Date: Nov 14, 1992
Weeks: 2
The Heights was a brief-lived TV show that was canceled one week after this song fell from the No. 1 spot. This was its theme song, which was all over the radio for months after the show was over and forgotten. Usually when a song from a TV show or movie reaches the top of the charts it's because the show is popular, but this time I think people were listening to the song who didn't even know it came from a TV show. I never watched the show, so thankfully my opinion of this song is entirely about the song. And this is a terrible song. It's not unpleasant, but it does showcase a lot of regrettable musical trends from the time.
The song opens in a way that sets the mood for an acoustic guitar song, which isn't something I generally care for. Then the song adds in a saxophone and a couple electric guitars. And none of them have any structure, they just improvise some blaring space-filler. This is classic generic power-ballad stuff, and it feels overmixed and overproduced and inorganic. I suppose that's what I should expect from a song specifically composed to be a network TV show theme song.
The sheer amount of vocals is part of that overproduction, too. I understand that this was supposed to be a showcase for the fictional band from the TV show, but when this many voices all sing the same thing, it loses its natural, organic feeling. The lead singer's voice is so gravelly, it almost seems like a parody of all the gravelly-voiced singers on the radio at the time (such as Bryan Adams, Michael Bolton, Rod Stewart, and so on). Maybe he has vocal talent, but I can't tell, because he's obscuring it behind his efforts to sound gravelly and bland.
For a 4 minute song, there aren't very many lyrics here. And even the few lyrics there are feel stretched to fill the time and the meter. The guy is trying to work up the courage to talk to a girl he's put up on a pedestal. "How do you talk to an angel?" It's a fine topic for a song, I suppose, although I think it's better to pursue the one you feel can talk to than the one you don't. The lyric-stretching really gets me on the line "Tell me, tell me, the words to define, the way I feel about someone so fine" Saying "tell me" twice is filler. "The words to define" is also one of those phrases that feels like they've deliberately tried to use as many words as possible to fill out the meter. Other than that, there aren't a lot of lyrics to nitpick, because there are only 2 verses, the second one is only 2 lines, and the rest is the chorus over and over and over again. Listen to this song once and you'll feel like you heard it twice.
My verdict: Don't like it. It's about as generic and bland as you would expect from a song written to be a TV show theme song. It doesn't strive to be anything better than that.
Do you think all songs written to be TV show theme songs are necessarily bland?
ReplyDeleteUsually. I suppose there are exceptions. Purely instrumental theme songs can be good. Oh, and theme songs that follow that 1950s-60s model, where the lyrics directly describe the show's premise, those can be fun. But if you want a generic pop song to promote your TV show, you're better off picking out one that already exists.
ReplyDelete"Princes of the Universe" by Queen for Highlander? I believe that was written for Highlander. Though it may have been written for the movie and was repurposed as the TV show's theme song.
ReplyDeleteThat was written for the movie. There's a difference. I'd probably also exempt it under the clause that it somewhat describes the show's premise. I would also exempt it under the "Queen is awesome" clause.
ReplyDelete