Miley Cyrus Knows Why The Caged Whore Sings

Miley Cyrus has ditched the Madonna/Whore thing she's been rocking of late for the straight up teen-stripper act. Her new album is called Can't Be Tamed and while the album cover has her posing as a baby-faced rock skank the title track's video is craziness on a whore 'nother level.

The song is kinda boring, electro-stamped pop/rock in the vein of Ke$ha, Glambert or Britney's "If You Seek Amy." But the video is trashy greatness. She plays a newly discovered winged creature, Avis Cyrus, and she escapes her confines with a posse of co-ed dancers. She grinds on the boys and the girls, as all winged creatures do, and basically acts like Lady Gaga without the vocal talent. (OH SNAP!)
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Trashy Thursdays: Miley Cyrus - "Party In The USA"

Trashy Thursdays will be happening every Thursday (duh) and will feature the trashy pop songs I kinda love. Don't get it twisted, I think pop music is an art form. But like all art, there are brilliant artistic works are fresh and dynamic and new as well as less inspired pieces of art. Sometimes those less inspired bits are as much fun as the "good" stuff, that's why we're getting trashy!

Ok, I'mma be honest here. I HATED this song when it first came out. I still kinda do, but after the flaccid melody and trite lyrics of "The Climb" any Miley Cyrus single is bound to be an improvement.

Miley was born to make trashy pop, the spawn of country flash-in-the-pan Billy Ray Cyrus has been a child star for a few years before churning out of trash-pop's greatest songs "See You Again." Every crap-tastic single that has followed has paled before that piece of surf-guitar-meets-Kylie-electro-pop brilliance that crashed over me in spring '08. And "Party In The USA" was destined to be merely an annoyingly catchy follow-up to the horrors of "Fly On The Wall."

That is, until the gays got a hold of it. Once a couple of Fire Island boys pop your CD in and start lipsynching on the beach, you have arrived. You are a goddess of trashy pop music; the paragon of all things tacky, yet refined. Miley, I salute you. And to the uninitiated, I present the masterpiece of YouTube: "Party In The FIP"

[Diva Week] Does VH1 Read My Blog? Because Divas Live Is Back!

Apparently Pictures & Conversation's Diva Week is starting a trend, because VH1 has annouced the return of the best program ever on the channel, Divas Live! The current divas are my girl Kelly Clarkson (you may hear more about her later this week... wink), Leona Lewis (because "Bleeding Love" is every diva song ever rolled into one and covered in extra runs and histrionics), British soul-pop singer Adele (I'm not sure about "diva" but I kinda love her), and my sworn frienemy Miley Cyrus. NOOOOOOOOOOOO! x infinity.

I have a serious love/hate relationship with Billy Ray's spawn. I wanted to hate "See You Again" but the crazy club beat and surf guitars sucked me in. Then came "Seven Things" and I was back in hate. "The Climb" almost had me, it's simple melody and lyrics lulled me into thinking Miley was more than a moppet who liked to show her bra strap in MySpace pics. The I realized a 16-year-old (who was dating a 20-year-old underwear model) was just repeating the ancient maxim of "It's not the destination, it's the journey." I already know this, I based my David & Bathsheba sermon on that very idea. Then the facts she's already writing her memoirs makes me roll my eyes, seriously. Only Drew Barrymore can write a life story worth reading while still in her teens. (Seriously, read Little Girl Lost. It's epic.)

Anyway, I'm excited for the other three. I'm hoping for a "Moment Like This" sing-off between Leona and Kelly. Who's with me?

Related video:



Above:
Kelly Clarkson - "Moment Like This"
Leona Lewis - "Moment Like This"
Miley Cyrus - "See You Again"
Adele - "Hometown Glory [High Contrast Mix]"

Everybody Sing! Pop Divas Join Forces For "Just Stand Up"

All-star charity singles were huge in the 80s, remember "We Are The World?" But with exception of some failed attempts post-9/11, nobody has been stepping up to the plate. Well, no more! The all-female chorus on "Just Stand Up (To Cancer)" includes cancer-survivors Melissa Etheridge and Sheryl Crow; hip-hop chicas Beyonce, Rihanna, Keyshia Cole, Fergie, Ciara and Ashanti; multi-octave range rovers Mary J. Blige, Leona Lewis and Mariah Carey; country stars Carrie Underwood and LeAnne Rimes and pop-tarts Miley Cyrus and Natasha Bedingfeild. And, it's surprisingly listenable. Like most charity singles, the lyrics are trite, but hearing some of the best songbirds on the planet give it their all, although Leona could out-sing her duet partner Fergie, obvs! Listen below, and read the lyrics and a break-down of who-sang-what here.

We're Halfway There... (Part One)

OK, kids, we've made it to the midpoint of 2008, and I'm hankering for some list making! So far 2008 has brought us a new Spears baby (not Britney's) a couple of pop diva comeback albums (again, not Britney's) and a new seriously hot American Idol (still not Britney) and an American pop star on How I Met Your Mother (yup, Britney!) So, what are my favorite tracks of 2008's first half?

I've decided to make two lists. The first is a top 15 list of just pop hits. These are the songs with heavy radio airplay and charted high on the Hot 100. Last year, a lot of these songs got buried at the back of my top 50, because I get so sick of hearing them they become less hot than the album tracks and indie stuff. But my number one pop hit may end up being my number one song of the year, it just depends on what the rest of the year holds. It's most played on my iPod, despite also being a massive radio hit. The peak position on the Billboard Hot 100 (per Wikipedia) is listed after the title.

List number two, which you will get later this week, is the non-hits. Maybe they got light airplay or are totally not radio-friendly indie-type stuff. Or perhaps they are remixes or album tracks, but my love for them is as strong or stronger than the radio hits. For my year end list, I will probably not do the separate lists, but who knows? That's six months away...

Paulbo's Top 15 Pop Hits 2008.5

15. Miley Cyrus - "See You Again" (#10)
For a song that I hated the first few weeks of radio play, Hannah Montana star Miley Cyrus's biggest pop hit sure is high on my chart. I still think some of the lyrics are shit ("My best friend Leslie said oh she's just being Miley" is one of the most obnoxious lines in pop music history) but it's got a killer beat, funky surf guitars and a chorus that is catchy as hell. More worth cranking in the car than I want to admit.

14. Janet Jackson - "Feedback" (#19)
Another beat-heavy track, only this time with a far more urban flair and mature lyric content. Featuring one of my favorite lines of the year: "My swag is serious/something heavy like a first day period" So gross, but so funny.

13. Rihanna - "Please Don't Stop The Music" (#3)
This Michael-Jackson-sampling club hit puts me in serious dance floor mode. Originally gaining major play in dance clubs in 2007 causing "Please Don't Stop The Music" to hit the top of the Billboard Clubplay Charts before it's official radio release in January 2008. But enough chart chat, it's a dance song. So shake that booty people!

12. Mariah Carey - "Touch My Body" (#1)
Sexy, flirty, fun. And that's just Jack McBrayer in the the video! Mimi emancipates herself from ballads and brings a naughty pop track to the masses. Apparently booty calls are her style, and a piano-driven beat is too. But she's not totally kinky, if there's a camera up here, then she best not catch this flick on YouTube. But the hilarious music video? That's all up in YouTube's bidness like a Wendy interview...

11. Coldplay - "Viva La Vida" (#1)
"Viva La Vida" is the first ever number one hit for the British band, and my favorite Coldplay track since "Yellow." I love symphonic rock, and this is a prime example of why.

10. Rihanna - "Take A Bow" (#1)
Many have tried to rip off "Irreplaceable" but leave it to that hit's songwriter (Ne-Yo) and production team (Stargate) to turn the new Beyonce into, well, the new Beyonce. It may not be as catchy as "umbrella-ella-ella-ella-eh-eh-eh" but it's still a stunning pop ballad.

9. Danity Kane - "Damaged" (#10)
I never really liked Danity Kane, they seemed like the Spice Girls for the '00s, only without the hits. While "Show Stopper" was an OK club track, "Damaged" is like "The First Cut Is The Deepest" only as a club banger! The lyrics are actually moving, but the girls don't park on the dance floor no matter how damaged their hearts are.

8. Natasha Bedingfeild - "Pocketful of Sunshine" (#6)
It's just a sweet little pop song, not as cloying as previous single "Love Like This" but not as brilliant as "Unwritten" or "These Words (I Love You, I Love You)" I love the downbeat of the track, reminiscent of fellow Brit-poppers Dido or Seal, which makes it a perfectly chill summer song.

7. Colbie Caillat - "Realize" (#20)
On this track Caillat's lyrics cut like a knife, which is something I never thought I'd say about the songwriter who described love as giving her "tingles in a silly place." It perfectly describes the tentative love one has for a friend, especially one that may be unavailable :coughstraightguyscough: Colbie wants her man to meet her halfway, to realize which she just realized, but we never find out if he does. I hope so, I know the pain of unrequited love and nothing spoils your peanut butter sandwiches more than it.

6. Chris Brown - "Forever" (#8)
I haven't heard a techno track get this much airplay since Cascada's "Everytime We Touch" but I'm not complaining. The beat insists on making you dance, the euro-synths shimmer like they should, the chorus is amazing: "It feel like I waited my whole life for this one night/It's only me, you and the dance floor" They may need a new word to describe this genre-blending on songs like this or Rihanna's "Please Don't Stop The Music" and much of Madonna's Hard Candy, perhaps techno-hop?

5. Katy Perry - "I Kissed A Girl" (#2)
A new-wavey nod to lesbian experimentation, with naughty lyrics like "I kissed a girl and I liked it/The taste of her cherry chap stick" and a synthy rock beat. It's an instant pop classic, from a girl whose worked with Matthew Thiessen of Relient K in the past and appeared in the Gym Class Heroes video "Cupid Chokehold" Emo enough for ya?

4. Jordin Sparks feat. Chris Brown "No Air" (#3)
The youngest American Idol winner completes her takeover of the pop charts with this torchy duet with R&B superstar Chris Brown. The runs-to-actual-lyrics ratio is pretty high, making it perfect for a chest-thumping lip sync in the bathroom mirror. I highly recommend it.

3. Flyleaf - "All Around Me" (#40, Hot Modern Rock Tracks Chart: #6)
With a stunning cry of "I'm alive!" over a bed of modern rock guitars, Flyleaf lead singer Lacey Mosely leaped into my heart. The smallest and most fragile looking rocker I've seen, her voice chills me, and the line from the chorus "I can feel you all around me/thickening the air I'm breathing" is one of the most amazing things I've heard all year. The album may be three years old, and the track may have debuted on the modern rock charts last year before finally entering the pop charts this year, but that only proves the longevity of this appealing rock smash.

2. Madonna feat. Justin Timberlake "4 Minutes" (#3)
This song was created just for me to love. My goddess, the Divine Madonna, and my boyfriend/stalkee, the Adonis-like Justin Timberlake, together? How could I hate? From the second the French radio rip hit the interwebs, I was all over it. The brassy beat, courtesy of pop-mastermind Timbaland and the self-referential hooky chorus were enough to have me in it's grips. The best dance single so far this year, with many other hit-worthy tracks on the parent album Hard Candy. I'm out of time, and I've only got four minutes...

1. Leona Lewis - "Bleeding Love" (#1, four non-consecutive weeks)
It's hard to believe this soaring ballad was written by former teen-pop star Jesse McCartney, and that the eighties-style beat wasn't a Timbaland production. The organ and strings put me in mind of Sinead O'Conner's "Nothing Compares 2 U" only with the vocals of Mariah Carey. I gorgeous pop ballad, perfect for singing along to, but you can't outsing the new diva in town, Ms. Leona Lewis.

New Miley Cyrus - "7 Things"

Miley's back! And suckier then ever... I wasn't sure if "See You Again" was a fluke of OK-popness, obviously it was as this is pretty crappy. Dropping the dance-floor beat for a Ashlee Simpson-esque earnest pop-rock vibe. Like Jewel, only fake. With stupid lyrics like "if you text it, I'll delete" and the kicker: "the seven things I hate about you, you make me love you" and guitars, drums, strings and a really bad attempt at a punk growl. Listen if you wish...

Reluctantly Enjoyed: "Realize" and "See You Again"

Sometimes I make a mistake. Not often, but sometimes I prejudge something, only to be proven wrong. There are two songs that I've done that with, and I am here to admit it. These are the songs I Reluctantly Enjoy.

First off is Colbie Caillat's second single off Coco, "Realize." I hated "Bubbly" so very much, it blinded me to the heart wrenching tale of newly realized love that may not be reciprocated. It sounds so much more personal and real than "Bubbly" but I was ignoring it, to my own detriment. "If you realize what I just realized, that we'd be perfect for each other and we'd never find another... We'd never have to wonder if we missed out on each other" is a line that I wish I'd written, which is something I've never said about anything in "Bubbly." We've all felt that sting of love both secret and unrequited, and I love a good song to wallow in that grief with.

Next is a song I blasted pretty harshly in one of my single rundowns a few months ago. It's in digital print that I thought "See You Again" by Miley Cyrus sucked. It's turns out that it's not all horrible, just the lyrics are really bad, and feel awful for saying that since she is just 15 and co-wrote the song. But I call a spade a spade, it's who I am. The beat is hot, though. The surf guitars and club friendly vibe is awesome, I just wish Miley's vocals had something there. They have no oomph. With all that said, I kind of love the song now. It took some time to get hot for me, but I turn it up in the car all the time now.