Cee-Lo’s Track
I’m fascinated by Cee-Lo’s track.
For the uninitiated, and no one will be out of the loop for long, you can get up to speed here:
I first encountered "F**K YOU" in e-mail, early this morning. Scanning through dozens of messages, nearly a hundred, I saw one by Jay Frank of Futurehitdna fame speaking about a song that would not get airplay. But I did not know what track it was, I was in too big of a rush to check it out.
But a few hours later, in front of my desktop computer after a doctor’s appointment, I started scanning through my Twitter feed, whereupon I found this:
RobGlaser: This will be the anthem of 2010. You heard it here first:Â
Cee-Lo Green youtube (via @tbquirk & @andyzax)
Rob Glaser, yes that Rob Glaser, the old majordomo of RealNetworks and Rhapsody. I’ve only met him once, but we’ve e-mailed from time to time and he’s always calm. What I mean by that is he’s sans hype, he’s about the information more than the spin, which is why I decided to follow him.
Not that I looked for Mr. Glaser, someone retweeted something he had to say and I was impressed. Rob Glaser’s on Twitter! I’ve got to follow him!
And I’ve learned about Rob’s offspring and daily life, but I also get nuggets of information that help round out my world view. But I don’t rely on Rob Glaser for music tips. Then again, since this is such a rarity, since Rob almost never recommends a track, I clicked through.
To find Cee-Lo Green’s "F**K YOU".
I love Cee-Lo. Because he’s so UnHollywood. He’s overweight. He’s a guy with a high voice. And he recorded my favorite single of the twenty first century, "Crazy". I’ve never heard anything by him since that’s quite as good, but I’ll always cut him a break, I’ll always give him a chance.
And listening to "F**K YOU" I got excited. I wanted to tell everybody I knew. We all want to be first.
But my mail server was locked up for at least an hour. And I had to run out of the house for another appointment in ten minutes.
Meanwhile, Perez Hilton tweeted about the track. It was already too late.
Actually, I’d decided to tweet about it first, when I realized I had no time to write a full missive, I said:
Lefsetz: Can the Internet Make Cee-Lo’s "Fuck You" a hit? I like the concept better than the song, but it is good: http://youtu.be/CAV0XrbEwNc
I checked the responses on my BlackBerry.
dcaballero said: interesting question. what’s a "hit" by internet metrics? radio can’t play it RT @Lefsetz: Can the Internet Make Cee-Lo’s "Fuck You" a hit?
Cathy Pellow of sargenthouse said: @Lefsetz my company and @mattstawski just made the video for that CeeLo green song and it’s so good! can’t wait for it to get unleashed.
thepark said: @Lefsetz looks like the internet will. can’t wait to see the call and response of it performed live hahah
marycigarettes said: @Lefsetz two repeat listens and it starts to feel like a novelty record,but he is a mighty and under rated talent.
I felt the excitement of an Internet phenomenon, but how long does an Internet phenomenon last? Didn’t that article say a YouTube video had a shelf-life of under two days?
I thought of Harry Nilsson’s "You’re Breakin’ My Heart", from "Son Of Schmilsson".
Check it out here:
"Son Of Schmilsson" stopped Harry’s momentum. After "Nilsson Schmilsson", he was gigantic. But this follow-up was not a remake. I loved "Spaceman", but it was a stiff. But "You’re Breakin’ My Heart" is better than "F**K YOU".
Few people heard "You’re Breakin’ My Heart", you had to own it or know someone who did in order to hear it, it got no airplay, which in the seventies meant it almost didn’t exist, especially when part of a stiff album.
But now we live in the Internet era…
Radio will never play "F**K YOU". Then again, they could bleep it. But if you bleep it, what’s left?
A not so good novelty song.
If recorded by a nobody, "F**K YOU" would get little traction. It’s only interesting because it was done by Cee-Lo. In a matter of days, everyone will know about it, an impossibility in pre-Internet days. But just because everyone knows about it, is it a hit? Everyone knows who Snooki is, does that mean she’s got talent? Paris Hilton? Kim Kardashian?
It looks like "F**K YOU" is another Net phenomenon. Today word can truly spread instantly. The mainstream media is last. Eventually you might read about "F**K YOU" in the paper, but not initially, at first word is spread by fans, and people trust their friends and check something out. But that doesn’t mean it’s got legs.
So we all know and we all don’t really care, we move on.
So now, more than ever, it’s about quality. Not in the radio world, not in the world of TV, but online. You can gain traction, but you’ve only got staying power if you’ve got quality. Hype might get you recognized, stunting by a star might gain eyeballs, but nothing sticks unless there’s a kernel of greatness inside.
And in many cases, especially if something is innovative, left of center, development/traction is very slow, a song has to percolate in the marketplace, the Net can blow it up, but the supernova could take months or even years to reach everybody. A song never goes out of rotation online, but it’s competing against every other song in history.
Analogize this to TED talks. The series still hasn’t reached its peak. People are still discovering great lectures. They’re e-mailing you what you saw a year ago. This doesn’t demonstrate their lack of cool, but the underlying quality of the material.
These TED talkers didn’t start yesterday, most have spent years dedicated to their field, to the point where they could be selected for a TED speech. That’s the new paradigm. Don’t ask how you can accomplish world domination right away, but keep woodshedding, creating great shit until finally, everyone wakes up and anoints it, welcomes you into the pantheon, agrees you’re great.
