This Week On Billboard: Adele - Rolling In The Deep

This Week On Billboard is where I unabashedly critique the current no. 1 hit on Billboard.com, the major yardstick for what's "hot" in music today. In order to simplify the review for those who don't want to read the whole article, each song is given a "!" rating, in which the finest grabs five of them. It's been gone for a while, now it's back after a 22-month hiatus.

A review of this week's number one single right after Adele lays your shit bare






I don’t believe Adele is only 22 years old because she is singing with such maturity in her voice. The version of “Rolling In The Deep” that I first heard was the Jamie XX Remix featuring Childish Gambino, and I thought the vocals were an unearthed soulful sample that would’ve found itself in a Fatboy Slim track if he discovered it first. When Haley Reinhart covered the song in this season’s American Idol (of course, much to everyone’s chagrin, we were stuck with two unadventurous country singers in the finale), people unfamiliar with Adele most likely had mistaken this song for a Nina Simone classic. I’m not saying that it’s impossible for today’s 22-year-olds to obtain this level of sophistication, but what Adele shows in “Rolling In The Deep” are skills that only well-seasoned veterans possess.

Proficient vocalists are becoming more and more insignificant in today’s pop music since beat makers and producers are becoming so impressive and technology is doing a marvelous job at covering up any pitch flaws. So whenever a genuinely remarkable singer like Adele reaches commercial success, it’s imperative that you take notice. She belongs in the same bluesy category as Amy Winehouse and Duffy, but what Adele has that these singers do not is the power in her vocals. It’s strange though that with all this muscle in her larynx, her performance in “Rolling In The Deep” is still marked by control instead of exuberance. When she launches into the colossal “we could have had it ALLLLLLLL” line in the chorus, there’s more impact because of the way she holds back in the verses.

Adele’s thrilling voice is the main reason for the massive success of “Rolling In The Deep”, but yet it’s Paul Epworth’s production that pushes the song from something capable into an eventual classic. Pounding drum kicks, piercing piano stomps, and taunting backing vocals form a merciless blend of sound. It’s like a snowball rolling downhill: it starts out small, but it gathers momentum along the way, and by the end of it, you have an avalanche of emotions trouncing you senselessly. I’ve been impressed with Adele’s voice since “Chasing Pavements”, but I’ve always found her singing very dull songs. This, however, is a perfect accompaniment for Adele’s powerful pipes.

My only issue about Adele is that everything about her appeals to people who long for “realness” in pop music, and her reaching Billboard’s peaks gives these authenticity-obsessed fans something to be “right” about. I understand the argument that a fan can’t respect or admire an artist if he or she doesn’t write his or her own songs, doesn’t play an instrument, utilizes an auto-tune, or looks like a fashion model pretending to be a musician. I just think that not liking a song because the artist possesses these criticisms—or, conversely, saying “Rolling In The Deep” is great because Adele is someone that doesn’t possess these objective qualities—is utterly ridiculous. I’ve always subscribed to the idea that you determine how good a song is by listening to it and deciding whether you like it or not. All of these factors that pertain, not to the song’s quality, but to (basically) how the song is manufactured should ideally be irrelevant.



(t5!) score: !!!!!