Why did Taylor Swift stop singing in a country accent?

Hey, what's up y'all? Steven, just the heads up.

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Hi'm Manny Noah, and.

This is Devin and this is No such Thing the show where we settle our dumb arguments and yours by actually doing the research. On today's episode, why did Taylor Swift stop singing in a cont reaccent? We explore authenticity in popular music.

There's no no such thing, no such thing. No touch, thank.

Touch thank no touch.

Than all right.

So today's episode was inspired by a listener email. This is from Joel V. He says, my wife asked me a question the other day as we were driving somewhere. This is his wife. Why do we only hear pronounce accents and country music songs? It seems like whenever Americans hear songs by British artists, we can never relate a cer in their accent. However, with country songs, the accent is clear. Their other top genres were accent is clear.

Yeah, I don't know if it's that black and white, but I certainly I know what they're getting at, which is, you know, growing up, I've been always fascinated hearing or like finding out that a singer is English. You know, we see this in acting all the time, but it adds in in music as well.

I feel like this is more of a thing in pop music, where it's harder to discern. You know, I think our classic example is like we think of like you're saying, like someone from the UK not being even like, oh shoot, I thought you were American, but because you know, in let's say genre like rap.

Yeah, it is very clear when is it's close to.

The spoken word, Yeah, dizzy Rascal.

Yes, there are some of our examples of artists that you are like, whoa, I didn't realize this person was from this place.

Well I remember, uh do you guys remember Leonna Lewis?

Oh?

Yeah, so in two thousand and eight. I think she had the song Bleeding Love, and the reason it's more clear to me as you guys know. Obviously I am married to an English woman and you like that I can tell the most obvious difference between the American accent and English accent is they don't pronounce r, so instead of first, it'd be like first or whatever, or like you know, let's go out there, let's go out there and Leona Lewis and so you can hear in in

So outs songs.

So that's always been you. It would be hard to act to like accidentally pronounce first like an American, I think, instead of I don't know, maybe when you're singing you're reading out enunciating the letters.

That's kind of my that's my my guess I was thinking of. I was thinking about trying to think of some examples, and then I was watching a movie yesterday and Elvis Costello was in it, and Elvis Costello is English. He's a rock kind of new wave rock guy. And I was like, oh, let me, let me listen to him and see, because I remember listening to him back in middle school or something, and I didn't know anything about him, and I was listening to him.

Just I guess.

I assumed he was American, and he had a lyric in a song that was like something mister Oswald with a swastika tattoo tattoo el dude, and I assumed he was talking about Lee Harvey Oswald.

And I was like, Okay, there's a lot of theories around this guy.

I've never heard this particular one, so I remember actually looking it up then, but it was like, oh, it's talking about like a well known fascist British politician.

Yeah, oh that makes sense, and then the references.

Yeah, So I was like, so it was from that context, clue.

But even in his songs, that are some songs he's more belting it out and some he's not talking, but a little bit more like faster where it's seems more closer to language. When I listened to him, I wouldn't.

I don't hear an.

Accent at all, so it's only the contextual clues of what he's singing about away for So yeah.

Reverse examples. Are there Americans that try to sound.

Yeah, I think there's a lot of like like the Ramones kind of do a little effect like whatever Blitz Creekbop or something you can get, and they're just singing in a it's just a little style where it's like not how you would actually talk if you're a person.

They're just like a little you know. That's the most prominent example I can think of.

And then I was there's a band Rancid, who are like later On, who are like very influenced by the Class, who are an English band, and the guy's just clearly doing a Joe Strummer clearly just heard him and is singing like him.

Say, It's like, I don't know, maybe he's just some street punk guy doing this thing, but it's like, yeah, he's trying to do this thing.

And that's funny because then there were bands copying. This guy becomes a real copy of a copy of all these guys mostly American, trying to sound like this British guy from you know, generations before.

Now that's fast.

But those are the ones I've I've thought.

Of, Oh, the guy from Grila, Damon Alburn from the band Blur, these English and Gorillas and they I guess they do a lot more kind of almost talking stuff.

So he you can hear is he sounds extreme.

He has a strong accent and it comes through in the music because it's more talking.

Like if you listen to whatever Clint Eastward or any of.

Those songs that happened glad I got Sunshine in a back, I'm useless.

But belong So there's no no mystery there. Yeah, when he's melting it.

Out here like the English singers that sound English when they sing. So that's her name, Lily Allen, that big Lily Allen song from like the mid two thousands. It was very clear.

Yeah, and again that's like a little more talking.

But that down next.

I want to do that for.

Yeah, there's the lack of ours.

Yeah, does Adele do this?

I was I was just yeah, let's pay that's this is my my belting theory. If you're belting it out and Adele is one of our great belters.

I think it's a lot harder to hear.

Ye this way, her singing accent is nowhere near Well that's the thing, yeah, because that's the thing.

You know, she has a very thick accent talking.

And Jennydale is little chopnut bits of eel which is probably just boiled actually now think about it, so got no flavor in it at all.

Because that's I was trying to think of, like, Okay, the Beatles, and it's like, I, you obviously know they're English, but it's more like, Okay, I recognize that's John Lennon's voice, and I know how he sounds when he's talking. Yeah, I don't actually think there's an accent when he's singing. Then there's obviously song is when they're doing more of a talk like you can hear it more, but mostly if you hear whatever Tristan Showder or something, Yeah, I wouldn't.

Think that, but let's hear Adele.

Yeah, they they by starting in my hoating that fever pictures bringing me out the dog.

It's just kind of like the classic soul singer voice, you know that doesn't necessarily sound English.

What about Taylor Swift.

Yeah, you think about it.

Like when she first came out, she was singing in that like crazy Nashville country accent. Like I remember one of my good friends, his cousin like went to like high school with or elementary school younger with Taylor Swift and she's from Pennsylvania. And I was like, wait a minute, you went to school with Taylor. Isn't Taylor Swift from.

Like yeah, Kentucky or yeah, somewhere down.

So it's like, no, she's from Pennsylvania.

And he said street singing out tadonio window when we're on the phone and it's all real.

So because it's late and your mama don't.

Know a song is that's crazy? Actually haven't. I don't know. I've never heard that song.

Yeah.

This her transition to pop was like a gradual thing, right like nineteen eighty nine, I guess was.

Like the one that was fully no.

Yeah, like I'm not.

Pretending anymore at all, but that early stuff that's really like a country toWin.

Yeah, fully country accent as opposed to what I was imagining was like a little bit of a you know, a tilt.

Yeah.

No, that's like, yeah, that's a little bit crazy and then you know, and I she's making pop music and like it doesn't exist anymore. But this is the crazy thing when I was looking for this. So she performed this more recently on the Error's tour, so I was curious, how does it sound? How similar this tailor sounds? Does she go back to that twang?

And he said, don't know.

She's done like the pop version now.

She completely lost the accent. Wow, or more accurately, she's no longer putting on an ac.

Yeah, it's like, you know, obviously she was much younger when that song came out. But this is not like, Okay, my voice is different, I'm singing in different key.

This is like the different Yeah.

Yeah, So what I want to do is I'm gonna play some songs and I want you guys to try to guess.

It's like where the artist is from. The one rules. If you know who the artist is, don't say.

Anything where the artist is from in terms of just their nationality.

Yeah, I don't know this.

I don't know this song either. Well, carrying the song, I'm just clar there's something away.

I get five dollars if I get this.

There was something about the way he said the word to t O that I thought was English.

Yeah, I'm getting English vibes, but I'm I'm in my head.

Now, okay, So that is McGhee from New Jersey. What the he?

Wow?

That's incredible?

All right, let me play and a little faith in me.

In his car the only star a lord on his nerve and the camerasine cops they could have been stars and this news scream I'm.

Going UK again.

I think he said cameras in a very UK way.

There's a couple of cameras.

What do we got?

This one's a little bit of a cheat. It's Mustafa He's so, I'll give you half a point for that. We in Canada, Toronto, Toronto?

Did you have an accent there?

I'll give you half a point because you know, okay, the queen's on the Queen's on the money. Yeah, i'll give you that one. Okay, I'll give you guys an easy one.

I ain't really got no, so I pulled. I just hope that God don't take them all my niggas. We drive step in the street and we.

Were waiting on the life go and hope he's saved the way for the calls right there.

We hoping.

I feel I don't know, I'm scared now, but they wouldn't be dropping that word like that over there. So yeah, this guy's American.

Yeah this is no cap from Mobile, Alabama.

All right, let's still.

Away if left today, but if goodbye to safe.

But this has to be like one of the one direction guys.

What a flus, the mind.

Far behind and the.

Never American American.

I'm gonna go English, English, you're American.

You're both wrong?

What this is?

Troy Savonne from Australia.

I was like, he see me too? I thought it was like, what's the what's the guy's name from? Not him the dane zay because he said never without an R. But I guess in Australia they also do that.

You guys did horrible at that game, did any right?

Yeah, we got a half point for Canadian. I should also get a half point for Australian. So I got a full point.

So maybe we're not so good at well, at least you two aren't so good at the certain Yeah, well at least we think we are. So we are gonna be joined by New Yorker music writer and critic call and we're gonna go deep on genre gatekeeping and of course accents in popular music. All that after the break. All right, fellas, I need you to help me with a problem that I got. You know, usually we're the ones helping other people with their problems. But I'm about

That's a tough one.

Maybe get a really large telescope.

I don't think that's the best way to do it. Manny, Do you have any solutions on how I can watch Mets games?

You broad I think I've got a slightly more practical solution for you, Devin. If you use nord VPN, you'll be able to change the location of your laptop's IP address and watch the content with no problem.

What about my privacy online? I'm worried someone's watching me.

First of all, no one is watching you, Noah. But in case someone was watching you, NordVPN provides you with privacy online, leaving no digital footprint by hiding your IP address. It's like wearing an invisibility cloak while you're surfing the web.

Sounds comfy, so, Manny, I've heard about these VPNs and how they're super slow.

How do I make sure my internet is not throttling?

If you want to use a VPN without slowing down your internet, Devin, You're gonna want to use NordVPN because whenever I use it, I don't see any buffering or lagging while I'm streaming my favorite content.

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So.

In the studio, we're joined by Quay, who's a critic inter writer at The New Yorker and author of Major Labels, A History of Popular Music, and Seven Genres.

Good News, Bad News. You have my book here?

It's like that.

I was looking you have the cover. I was like, wow, why does it have a kind of a plastic key. That's a library book.

I support my local library, and you know what, I was doing early in this podcast was I was buying every single book, and then I got some books that I didn't want to keep.

I see you're saying this might be one of them.

Well, we'll find out.

This is the audition by the end of the episode. You know, is that a thing on your show? Like at the end of the episode, if it goes well, I get to watch you log onto Amazon.

And so just as a reminder, uh, this episode started with a question from unless your named Joel, why do we only hear pronounce accents in country music?

First of all, do you agree with that premise?

No, that's insane. Okay, all right, right on the same page. Well, like, what's an accent?

Right?

And to be fair to Joel, he says pronounced accents like you. Yes, I think he thinks you can hear you know, if someone's got an English accent, for example.

Well, I wonder if when Joel says pronounced accents he means fake?

Is that his polite way of saying fake?

I think he yes.

From the rest of the email, it seems like performative maybe, if not fake.

Well, yes, it's.

Funny because in one definition, any musician who has any the accent is performative by definition if you're performing. But yes in terms of in terms of there being a noticeable difference between the accent and the way you talk in every day life, or a sense that the accent is there to help you try to like fit in with the genre you're part of. Yeah, you hear some of that in country, but yeah, I think you hear

We mean by regional.

There's a lot of different there's a lot of different reasons a person might have an accent.

So yes, you tell me where are we going?

But I want to start with country music, okay, because that was where you know, that was Joe. But you talk about this Country is an interesting genre because I think it gate keeps in a way that a lot of other genres just don't.

I disagree, but please, oh okay.

There is this thing in country music in which they love to talk about sort of like authenticity and holding on to that. And there are certain when you talk about this in your books, certain signifiers of country music that we all know of. So can you talk a little bit about sort of like country music's positioning of sort of like authenticity and sort of this fear of like almost being too big and like holding on to that.

Well, I want to zoom out a little bit, because when I think about musical genres, I think of them as communities. And it's like a community of listeners and musicians, sometimes literally in the same room. But sometimes it's just like you're listening to the music and you're like imagining the other people that might also listen to this.

Music, and you know, you're listening to Dolly Parton, and.

For the half hour that the album lasts, you can become the kind of person who listens to Dolly Parton, Like that's part of the fun. And so when you think about a community, any community needs gatekeeping. Sometimes a gatekeeping might be like literally turning people away, and especially if you want it to feel to have some sense of intimacy, some sense of like, oh, me and you have something in common that's a little different from those

Like what we all agree on.

And so yeah, the question of like it's hard. So yeah, it's hard to even know how you would rank, Like does country is country music more gatekeepery than techno? I don't know, man, Like techno has some rules and those clubs might be like literally hard to get into, whereas like anyone can buy a ticket to a country music concert. So I think that in country music, yes there's gatekeeping, but there is I think more than that, there's a

Extremely vexed in every genre, including country music. You could look at them not playing Beyonce, but you have to keep in mind these are the same radio stations that also don't play Taylor Swift because they also don't view Taylor Swift as like really country enough, sure, but they're happy to play shaboozi.

Can you walk us through this country music identity?

It starts as a kind of disparate thing, right, country and Western when Billboard is doing these charts of country music and Western music, and those are thought of as like maybe slightly separate things. Right, you think about the

From the beginning of its existence as a.

Genre are about the fact that the singers themselves used to live in some rural place, or America used to be rural, and now we've come to the city, which is what creates the country music industry. Right now we've come to we're at the Wheeling Jamboree, or we're at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. But we remember the way things used to be. So that sense of like we remember how things used to be when things were more rural is a big part of the identity of

Of like fades away a little bit.

You know, nowadays you don't say country in Western you say country. Obviously, one of the most fun ones which I've saved until now, is it comes to be thought of as white music. And this despite the fact that obviously, if you look at the history of country music, there's tons of black musicians who have contributed to this history.

Here's Dave Ford Bailey with the fox Chains.

And what happens at a certain point is that the genre itself comes to be seen as segregated in a way that kind of mirrors the segregation of American life. So the white performers from this genre are kind of pulled out towards this thing that gets called country music, and some of the black performers you might say, are excluded from that tradition or are considered more rhythm and blues.

Here's that brocm hat what Time has.

So part of the identity of the genre is it's going to be a white genre. Ye, And that's a thing that is hard to That's an interesting thing to kind of grapple with because I think a lot of people have a reaction when they hear that of like, that's really that it's white. But then you think about R and B, which is thought of as a black genre.

Well, Jack Carlow would say otherwise.

That's right, come on and Jack with his extra tall hat ely.

I mean, obviously I love it when people are playing in transgressing in that kind of a way. So, but generally, the idea that R and B music is black music is often talked about as something to celebrate like this, this is a black musical tradition, like this is great, this is something to be proud of. But you know, if you do the math, in a country that's what thirteen percent black, if you have black genres, you're also gonna have white genres, just like mathematically and so the

That's still whatever it is, fifty eight percent non Hispanic white or something, you're gonna have some disproportionately white genres. And then the question is, well, like, how do we think about that, and how do we think about diversity within a genre? And the reason I bring up R and B.

Is because it's a good example of how like we might not want that. We might not look at R and B and be like, wow, that's a shame that it's so many black performers.

I wish it was only thirteen percent black.

Performers and half percent Hispanic and you know, so you know, I don't think it's obvious that musical segregation is bad.

Or is a problem in a genre.

One of the things I love about popular music is that it reflects America, good, bad, and otherwise. And so to the extent that Americans are living somewhat segregated lives, I would expect and even in a way celebrate the idea that music would reflect that, rather than sugarcoating it, or rather than pretending something different is happening. So yes, country has and still does kind of grapple with its

A country accent.

And when she starts making records that are more considered or marketed or influenced by pop music, you hear less of that. Sage Sea, and I think, I think you know we're talking about music, right, So we're talking about singers, and we're talking about people using their voice and also using words to create music. So whenever you're turning words into music, the question of how you pronounce those words

So when you start.

Making that music, I think, I don't want to say naturally, it's hard to know what is or isn't natural, but I think it's it's inevitable that people would start using that sort of accent.

Because it feels organic.

Yeah, it feels like it's linked to the sort of music you want you're making, and that you know this once you start looking for that, that's everywhere, right. That's like, that's like British rock bands in the sixties singing with an American accent because that's what seems to go with rock and roll, and like, if you try to pin down Mick Jagger's accent, you'd be like, whoa, it's not English.

The one over.

You see Keith Urban, Yeah, I believe born in New Zealand, but spent some time in Australia. People always getting mad if you if you messed that up, but yes, from that part of the world somebody, and yes, well I personally think it would be fascinating to hear like a Keith Urban record with like a thick accent that suggests Australia and New Zealand. Obviously, he's found a way to do it where it's not corny, he doesn't sound like

Obviously, there are.

Moments in popular music where people lean into their local accent, right, and that can be that could be a musical strategy, right if your kneecap and you're like, we're not going to rap all the time in English, We're going to use our indigenous Irish language mockery, and then in other times people want to be part of a tradition, so

Yeah, yeah, it's this weird sort of I think there was an interview or people were questioning some of the members of cats I about.

Like why did you guys use these lyrics and his song?

And they're like if you didn't write this, Like yeah, it sounds kind of weird to us too, But now it's becoming its own new thing of.

Like, well, and you see that that's similar, that's like Britney spears.

Yeah, exactly.

Maybe one more time, Max Martin like he didn't know that. We don't say that.

Yeah, for those of you who don't know Max Martin is a legendary Swedish producer and songwriter. He's produced some of the biggest pop hits over the last thirty years, working with Britney Spears, Taylor Swift, the Backstreet Boys and more.

Hit Me One More Time, Don't That's Not Yet? Or like you know when you think of like Backstreet Boys, Yeah, I want to say I want it that way, like what are you talking and yes, and if a song becomes big enough, we're like, oh, that's just the language of pop music.

Yeah, it becomes its own thing.

I want to go back to your country music example, because you talk about in your book too, especially early days of country music, of these white artists who are writing speaking to this like hip hop example, as if they are a black artists in trying to use black lingo. And I think of the Tom Hanks scene in the New Elvis movie of like you know, zoom into his face, he's like he's white in like just realization that like

Sound black quote unquote or you know, taken from black artists.

You know, it's funny.

Authenticity is a slippery thing to define, but it's a quality that often people seek out in popular music. But it's not the only quality that people seek out in popular music. You might you might pair authenticity with something more like relatability. Right, So you hear a voice and you're like, oh, this person's kind of normal, this person's kind of like me, and right, maybe.

The opposite of that is like whoa this.

Person comes really comes from the real, whatever the real is supposed to be, right, this person represents a very different world from my world. And so yes, there's certainly moments in American music where, you know, in the Elvis example, maybe to listeners in that moment, a certain kind of rhythm and blues is associated with black singers, like there was something exciting about a singer who could get close to that. You know, you see maybe some of that with Eminem, who Eminem was.

Always very careful.

I think that he's not he's not doing anything where it sounds like putting on a show exactly, But he's also not necessarily talking the way a white kid from Detroit who.

Wasn't a rapper might talk.

And like there's certain things he can say and can't say, and like, you know, he could say yo, and it doesn't sound that weird, but there's maybe other things that he would say that he would sound as if he was leaning into it a little too much. And so yeah, obviously, at various points there's this moment in Elvis's career where being perceived as like maybe he's black could be helpful.

Really wanting to be part of this hip hop.

Scene, sway to the groove that no want chop.

Sam moved to the kid in Black Breath bos not a cheap heart job, but a rock the second So fuck coryon Man, Johnny Dell.

Then let's go, and then eventually finds his own identity, which is very much a reclamation of his roots and the music his father listened to and living way outside of the city in Detroit and literally going to Hank Williams Junior shows with his.

Dad, living my life and a slow hell different girl every night at the hotel, I Hain't Seen the Sunshine and three Damn Day, and there.

Is this this idea of like, well, yeah, over time you return to what you quote unquote really are.

Yeah, Post Malone another great example of this, starting with White iverson.

Yeah, Saucy, I'm Sargon, I'm swaggon.

Too, like fully making country music now.

The Last Cars, Last Chancers, ninety five truck Is Dancers, a couple of trucks, an chin.

And you know, I would I imagine and hope he's not done yet. I hope we get a metalcore record from him. I know he enjoys, uh that kind of music is well. I think sometimes we forget what it was like for us when we were teenagers and trying to figure out, like, well, I want to be cool.

What does it sound like if I'm cool? Like if I use this word, if I use that word.

And sometimes in this context we even talk about appropriation, which I think sometimes I think sometimes there's more of it than we realize. Like there are things that we learn and literally hear from birth, from our parents, but most of the rest of our lives is things that we pick up from our friends, yes, or from someone else, or like, yeah, you didn't come out of the womb. No matter what race you are, you maybe didn't come out of the womb like hip hop, or you didn't

And yes, so you hear that.

You hear that with accents, And again, accents are an important musical tool which you're making pop music with your voice, and it's you know, I think you've seen that, especially with hip hop, where when hip hop goes international it sounds a little different, Like Polish hip hop sounds a little different because the rapping is in Polish and so

How could you mean that you'll be empty Tommy, then breast listen, look baby done your back and then dipen your back and then diga back and then more back in one minute.

I feel like we're currently in the era of hip hop that is like, at least in the US, well mainstream.

About to make a big claim. I want to say a big claim.

Mainstream hip hop.

It it has become a bit flattened in terms of regional sounds. I think there are more underground stuff that definitely you know, you took about Detroit, and there's definitely some more interesting stuff happening that's not in the mainstream. But there was a time when certain radio stations wouldn't play music from different areas, right, so New York radio stations would only play quote unquote New York artists. Think about this with outcast in the nineties being booed at the Source Awards.

So here's some background for you who are not hip hop heads.

In nineteen ninety five, Source Magazine is this huge New York based hip hop magazine. They have an award show based out of New York and Outcasts. The Atlanta Group wins for best New Artists and.

The winner and ladies help me out Outcast.

And the New York crowd boost them because at the time, New Yorkers aren't interested in hearing music from down South, for even in the West Coast. And Andre three thousand, who's a member of Outcasts, says this infamous line, but it's like this, though.

I'm tied of folks, you know what I'm saying, Clothed.

Minded folks, you know what I'm saying. We got a demo table on them by the want to hear. But it's like that the South got something to say. That's all I got to say.

New York radio stations would not play out Cast because they weren't seen as you know, being cool to New Yorkers.

But also this had a lot to do with the economy and the technical infrastructure. Like people used to buy their records at stores, so there were distributors that would distribute records in you know, Southwest wholesale or whatever the big distributors were, especially in the nineties, and you would build your audience through record stores, through shows, and through

Houston, or in Atlanta or in Orlando.

And so yeah, it was just like it was literally different radio stations, different record stores, different compact discs, and also different people. So you know that guy you knew from high school that became a rapper, it's gonna sound very different if you're in the Bay Area versus if you're in Philadelphia. So yeah, like everything, like a lot of things in American life, it was very fragmented, like it was.

It's I think it's hard.

I think it's probably hard for younger people to even understand, Like it was hard to get those albums, Like I would mail order those albums because there's all this crazy down South stuff happening and we're not getting it in New York.

No.

So, yes, there was a time when the hip hop world was a lot more fragmented. And you know, obviously at the time the artists it was cool that they could sort of make a living, but they were it was frustrating to the artists, right, They're like, how come how do I break through? And so, yeah, there was

Is that diversity in the sounds of a genre unique to hip hop? For such a young genre, you would imagine that everything would sound kind of similar and before it started to break out, But in other genres as they kind of first were formed, did you get that level of fragmentation.

I think hip hop is really good at taking like vernacular culture and turning it into music, right, So you have this incredible diversity underneath, which is maybe a little bit different if you have like a guitar bassed genre where everyone's got to learn guitar, and then yeah, the licks might be a little different and these people play the stratocaster and these people play the telecaster, like and you do hear some diversity, But yes, I.

Think hip hop.

One of the great strengths of hip hop was that there was this incredible untapped linguistic richness in all these different communities, where for hip hop it was just maybe guys who would be just like telling stories on the corner and everyone in the neighborhood would be like, Yeah, that guy's really funny, or like they would just gather that guy's a good storyteller, or that guy's got good jokes, but it didn't have a way to travel outside the neighborhood.

Boy and his crew, and this is the Baton rouge vibe.

And I can hear that in the music in a way that feels really unmediated and and.

Direct sum trumpsas straight from others.

Well, I felt like that might have been at the core of the whole. I mean the Drake Kendrick or he Kendrick makes music that is so personal and intimate sounding, whereas Drake and I'm a Drake apologist obviously, but it's just like, based on the song, it could sound like it's from anywhere in the country. And so I think there's a level of authenticity in Kendrick's music where it's like, oh, this is clearly his life.

Yeah, although you know it was, It's funny.

It was kind of later in Kendrick's career that he really started to lean into the sounds of LA hip hop, you know what I mean, Like the early records when he was considered like a little more conscious or something, maybe had a.

Little less geographical specificity.

What if the dream?

What's the stream?

And as complicated as the scenes things we match it actually happened in real life situations.

They did.

He was also looking back to freestyle fellowship and other more like underground LA things, and so one of the interesting things that happened was that you know, over the years and then especially at that like uh not like us moment, you got something that felt very specific to lay Right.

Hey, I'm Trippman, I'm slatting.

I'm like, what's that.

I got?

Mustard, He's gonna bring the whole city together, And if you're from LA you're like part of Kendrick's crew, And that's not exactly the feeling you got. And Drake is interesting in a different way, right because he has this relationship with Houston and he has like probably one of the best ears in the history of hip hop. Yeah, like just his knack for being like, oh, there's something cool going on halfway around the world, right, I think.

Need one got out of scene mind one more time, idol, how if I was taking old.

Kiss think about like the whole afrobeats movement that comes after the success of One Dance and the fact that Drake was able to hear Oh this African thing and it's kind of got a Caribbean feel, which we have in Canada, but it's also this interesting other UK London legos thing that's happening. So yes, I think, and the idea, and you know at various times. You know, there's obviously some videos where you hear Drake talking and he's got like a thick Canadian accent.

You're like, oh, right, the whole world, look around, look around you, look at this. We created this. This didn't exist before we were here. Look around at the square.

I promised you right now we did this.

Doesn't matter what anybody says.

They could say it's.

Disrespectful, they could say it's dis and that everybody.

But part of his skill was this thing that traditionally rappers weren't supposed to do, which was he can kind of like move around and he can borrow sounds from different regions. And you know, in the old days that might have seemed inauthentic. But you know, Drake's success it sort of made hip hop fans think a little differently about authenticity.

Right, He's like, yeah, wearing a sweater, Like, so.

What I'm gonna say.

It feels like the slider has changed now, Right, you were talking about these two sort of like knobs. There is like does it sound good? And is it quote unquote authentic? And I feel like now in hip hop it's really like does it sound good. People don't really care about authenticity that much. Authenticity as long as the person feels like it's like it's cool.

But authenticity can mean so many different things, right. It can mean like do you have credibility in your neighborhood? Like it might literally in hip hop traditionally, one thing it's meant is like can you put on your jewelry and walk down the street? Right, that's a kind of authenticity, But obviously another kind of authenticity is like does this music reflect who you really are?

Does this feel like you?

Do?

We feel like we're getting to know you?

And that's maybe a more traditional pop kind of authenticity, where you're communicating through the music, and what people want is a sense that they can make a kind of personal connection with you, and that it's less about necessarily like what's your reputation in the neighborhood? And it's more like, does this highly artificial thing you're doing into a microphone

This point of view. This is not some guy in an office telling him to make this type of music.

But I think also we've kind of like we sort of hinted at but not really talked about one of the things that I think a lot of people think about when it comes to accents, which is diversity and geographical diversity. And this idea that a lot of people have that we're so much more connected now we can hear each other now, is some of that geographic diversity

So you have that, and then you have that happening with other languages.

Right, You're having you think about the different accents within Spanish speakers in the Americas, and you know these moments where an English speaker might not notice of like, oh that's bad Bunny doing kind of a Dominican accent to like tip his cap to dembo music, you know, from

Doune run out.

I'll be giving it my bestness and not that's going to stop me, but divine into invention. I reckon it's again matter to win some more, learn somebody.

Right because those are the rhythms in the music, So that's gonna bring out the rhythms in the speech. So I think that that's something that I think that that's something that's definitely gonna continue and that you hear again, not just in country, not just you know, you hear that in you know, if you're listening to Blink one eight two and you're like, is that a calid like Tom's voice? Is that a California version of an English version of an American accent.

Let's talk a little bit about we've touched on it and to all these other genres, but just like pop music more generally, you know, talking about like a Harry Styles or Adele and this idea of you know, these UK artists singing in you know, a quote unquote American accent. Would you attribute that to like you're saying, this is just like we associate with, you know, quote unquote pop music and how it should sound like or do you think it's a purposeful like you know, Adele's talking voice

I would love to hear it.

I would love to hear it too, but I don't know if it would have as wide of an appeal.

Traditionally, hip hop is unusual, right because hip hop there really is the expectation that the talking voice and the rapping voice.

Rapp it is a little closer to talking, so it's gonna match.

Yeah, singing is always going to be like it's not necessarily opera where like you open your mouth a big voice, you're singing in Italian it's a whole different thing.

But there is more of a separation between singing a song stretching out the words yeah, and doing an interview.

And so and yeah.

I think, you know, Adele is making music that's influenced by a particular tradition, whether it's you know, Whitney Houston or whoever her influence is, and that's an American tradition, it's partly a Black American tradition, and so you're hearing that in her voice. You know, Harry Styles is kind of interesting because like you're hearing some of the American boy bands, but you're also hearing, you know, some beatles.

Sweet Creature.

Had another talk about where it's going on, but weird still young some of that, some of that Paul McCartney and some of that stuff, which is you know, influenced by America but routed through the UK. So yeah, I think that you're definitely again, for most of these singers, I think it's pretty intuitive, right.

It's not like they have a plan.

It's like they go into the studio and they start feeling it, and they start vibing and they're listening to their favorite records and what comes out sounds.

A little bit like their version of their favorite records.

Like I said, I think because I love hip hop, I'm a sucker for vernacular and for local languages and for music where the rhythms are different because of the local language. Right. But again, one thing that popular music does is find what used to be called the lowest common denominator, which used to always be said with a sneer. And I never understood why. I'm like, you mean, the

Mm hmm. So we say, in this case, like the American accent is the neutral?

Yeah, yes, it feels a little neutral. And you know, obviously in the UK, where the discourse about accent and class is a lot more sophisticated than here, and so you have all these fights about BBC and received pronunciation and the idea of like, you know, the Queen's English, Yeah, the King's English, And you know, the idea that certain acts sense are related to class, and that if you're putting that on that could be embarrassing, the same way

Guarante it looks like Salawan placing it and I want like to get my tarnils done.

I'm old lady like.

His Oh my god, your tarnails were like so broady, it was like.

And like that that sort of makes its way into popular music, and you know, by the time you hear Katie Perry singing California Girls, you're maybe hearing an.

Echo of that.

Crazy speaking.

And again, part of the fun of pop music is make believe. Whether we're listening to like some drill track or we're listening to.

Like a main mainstream pop song.

Part of the fun of it is like you can learn the lyrics, maybe in the privacy of your own car, you can sing along, and you can like be that person a little bit. And I think that's something you don't have with movies in the same way you can you can memorize movie dialogue, but there is something about popular music where you can kind of become that person. Yes, and sometimes sometimes an accent might seem like a barrier to that, but sometimes an accent might be part of the fun.

All Right. That was Kay, writer and critic at The New Yorker.

If you enjoy this conversation, check out his book Major Labels, available anywhere purchase books, or if you want to be like me, you can rent it at your vocal library.

Well, now I'm interested which one of you has the strongest accent?

Probably Devin, I would vote Devon. Yeah, wow, I think so.

This is like this American Life episode where they got their testosterone tested.

We got to do that anyway, that's also probably Devan.

We're no such thing.

After the break, Okay, we're back many Noah, Devin. All Right, so that was Okay, I learned a lot.

Yeah, really fun conversation.

I felt like, you know, I was back in school, you know.

Yeah, yeah, like kind of shooting ship at the cafeteria table. M hm, going through all of our.

Through all our favorite artists, artists I don't really know about. I got some people we should make a playlist for this episode.

Yeah, people love the playlist a lot of I'm sure I'm looking at the clicks and people are listening.

I'm sure all ten of you.

Yeah, so scroll down.

But what I was trying to think about, you know, after you know, we've had that conversation, I guess a week ago now, and during that time, I've been trying to think through are there any examples We talked a lot about, you know, people sort of like playing in different playgrounds and sort of like just wearing different hats.

Yeah, mister Harlow, mister Jack Hard Now he's wearing kangle hats.

It's like give so for for those of you who are not online, uh, in a way that us three are Jack Carlow is a white rapper, grew up outside of I'm going to say Louisville, Kentucky's pop brand.

I got.

He has decided on this new album that he's put out, he got bored of his wrapping, so he wanted to make a R and B album.

We go around Together singers. That all.

Part of I feel like some of the conversation around this album is really about the conversation he had on the New York Times Popcasts, which is their music podcast, in which they were talking to him about, you know, like we talked about earlier in this episode, a lot of white artists who come up in some you know, like hip hop, often pivot to wider genres.

John saying, you didn't retreat into a whiter genre. In fact, you arguably went into deeper into its deeper into black. So is that was that conscious? Absolutely, because you like pushing that boundary that line.

I think I love black music.

I love the sound amo, I love the sound of black music.

So Jack Carlow puts out this R and B album, there's a little bit of backlash.

And the fact that he's cosplaying.

It's kind of like a yeah, a little bit of a black guy, you know, both in his you know, like sort of the promo for the album in terms of like is what he's wearing?

Yeah? Yeah, My issue with it is just is just not very good. Like it's kind of just like a boring moment.

It's not interesting he talks about, you know, in his interviews, like he didn't do any like voice training or like, you know, it's just sort of I'm like, so, what.

Did you do? They're prepared to make this R and B album?

You know, it's like that's an interesting question. Is the only thing stopping you from kind of respecting this for lack of a better word, is that it's not good? Like what if the music was good and catchy?

Yeah, I wouldn't mind as much.

Because I feel like, oh yeah, because I feel like I was never a huge head but Mac Miller, Yeah, yeah, he kind of moved into more of an R and B space too.

I feel like that's true.

And granted I don't think he was ever like I mean, obviously very successful, but it's successful in a different way where I feel like more respect did I guess then, Jack Harlowe and I'm wondering why exactly, even though he did change his sound, but not in a you didn't get like whiter in the you know, not you know, in the same generally the same way or direction as what we're seeing.

Now.

Well, here's a maybe a weird way to end this episode, but I think it does speak to this.

Who just came to mind.

Also maybe because he's a friend of Drew Ski, but Timothy Shallomey right for Mary Supreme. Yeah, he was promoting this latest film, this you know, Oscar nominated film, and to get people to go see it, he was doing a lot of things that people saw as like black coated. He was leaning into his you know, wigger uh wigernoess you can say. And there was a little bit of backlash online of like Timothy, like, you're doing this rapping thing.

Really, I'm just a fan, you know, I'm a fan of of black culture and hip hop and all of it. And how could you be, you know, a child of American culture without being influenced by it.

So it's a fine line, and that rubbed people a bit the wrong way because they didn't feel like it was authentic to who he was, and there was people defending him saying, hey, he grew up in New York around black people. He's been rapping, you know, he was rapping super Base in high school. You know, like he's been down with the cause. But there was this conversation about like authenticity or are you putting on a costume when it's convenient for you?

Well, yeah, then it's like that's the code switching thing, because then when he's sitting down to do a more serious interview, he's not acting. Yes, I think that's more what irks people generally, whereas it's so transparent in that way. And I don't think it's like conscious conscious in a certain way of course, but I don't think, you know, I don't think he and like his team sat down and were like, Okay, when you go to this, do this.

Yeah, yeah, like malicious, I guess it is my my thinking.

I agree.

I'm also from uh, you know, I grew up in a very poor, low income neighborhood that was like fifty white and fifty percent black, and those white guys do exist, like yeah, totally like and then they'll go to college and like you know, kind of uh, straighten up.

A little bit.

But I could totally see why some people were skeptical because he does come like if your first introduction to Timothy Schuldmy was like prestige actor, yes, and then you see him doing this, well you really need to do is go back to those YouTube videos from him in high school.

I drag, I got Dog Dog.

Cat with FIFA. Thank you know your little pollard.

Now I'm a Randrick Pop with a B.

That's it for today's show.

If you are a new listener, you may want to check out our episode on is Taylor Swift Bigger than Michael Jackson. It is number thirty six. I'm going to link to it in the show notes, and also just check out our whole archive. We got a lot of great episodes. They're all pretty evergreen, so you can make your way through it. No such thing as a production of kaleidoscope content. Our executive producers are kad Osbourne and men guest Kadakudur. The show is created by many Fidel

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