SONG OF THE DAY
“Bright Lights Bigger City” by Cee Lo Green (The Lady Killer, Elektra Records, 2011). Written by Cee Lo Green, Ben H. Allen III and Tony Reyes.
WHERE I HEARD IT
ABC’s now-defunct “Detroit 1-8-7”, Episode 115: “Legacy; Drag City”, first aired: February 15, 2011.
INTERESTING FACTS (a la wikipedia)
– “Bright Lights Bigger City” is the third single from American soul singer Cee Lo Green’s third studio album, The Lady Killer.
– The single version of the track features an uncredited guest rap from American rapper Wiz Khalifa.
– The song samples “You Only Live Twice”, the soundtrack to the James Bond film of the same name, which was sung by Nancy Sinatra and composed by John Barry.
– Of the song, Cee Lo told MTV News: “This song, I think, just has a broader appeal, because it’s just not talking about me, it’s talking about us. It’s a song about the nightlife and just kinda being out and living for the weekend. It’s kinda got that ‘working-class hero’ quality too; I reference, you know, songs like Johnny Kemp’s “Just Got Paid”. So it’s a story that’s been told before, and it’s so true to life. … We all work pretty hard throughout the week, and Friday and Saturday, you know, will always be special, so this is just a song to commemorate that.”
– Several reviews, including Rob Williams of The Winnipeg Free Press and Zachary Berman of The Diamondback Online argue “Bright Lights Bigger City” is reminiscent of Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean” due to a similar looping bassline. Williams writes, “Bright Lights Bigger City sounds like the cousin of Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean”; while in Berman’s analysis, “Green even goes so far as to touch on disco and early-1980s pop elements, as with “Bright Lights Bigger City,” which opens the album with a bang. With a bass line that references Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean,” a string section straight out of any classic disco dance tune and even a synth reminiscent of Van Halen’s “Jump,” the song is still a powerful, cohesive pop track.” Luke Winkie of Music OMH says “the only thing that sounds inherently new on The Lady Killer is the post-intro curveball, “Bright Lights Bigger City”, which combines an electro-funk groove, swirling violins and a massive rave-synth chorus. It’s great, off-the-wall, and totally engaging.”
– The first music video for “Bright Lights Bigger City”, which features the album version of the track, was released on November 9, 2010, the same date as the release of The Lady Killer in the US. In describing the video, MTV.com’s Kyle Anderson reports: “The video puts Cee Lo in the back of a car, cruising through the streets of New York surrounded by glammed-out women and flower petals. In between, he seduces a woman in a bathtub, gets his head shaved in a black-lit room and gets into some sort of super-spy battle with a female ninja in a restaurant kitchen. The video reflects the posh and slightly hallucinatory nature of the track… It’s emblematic of the rest of The Lady Killer, which borrows all sorts of classic Motown and Stax elements and augments them with futuristic sounds, all buoyed by Cee-Lo’s remarkably elastic voice.”
– A second version of the music video, featuring the remix featuring Wiz Khalifa, was released on March 10, 2011. Khalifa’s verse begins at approximately two minutes and twenty seconds in. Drew Grant of Salon Magazine described the “neon” video as “a city populated entirely by neon signs instead of people,” allowing one to “visualize all the words of the song, so it’s kind of like a Sing-a-long!” The remix video has been compared to Cee Lo’s original video for “Fuck You!” and other videos that feature a visualization of the song’s lyrics.
– Green is touring with an all-female backing band named Scarlet Fever, performing this song on November 11, 2010, as part of the Symmetry Live Concert Series at the W Hotel in Midtown Manhattan, New York, and the January 15, 2011, episode of Saturday Night Live. The performance received positive reviews, being described as “rock-star-esque”, “surprisingly good”, “the best song that mid-80’s Glenn Frey never wrote,” and “better than all right”.
– They performed the song opening for Prince at Madison Square Garden.