![]() ![]() the happy high days and money of a one-hit-wonder ( Hey long distance, it's a rock and roll romance/ CBS is gonna pay a great big advance/Hey Atlantic, come on take a chance/ Arista say they love it but the kids can't dance to it). Nick Lowe's "They Called It Rock" which is odd, in that we get both the lead-up ( They went and cut a record/the record hit the charts/and someone in the newspaper/said that it was art).Examples include "Sunburn", "Muscle Museum", "Cave", "Hate this And I'll Love You", and "Showbiz". Muse dedicated the majority of their debut studio album (titled, appropriately enough, Showbiz) to songs of this type.Rick Wakeman - "Ghost of a Rock and Roll Star" (about becoming out of date and irrelevant - perilously self-referential, some might claim).Bad Company - "Shooting Star" (about burnout, being a One-Hit Wonder, and suicide).Both positive and negative, but much more positive ("As the doors fly open even the promoter smiles") in "Long Live Rock.".They also have "New Song" from Who Are You.Half of ''The Who by Numbers'' could go here really. The Who - "Success Story" (about disillusionment with the business), and "How Many Friends" (about people only pretending to like you because you're famous).The Raspberries - "Overnight Sensation (Hit Record)" (about wanting to be a success). ![]() P!nk - "So What" (which is actually a subversion, since it's really a Break-Up Song making fun of this genre.Sung by Procol Harum's Gary Brooker, it's cautiously optimistic as opposed to Rush's song, but it's played at a more sombre tempo, perhaps foreshadowing that the long awaited fame might not be all it's cracked up to be. The Alan Parsons Project also has a song called "Limelight".It shows the fame and attention received by the person in the song (something of an Author Tract by Neil Peart, who is very introverted in real life) can be difficult to deal with at times, explaining "I can't pretend the stranger is a long awaited friend". "Limelight" actually works as something of a deconstruction.(In other words, it's somewhat bittersweet and disillusioned, although not anywhere near as openly pessimistic as some of the songs on here.) "Limelight" by Rush, which puts Rush's usual spin on the theme.Hole has a straighter example in "Playing Your Song," which is about losing artistic control of your work.However, there wasn't enough time to print new sleeves, so "Olympia" got stuck with the title "Rockstar" instead. The last song on Live Through This was originally named "Rockstar", but it featured lines like "Barrel of laughs to be Nirvana/I'd rather die", so it was thrown off the album because Kurt Cobain's suicide happened shortly before the release date, and it was replaced with "Olympia". Hole's example is more complicated: the song in question was originally named "Olympia", and it was written to mock the Riot Grrrl movement, but it wasn't meant to be on Live Through This.They played this straight in "See You At The Show." The Nickelback song is a subversion, as the narrator is someone who aspires to be a rock star, and for all the wrong reasons.(There are 12 songs on that list, for the record) And.well, just about any song called "Rockstar". 10cc's The Worst Band in the World is about an indifferent group who suddenly become famous.Now count how many of these appear in Rock Band. See also Anti-Christmas Song, Anti-Love Song, Break-Up Song, Obsession Song, and various others for other commonly used musical themes. The Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism can be seen very clearly at work among the below examples. Like any theme, different bands handle it different ways, but they often mention their origin and rise to stardom (mis)handling fame and fortune isolation the daily grind of life on tour and occasionally Sex, Drugs, and Rock & Roll. Just as many bands have done a Money Song, and others like to do Silly Love Songs, so too have many bands done songs about being a rock star. The Who, "Success Story" - The Who by Numbers.
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