Taylor Suffers “Swift-lash”

Much of the fuss seems to be (and should be) over the fact that Swift’s rendition of the Fleetwood Mac classic “Rihannon” was teeth-grindingly off-key. The performance was widely panned everywhere from the Los Angeles Times to The Washington Post. (Even I wasn’t immune from offering criticism of the duet. Although I was taken to task by several readers for being too kind.)

But it was The New York Times’ Jon Caramanica who I believe hit the nail on the head when it comes to the main reason behind the sudden and furious “Swift-lash” emerging online and elsewhere.

“Most stars – and make no mistake, Ms. Swift is the most important new pop star of the past few years – have their images undone by failure,” Caramanica wrote on Monday morning. “In Ms. Swift’s case, the opposite is true: success has necessitated a re-evaluation.

“Her Sunday night at the Grammys will be remembered as the turning point. She won four awards, including album of the year for Fearless (Big Machine), her outstanding second record – the youngest artist ever to do so, and the first solo female country singer to earn that as well. It was the ultimate stamp of approval for someone who insists that she’s thrilled just to be invited to the party.”

Of course, Caramanica also admits “it’s refreshing to see someone so gifted make the occasional flub,” and in doing so, cops to something that’s probably motivating much of the gleeful criticism of Swift that’s been circulating on the Internet – schadenfreude, that little black part of all our souls that takes perverse pleasure in witnessing the suffering of others.

Schadenfreude (plus a generous portion of plain old jealously) certainly explains why a lot of people commenting about the singer on sites scattered across the Web have seized the opportunity to question her success in general.

On Tuesday, MTV.com posted a piece by writer James Montgomery marveling at the venom being spewed at Swift and asking rabid readers to take a deep breath and reconsider how fair they were being.

In the article, Entertainment Weekly’s music critic Leah Greenblatt gave Montgomery her take on the situation, which echoes Carmanica’s while revealing a couple other motivations behind the public’s spite.

“As the awards began to pile up, [Swift] went from the underdog to the over-dog,” Greenblatt told Montgomery. “She became just another celebrity. And the cycle of celebrity, it will always come back to a takedown. Some people are mad because she seems too perfect. Some people are mad at her for dumping Jacob from ‘New Moon.’ And a lot of people are mad because she wiffed so hard with Stevie Nicks at the Grammys.

“We got tons of comments from people, and a lot of them were really nasty. The cry of ‘She writes her own songs’ was overtaken by ‘But she sings them badly.’ We’re used to divas – Mary J nailing it, Gaga doing versions of her songs to pound it in that she can really sing. And the thought after the Grammys seemed to be, ‘If Pink can spin in a hammock, soaking wet, wearing a ribbon, and hit notes, why couldn’t Taylor do it standing behind a microphone?’”

The reaction to the MTV.com post in Swift’s defense was stunning. So much so that the site posted a dozen of the best comments the next day – from people defending the hate as well as defending the singer.

Perhaps the most surprising development in this story is the reaction from the head of Swift’s record label, Big Machine Records.

In a move practically unheard of in the recording industry, Scott Borchetta angrily responded to attacks on the singer, beginning with a statement issued to The Tennessean, and pretty much threw down the gauntlet for further attacks.

“The biggest message is [the critics] are not getting it,” Borchetta said. “Because the facts say she is the undisputed best communicator that we’ve got. When she says something, when she sings something, when she feels something, it affects more people than anybody else.

“Maybe she’s not the best technical singer, but she’s probably the best emotional singer because everybody else who gets up there and is technically perfect, people don’t seem to want more of it … I think [the critics] are missing the whole voice of a generation that is happening right in front of them … She’s an extraordinary songwriter and her vocal performances are getting better. Everybody is not perfect on any given day. If you pick any of those artists that performed [on the Grammy Awards], I’m sure you can go online and find something where you go, ‘ew.’ Maybe in that moment we didn’t have the best night. But in the same breath, maybe we did. And nobody is arguing with the awards.

“The critics are missing the bigger picture. This is what always happens and is the unfortunate part of the American dream, that we build these people up to watch the critics tear them down. Well, you better have more than what you’ve got now if you think you’re going to get in the ring and fight with us. So, get in the ring.”

While Borchetta makes some good points – the best being that every singer on the planet has tanked a performance at one time or another – his assertion that Swift is “the whole voice of a generation” is a bit much.

Certainly her record sales are a testament to how much she touches people, but the same argument can be made for Lil’ Wayne, Lady Gaga, or even Susan Boyle. And it’s a safe bet nobody would venture to call any of them “voice of a generation.”

So that’s strike one against Borchetta’s case, but then he went even further out on a limb in a follow up interview with the Associated Press (which drew some fire of its own – but we’ll get to that in a moment).

“She is the voice of this generation,” Borchetta reasserted. “She speaks directly to [her fans], and they speak directly back to her. This is not ‘American Idol.’ This is not a competition of getting up and seeing who can sing the highest note. This is about a true artist and communicator. It’s not about that technically perfect performance.”

Uh-oh. It’s one thing to defend your artist against critics and rabid commenters hiding behind the anonymity of the Internet, but it’s entirely another to attack other artists to make your case.

You didn’t really think that Borchetta essentially claiming that everyone who ever walked onto the stage of “American Idol” was not “a true artist and communicator” was going to go unnoticed did you? Of course not.

Enter “Idol” alum Kelly Clarkson, who quickly took to her blog to offer the label exec a piece of her mind.

“I understand you defending your artist obviously because I have done the same in the past for artists I like, including Taylor, so you might see why its upsetting to read you attacking American Idol for producing simply vocalists that hit ‘the high notes’ … We not only hit the high notes, you forgot to mention we generally hit the ‘right’ notes as well. Every artist has a bad performance or two and that is understandable, but throwing blame will not make the situation at hand any better … You should take a lesson from [my manager and label executives] and instead of lashing out at other artists (that in your ‘humble’ opinion lack true artistry), you should simply take a breath and realize that sometimes things won’t go according to plan or work out and that’s okay.”

Clarkson signed her message, “One of those contestants from American Idol who only made it because of her high notes.”

Ouch.

So what does all of this mean? It seems to me that what happened to Swift’s duet with Nicks is that the song was performed in a key that wasn’t comfortable for either singer. I’m assuming that’s because it needed to be in a different key than the original to allow Nicks to sing harmony without having to scrape the bottom of her range.

The bottom line here though is that nobody’s perfect. Yes, the Grammy performance of “Rihannon” wasn’t good. Yes, we’ve been heading into Taylor Swift overkill territory for some time now. A negative reaction was inevitable. As Mel Brooks, who’s had his share of hits as well as misses over the years, once said to me in an interview after his Broadway version of “The Producers” became a smash, “There’s gonna be a backlash.”

So I have a message for Taylor Swift. Hang in there kid. Holding on to that place in the spotlight can be tricky, but this too shall pass. It’ll be somebody else’s turn pretty soon.