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The Sound of Crossover: Micro-rhythm and Sonic Pleasure in Michael Jackson's “Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough”

2012; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 35; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/03007766.2011.616298

1740-1712

Anne Danielsen,

Music Technology and Sound Studies

Abstract Michael Jackson's album Off the Wall consummated a trend toward the success of black dance music in late-1970s crossover markets. This article investigates the musical qualities of the album's lead single, "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough." Through the combination of a compelling micro-rhythmic design derived from previous black dance music styles with a pop song format and production techniques that were mainstream friendly and not marked by race, Jackson and his producer, Quincy Jones, achieved a critical balance that transcended the segregation of the music market, neutralizing the cultural background and historical baggage of what otherwise would have been deemed "black" music. Notes [1] The album Off the Wall reached number one on the "R&B Album" list in 1979 and number three on the "Billboard 200" the year after that. The album produced four top ten singles; "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" went to number one on both the "R&B Singles" list and the "Billboard Hot 100" ("Michael Jackson" "Michael Jackson." allmusic, 2011. Web. 7 Aug. 2011. < http://www.allmusic.com/artist/michael-jackson-p4576/charts-awards/billboard-singles > [Google Scholar]). [2] Toynbee Toynbee, Jason. 2002. "Mainstreaming, from Hegemonic Centre to Global Networks". In Popular Music Studies, Edited by: Hesmondalgh, David and Negus, Keith. 149–63. London: Arnold. Print [Google Scholar] in fact identifies three different but overlapping "mainstreams" in the history of popular music. The first, labeled "TiPAH" (Tin Pan Alley–Hollywood), runs from the early 1920s to the turn of the 1950s. The second, rock, emerges in the 1950s and peaks in the 1970s. The third, which has dominated since the 1980s, is less a monolithic entity than a plural one characterized by parallel international networks and "glocal" phenomena such as, for example, rap (159). [3] In a later work, Regev describes rock and pop as mutually dependent, in fact close to forming a binary opposition: the one is defined as a negation of the other, and vice versa (Regev Regev, Motti. 2002. "The 'Pop-Rockization' of Popular Music". In Studies in Popular Music, Edited by: Hesmondalgh, David and Negus, Keith. 251–64. London: Arnold. Print [Google Scholar], "'Pop-Rockization'"). [4] In an essay called "Ain't No Mountain High Enough: The Politics of Crossover," Steve Perry Perry, Steve. 1988. "Ain't No Mountain High Enough: The Politics of Crossover". In Facing the Music: Essays on Pop, Rock and Culture, Edited by: Frith, Simon. 51–87. New York: Mandarin. Print [Google Scholar] describes the integration that took place in the pop market during the 1980s. For a discussion of the debate between Perry and Nelson George on these issues, see Garofalo Garofalo, Reebee. 1993. "Black Popular Music: Crossing Over or Going Under?". In Rock and Popular Music: Politics, Policies, Institutions, Edited by: Bennett, Tony. 231–48. London and New York: Routledge. Print [Google Scholar], "Black Popular." [5] See Danielsen Danielsen, Anne. 1998. His Name Was Prince: A Study of Diamonds and Pearls. Popular Music, 16(3): 275–91. Print[Crossref] , [Google Scholar] ("His Name)" and Hawkins Hawkins, Stan. 2002. Settling the Pop Score: Pop Texts and Identity Politics, Aldershot, Hants: Ashgate. Print [Google Scholar] (Settling ch. 6). [6] According to Garofalo, rap's commercial breakthrough was the first time black artists performing an "Afrocentric genre" achieved mainstream success. He thus regards this as the third period of interaction between the mainstream and the black sub-genre leading to permanent change in the relation itself ("Culture" 283–84). [7] For a thorough discussion of this theoretical premise, as well as the concepts of figure and gesture, see Danielsen (Presence ch. 3). [8] All musical examples are author's own transcriptions. [9] The mainstreaming of disco has also been described as the "heterosexualization" of the genre, cf. Fikentscher Fikentscher, Kai. 2000. You Better Work!" Underground Dance Music in New York City, Hanover, NH: UP of New England. Print [Google Scholar]. In this process, many of the subcultural codes of the gay disco culture were obviously lost. [10] For analyses and discussions of the shaping of sounds in electronic dance music, see Zeiner-Henriksen Zeiner-Henriksen, Hans T. 2010. "Moved by the Groove: Bass Drum Sounds and Body Movements in Electronic Dance Music". In Musical Rhythm in the Age of Digital Reproduction, Edited by: Danielsen, Anne. Ashgate: Farnham, Surrey. [Google Scholar] ("Moved" and "'PoumTchak')." [11] In his autobiography, Brown writes: "I'd mix a song until I thought—until I knew—it was right, but they [Polydor executives] would want their machines to say whether it was right or not. I had to register certain numbers on the machines. It didn't matter whether the track was alive and moved, all that mattered was the numbers.…I was supposed to have creative control, but they started remixing my records. I mixed them, but when they came out they didn't sound like what I'd mixed. The company didn't want the funk in there too heavy. They'd take the feeling out of the record. They didn't want James Brown to be raw. Eventually, they destroyed my sound" (23–24). [12] Also many of Motown's productions had a polished sound. In Dancing in the Street: Motown and the Cultural Politics of Detroit, however, Suzanne E. Smith Smith, Suzanne E. 1999. Dancing in the Street: Motown and the Cultural Politics of Detroit, Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP. Print [Google Scholar] describes the huge impact of Motown's music and artistic activities upon the black communities of Detroit during the 1960s, when the record company was clearly more than a role model and forerunner regarding ownership and black entrepreneurship. [13] The single "Don't Stop" topped both the R&B and pop singles lists in 1979 (see "Michael Jackson"). [14] See, for example, W. E. B. DuBois' DuBois, W.E.B. 1989. The Souls of Black Folk. 1903, New York: Bantam Books. Print [Google Scholar] account, from 1903, of the pain and challenges linked with "the double life every American Negro must live, as a Negro and as an American" (142). [15] See Danielsen (Presence ch. 9) for analyses and discussion of the differences between the temporalities conveyed by a groove and a traditional song.