First of all, I would ask that this article doesn’t make you go watch the music video “Watch Me." It’s terrible and I don’t want to give it any more traffic. If you want to visualize my comments, use your imagination. If you remember the song and just want to scratch that itch and hear it again, just don’t. Go find some new music. There’s so much of it out there. Go give some attention to a deserving artist. In fact after you read this, I encourage you to take a few minutes to go on Pitchfork.com or some other review site, find a critically acclaimed artist you haven’t heard of before, and listen to a song from them.
I may be late to this party, but I just heard this song a couple of weeks ago and I can’t quite push my anger over its massive popularity out of my mind. If you haven’t heard "Watch Me" before, I envy you. It’s awful and its success makes me mad every time I think about it. I wouldn’t wish this pointless anger on anyone, even you. I may not be a dancey man like many of the kids these days, but I still don’t think I would find this song worthwhile even if I liked swaying my gangly form to and fro as Silento commands me to do.
The moves themselves are okay -- most of them are repurposed from other songs -- but by themselves they’re fine dance moves. That being said, Silento never brings them together to form something cohesive. He just throws the disjointed moves out there willy nilly. I know how to play piano chords, but if I just randomly throw those chords, all of which sound fine by themselves, together, I don’t get a piece of music. I get a loose assembly of piano chords. It’s not as if Silento is delivering these dance moves in the way he does to make a more compelling song, either. I know that no one actually suggested that to me, but just picturing someone sharing their theory that Silento was more focused on the musical composition than the dance he was creating with me makes me laugh. Don’t make me laugh, imaginary guy.
Right of the bat, this song strikes a bad chord (count it) with me. Silento runs into the frame screaming, “You already know who it is!” There are two problems with this. First, we don’t know who it is; this is Silento’s first song. There is no reason for him to say this other than because he heard another rapper say that line before. This is an omen of things to come, as this entire song will be nothing but Silento repurposing things he’s heard other people do better. Second, that voice. Sweet Jesus, his voice. Silento warbles like an old woman with a throat infection who doesn’t want to have to repeat her unfortunately long name. Silento sounds like a cat doing a Fetty Wap impression. In the very first line, Silento is letting us know that he straight up cannot sing. This is an uncomfortable realization to have five seconds into a video with 200 million views.
I could continue in this manner and break apart every single thing Silento does over the next three minutes, but I won’t because it’s just too painful. Besides, the rest of the video is really just Silento ripping off the Soulja Boy (yes, the Soulja Boy) in a giant warehouse with a bunch of people who are doing vaguely similar dance moves to one another. It’s cool that he got normal people involved with his video, but he could of at least shown them how to do these simple moves. It looks like the physical manifestation of telephone, with people managing to misinterpret something as simple as raising your arm. I’ll also just mention that Silento doing the bop scares me. It’s the way he says bop, the way he talks, the vapid look glazen on his stupid muppet face, it all feels disturbingly inhuman. Silento looks like a Muppet being controlled by an alien, and it scares me.
On the whole, the song confuses me. I’m confused as to who backed this seemingly high-budget project, why they couldn’t find a better performer, why they couldn’t teach the extras how to do the moves, why Silento is trying to rip off the Soulja boy (the most regretted cultural fad of the last decade) and, most importantly, why the hell anyone likes it. Seriously, why do people like this song?
Yes, it did introduce the world to the “whip” (the raising of one’s arm as if to grab onto an invisible steering wheel paired with the simultaneous stomping on an invisible pedal) and the “nae nae” (another horsey dance, but unlike the “Gangam Style” tossing of the reigns, this dance harkens back to the image of a cowboy waving his hat in the wind), but that’s it, and despite its lack of musical merit, this song is still being played on the radio. People hated “Gangam Style,” but at least that was an original and funny video. Was it overdone? Of course. But at least the video itself was in some way worthwhile and it gave attention to a somewhat deserving and sincere artist. “Watch Me,” on the other hand, triumphs a dumb kid with no discernible talents.
When it comes to the music industry, if your mom hasn’t heard of someone, if they’re not super popular, then there’s a good chance that they make less than the national average. If they’re “underground,” they probably barely manage to make ends meet. There are, of course, exceptions to this rule, but most indie darlings are startlingly poor. It’s just unfortunate that we live in a world where sincerely talented and dedicated people can pursue a craft with all the effort they are capable of and influence the small group of people who enjoy them on a very fundamental level, yet still fail to carve out a living doing what they love and were arguably born to do. Meanwhile there's some talentless muppet that can be skyrocketed to stardom for no discernible reason. Life is cruel and you can’t do anything you want. Sometimes you just have to get lucky, or be a muppet. The least we can do is try and give our attention and help the careers of those who we think deserve it.
A few recommendations to check out if you want: Milo, Clipping, and Battles. They’re all really talented and they could all use more support.
I'm just going to leave this here (wait for that 13 second mark)...
