THE MELODIZED WHIMPER
News that the Backstreet Boys had released a new album last month came as a mild shock to me. I thought they had long ago broken up and vanished into the pop music netherworld, spirits to be summoned only when VH1 was scraping the bottom of its Behind the Music barrel.
But, no, they are very much in this world, holding on to their sliver of fame with the tenacity of a moray eel. My shoulders slumped when my co-workers told me about the new album. I view boy bands -- be it Backstreet Boys, N'Sync, OS5, New Kids on the Block or whoever -- as avatars of commodified youth culture. They sing, they dance, they sometimes strike defiant poses, they croon about painful love -- but always within a safe package that blots out any hint of the anger, rebellion or pain-in-the-ass trouble that's part of youth. Simply put, they're annoying. They're like kids who wrote down the names of troublemakers when the teacher was out of the room and then went on to fame and fortune as wannabe bad boys.
For some reason, what annoyed me most about boy bands is something I call the melodized whimper. It usually comes at the end of a love ballad that imparts the band's collective tender soul beneath tough-guy exterior. The song is all about the yearning for love, and the melodized whimper is the punctuation mark at the end that implies that the song has been achingly ripped from the heart.
I think it sounds like something that evolved from the primal yelps and mewling of a misbehaving 6-year-old boy who is desperately trying to ward off a spanking, but what do I know? Chicks seemed to dig these songs. (Perhaps there is something in the frequency and modulation of the whimper that only female ears can hear.)
That got me thinking. The melodized whimper often came at the end of songs that said things like "I never should have banged your little sister and sold your cat to the research lab. I realize now after spending your college fund in Vegas that I was wrong and you are the only one for me. Please take me back. I love you so much (whimper)." And it just might have some mojo behind it. So why not use it in more prosaic situations? If young women can't resist the melodized whimper, why not use it to work my will all the time?
Of course, it can't be used merely for the commonplace. It should be used in life-and-death situations. Or in moments of diplomacy when talking to a female head of state.
News that the Backstreet Boys had released a new album last month came as a mild shock to me. I thought they had long ago broken up and vanished into the pop music netherworld, spirits to be summoned only when VH1 was scraping the bottom of its Behind the Music barrel.
But, no, they are very much in this world, holding on to their sliver of fame with the tenacity of a moray eel. My shoulders slumped when my co-workers told me about the new album. I view boy bands -- be it Backstreet Boys, N'Sync, OS5, New Kids on the Block or whoever -- as avatars of commodified youth culture. They sing, they dance, they sometimes strike defiant poses, they croon about painful love -- but always within a safe package that blots out any hint of the anger, rebellion or pain-in-the-ass trouble that's part of youth. Simply put, they're annoying. They're like kids who wrote down the names of troublemakers when the teacher was out of the room and then went on to fame and fortune as wannabe bad boys.
For some reason, what annoyed me most about boy bands is something I call the melodized whimper. It usually comes at the end of a love ballad that imparts the band's collective tender soul beneath tough-guy exterior. The song is all about the yearning for love, and the melodized whimper is the punctuation mark at the end that implies that the song has been achingly ripped from the heart.
I think it sounds like something that evolved from the primal yelps and mewling of a misbehaving 6-year-old boy who is desperately trying to ward off a spanking, but what do I know? Chicks seemed to dig these songs. (Perhaps there is something in the frequency and modulation of the whimper that only female ears can hear.)
That got me thinking. The melodized whimper often came at the end of songs that said things like "I never should have banged your little sister and sold your cat to the research lab. I realize now after spending your college fund in Vegas that I was wrong and you are the only one for me. Please take me back. I love you so much (whimper)." And it just might have some mojo behind it. So why not use it in more prosaic situations? If young women can't resist the melodized whimper, why not use it to work my will all the time?
Of course, it can't be used merely for the commonplace. It should be used in life-and-death situations. Or in moments of diplomacy when talking to a female head of state.
posted by John Parnell at 2:34 PM
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