The Ting Tings - 'Great DJ'
Ahh! Thank goodness someone remembered that the best pop music isn't about sex, or dancing, or magic, or real life, or anger, or excitment, or polemic, or gloss, or angst, or escape, or sweetness, or idiocy, or darkness, or intelligence, or entertainment, or goosebumps, or genius, or being a balm for the soul or fire for the belly. It's about all of these things at once, contained within an extravagent gesture which hints at many deep and urgent meanings, without detailing a single one of them.
A gesture such as this can be found in the chorus to 'Great DJ', where the sweet, nursery-rhyme verse gives way to an impossibly exciting series of atonal grunts and squeals.
"Imagine all the girls,
Ah ah aah aah, ah ah ah aaah
And the boys,
Ah ah aah aah, ah ah ah aaah
And the strings,
Ee ee eee eee, ee ee ee eeee
And the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums, the drums."
See what I mean about suggesting things but not actually saying them? Hell, those lyrics don't even really make sense. But if you get a wide-eyed harpy howling them over a maelstrom of sullen guitar and crashing cymbals, it's like a conductor, baton at the ready, leading an incantation. Someone's trying to raise the dead, and then make them dance about.
Astonishingly, there seem to be people idiotic enough to believe that just because the band's singer has made some claim about not needing to be a brilliant guitarist to be in a band (a point I thought punk had already made some 30 years ago, and certainly not one worth getting in a righteous fury about now), this means they're a) stupid b) musically unsophisticated c) an affront to anyone who has really put the hours in learning their instrument and d) not real music.
Well, I can help clear all this up if you'll forgive a moment's self-righteousness (or a moment a day, as it seems to be turning out). I have only heard two songs by the Ting Tings, this one and the equally amazing, 6-out-of-5-star 'That's Not My Name', and both of them are brilliantly-structured, beautifully performed, head-spinningly good pop songs.
The kind of pop songs which are very very hard to do this well. The kind of pop songs, in fact, which prove beyond all reasonable doubt that they are a) sharp as nails b) musically canny c) an inspiration to anyone thinking of picking up an instrument and d) more real than an Astoria full of copycat indie bands who're all too busy doing an internal Stars In Their Eyes - The Britpop Years to turn their bowlcut heads towards anything happening today.
Don't let the simple repetitions of the chorus fool you into thinking this is a stupid song. It's a clever song about experiences which are only possible to capture using stupid words.
Best of all, it feels like the beginning of something special with these two. Why let a little fret-envy spoil the fun?
Download: Out now
CD Released: March 3rd
(Fraser McAlpine)
Comments
i agree whole-heartedly! i've loved these two ever since i stumbled upon them on myspace about six months ago! they are gonna be bigger den big!
saw them live at the nme awards on friday, excellent band :D!
Summed up so well. This is one of those tracks that sounds really good the first time you hear it and you think it will do your head in after a few listens but I've been listening to this track for 2 weeks solid and the only thing it is doing is making me love it even more. A wonderfully brilliant track, I think I am going to go check out their website if any of their other stuff is as good as this.