Last week (October 3rd), I analyzed the No. 1 and No. 3 songs (“I Gotta Feeling “by Black Eyed Peas and “Down” by Jay Sean ft Lil Wayne) of that week. Anyhow, guess which songs are #1 and #2 this week (Week of October 10th)? Those same songs, so where did that leave me? I checked the charts and to my chagrin, the highest charting song that I haven’t analyzed was Miley Cyrus’ “Party in the U.S.A.” I’ve never heard the song before and don’t know anything about her personally (or her music), so I shouldn’t rush to judgment, so here we go, objectivity in hand:
Chart Position: No. 3 (Week of October 3rd, 2009),
Songwriters: Lukasz Gottwald, Claude Kelly and Jessica Cornish (I’ve heard some of Claude Kelly’s songs before which were great. I didn’t know he wrote pop. Dr. Luke is an amazing producer and songwriter, so the big guns were definitely brought out for this track.)
Producers: Lukasz “Dr. Luke” Gottwald
Key/Time Signature/Tempo/Genre: F#, 4/4, 96 bpm (Mid-Tempo), Pop Rock
Song Structure: After a short intro of four bars of solo guitar, the song structure looks like this: Verse/Chorus/Verse/Chorus/Bridge/Chorus. I like short intros, since there’s no time for the listener to change the dial (did I just date myself? I was talking about radio…should I say click the mouse?). Anyhow, there’s nothing to say here other than the most common song structure was used – this is neither good nor bad. Its just usually an appropriate way to present a problem and a resolution.
Theme: The song is about Miley’s move from Nashville to Los Angeles and her anxiety about that move and how she was able to overcome her feelings. Generally speaking, I don’t think its too wise to make a song too specific about your own circumstances but Miley is still fairly young and probably doesn’t have enough autobiographical experiences to draw upon. However, the song quickly segues from her feelings to “partying in the U.S.A.” so I guess that’s where the song gets universal.
Melody: Overall, I liked this song from a melodic standpoint. The only part that I wasn’t sure about was the end of the lead-up to the chorus where she sings three straight lines (“and the Jay-Z/Britney song was on…”). Not sure what happened there – did the songwriters get lazy or did they actually like that? I liked how the most important part of the chorus (“hands up”) was the highest note in the song’s range and that it hit on the downbeat at the beginning of the chorus. The songwriters put that phrase in the best piece of real estate in the song and its effective. I can see visualize her fans putting their “hands up” going crazy at that moment in the song. In the 8-bar bridge, there is use of call and response, which I always like and which I think always adds excitement to a song, which is important for a track like this one. There is always a lot of variety about where phrases start in this song (another thing I always harp about), which makes the song unpredictable and exciting. Overall, there’s nothing to pick at here…its solid as a rock.
Lyrics: Let’s start with rhyme scheme. The beginning of the first verse tries to rhyme, which it does using really loose rhymes (LAX/excess and cardigan/in) for the first four bars, but from there on, there really aren’t rhymes to be found in the rest of the song. I’m beginning to think rhyme scheme is pretty irrelevant these days. As long as it doesn’t detract from the song’s feel and flow, rhyme scheme is not a very important factor in a song.
The lyrics aren’t fantastic or profound, but I think they’re appropriate for the age group/audience and they present a problem and the resolution in a straightforward and easy to understand way so it works. I’m not sure about “dating” the song with references to Jay-Z and Britney, so its no major revelation here that this song will not likely be a classic tune one day. Please take a lesson here and try not to do that to your song if you hope it will generate income from a number of sources now and in the future.
Production: Dr. Luke’s production as usual is amazing and appropriate – he says out of the way and le’s the singer carry the tune and Miley does a good job carrying the ball. For a Dr. Luke production, its actually rather understated. He does an incredible job (its harder than you think) of blending rock and synth instruments into the song – he’s just a master at this – look at all the great pop/rock songs he’s produced and you’ll see what I mean. To create contrast between sections, he brings out a few new instruments in the chorus (very large synth sound and a jet airplane take-off sound…whatever happened to the good ‘ol cymbal? The jet airplane sound is the new cymbal, one day someone will bring back the real thing and it’ll sound revolutionary just like the vocoder). The only other thing that I thought I’d mention is that in the bridge, where she sings “flight”, the production is very airy and I’m sure that was probably deliberate. Overall, a strong effort by Dr. Luke although there’s nothing particular revolutionary or original about his production in this song.
Summary: I started enjoying the song more and more as I started listening to it during the writing of this article. There are not a lot of songwriting or production gimmicks in this song and I think overall it works. However, I’m not sure whether the song is popular because the song is great or because its singer is the most famous teenager in the world.
Hit Theory: The Art and Science of Hit Songs 