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Originally posted by CountryFriedChick
I agree with most of this though I do like to see artists get some influence from artists they admire but not to the extent to where it sounds more like them than it does you. I hope you get what I'm saying.
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Yeah you do get me. I'm all rambling today so I'm glad you half understood! I'm all for being influenced by artist otherwise the album would sound stagnant and be boring. But I don't like it when artists lose themselves completely by trying to fit in. Usher did that smh Usher. That's a lot of what happens on mainstream top 40 radio and why everything sounds so similar. There's a handful of *producers* who define the styles on radio today and they take popular artists and stick them into whatever sound they're experimenting with at the moment. Basically you wind up with a bunch of songs that sound similar because the producers are the ones making the music the only difference is the vocals. I think that's the danger of working with the big pop producers, they have THEIR own sound and they just move artists around within it.
As much as I'm not a huge fan of the lyrics on Red, the production sounds very "Taylor influenced by some of today's more popular trends." instead of "musical tread of the day featuring vocals by Taylor Swift" I think that's why I loved it so much at first. It sounds like Taylor but different. You know that's a T-Swift song when you hear it. Having a musical identity isn't a bad thing, letting it get stagnant is. But I also think losing that identity in a jumble of top 40 trends is a bad thing too. You become just another pop singer, completely interchangeable and disposable. Taylor's too good for that. The only concern for me with Red is her personal touch on the lyrics seems to be lost. Since it's a solo write I worry that she picked up some bad habits from her little sessions with Martin and Shellback. But I have faith in her, Begin Again has all the trademarks of classic Taylor Swift lyrics.
