“Call Me Maybe” by Carly Rae Jepsen

song info

    “Call Me Maybe” by Carly Rae Jepsen (popular viral video) featuring Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, Ashley Tisdale, Alfredo Flores, & MORE is a pop song.

    
    U.S. Billboard Hot 100: #45, down from last week #41, missing week, #31, 42 weeks on chart, peak #1 (one)
    Adult Contemporary: peak #4 (four)
    Radio Songs: #61, down from last week #56, missing week, #44, 37 weeks on chart, peak #2 (two)
    Digital Songs: peak #1 (one)
    On-Demand Songs: #32, down from last week #31, missing week, #25, 40 weeks on chart, peak #1 (one)
    Ringtones: #8 (eight), down from last week #7 (seven), missing week, #7 (seven), 37 weeks on chart, peak #1 (one)
    Japan Hot 100: #66, down from last week #57, missing week, #27, 35 weeks on chart, peak #3 (three)
    Canadian Hot 100: #31, down from last week #33, missing week, #33, 62 weeks on chart, peak #1 (one)
    YouTube: #9 (nine), down from last week #8 (eight), missing week, #7 (seven), 37 weeks on chart, peak #1 (one)
     Billboard information for the week of Dec 22, 2012
     Billboard chart listings courtesy of Billboard Magazine

link to the static song information page for this song:
http://www.thissideofsanity.com/music/songs/ca/callmemaybe.php

    Summary quotation from Wikipedia:

    “Call Me Maybe” is a song by Canadian singer-songwriter Carly Rae Jepsen, taken from her first EP, Curiosity (2012) and appearing on her international debut album, Kiss. The song was written by Jepsen and Tavish Crowe as a folk song, but its genre was modified to pop following the production by Josh Ramsay. The song was released as the lead single from the EP on September 20, 2011, through 604 Records. After pop singers Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez tweeted about the song, Jepsen gained international attention and was signed to Schoolboy Records, releasing her single in the United States through the label, as the first single from Kiss. Musically, “Call Me Maybe” is an upbeat teen pop track that draws influences from dance-pop and disco. Lyrically, the track alludes to the inconvenience that a love at first sight brings to a girl who hopes for a call back from a crush. It received generally positive reviews from contemporary critics, who praised its composition and clever lyrical content.

    The song received generally positive reviews from contemporary critics, who praised its composition and clever lyrical content. “Call Me Maybe” has attained commercial success worldwide and was one of the biggest hits of 2012, reaching number one in Australia, Czech Republica, Denmark, Finland, France, Hungary, Ireland, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Poland, Slovakia, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United Kingdom, while peaking inside the top ten in Belgium, Norway, and The Netherlands. After reaching the top position in Canada, Jepsen became only the fifth Canadian artist to do so in her home country since 2007. In the United States, the track has reached number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and Pop Songs chart. The song is the first number one by a Canadian female artist on the Billboard Hot 100 chart since 2007’s “Girlfriend” by Avril Lavigne. With worldwide sales of over 12.5 million copies, “Call Me Maybe” is 2012’s best-selling digital single, and one of the best-selling digital singles of all time.

    An accompanying music video was directed by Ben Knechtel. In it, Jepsen seeks the attention of an attractive boy next door who is revealed at the close of the story to be attracted to a male band member. As part of promotion for the song, the singer has performed the track on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, where she made her US television debut, and at the 2012 Billboard Music Awards. “Call Me Maybe” has been covered by several artists, including Katy Perry, Kelly Clarkson, Dan Deacon, Fun, Big Time Rush, The Chipettes, R5, Lil’ Wayne, Enter Shikari, Ben Howard, Cody Simpson, The Saturdays, Glee and parodied by Cookie Monster and some of the news staff of National Public Radio. It was also covered on the season premiere episode, “The New Rachel”, of the fourth season of Glee. The song was used in other television shows, Castle, Jane by Design, Degrassi: The Next Generation, and 90210.

    An alternate music video done by Big Time Rush, Ashley Tisdale, Justin Bieber, and Selena Gomez was uploaded to YouTube and instantly turned viral, having over 35 million views as of May 8, 2012.

    “Call Me Maybe” was nominated for two Grammy Awards, for Song of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance at the 55th Annual ceremony, but lost to “We Are Young” by Fun and the live performance of “Set Fire to the Rain” by Adele respectively. On December 11, 2012, “Call Me Maybe” was named Song of the Year of 2012 by MTV. In its 2012 Year-End issue, Billboard Magazine ranked this song #2 in the Hot 100 Songs, Digital Songs, and Canadian Hot 100 Songs charts, in each case behind “Somebody That I Used to Know”, by Gotye featuring Kimbra. The song was also ranked number one by the Village Voice’s annual Pazz and Jop poll, which compiles the votes of music critics from all over the United States. The song was the best-selling single worldwide in 2012, selling over 10 million copies in that year alone, and the best-selling single on the iTunes Store in 2012.

Background

    “Call Me Maybe” was initially written by Jepsen and Tavish Crowe as a folk song, while they were on tour. Jepsen stated that the writing process was easy, and that she wasn’t “over-thinking it. We brought in Josh, and he helped us kind of pop-ify it.” The following days, she recorded the track at the Umbrella Studios in Richmond, British Columbia, Canada. Jepsen later stated that it is “basically a pick up. What person hasn’t wanted to approach somebody before and stopped because it’s scary? I know I have.” “Call Me Maybe” had been first released in Canada only through 604 Records on September 20, 2011.

    In January 2012, dating pop singers Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez were in Canada and heard the track on the mainstream radio. After they tweeted about it on their personal profiles, Jepsen instantly gained international attention, and got signed by Scooter Braun to his Schoolboy Records. Braun revealed that Bieber has “never jumped out and promoted an artist like this before. He sends me different YouTube videos of unsigned artists that he’d like to work with, but never someone who already had a song out and is on the radio.” Worldwide distribution of the single was done through Interscope Records.

Composition

    Written by Jepsen and Crowe, with additional writing and song production by Josh Ramsay, “Call Me Maybe” is an upbeat track that draws influences from dance-pop and disco. Lyrically, the song describes the “infatuation and inconvenience of a love at first sight,” as described by Bill Lamb of About.com. During the pre-chorus, Jepsen states how she suddenly becomes attracted to a person, singing, “Your stare was holding, ripped jeans, skin was showing/Hot night, wind was blowing/Where you think you’re going, baby?” As the chorus begins, the background incorporates synthesized string chords, and Jepsen explains that her feelings towards the guy are unexpected, “Hey, I just met you, And this is crazy, But here’s my number, So call me maybe.”

    Melody Lau of Rolling Stone wrote that “Call Me Maybe” is a “Taylor Swift meets Robyn” song. Jon O’Brien of Allmusic stated that the songs of Curiosity recall the bubblegum pop era of Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera, and added that “Call Me Maybe” is a combination of teen pop and synthpop with “a chorus that just about straddles that fine line between sugary sweet and sickly.” Tiffany Lee of Yahoo! Music deemed it as an instant summer hit, and added that “Call Me Maybe” has “a good beat, great melody and catchy lyrics; something you and your friends can belt out in the car while driving to the beach, a party, and pretty much anywhere.” Jon Caramanica of The New York Times wrote that the song is “breezy and sweet, an eyelash-fluttering flirtation run hard through the Disney-pop model of digitized feelings and brusque, chipper arrangements.”

    According to Musicnotes.com, “Call Me Maybe” is written in the key of G major with a moderate tempo of 120 beats per minute. Jepsen’s vocals span from G₃ to C₅ and the song follows a key progression of Cmaj7-G/D-Cmaj7-G/D.

Music video

    A music video for “Call Me Maybe” was written and directed by Ben Knechtel. According to Knechtel, the main idea behind the concept was to have a “twist at the end”, trying to get away from the idea of the classic “boy meets a girl” story. The music video has over 416 million views on VEVO and YouTube as of March 2, 2013. It begins with Jepsen spying on her attractive tattooed neighbor, portrayed by Holden Nowell, as he is working on his lawn. As he takes his shirt off and notices she is staring at him, Jepsen slips on her high heels and falls below her window. She is reading the books Love at First Sight (Men In Uniform) by B.J. Daniels and Skylar’s Outlaw by Linda Warren. The scene then cuts to her garage, where she is rehearsing the track with her band. Following the rehearsals, her bandmates push her to go and wash her car, where she tries to gain her neighbor’s attention with various sexual poses only to fall from the hood of the car. She is briefly knocked out from the fall, during which she dreams of a romance novel-type encounter with her crush. As she comes to, the neighbor then helps Jepsen to get up, and watches the band rehearse the track again. After turning and writing down her telephone number, Jepsen sees her neighbor pass one of her male bandmates (Tavish Crowe) his own number, indicating he is attracted to the man instead. The video received three nominations on the 2012 MuchMusic Video Awards in the categories of UR Fave Video, Pop Video of the Year, and Video of the Year.

—from Wikipedia (the Wikipedia:Text of Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License applies to Wikipedia’s block of text and possible accompanying picture, along with any alterations, transformations, and/or building upon Wikipedia’s original text that ThisSideofSanity.com applied to this block of text)

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