Track Review ⊙ Daily Ops Home
Blake Lewis :: "She Loves The Way"Single (2007)
Idol time, homies. It's been a weak season; mostly just plentiful bizarro moments (many of them involving Sanjaya's exuberant self-embarrassments) keeping interest alive, but I can't help but become rapt as we enter the final seconds of the last round. In one corner we have Jordin Sparks, an implausible giant of a young girl who sweats sugar water and seems incapable of not smiling or cutely fidgeting in between her performances of songs about wanting to be loved, melodrama sitting uneasily atop the threat that any moment she's gonna bust a gut giggling. In the other corner we have Blake Lewis, a performer that I imagine many might consider American Idol's first hint at someone with a smidge of artistic cred. And while a dude who cites 311 as one of his favorite bands might not match up to the likes of that other AI's Bobby Flynn, a goofy-looking cat who quietly reinvented "Superfreak" and "Under Pressure" on Aussie national television, Lewis might in fact be more than just a chach who listens to fake reggae and wears sweater vests. He claims to be a big fan of underground hip-hop and electronica while in the same breath deifying Prince and Michael Jackson; he took ten seconds of primetime to shout-out Seattle groups that nobody even wants to listen to, i.e. Common Market and Panic Conspiracy. This all shortly before he techno-freaked Diana Ross' "You Keep Me Hanging On."
A move that proved only mildly successful. And he sang John Lennon like it was an obligation. But, man, he killed "Time of the Season." And he turned the one Bee-Gees single that nobody likes (not even my mom) into an unpredictable disco twister. And on this song "She Loves the Way," a pre-Idol original, he Medulla (2004)-style crafts an extended vocal jam that occurs somewhere at an intersection of David Thomas Broughton, Jamie Lidell, and fucking Maroon 5. Blake likely only listens to the last of those, but the song still stands. He opens with a summary in one vocal line, then he starts the loops, first beat-boxing the bass line then the snare hits then an egg shaker. DJ deepening the bass, Blake white-raps some verses, cutting his vocals up and eventually beginning his disintegration into whale songs and glitch effects. And just before the whole thing disappears behind starry oceans of reverb, Blake kicks the beat back on and launches into a vocal scratching solo. It's the first good trip-hop song since forever ago.
Now he's set to become the next American Idol or the next American Idol runner-up. In his Daughty track review my colleague Eric Sams talked about how none of the show's contestants have released an album with anything interesting to be heard; this song shows that there's a chance that Blake will buck that trend. Maybe there'll be a track with Rahzel or a single produced by Timbaland. Then again, there'll just as likely be a song with, I dunno, Jack Johnson or some shit. Let's keep our fingers crossed against any Jimmie Walker Blue skits.
Chet Betz :: 22 May 2007 |
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