Music Review – Ivan Kelley’s ‘Lights On’

As a professional indie music critic, it isn’t often I get an artist that breaks several thousand spins of their music, let alone over a million. That’s the case, though, with the rising talent Ivan Kelley. His Sound Cloud and social media is chock-full of contemporary covers the likes of Adele, Chris Brown, and Justin Bieber, and thus, I think he’s a massively marketable artist. Thus, he’s bordering that line between independent and commercial.

Though Kelley’s presence is primarily cover-based, he is putting out original content on an increasingly regular basis. His new single is ‘Lights Out,’ a track with a heavy electronic pop influence. If you’re reading this review to discern if it’s a good ​ ​track, read on, however, if you’d like me to delve into why it has the potential to be.

‘Lights On’ is everything that’s forgettable and creatively void about contemporary popular music. Its composition is painstakingly unoriginal, its beats are generic, and the lyrics are almost comedically predictable.  “Baby, we can do it with the lights on,” Kelley says. “I want to know, do you like it rough?” Really? I wouldn’t even be so taken aback by those lines if the instrumentation backing them didn’t sound like royalty free pop music off the internet.

 

As a critic, it’s my job to poke holes in songs like this, songs that are void of any meaningful creativity. ‘Lights On’ is generic Top 40 radio fodder, and the worst of it – which in honesty, is why it is so popular. I realize that picking apart this tune may not be good for me, given Kelley has such a prominent following, but… it’s my job. (And I’m proud to do it, whereas some modern critics would turn a blind eye to this problem.)
 
 

How could this song be good, then? Well, when I dug into Kelley’s covers, I discovered a rather soulful artist. He can sing soul remarkably well. Hell, he’s a talented vocalist probably versatile enough to cross genre lines repeatedly. He’s choosing to create mundane, predictable content with that talent, which is a bummer.

One of my favorite anecdotes comes from 1982 – the great songwriter David Ritz sees a drugged out Marvin Gaye sitting half-dead by a poolside. “Man, you look like you need some sexual healing,” he says. Thus, the great song was born. Gaye put his talent to good use and he made a sex song actually feel sensual, meaningful, and well done. I share this anecdote because I don’t think the subject matter of Kelley’s song is necessarily the culprit of its mediocrity. It’s nearly everything else around it.

By Brett Stewart

I’m a professional writer and editor, a journalism major, and I have extensive experience in musical review. I worked for two years as the Editor & Chief of an arts magazine, Strike Magazine, where I worked closely with writers and musicians. Through this, I was able to interact with dozens of acts including Heart, Holly Williams, Robert Cray, John Hiatt, and more. The magazine printed thousands of issues and was even recognized by Rolling Stone’s founder, Jann Wenner.