Written By: Chaz McKinney
I talk often in my personal life about the importance of musical integrity regardless of genre. As much as people love to bash pop music or push it to the side, there are genuinely intelligent, well-crafted pieces within the genre that become ubiquitous entries in the soundtracks to our lives.
Enter Katy Perry, 28-year-old singer/songwriter from California who began by making gospel records and broke into the pop charts with nigh-everybody’s 2008 guilty pleasure ‘I Kissed a Girl’. Perry’s first record, One of the Boys, was notable at the time of its release because, though its lead single was co-written by arguably the biggest cash-cows in the music industry (yes, you, Dr. Luke and Max Martin), the remainder of the record was heavily informed by indie rock, and it produced two other smash singles before Perry faded into oblivion for about two years.
Then Teenage Dream happened…
Perry’s second album (produced and co-written entirely by Martin, Luke, and their respective protégés Benny Blanco, StarGate, and Christopher “Tricky” Stewart) produced FIVE number one singles (six counting ‘Part of Me’ from the record’s 2012 re-release) on the Billboard Hot 100, the only album to do so since Michael Jackson’s Bad. Yes, most of them are quite throwaway, but the album’s title track is arguably one of the best pop songs of the last 15 years and certainly one of the most well-written, and the deeper album cuts written by only Perry and Greg Wells are beautiful lyrical masterpieces.
Over all, while repetitive, the album was a spectacular showcase of the possibilities of fun pop songs without trying to push the genre forward – and it paid off well, selling 5.5 million copies worldwide since its 2010 release. Having one of the most important pop albums ever to live up to, Perry has given us PRISM.
‘Roar’
Currently dominating radio, ‘Roar’ seems the best way to kick of the album. It’s very lightweight, catchy as hell, and extremely accessible. That being said, it’s also extraordinarily boring. The lyricism displays a tremendous instability with the first verse displaying wonderful, raw, and honest encapsulation of emotion and the second displaying pure laziness on the part of the writers in comparison. “I went from ze-ero, to my own hero” makes me cringe every time I hear it through my radio and the effect lessens none through headphones.
The lack of a bridge doesn’t exactly help the case that this song was audibly written quickly as a by-the-numbers attempt to get another number one while trying to still seem raw, which is quite sad really given that the first verse is beautiful. I won’t comment on the fact that the song is almost identical to Sarah Bareilles’ ‘Brave’ simply because that horse has been beaten beyond its death.
‘Legendary Lovers’
Surpassing ‘Roar’ by a long shot, this is everything Perry and her studio cohorts are capable of. The opening subdued sitar riff sets a perfect atmosphere for what ends up being a very succinct, well written verse and a dizzying and magical pre-chorus. As for the hook itself, it stands among some of Perry’s best.
“Take me down to the river, underneath the blood orange sun. Say my name like a scripture, keep my heart beating like a drum.”
That’s golden. The chord movements throughout the hook are cinematic and are absolutely beautiful, abstaining from the usual 1-4-6m-5 that’s littered through most pop. There are tints of Grouplove/Matt & Kim-influenced indie-rock colored with Desi influences that work for the most part. If the rest of the album lives up to this track, it would show a wonderful progression beyond Teenage Dream’s disco/electropop-influenced tropes.
‘Birthday’
Oh, look. A disco/electropop-influenced song. Recycling Teenage Dream’s overtly sexual nature paired with immature naive euphemisms. It’s catchy enough, and I suppose the lyrics are clever, but it’s really a letdown after the apparent willingness of ‘Legendary Lovers’ to experiment – and it’s another obvious attempt at a radio hit.
Granted, by the final chorus it’s hard to not find yourself dancing to what is an undeniably infectious hook that Whitney Houston could have rocked.
‘Walking On Air’
Perry’s forage into 90′s-drenched House music. The production is interesting (particularly the slap-bass riff running through the chorus), but the song itself is underwhelming to say the least. It’s not particularly catchy, and the songwriting doesn’t make up for what it lacks.
It also presents a massive problem with Katy Perry’s position as a pop idol: the girl has a really weak voice. Yes, yes, anyone with a passive viewing history of music award shows for the last 5 years should be well aware of that, but it’s blindingly apparent on ‘Birthday’ and ‘Walking On Air’ that while her voice isn’t capable of a huge range (2 octaves, 5 notes by all accounts) – she has done nothing to help herself in that department, relying instead on a very weak falsetto to hit the notes her catchy choruses demand.
Her brassy chest voice is charming at times, but when it’s used to give the false impression that Perry is able to vamp off vocal runs like Houston, it almost becomes intolerable. Without ranting too long, what I mean to say is that there’s a specific moment as the bridge builds into the final chorus in which the music moves to the 3rd chord to build tension in the track while Miss Katy lets out what should sound like an impressive vocal run were it not only two notes in actuality that are lower than parts of the chorus melody. Vocally, this is essentially tantamount to a baseball player hitting home runs for an entire game before striking out and expecting a larger applause than previously.
‘Unconditionally’
Reaching into the stratospheres of that limited vocal range, ‘Unconditionally’ is a beautiful, urgent, soaring love song. This may be Perry’s best ballad to date. There’s not much to say other than that. The syncopation of the chorus melody is what really sells the song. What’s to be seen is whether or not she’ll be able to pull it off live in all the glory it deserves.
‘Dark Horse’ (feat. Juicy J)
Built over a percolating trap-influenced beat, this song is definitely the sexiest of the lot thus far. The verses are cool and breathy, but what absolutely sells this song are the near-perfect pre-choruses.
The vocal delivery of the lines “make me your Aphrodite/it’s a yes or a no now, baby” is nothing short of spine-chilling, and the harmonies introduced the second time around flirt with Danny Elfman-esque colors. The transition from the more anthemic choruses back into the verses is a little rough, but it’s forgivable.
Juicy J’s guest verse is painful, presenting moments sparse of clarity (if not lyrical obviousness like “she’ll eat your heart out like Jeffery Dahmer”) over a very dull flow.
‘This Is How We Do’
An unapologetic update of 2010′s ‘Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)’, this song presents nothing new. The lyrics present various vignettes of how Perry and her ladies “stunt”, sandwiching a rather unimpassioned shout-out dedication section that’s written for live performance. The most impressive part of the track is the production, which bleeps and blips over a pounding beat, guitars and house-inspired pianos blazing in the chorus. It sounds magical in headphones, but is ultimately a cool track wasted on such a boring song.
‘International Smile’
Something about the guitar work in the verses is reminiscent of Rio-era Duran Duran, and the lyrics have some interesting word play that’s both cool and facepalm-inducing simultaneously (“She’s a little bit of Yoko, and she’s a little bit of Oh-no”), and the vocoder solo is a cool touch, but that’s where this song’s strong points end. The chorus isn’t memorable by any measure, and the whole song just sounds like conscious filler. This could have easily been left on the cutting room floor and it wouldn’t affect the quality of the album at all and would probably improve it.
‘Ghost’
The first piece of heartbreak apparent on the record is one of its best moments thus far. Aside from lyrical faux-pas like “there’s just a pillow where your head used to sleep, my vision is 20/20” (which just sounds awkward in context as it does in print) and the one-liner bridge that seems to have just been written as a placeholder lyric before being left in, it’s one of the best pieces of wordsmithery available in the collection. The chorus walks a fine line between catchy and heartbreaking, treading it with ease. Beautiful production, beautiful vocal delivery, and one of the best songs on the album.
‘Love Me’
Essentially ‘Roar’ version 1.0, this mid-tempo ballad presents the revelation that precedes the sense of victory and self-empowerment of ‘Roar’: that you must love yourself before someone else can love you. Which is fine. Just fine. What’s almost maddening about this wonderful, wonderful song is that the lyrics are flawless. By any standard of songwriting in any decade, these lyrics are absolutely perfect.
The problem is that moments like this that are so obviously inspired, genuine, and intelligent really showcase how lazy songs like ‘Roar’, ‘This Is How We Do’, ‘Walking On Air’, and ‘Birthday’ are. This is Perry & Co. at their finest.
“Sometimes I wish my skin was a costume that I could just unzip, and strip; but who I am is who I’m meant to be, and it’s who you are in love with.”
‘This Moment’
The beat is identical to ‘This Is How We Do’, but the pulsing bass underneath is what makes this sound magical from the first moment. It gardens through the same “live for the moment because tomorrow’s not guaranteed” subject matter that litters radio, but it’s delivered with a little more charisma than most. At times, Perry sounds like Imogen Heap, layering her voice into beautiful chordal movements for her falsetto to really shine.
That being said, the lyrics have fallen back to sub-par, sprinkling forced lines — “Do you ever think that we’re just chasing our tails like life is one big fast treadmill? And we pop what is prescribed if it gets us first prize (I actually do like that part). But you know who I, who I think will win? Are the ones that let love in, are the ones that take the time” — that would make Dangerous-era Michael Jackson cringe. The ballads are beginning to drag the album down, as well, but that’s a minor complaint.
‘Double Rainbow’
And yet another ballad. There is nothing new here, and while the song isn’t bad, it’s not really noteworthy in any way. Lyrically, it’s not as bad as it could be…
‘By The Grace of God’
…and, going for the fifth consecutive ballad, Perry presents the album’s third I-overcame-adversity-by-learning-to-love-myself tune, ending in much the same way she became. Not to disparage Perry’s own personal struggles or the therapy of songwriting, but this is a completely unnecessary entry into PRISM’s already drudgingly repetitive fare. It’s pretty enough, and it’s impassioned, but by the end, PRISM has expired well beyond its welcome.
Bonus Tracks
‘Spiritual’ is a cool, spacey electro-ballad that comes close to ‘Legendary Lovers” experimentalism and succeeds far and above most of the standard album’s ballads. ‘It Takes Two’ is bland and is rightfully left off the record and ‘Choose Your Battles’ falls in much the same category.
To say that this record had a lot to live up to as far as radio success is concerned is an understatement, which makes it understandable why so many of PRISM’s choruses are so obviously crafted solely for the purpose of digging their way into your ear.
However, that doesn’t excuse the fact that it’s a very bland, overdrawn record that seems to be part of a new stream of ennuis-as-the-norm, joining the ranks of Justin Timberlake’s The 20/20 Experience, The Weeknd’s Kiss Land, The 1975′s debut album, and Drake’s Nothing Was the Same. Good pop comes from a combination of musical integrity and being able to sacrifice ego for succinctness; Thriller and True Blue both only have 9 songs, but they all present new ideas and don’t stale. On the flip side, while Abbey Road has 18 songs, it never grows old and is a wonderful exercise in expert songwriting. The point being that, on a record made for commercial purposes by an artist who has lamented about not being taken seriously critically, some sacrifices could have been made easily to whittle this record down to its best tracks.
Truth be told, in a perfect world and with a little bit of willingness to make sacrifices on the part of the Perry, Max Martin, and Dr. Luke, this could have easily been a classic, 9-song pop album and packed a much better punch than it does presently. If you want to really experience what this album could have been, here’s your ideal track listing:
- Roar
- Legendary Lovers
- Birthday
- Unconditionally
- Spiritual
- Dark Horse (sans Juicy J’s shoehorned verse)
- Ghost
- This Is How We Do
- Love Me
It also doesn’t excuse the fact that Perry says she tried to avoid making Teenage Dream 2.0 (as she should), and yet so many moments presented her could have been throwaway songs from the TD recording sessions. Putting all of that aside, this album’s biggest Achilles heel is its scatter shot lyricism. I understand that I shouldn’t have extremely high expectations from a pop album, but when real ability to write something smart is shown in songs like “Ghost”, the first verse of “Roar”, “Love Me” and even “Birthday” [at times], it begs the question why more time wasn’t spent refining the remainder of the tracks to make something that cements itself as both a commercial AND critical success.
With all of that in mind, of the 13 tracks on the standard edition of PRISM, 8 are pretty great. The dead weight brings it down on the whole, though.
Katy PerryHaving one of the most important pop albums ever to live up to, Katy Perry has given us PRISM. Read Chaz McKinney's track by track take on Perry's 2013 LP.PRISMWritten by: Chaz McKinneyDate Published: 10/22/2013Having one of the most important pop albums ever to live up to, Katy Perry has given us PRISM. Read Chaz McKinney's track by track take on Perry's 2013 LP.6 / 10 stars
