Beyonce Proves Me Wrong Again

How was I suppose to know that the week after I post this blog, "Beautiful Liar" would jump 91 spots to No. 3 on the pop singles chart, the biggest single-week jump in Billboard history. I questioned the strategy of not releasing the song until a month after it was released to radio and MTV, having already peaked on those countdowns and starting to drop. But I guess enough demand built up so a lot of people bought it. I still don't think it's a good song. In fact, the really long lead time before it's sales release let a song that didn't exactly grab radio airplay by storm to get into people's heads and build a demand. So I stand by my opinion that it's not a really good song. And I don't know if it'll boost sales of B'Day. But as for the single, Beyonce can claim another big hit.

It took about a month after it hit radios and MTV, but Beyonce and Shakira’s “Beautiful Liar” is finally available as an EP and iTunes. Can’t say, I or anyone for that matter, have been begging for this song, its pretty average. Even though one sings in Spanish and the other in Beyonce, I can’t really tell the difference between the two. Production work was by Stargate, a Norwiegan dude who wrote the deservedly massive hit, “Irreplaceable.” Like most Europeans, he can drop killer pop hooks all day, but any attempts at aping Stateside hip-hop beats are bland. “Beautiful Liar" rides a vaguely Spanish acoustic guitar riff, a few horn punches and hand claps. This is the first song that made me wish Pharrell produced it instead since it’s kind of similar to “Like I Love You,” and I thought I’d never, ever wish that in this age and time.

I’ll be more interested in seeing how “Beautiful Liar” helps the commercial prospect of B’Day, since that album’s been pretty disappointing overall. The first single, “Déjà Vu” sort of sucked and it barely cracked the top 10 singles chart. It took five months after the albums release before people actually started buying it, thanks to the one great song on the album, “Irreplaceable.” At first, I wondered why it took so long to release “Irreplaceable;" if it was the first or second single, B’Day could’ve came out of the gates huge. Instead, it was labeled a modest hit, nowhere close to the success of Dangerously In Love, and only around Christmas did the album start sneaking back up the chart. But then her PR campaign was in full “Beyonce was the actress, Jennifer Hudson the supporting in Dreamgirls” mode and B'Day was on the backburner.

Now that Oscar delusions have subsided, Sony is trying to wring more sales and hits out of B'day. The problem is, there are no more “Irreplaceable’s” on the album. Hence the last resort that is "Beautiful Liar," tacking on the new single on a more expensive, deluxe-edition version of the same album. You can buy “Beautiful Liar” as an EP or single. But the record label is really hoping you drop $20 for a double-disc deluxe edition of B’Day, now with “Beautiful Liar,” that comes out in April. Lots have already been written about this tactic three years ago, about how slimy it was that major labels tried to get fans to buy the same album twice. It was yet another reaction against the label’s fear of illegal downloading and iTunes ruining sales of the more profitable albums. Usher released a deluxe edition of Confessions with “My Boo” tacked on and a new album cover that was um, “sexier.” Not a whole lot of people bought the special edition, but it sold just enough to extend Confessions run on the album chart, which was devious. And then there’s Nelly, who ridiculously released Sweat and Suit, forcing his fans to cough up $30 for both albums. Months later after one lone hit (on the country charts with Tim McGraw, of all places), Nelly dropped some of the weak tracks, tacked on “Grillz” and released two versions of Sweatsuit, one basic album and another with a bonus DVD. A former co-worker of mine was a huge Nelly fan and to put it nicely, she was not happy. A look at buyer’s comments on Amazon showed a similar response. Instead of encouraging people to buy albums, fans who didn't want to drop $50 for three Nelly albums started looking for just the hits to download, and you really couldn't expect a business model as effective as that from a major label.

So we have another attempt at repackaging and re-selling a product to a public that never really asked for it. But “Beautiful Liar” isn’t exactly a song to get people to spend more money, outside of a dollar on iTunes. Despite having two chart-topping divas listed as artists, the song hasn’t exactly taken off. It peaked at #4 on the R&B Billboard chart, but it’s languishing at #93 on the Hot 100 Singles Chart, which means it isn’t crossing over. And the song peaked on MTV TRL weeks ago. The only way you can get people to buy an album twice is if they REALLY want that song. It has to be an anthem that everyone knows. I mentioned this song to some friends at a bar yesterday and half of them have never heard of it. I doubt enough people will cough up $20 again to give B’Day to extend its run for too much longer. After a year when Beyonce was a Golden-Globe nominated “lead” in a big musical, broke the record for the longest #1 chart position by a single (“Irreplaceable”), sold two million copies of her last album and released a new song with an equally hot girl in Shakira that could’ve been massive, we’ve seen her most as the cover girl for Sports Illustrated’s swimsuit issue and as Jennifer Hudson’s co-star. Not a bad year, but I don’t think those were her career goal either.

Download: Beyonce and Shakira "Beautiful Liar"

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Am I Hot Or Not?

With the early daylight savings time that only applies in the US and the record breaking 90 degrees temperatures in Early March, it definitely feels like summer over here in LA. There’s even a summer song all over the radio and the clubs right now, though calling it a “song” is debatable. I have to admit, I’ve never heard of Mims until two weeks ago so I’m pretty late to “This Is Why I’m Hot.” On first listen, it’s a horrible song, another case study of a terrible rapper depending entirely on production value. Mims doesn’t even try to rap, the first three lines of his rap is essentially a disclaimer for his lack of skills: “this is why I’m hot/I don’t have to rap/I can sell a mill saying nothing on the track.” And then he embeds himself in every rap circle. He’s about as New York as Hillary Clinton, but that doesn’t stop him from claiming New York’s hip hop scene before pulling all the girls in the Midwest (complete with a green screen Wrigley Field in the video) and then jumping on the Bay Area hyphy bandwagon. Most of the time though, he repeats “This Is Why I’m Hot” about 82 times, followed by “I’m hot because I’m fly/That’s why you’re not,” which doesn’t even try to make sense.

The song sounds as bad as I’ve described, saved for a pretty slick, minimal beat that’s like a Clipse song glossed over for radio. And yet, every radio station, club, car stereo and TRL countdown is playing this damned song. It’s been near the top of the iTunes download for over a month now. I hated the fact that this is looking like the soundtrack to my early summer. But I was also obviously missing something. The beat itself is awesome, but it really does sound like one of Pharrell’s skeletal stuff for the Clipse. But then, songs about Pyrex stirrers don’t fill the dance floor, and that explains why Hell Hath No Fury moved a paltry 70,000 units in its first week despite a massive amount of hype. Mims’ upcoming debut Music Is My Savior will probably debut at or near the top of the chart. Rapping about nothing is truly more universal than rapping about cutting cocaine. That’s marketing 101, and Mims understands that. He knows, or rather, revels in the fact that he can have literally no rhyming skills as long as he produces a sound that’ll get heads nodding that isn’t too harsh for Radio Disney. And if there’s one thing to be said about Mims, he has a lot of charisma. Yeah, no one is willing to seriously consider him a challenger in New York. But he makes a generic claim anyway, all with a puppy dog grin. It’s all rather charming and as any girl will tell you, confidence will always win people over.

A lot of hip hop critics, writers and Nas keep saying hip hop is dead last year, and they point to slowing record sales and a genre that’s not raking in as much capital for the corporate coffers. I don’t think it’s that dire, the entire recording industry is down. But it’s hard to make a convincing argument when Mims, Jim Jones and Rick Ross can all produce chart-toppers with minimal lyrical skills. So you can’t call them hip hop or rappers, they’re more pop stars and simple always works best for pop hits. As much as I find Mims exasperating, he’s really no different from David Cassidy or any other similar pop artists who had a big hit or two. So yeah, “This Is Why I’m Hot” isn’t much of a song. But then, neither is “I Think I Love You,” and that song sounded great in a Levis ad a few years back. So it’s not good per se, but in a way, “This Is Why I’m Hot” is a summer song. Not my favorite, but I’ll accept it. And I have to admit, I heard someone sitting at a red light in his car blasting this song this past Saturday, and it definitely felt like summer.

Download: Mims "This Is Why I'm Hot"

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