Powerless (Say What You Want)
| "Powerless (Say What You Want)" | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
.png) |
|||||||||
| Single by Nelly Furtado | |||||||||
| from the album Folklore | |||||||||
| Released | 7 October 2003 | ||||||||
| Format | |||||||||
| Recorded | 2003 | ||||||||
| Length | 3:53 | ||||||||
| Label | DreamWorks | ||||||||
| Writer(s) |
|
||||||||
| Producer(s) |
|
||||||||
| Nelly Furtado singles chronology | |||||||||
|
|||||||||
|
|||||||||
"Powerless (Say What You Want)" is a pop song written by Nelly Furtado, Gerald Eaton and Brian West for Furtado's second studio album, Folklore (2003). It contains a sample of Malcolm McLaren's "Buffalo Gals" which was written by Anne Dudley, Trevor Horn and Malcolm McLaren. It was produced by Furtado and Track & Field and was chosen to be the lead single from the album, released in December 2003. Banjo player Béla Fleck appears on the track.
"Powerless" addresses how Furtado herself was discriminated against in that her record company wanted to hide her ancestry: "Paint my face in your magazines/Make it look whiter than it seems/Paint me over with your dreams/Shove away my ethnicity". According to Furtado, “I noticed that when I turned on the TV, I didn’t really see anybody that looked like me. So it’s really important for me to keep that realness in me and always remember where I came from, while at the same time always entertaining people. I like music to be inclusive.” Afterwards, come reflections on gaining strength through the things that are truly important - "real power comes from not caring about power and just letting yourself be free." - and "have balance in life".
Of the instrumentation, Furtado said: "I get to see a lot of DJ-oriented performance stuff, and I'm into the heaviness of breakbeats, how raw and powerful they are. Everything lately has become so synthesized, but just the standard sound of breakbeats is inspiring. 'Powerless' uses breakbeats like that; it's a real groove, a real vibe. It just carries you away. There’s a banjo mixed with a breakbeat from elements of Malcolm McLaren's 'Buffalo Gals.' So right away you're bobbing your head. The lyrics are initially in-your-face, like, 'Okay, I know I'm going to be stereotyped in my life because that is the world we live in; that's society.' But the song tries to find some sense of order in this complicated world." The song won Single of the year at the 2004 Juno Awards.
...
Wikipedia