Tynan's Anger

Arts & Culture Commentary from a Loving Digital Skeptic

[SONGS OF THE DECADE] #24 Kelly Clarkson – Since U Been Gone

Posted on | December 7, 2009 | No Comments

SONGS OF THE DECADE #24

[For more info, read the Ground Rules of The Song of The Decade List]

Kelly Clarkson – Since U Been Gone (2004)

Since U Been Gone – Kelly Clar…

The biggest problem with American Idol on American pop music has not been Simon Cowell, the rise of snark in amateur singing, putting bad music on national television or its hopeless relationship with celebrity: the biggest problem is that it has promoted one kind of singing—the Clay Aiken screech, rehashed year after year (a case could be made that Randy Jackson has done more damage on that show). Adam Lambert has been such a sensation in part because he doesn’t sing that way, but we’ve yet to see any trace of musical quality close to meriting that kind of celebrity.

The more appropriate exception is Kelly Clarkson, perhaps the only former American Idol singer to actually sustain a career using her lungs. The bellowing chorus line of Since U Been Gone is impressive enough musically; what’s more impressive was that, for once, the best musical song out of a movement was also the most popular. Kelly Clarkson is a hero to every young girl in the side of America where Walmart is the only source of music, and where ironic culture is unfathomable when you’re working away from fundamentalist opining. Ultimately, Clarkson’s self-empowering tour-de-force is one thing pop music has rarely been, especially in the past 20 years: classy.

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