My Week On Top: Adele “Skyfall”

My Week On Top

  My Week On Top is a weekly article where music writer, Tyler Bruno, spends seven days with the most popular song of the week. Each day, he’ll test the song in a new (ridiculous) way and discover the hidden (if any) potentials of what pop music has to offer. This week, he reviews Adele’s new James Bond hit— Skyfall. Let’s do this!

Initial Response (Before Listening)

  I don’t really like Adele. My feelings aren’t really based on any qualms I have with her as a person and her voice is, objectively, good. But as far as this whole sultry, blues thing she’s got going— it’s just Amy Winehouse and Billy Holiday with the safety on. She’s merely taking on the tradition of the “smokey chanteuse” and declawing it so no one gets scratched. But isn’t that the whole point of the blues? Aren’t we all kind of begging to get scratched? In short, I find her a painfully safe charcuterie or a much valued musical archetype.

But anyways…

  As far as this particular song goes— I’m fairly indifferent to the prospect. It’s meant for a major motion picture that’s had a long legacy of advertising danger while producing not much more than a soap opera’s worth of innuendoes— so she she seems to fit perfectly. The James Bond franchise has often picked the “safe musician masquerading as something edgy” choice— Paul McCartney, Duran Duran, The Pretenders, Garbage, Sheryl Crow, Alicia Keys, Madonna, etc. To me, the whole thing’s a lot like spiking the punch with a bottle of wine-cooler— it’s sort of in the right idea, but basically does nothing but add a weird taste.

Day One- First Listen

  The song is just okay. It’s typical Adele from what I’ve heard of her. The string section in the background is pretty cool and very “James Bond-y” and the whole thing has the devil-may-care vibe that I’m assuming they were going for. But, it’s pretty boring. The song would go down a lot better if it was chased by a shaken martini (Which is a bullshit way to order a martini, by the way. It just chips the ice, which is the very reason people started stirring martini’s to begin with). All in all, I’m not looking forward to spending a week with this song.

Day Two- Play at a Ridiculous Volume

There are some songs that shouldn’t be played above a quiet simmer— this song is one of them. It was a very, very uncomfortable four minutes.

Day Three- Find the Worst Youtube Cover

Okay, so this day of the challenge was harder than I thought it’d be. Not because there aren’t enough bad covers (trust me…there are), but because most of the truly terrible ones are so ernest and heartfelt that it just doesn’t feel right making fun of them. But this guy put the word “Awesome” in front of his video…so he had it coming. Really bad video, dude.

 

Day Four- Continuously Listen to the Song for One Hour

  You know how sometimes trauma victims can’t remember exactly what it is that happened to them due to psychological suppression? I can’t remember anything that happened. I just randomly snapped into consciousness as soon as the hour was over, the wall next to me dented with the various shapes of my head. It’s unclear to say for certain, but I don’t think I enjoyed this.

Day Five- Overdub a Scene From a Favorite Movie with Said Song

This Week: That scene in Star Wars The Empire Strikes Back where Han and the gang get chased through an astroid field.

It honestly added a nuanced sort of introspectiveness to the original cut. I surprisingly didn’t hate it. Weird.

Day Six- Ask a Three Year Old’s Opinion

Tyler (age 24): Hey Michael, what do you think of this song?

Michael (age 3): He sure sings it real well. Can we go back on my slide? I built this slide (readers note: he did NOT build that slide).

Day Seven- Don’t Do Anything (sunday is a day of rest, after all)

I’ve never been more stoked to not listen to something.

Final Thoughts

  I surprisingly grew a strange sort of nostalgia towards this song. I still think Adele is bullshit and will probably never listen to this track again for as long as I live, but I’ll remember it fondly. Have you ever had a really shitty job and then you quit and suddenly, for no damn reason, your memory of that job morphs into something it totally wasn’t and you suddenly miss everybody even though you hated that fucking job? It sorta feels of like that… I kinda miss everybody.