No one should be surprised that the Black Eyed Peas have yet another hit on their hands. If "I Gotta Feeling" taught us anything (aside from that tonight's gonna be a good night), it's that BEP isn't satisfied to just rock your prom, AKA the place where Taylor Swift and Kanye West can get along just fine. Will.i.am, Fergie, David Guetta and those other two guys aimed higher -- quinceañeras, company picnics, book signings, dance recitals, retirement parties, and, natch, weddings are all prime targets for all ages chanting along for the "fill up my cup/ mazel tov!" moment.
Given that standard goal for special event mixologists is to segue the past hits into the present so that the old people just get heck off the dance floor Ray Charles' "I Got a Woman" into Kanye's "Gold Digger" or Michael Jackson's "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'" into Rihanna's "Don't Stop the Music" being prime examples of the blatant sampling use of the older song forever tattooing it with the context of the new one.
Well, Dirty Dancing fans and haters, welcome to the just-released "The Time (The Dirty Bit)."
If it's necessary to explain which song the Black Eyed Peas are giving the Jersey Shore treatment to, the reader need only to watch a Sandals Resorts ad, or just suck it up and attend a family gathering. The strains of husky-voiced Bill Medley and comely Jennifer Warnes' "(I've Had) The Time of My Life" aren't far away.
Now, there's this from The Beginning, out November 30 (thanks, of sorts, to County Grind pal Maura Johnston for the nudge to listen):
Just hand out glow sticks as favors, why don't you? Here, Black Eyed Peas brilliantly hi-jack just enough of the familiar refrain of the original, and then inject "Boom Boom Pow" into the verses. You don't have to like it, but by New Year's 2011, this song is guaranteed to be part of your cross-generational gathering.
In this passage, we get a rundown of pretty much everyone this song is for. "All these girls they like my swagger/ they calling me Mick Jagger/ I be rolling like a stone/ jet-setter, jet-lagger/ we ain't messin' with no maggots/ messin' with the baddest/ chicks in the club/ honey, whassup?"
In order:
1. Bros who refer to their steez as "swagger." Don't look up either of these words, please.
2. People old enough to know who Mick Jagger was.
3. Kids who know that rolling isn't a type of dancing.
4. Virgin Airlines customers.
5. Exterminators.
6. The baddest chicks in the club.
7. Bees.
Aside from the over-chopping of the vocals ("Never felt this wa-a-a-y before"), this is probably not the worst song of the bat mitzvah after-party -- that honor goes to this lass. Come to think of it, "Macarena" is sagging a bit. Will, can you fix?
