on that album. In fact, the only parody I have been thoroughly disappointed with on the last four albums is the abysmal "Trash Day," so minus that one that's an impressive track record for parodies. WYL is almost like a slight step backward in that progress.

Don't get me wrong, I do like the song. I think the concept is great, and as satire it does work both as a current cultural comment and as a comment on the "bling bling" lifestyle that hip hop projects. The music is faithfully produced by a band that never ceases to amaze me in their mimicry, and the vocal melodies and harmonies are well done...it's a good song to sing along to, something I will never be able to say about "Trash Day."

Lyrically it's another matter. I think this has been said already, but there weren't any laugh-out-loud moments, and I sorely missed that. One of the greatest new-album experiences I had was listening to "Running with Scissors" for the first time. I was practically on the floor as early as during "My Baby's in Love with Eddie Vedder." Instead, WYL didn't register anything more than a (at times even forced) mild smile, more like "oh, that's a silly lyric." Yes, there were some genuinely "sweet"-sounding moments, and at times it reminded me of "Cupid's Chokehold" by Gym Class Heroes (speaking of songs that need to be in the next polka), but this kind of song needed more than that mild "aww" smile (and I'll explain why in a moment). Al is quite capable of belly laughs, and in a song about the plummeting economy, that's most definitely needed.

Al's a little all over the place with lyrics. There are a lot of scattershot references to dining out at specific fast food chains, and nods to Costco and Wal-Mart were a little vague considering their respective reputations as a warehouse club and a retailer that is widely known for its disingenuous worldwide ties to produce cheap clothes.

The song has a very "back and forth" feel to it...we'll talk about eating, then about going out and doing something, then back to eating, then onto shopping, then back to eating, then driving, then eating, etc. There's something of a flow problem here, like the lyrics are out of order. That "back and forth" style works better for a song like "White & Nerdy" because nerd culture is very diverse in that regard: "Well, I like 'Star Trek' and gaming and computers and Monty Python and Ren Fests and webmastering and..." Here it doesn't seem to go anywhere, like it's not building up to any conceptual crescendo, which was my main gripe with a number of the songs on "Poodle Hat." I'm not saying it definitely needs a final "punchline," but it sort of ends uneventfully, and the government cheese gag sounds almost slapped on, which is a little sad because on the surface it's a funny reference (it's sort of the '90s version of the "soup bowl haircuts" as far as the depths of poverty go). Meanwhile, it seems there were some missed opportunities for more jokes about entertaining...perhaps a reference to going to the "dollar theater" to see a movie, or "renting" DVDs at the library, or "splurging" to spend a whopping 99 cents for a song download versus getting it illegally online (which would have had a note of delicious irony considering its release). Instead we get a weird, out of place couple of lines about liposuction and being Miss Ohio.

But as I said, I did like the song, and there were some good references throughout, signs that Al did his homework. The Top Ramen stanza was apt, and I got a kick out of the idea of grabbing extra napkins at White Castle to use later (something I admit I'm guilty of), and the part about the half-price jeans sale at the thrift store was a nice surprise. And of course, the verse about the city bus was probably the highlight of the song, both lyrically and in execution.

I played this song for someone else yesterday, and they actually thought that it was a little "condescending." They got the joke and the idea Al was going for, but they thought on the surface that it sounded like Al was mocking poor people. I don't agree with that assessment, but I can see that and it definitely made me think about how this song could have been produced. Al has done a number of other songs that had the potential to offend--"Fat," "Amish Paradise," "Party at the Leper Colony," "White & Nerdy"--if they weren't done just the right way. What stops them from doing so is that they're too ridiculous, too extreme in their concepts to be taken seriously. Here Al might be hitting it a little too close to home for some people, and that's why there needed to be some more ridiculous jokes, some more of the belly laughs, to get it away from the potential "laughing at" category and more safely in the "laughing with" category. As I said, I don't agree that Al is trying to be malicious or anything, but I can understand that reaction, and I have to wonder how the song would have turned out if the idea had gestated a little longer before Al recorded it.

As for the whole iTunes idea, I've had mixed feelings about it, and unfortunately this release didn't alleviate them for me. On the one hand, it's a very progressive way of thinking for Al, especially since he rarely allows too many "teasers" before an album's release, and it will definitely give exposure to a greater number of tracks. But on the other hand, and I think this is something that hasn't been focused on too much since the iTunes debate began, the key ingredient to a successful Al single has always been a music video. Yeah, "White & Nerdy" may very well have become a viral hit on its own, but there's no denying that the video helped push it into the more-mainstream avenues of promotion (VH1, etc.), so much that the video charted higher on its respective iTunes chart than the song itself did (though #2 is nothing to sneeze at). And granted "Canadian Idiot" did chart without a video, but it was clearly riding the wave caused by W&N.

What level of promotion will WYL receive? It's doubtful there will be a video, but will it even be sent to radio? Will Al be available to do a press junket to promote it, or to perform the song on the talk show circuit? Are they just wanting to see how well the song will do solely by the fan base buying it, or are they seriously considering each of these tracks as marketable, potentially mainstream singles?

If it's just the former, then I don't know, I would have rather Al took a little more time with a parody like this. Yes, it is remarkable that the parody came out while the original song was still #1, but really, isn't that more for bragging rights than it is a sign of quality? Was, for example, W&N any less relevant of a parody because it came out a month after its source had topped the chart? To me that was a fantastic turnaround.

I just wish that Al fine-tuned his parody a little more first, because it really could have been a stroke of genius. And if another "Whatever You Like" parody came out online in the meantime, so what? In fact, I would have liked to have seen that situation. You know, let everyone else have their go at it...the "morning zoo" deejays, or the Luke Skis of the world who think people care that he recorded and FedExed his song to Dr. Demento hours after seeing whatever movie it was about...and then let Al, the master, come out with his and just blow the others out of the water. I fear that Al will now be concerned more about the race to get the parody out than he will making sure it's up to the incredibly high standards that he has set for the last three decades.

And if a new parody isn't ready yet, and if everyone needs to see this iTunes-sales experiment continue, then what's stopping Al from going into the studio to officially record some of the short little odds and ends we've heard on the last tour? We know he had permission to do "I'm in Luv wit da Skipper," and it's unlikely that he would have too much trouble getting the okay to do "Cell Phones" (if he would even need permission from Mr. Stipe for that). IMO, that's what this iTunes idea should be used for first, these little individual and inconsequential fan nuggets...I mean, it's no stranger than actually including "Harvey the Wonder Hamster" on an album.

But I digress. Back to WYL. As a basic album track, it's all right if a bit rushed in execution. As a single, it leaves a lot to be desired and might not have been the ideal song to kick-off this iTunes experiment.

[fred27]

well i listened to it for 11 hrs straight today while at work

[Big Spoon]

Wow.

[fred27]

and you memorize the lyrics so that you can do rocky horror preshows with it, im still trying to fig out what to do with it

[Big Spoon]

Hey, I don't try and memorize song lyrics, I just do. Honestly, I sometimes wish I didn't, but it's just the way my mind works.