Speaker 1: Welcome to Rolling Stone's five Hundred Greatest Songs, a podcast
Speaker 1: based on Rolling Stones hugely popular, influential and sometimes controversialist.
Speaker 2: I'm Britney Spanis and.
Speaker 3: I'm Rob Sheffield. We're here to shed light on the
Speaker 3: greatest songs ever made and discover what makes them so great.
Speaker 1: We have a very important songwriter and producer you talk
Speaker 1: about today very special episode. We'll be discussing Max Martin
Speaker 1: and his contributions to the five hundred Greatest Songs list,
Speaker 1: of which he has four songs on the list. There
Speaker 1: is Backsheet Boys, I Want It That Way and Taylor
Speaker 1: Swift's Blank Space. But today we're going to talk very
Speaker 1: specifically about the song Baby One More Time by Britney Spears.
Speaker 1: I mean there are so many artists on the list
Speaker 1: that he has worked with in different capacities. I mean
Speaker 1: there is very there are very few pop artists who
Speaker 1: have not had a session in Sweden with Max Martin
Speaker 1: and his kind of group of songwriters and producers that
Speaker 1: he works with. Of course, he's worked with Ariana Grande
Speaker 1: and Adele, Backstroop Boys, Robin Slain, Dion and sing Demi Lovado,
Speaker 1: Selena Gomez, Perry Katie Perry think. I mean, it's like
Speaker 1: it's a big deal if you don't If you don't
Speaker 1: work with Max, it's almost as big of a story
Speaker 1: to not work with him.
Speaker 3: It's like, what's wrong with you if you don't? You know?
Speaker 1: And he's had twenty five number one hits that he
Speaker 1: has written or produced or both, and he has five Grammys.
Speaker 1: His first Grammy ever didn't come until he worked with
Speaker 1: Taylor Swift. But I mean that kind of figures into
Speaker 1: a lot of what we'll probably talk about a lot
Speaker 1: of the music that he's worked on and how we're.
Speaker 2: Giving it to due as as the years go by.
Speaker 1: And one of the fun facts about Max I learned
Speaker 1: while researching this is that he was in a hair
Speaker 1: metal band that kicked off his career called It's Alive.
Speaker 1: I actually had no idea that that was the background.
Speaker 2: Of how he was originally signed.
Speaker 1: And then he ended up starting to work on Dennis
Speaker 1: Pop's label, and Dennis Pop took him under his wing
Speaker 1: because they realized he had this, you know, brilliant pop mind,
Speaker 1: which was very smart. And then lo and behold, the
Speaker 1: Backstreet Boys come come call, and that's when Max gets
Speaker 1: his really big break as a pop songwriter is working
Speaker 1: with the Backstreet Boys on their self toile debut. In
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety six, he worked on Quit Playing Games with
Speaker 1: My Heart, which hit number two on the Hot one
Speaker 1: hundred and was a big moment for both Backstory Boys
Speaker 1: Max Martin for pop music and kind of set the
Speaker 1: tone for years to come to this day.
Speaker 3: Unbelievable and Max Martin, what was he like twenty fourth that, yes,
Speaker 3: was barely older than the Backstreet Boys that the stereotype is,
Speaker 3: you know, the young hungry boy band and then the
Speaker 3: manipulatives Fengali figure. He was like just their age. It's
Speaker 3: it's crazy how young he was when he began this
Speaker 3: whole yeah, Swedish hair metal as disco revolution that took
Speaker 3: over the.
Speaker 1: Pop world, and the Backstor Boys had their own Spenglly
Speaker 1: to worry about it.
Speaker 2: Sax Martin didn't need to add to that.
Speaker 3: He was literally the least to their.
Speaker 1: Problems and the placement of the songs that are on
Speaker 1: the list. We have blank Space at three fifty seven,
Speaker 1: which we have a whole episode we're gonna talk about
Speaker 1: that song because of course we have to Backstreet Boys.
Speaker 1: I want that way comes in at two forty, Britney
Speaker 1: Spears's Baby One More Time comes in at two o five,
Speaker 1: and Kelly Clarksonson she began clock cent at number ninety
Speaker 1: three hits the top one hundred.
Speaker 3: I guess I'm curious since you go way way back, yeah,
Speaker 3: with like the pop artists. Yeah, that he began with.
Speaker 3: What was your sort of Max Martin origin story?
Speaker 1: It was definitely Backstreet Boys. I think, like what's great
Speaker 1: about the that late nineties pop boom that Max was
Speaker 1: so ingratiated and was that that was when I was
Speaker 1: six to nine, you know, like this was the time
Speaker 1: when I was really formulating my own personality and taste
Speaker 1: in music.
Speaker 3: Amazing. Well, that the whole Carson TRL era unthinkable without
Speaker 3: Max Martin. Yeah, who everybody got to know his name
Speaker 3: because he was on so many hits. But it's wild
Speaker 3: that he was such a behind the scenes personality.
Speaker 2: It still is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, he really he is very press shay. He
Speaker 1: doesn't talk about his work very much, very rarely, I
Speaker 1: mean doesn't do interviews at all, as much as he's
Speaker 1: such a major presence, Like that is a name brand
Speaker 1: person of someone that like everyone knows Max Martin.
Speaker 2: If you love pop music.
Speaker 1: You know that name, and you're very familiar with it.
Speaker 1: So he's like such a large, larger than life presence
Speaker 1: in pop music, but he still kind of stays very
Speaker 1: silent and stays behind the scenes and stays away from
Speaker 1: it and really lets the artist kind of build that
Speaker 1: narrative around the songs and around who they are and
Speaker 1: kind of how they fit into it. And you know,
Speaker 1: every once in a while we will get the kind of
Speaker 1: glimpses into his creative process from the artist talking about it.
Speaker 1: But for the most parts, he's just very He kind
Speaker 1: of just stays out minds his business, and that's why
Speaker 1: he writes great pop songs.
Speaker 2: He minds his business absolutely.
Speaker 3: He had never had any interest at all and being
Speaker 3: a celebrity producer. He just he didn't want anybody to
Speaker 3: know his face or his voice or his ideas. Yeah,
Speaker 3: he was always about the artist in the cell and I.
Speaker 1: Mean all the artists that he works with and was
Speaker 1: such a part of their careers. And I mean both
Speaker 1: in terms of the star making moments that he's been
Speaker 1: a huge part of, but also for the shifts in
Speaker 1: people's own sort of musical sounds, in their own kind
Speaker 1: of careers. He's been such a big part of every
Speaker 1: turning point for a lot of the biggest names in
Speaker 1: pop music over the last nearly three decades that he's
Speaker 1: been working. All these songs speak so much for themselves,
Speaker 1: so you don't really need him to weigh in, even
Speaker 1: though obviously we are nerdy about that and would love
Speaker 1: to hear what would love to hear him talk about
Speaker 1: that process and things like that. But yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: those songs so speak for themselves and change pop music
Speaker 1: for I mean again, we still are hearing the reverberations
Speaker 1: of what he started to do with the Backstreet Boys
Speaker 1: and on today.
Speaker 2: Everyone tries to get that.
Speaker 3: Sound absolutely and has never sounded dated. None of these
Speaker 3: songs sound like oldies. Yeah, the Backstreet Boys songs, it's
Speaker 3: funny that those are a little before Britney blew Up,
Speaker 3: Britney Spears the other Brittany. But it's it's wild that
Speaker 3: even then it was such a distinctive sound, like you
Speaker 3: were a fan, you were right on the right in
Speaker 3: on the ground floor with the Backstreet Boys.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it so just the combination of genres. Obviously,
Speaker 1: there's so much of that euro pop eurodance sound that
Speaker 1: was taking over the clubs in the nineties and was
Speaker 1: such a big part of dance music and kind of
Speaker 1: the underground music of that time. But there's so much
Speaker 1: of that R and B sound because all of these
Speaker 1: bands and these artists who were singing his songs were
Speaker 1: such big fans of the R and B music of
Speaker 1: the time. Backstreet Boys were imitating New Edition, and Britney
Speaker 1: Spears is such a fan of Mariah and Janet and
Speaker 1: every you know, just any and Whitney Houston and every
Speaker 1: R and B singer of the of the nineties. So
Speaker 1: you kind of hear that so much in the melodies
Speaker 1: that he's doing, and like the actual kind of beats
Speaker 1: are are so Euro dancing and kind of like Euro
Speaker 1: trashy kind of dance music, which is great something I
Speaker 1: love a lot. And yeah, a little bit of New
Speaker 1: Jack Swing and some of the songs, and especially in
Speaker 1: the ballads, and so it's kind of an interesting fusion
Speaker 1: that he was playing with that worked really well because
Speaker 1: it meshed so much with what these artists were wanting
Speaker 1: to do musically anyway, like who they were as vocalists,
Speaker 1: and let that shine on a lot of these songs.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and of course, baby One More Time with Britney Spears.
Speaker 3: I think that's probably when people started to say, Okay,
Speaker 3: there's this producer in Stockholm who's got this sound, because
Speaker 3: the Backstreet Boys songs they were huge, but the fact
Speaker 3: that you know, Britney Spears came out of nowhere with
Speaker 3: this just absolutely massive song. I mean that the euro
Speaker 3: pop and R and B mentioned, but also so much
Speaker 3: metal in his production style, which is why it's so
Speaker 3: wild what you say about his Swedish hair metal roots,
Speaker 3: because there really is that apocalyptic bam bam bam and.
Speaker 1: Everything he it nods to the eighties without feeling overtly
Speaker 1: eighties in a lot of ways. All the songs are
Speaker 1: very like bombastic and very like big, which is great
Speaker 1: Rolling Stone.
Speaker 3: When we did our list of the greatest debut singles
Speaker 3: of all time, maybe One More Time was an easy
Speaker 3: pick for number one. It's the perfect example of a
Speaker 3: song that comes out of nowhere and introduces not just
Speaker 3: a new artist, but a new aesthetic and a new
Speaker 3: approach to the sonic architecture pop music. And you definitely
Speaker 3: remember where you were the first time you heard that song. Yeah,
Speaker 3: you probably said, what the hell is this?
Speaker 2: Do you remember the first time you heard it?
Speaker 3: Yes, I do. It was December ninety eight and it
Speaker 3: was that song and it was hearing it on MTV
Speaker 3: and it sounded so alien, so robotic, which was a
Speaker 3: really bizarrely distinctive thing about the Max Martin sound. And
Speaker 3: it's where the hell is this song coming from? And
Speaker 3: I thought, I cannot tell where this singer is from
Speaker 3: on the planet, like it might be euro might be US,
Speaker 3: but it could be anywhere. And I said, I cannot
Speaker 3: tell if this singer is old or young. I can't
Speaker 3: tell anything. It's just this amazing, bombastic, like you said, thunderous,
Speaker 3: apocalyptic kind of sound. It was mind blowing to hear
Speaker 3: it for the first time and realized, this is something
Speaker 3: we never heard anything that sounded.
Speaker 2: Like this before.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I really love a detail that Brittany had given
Speaker 1: around that time of wanting to imitate soft cells, tainted love, yeah,
Speaker 1: and vocal.
Speaker 3: That was when I interviewed it, and I had so
Speaker 3: many questions about that song, and she said, yeah, I
Speaker 3: wanted to get that tainted love sound. And she said, like,
Speaker 3: that's what I was going for, that sort of new
Speaker 3: wave sound, And she said, I wanted my voice to
Speaker 3: sound like that. So she said, I didn't want to
Speaker 3: get any sleep, so I stayed up, stayed out very
Speaker 3: late the night before, and she said, I kept telling myself, Brittany,
Speaker 3: don't get any sleep, because you want that raspyat rowl
Speaker 3: in your voice. She definitely got that.
Speaker 2: It works so well on it.
Speaker 3: It sure does. Soft Cell must have been so honored.
Speaker 1: Thinking about how every pop star has tried to imitate
Speaker 1: that over the years is so incredible, Like that is
Speaker 1: a song that everyone wants a baby one more time
Speaker 1: moment when they come out the gate, of course, and
Speaker 1: like they want that.
Speaker 2: You know, it's a big pop moment. But there's no
Speaker 2: one else who could.
Speaker 1: Have delivered it the way that Britney Spears had done,
Speaker 1: because even like Max had offered it to Backstreet Boys
Speaker 1: at first and TLC and they had been sort of
Speaker 1: possibly going to be the one singing that song and
Speaker 1: then both rejected it, and then it went to Britney Spears,
Speaker 1: who loved it immediately.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, I firmly believe that if either of those artists
Speaker 3: had recorded the song, Britney's version is still the one
Speaker 3: we would know, it would have been just as big
Speaker 3: because it was made for her, and she for it.
Speaker 3: It's so funny to think of TLC, who were adults, yeah,
Speaker 3: singing the song. It's like, no, this isn't a song
Speaker 3: for adult veterans to sing. This is a song for
Speaker 3: a new voice who's got something to say say musically,
Speaker 3: sonically and in every way.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The only regret about that is that I wish I
Speaker 1: could hear Left Eyes maybe one more time.
Speaker 3: First, well, you could definitely tell that, you know that
Speaker 3: the TLC vocal influence. Yeah, but yeah, would have been
Speaker 3: all wrong for a singer, is you know? I mean
Speaker 3: Tea Boss was always super smart sounding singer. She never
Speaker 3: came on naive or confused. She was always super in control.
Speaker 3: It's something that just defines her power as a vocalist.
Speaker 1: It just feels so perfectly in tune with everything that
Speaker 1: Brittany loved and was kind of already a fan of
Speaker 1: in music, and then also kind of helped mold this
Speaker 1: this like important phase of her career and kind of
Speaker 1: the way that we were introduced her in the video
Speaker 1: of course, like that was her idea to kind of
Speaker 1: be like, I'm a teenager, I'm singing for other teenagers.
Speaker 1: I'm going to be in high school where she went
Speaker 1: to the high school where they filmed Grease as a
Speaker 1: big Grease fan that she was, and did that. I mean,
Speaker 1: it just it feels like so perfectly, like such a
Speaker 1: perfect teen idol pop moment in that way. That album
Speaker 1: just blew up so quickly, and so it's kind of
Speaker 1: I mean, the song itself blew up so quickly. So
Speaker 1: it's kind of hard to even think of a time
Speaker 1: where it wasn't everyone that I knew knew of Britney
Speaker 1: Spears or had like an opinion on her or had
Speaker 1: you know, were even just like arguing about like their
Speaker 1: favorite Brittany songs and kind of all this, you know,
Speaker 1: all that stuff. But yeah, it's kind of it's tough
Speaker 1: to imagine a time before like Brittany was such a
Speaker 1: part of my own listening habits and of my own
Speaker 1: kind of music taste and for all, like all the
Speaker 1: acts that again like Max is so integral part part
Speaker 1: of their careers is Backshitt Boys and Sync and Brittany
Speaker 1: and those are all artists that just immediately became in heavy.
Speaker 3: Rotation for absolutely.
Speaker 1: And next up we will be joined by Rolling Stone
Speaker 1: senior writer Brian Hyatt. We're here with senior writer Rolling Stone,
Speaker 1: Brian Hyatt. Thank you so much for joining.
Speaker 4: Us, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2: I know you're a big.
Speaker 1: Max fan, and you're a big Sabe one more time.
Speaker 2: Fan for sure.
Speaker 1: You've spoken with so many artists and especially artists that
Speaker 1: have some relationship with Max, Right, what do you think
Speaker 1: it is about him that that keeps beyond of course
Speaker 1: the obvious of he has so many hits under his belt,
Speaker 1: so twenty five number one singles, things like that, like
Speaker 1: why do people still call Max Martin above all else
Speaker 1: to make that special moment in their.
Speaker 4: Career, say that he sort of cracked the mathematical code
Speaker 4: to writing pop songs, And then when you ask him
Speaker 4: to explain that, they start to and nothing they ever
Speaker 4: say really makes sense to me. It has to do
Speaker 4: with I think some of it has to do with
Speaker 4: the amount of repetition of bits of the melody. You know,
Speaker 4: you repeat this bit twice, but then change it, change
Speaker 4: one note the third time. There's stuff like that. There's
Speaker 4: stuff that has to do with the syllables and thus
Speaker 4: the rhythm of the you know, the rhythm of the melody.
Speaker 4: He occasionally doesn't interviews but he doesn't do interviews with
Speaker 4: people who know how this stuff works, who can be like,
Speaker 4: you know, basically, what do you mean? It's a scientific
Speaker 4: approach A and then belt. The other thing is that, weirdly,
Speaker 4: like a lot of pop since like ninety eight or so,
Speaker 4: it's really bringing in so many rock influences into what
Speaker 4: we're calling pop, and he's he was a big part
Speaker 4: of starting that as well. He was kind of a
Speaker 4: hair metal fan. He's a Springsteen fan. You can hear
Speaker 4: it on a Baby One More Time. You can hear
Speaker 4: it on Oops I Did It Again, which was tragically
Speaker 4: omitted from our list, but you know, also one of
Speaker 4: the greatest songs of all time. It's like they can
Speaker 4: so easily just take out the synth and change them
Speaker 4: into heavy guitars and you have rocks on which of
Speaker 4: course so many people did right. The ironic and then
Speaker 4: suddenly not ironic cover of Baby One More Time was
Speaker 4: such a phenomenon, as you remember, at the for indie
Speaker 4: bands at the time.
Speaker 2: The bullying for super version is very good.
Speaker 4: There was a Travis version, there was who else?
Speaker 3: Who else? Thompson did a great version, a shockingly great version.
Speaker 4: That was when he was doing the entire history of
Speaker 4: popular music from like fifteen hundred to that, right, Yeah,
Speaker 4: millennium pop.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it ended with Baby One More Time. It like
Speaker 3: began with like, you know, medieval ballads. And there's something
Speaker 3: kind of beautiful about that because like these are two
Speaker 3: allergic folk songs. They traveled, they have weird lives.
Speaker 4: He thus proved, like as as they say in the Matrix,
Speaker 4: that nineteen ninety nine was the peak moment of your
Speaker 4: human civilization. So that that's like when a thousand years
Speaker 4: of pop music peaked with Baby One More Time? And
Speaker 4: there really was We've had all this nice music since then,
Speaker 4: but was there really any more need for songs after
Speaker 4: Baby One More Time?
Speaker 2: I just stopped right there.
Speaker 3: Do you have a favorite Max Martin song?
Speaker 4: I mean the ones on the list? I mean I
Speaker 4: want it that way? Is I like Baby One More Time?
Speaker 4: The record, the recording better, but I want it that way.
Speaker 4: It's just such an impeccable song. It might very well
Speaker 4: be that one, And we all have a soft spot
Speaker 4: for It's My Life by a Bun Jovie.
Speaker 1: Great Hamy and Gina's sequel.
Speaker 4: You know. One of the things that was so interesting
Speaker 4: about that is it was Max returning just as I
Speaker 4: was saying the fact that really he was kind of
Speaker 4: right bon Jovi's songs, but like with the synth dress up,
Speaker 4: you know, the boy band or teen pop dress up.
Speaker 4: But then he just straight up went back into the
Speaker 4: Bonjobe's song and proved that the formula was so durable.
Speaker 4: Both that and since she'd been gone again, does the
Speaker 4: same thing that is my life does? It takes the
Speaker 4: implicit rock and makes it explicit.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I love the way Tyler Swift used him, which is
Speaker 4: she kind of worked with him and learned everything he
Speaker 4: had to teach, and then she's like thank you, and
Speaker 4: then went on to do it without him, And then
Speaker 4: I think that she's one of the only artists who
Speaker 4: did it that way.
Speaker 3: I think that that also says a lot about her.
Speaker 2: You know, Yeah, what were your favorite songs? Rob of
Speaker 2: the Maximartin Cannon.
Speaker 3: Well, if I had to choose, and I do at
Speaker 3: this moment, my three would be Avril Levine's greatest song ever,
Speaker 3: What the Hell from twenty eleven, Wow, her midlife crisis,
Speaker 3: Live in her Life thirty something post divorce. Avril absolutely
Speaker 3: perfect song. Every time I hear it, I think this
Speaker 3: is the song that will outlive all the other ever
Speaker 3: Lavine songs, and it's such a bop. The Max Martiness
Speaker 3: of it is so huge, but he's as always, he's
Speaker 3: really great at listening to these artists and what their
Speaker 3: voices and what they're good at, and just as he did.
Speaker 3: I think it's her version of bon Jovies, It's My Life,
Speaker 3: and then a song that I know we all love,
Speaker 3: Selena Gomez Hands to Myself. I think it proves, if
Speaker 3: I may use this expression, that Max Martin is the
Speaker 3: metaphorical Gin and Juice and Taylor Swift's New Romantics Yeah,
Speaker 3: which to me is the culmination for both of their careers.
Speaker 3: This is such a perfect peak for them to arrive at.
Speaker 1: I mean, even on a song like I Feel Like
Speaker 1: break Free, I always think of as sort of like
Speaker 1: peak kind of recent years Max Martin, where it is
Speaker 1: sort of that good kind of weird lyricism, that very
Speaker 1: like kind of swedishisms that are in there, where you're like,
Speaker 1: now I've become who I really are and you're like,
Speaker 1: this is such like a Britney Spears like ninety nine line, that's.
Speaker 3: Who writes songs in English for so many decades and
Speaker 3: refuse to learn.
Speaker 2: But it's a great line. It works so so great.
Speaker 1: Like now I become who I really are, Like that's
Speaker 1: stuck in my head.
Speaker 3: Constantly, Like again, we don't know who did what, but
Speaker 3: I refuse to believe Max Martin didn't write those himself
Speaker 3: because you look at you know, I want it that way.
Speaker 3: And it's mind blowing that a song impeccable, like you said,
Speaker 3: and a song that's a standard and a classic that
Speaker 3: makes almost no sense. Almost no phrase of the song
Speaker 3: connects with any other phrase of the song.
Speaker 1: I think, like I always really love how kind of
Speaker 1: casualness is it? Like there is something that feels very
Speaker 1: like he just like wrote down a phone conversation he
Speaker 1: had with like an X like set five seconds before
Speaker 1: he started writing the song.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, it's really amazing when you think of how many
Speaker 3: conversations begin here's the thing and that song. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 3: so many genius things about that song, but that it
Speaker 3: actually uses that to begin a conversation in a song.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that song wasn't originally supposed to go
Speaker 1: to Clor Clarkson either, as supposed to. It was originally
Speaker 1: pink and then Hillary Duff really were the other two
Speaker 1: who almost got that song, I had no idea. I mean, Pink,
Speaker 1: you know, obviously her and Max have had a very long,
Speaker 1: ongoing collaborative relationship. They've worked on a ton of music
Speaker 1: together to this day, so that makes sense. But of
Speaker 1: course Breakaway is I would say Kelly's classic album. Of course,
Speaker 1: this is an album that really really helps her solidify
Speaker 1: who she is as a pop star. And I mean
Speaker 1: Misindependent was kind of a good precursor to what she
Speaker 1: would end up doing on like Breakaway and Misindependent from
Speaker 1: the Thankful era kind of helped maybe push her towards
Speaker 1: this like pop rock moment. But since You've been gone
Speaker 1: as the as a second single from that being this
Speaker 1: like big, boisterous, like kind of like pop punky, pop
Speaker 1: rocky kind of moment from her with like these giant
Speaker 1: guitars and like this like booming voice that she has
Speaker 1: that works so well over it. I mean, there's no
Speaker 1: one else that can sing that song in the same
Speaker 1: way with maybe one more time, Like you know, even
Speaker 1: with the potential other artists who were going to sing
Speaker 1: that song first, it just makes so much sense with
Speaker 1: who ended up with it that I feel, no, no
Speaker 1: remorse in Losing a pink version of Since You've Been Gone.
Speaker 3: You know totally and such a great moment where this
Speaker 3: sort of this whole like school of New York meet
Speaker 3: Me in the Bathroom era, like punk rock was finding
Speaker 3: it's it's pop outlets, and that this is so perfect
Speaker 3: just even that they get that perfect drum sound from
Speaker 3: fabmready of The Strokes, the sort of The Strokes hard
Speaker 3: to explain drum sound, and the way it becomes the yeah,
Speaker 3: yeah yeah song, and the turnaround when it's exactly Brian
Speaker 3: Chase's drum sound, and that all these precise fan details
Speaker 3: are worked so perfectly into this song. But you don't
Speaker 3: have to know any of those references to respond to
Speaker 3: the song. It's it's as timeless as a as a
Speaker 3: breakup song can be. Yeah, I'm so moving.
Speaker 1: Off, And I mean the yaas do not like Since
Speaker 1: You've Been Gone very much.
Speaker 3: Just feel somewhere in their hearts. Beyonce and hold Up
Speaker 3: must have opened them up to the idea of like
Speaker 3: their pop presence well and maps you know, another one
Speaker 3: of the greatest yeah of the century. But it's wild
Speaker 3: that so typical of Max Martin's genius to find stuff
Speaker 3: to use everywhere in pop music.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I thought it fascinating that, like in the
Speaker 1: twenty ten version of the list, that kind of interim
Speaker 1: revamp that happened between the twenty four list and the
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one list, Since You've Been Gone was ended
Speaker 1: up being added to that. And I mean, of course
Speaker 1: that meant that within the few years I had been
Speaker 1: At had already been seen kind of immediately as one
Speaker 1: of the best songs that Max Martin had made thus far.
Speaker 1: But I'm curious, like what you think in a future
Speaker 1: revamp of the list will be. It still feels kind
Speaker 1: of like a low number of his songs are represented
Speaker 1: on the list, But yeah.
Speaker 4: That seems like a I mean, I think Rob has
Speaker 4: a lot of later period candidates.
Speaker 3: That song that I'm sure we all love. So what
Speaker 3: the Pink song?
Speaker 4: To me?
Speaker 3: It's funny that Pink has so many classics, but the
Speaker 3: Pink Maxim Martin collaborations are so unique for both of them,
Speaker 3: They really bring something out of each other. Yeah, so
Speaker 3: Wet to me is like the pinnacle for what that
Speaker 3: collaboration achieves in terms of attitude and sound and humor
Speaker 3: and rage and everything.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in terms of other Max songs that should probably
Speaker 1: or hopefully will make the list in the future, Like,
Speaker 1: there are very few boy band songs on the list,
Speaker 1: and of course I want that ways on there. It's
Speaker 1: going to be Me another song that I was I
Speaker 1: was kind of surprised that we didn't have it so
Speaker 1: good that and sync representation on the list at all,
Speaker 1: but especially It's going to Be Me.
Speaker 3: Another Backstreet Boys song that no way reminds me of
Speaker 3: any Britney Spears song. Is Larger than Life. Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 3: phenomenal song.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and everybody that synth on Everybody is so like
Speaker 1: the you know, the beat on that is so good.
Speaker 3: I remember it was a huge moment in terms of
Speaker 3: Max Martin becoming a recognized brand. When Britney's You Drive
Speaker 3: Me Crazy and the backs Your Boys larger than Life
Speaker 3: where hits it around the same time, people are like,
Speaker 3: I'm seeing a pattern here. But Larger than Life is
Speaker 3: such a perfect I mean, in so many ways, it's
Speaker 3: the ultimate boy band tribute to the audience. Yeah, and
Speaker 3: it's such a fantastic, bombastic song in every way.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And Brian mentioned oops I did again too earlier
Speaker 1: in that song. Again, another another Britney classic that could
Speaker 1: very easily make a future.
Speaker 3: Yes of the list.
Speaker 4: Yes, I thought the old lady put it at the
Speaker 4: bottom of the ocean. Speaking of which, nothing was more confusing,
Speaker 4: I'm sure to many kids than Backstreets Back all right,
Speaker 4: when Backstreet Boys was to Americans at that point a
Speaker 4: new act. Obviously they've been had a certain amount of
Speaker 4: bigness in Europe, but it was one of those things
Speaker 4: where I think it almost had a sort of inception
Speaker 4: effect on people would be like like like like that,
Speaker 4: the sort of the Simpsons boy band, with the subliminal
Speaker 4: messages like well they're back. I mean, I guess I
Speaker 4: already liked them. I think that's a big secret.
Speaker 2: To this success so much.
Speaker 3: How did I miss the whole Backstreet era? A phase
Speaker 3: of Max Martin's that that we have to give up
Speaker 3: to because I know we all like feel deeply about this,
Speaker 3: but Katie Perry's yeh star making collaborations with me.
Speaker 1: I mean again, Katie Perry not being on the list
Speaker 1: is a travesty.
Speaker 2: But that's neither here nor there. I have my own we.
Speaker 3: Have to insert a Brittany pop ed about.
Speaker 1: Yes, I mean, there's there was a lot of a
Speaker 1: lot of things that went wrong, But at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, we shouldn't be ignoring Teenage Dream or One.
Speaker 2: Of the Boys as classic albums.
Speaker 1: But I think because of what Max has been associated with,
Speaker 1: which was so much of this pop movement at the
Speaker 1: end of the nineties and early two thousands, pop movement
Speaker 1: that was seen as very manufactured and these like artists
Speaker 1: that versus been galid and these artists who like didn't
Speaker 1: have agency and things like that or creative input. I
Speaker 1: do think that's obviously affected the way that people remember
Speaker 1: these songs right and remember and kind of give respect
Speaker 1: and due to what was created during that time. And
Speaker 1: I think, you know, we're seeing a little bit more
Speaker 1: of Max Martin as a songwriter and producer kind of
Speaker 1: get a little bit more respect as years go on.
Speaker 1: And I mean there is music's being celebrated on Broadway,
Speaker 1: the musical Musical and Julia, which is I don't know
Speaker 1: if either guys have seen that wacky time. I'm wondering,
Speaker 1: do you do you guys think that there's still even
Speaker 1: more due for him to be paid over the years
Speaker 1: as a songwriter producer, Like do you think that we
Speaker 1: still have kind of lost a little bit of that.
Speaker 1: People really respecting his contributions to pop music, or do
Speaker 1: you think it's been properly bestowed upon him.
Speaker 3: I think as time goes by, his legend will just
Speaker 3: rise because none of these songs. Yeah, you know, none
Speaker 3: of them are dated, none of them are oldies. These
Speaker 3: are all songs that none of us would be surprised
Speaker 3: to hear on the radio today.
Speaker 4: Yeah, like I said, I feel like those covers, there
Speaker 4: was a striking sort of acknowledgment from many people in
Speaker 4: this sort of indie world, in the rock world and
Speaker 4: the singer songwriter world, that well, these songs are really
Speaker 4: well written. Like right away, there was sort of this,
Speaker 4: like I said, all those covers and it was immediate,
Speaker 4: it was and it was there were all these acoustic
Speaker 4: covers of Baby One More Time, which didn't happen with
Speaker 4: like any random pop song, and it didn't happen with
Speaker 4: ones that it should have, Like you know, I mean,
Speaker 4: where's the love for all those great Ashley Simpsons songs,
Speaker 4: Like no indie band's ever covered them to this day.
Speaker 4: So it doesn't always happen. It's some you know, there's
Speaker 4: often that barrier. But something about this there's a level
Speaker 4: of craft I think that you can have where it's
Speaker 4: just it overcomes those kind of genre prejudices.
Speaker 3: So I feel like kind of.
Speaker 4: Since the beginning, at least in maybe some critics, for sure,
Speaker 4: are a number of critics, and then definitely like musicians,
Speaker 4: songwriters were like, whoa this guy is like and that's
Speaker 4: sort of why even you know, people who were songwriters,
Speaker 4: like you know, like the Great Bad Job, you know,
Speaker 4: but like you Bunjovi, who was a songwriter. I mean,
Speaker 4: he was like, I have to work with this guy
Speaker 4: because I you know, he's cracked something, and you do
Speaker 4: hear about people studying who aren't necessarily in the pop
Speaker 4: work kind of studying that melodic math and trying it.
Speaker 3: So I think he's got that love.
Speaker 4: Couldn't have more love for musicians and songwriters already, And
Speaker 4: then I think critics have mostly caught up. So I
Speaker 4: think he's you know, he's an absolute legend already for sure.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you so much, Brian, Yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening to Rolling Stone's five hundred
Speaker 1: Greatest Songs. This podcast is brought to you by Rolling
Speaker 1: Stone and iHeartMedia. Written and hosted by me Britney Spanos
Speaker 1: and Rob Sheffield. Executive produced by Jason Fine, Alex Dale
Speaker 1: and Christian Horde, and produced by Jesse Cannon with music
Speaker 1: by Eric Zeiler