There must be someone employed by Jo Whiley whose job it is to think up the worst possible misinterpretations of songs, so that unlucky pop stars get to perform them in the Live Lounge. Girls Aloud, the best pop group in the world right now, perform “With Every Heartbeat,” one of the best songs of the past year and a natural fit for GA’s style. And I don’t think it would be possible to come up with a worse version:
A while back, I was listening to Le Tigre’s “Deceptacon,” in which Kathleen Hanna performs the hysterical subject demanded by contemporary gender roles, and it occoured to me that this would be a good direction for Britney Spears. Everyone thinks she’s mad anyway; why not embrace that madness? Read more↴
I’m probably not the first person to come up with a variation on this macro to celebrate the new Britney Spears single (though it’s surprisingly difficult to find immediately recognizable pictures of her which don’t lead to 100% wrongness when you superimpose the words “GIMME IT” on top of them). It’s really very good, although in the genre of famous‐person‐sings‐about‐not‐liking‐being‐famous I don’t know if it’s as good as Lindsey Lohan’s “Rumors,” or, of course, Britney’s own chef‐d’œuvre, “Lucky.”
I was listening to the Happy Mondays the other day and was struck by the thought that WFL (which I’d believed to be a kind of hedonistic bragging – “I ordered a line / you formed a queue,” etc) might actually be a dialog between the crassly capitalist and their others (“Is there nothing else you can do?” / “Well not much, I’ve not been trained”). Possible material for the theory of proletarian resentment?
I’ve been listening to Kate Nash’s “Foundations” quite a bit recently. It’s another fine entry in the recent genre of housing-market related tracks (“Life For Rent,” “Everything’s Just Wonderful”). I’m slightly in awe of her accent, too; surely no-one’s Rs are naturally that non-rhotic?
Listening to MIA’s new album, I’ve been wondering what it is I find so creepy (and not in a good way) about her records. Possibly clarified for me slightly by the track “Grapes” which claims to feature Three 6 Mafia but appears to be a version of Nump’s Bay Area hit “I Got Grapes.” Hearing the area where I live incorporated in MIA’s third-world chic is definitely disconcerting. Not that there aren’t some enjoyable tracks; “20 Dollar” and “Paper Planes” are rapidly growing on me, and “Jimmy” is very nice indeed.
In other news, I’m wondering if “Jellyhead” by Crush (which could have been a 90s video war contender if I’d remembered it) is about the difficulties of going out with someone addicted to Temazepam?
Via Jessica, a marvelous French pop song. My French isn’t good enough to be entirely sure what it’s about, but I suspect the influence of Fourier:
Quand ça m’plaît plus j’efface tout et je recommence
Avec d’autres maisons et d’autres animaux
These “autres animaux” appear to include a bird, a goat, and a crocodile; un autre crocodile or, would it be too much to suggest, a counter-crocodile? Which, in a roundabout way, makes me think of Fourier’s exemplary materialism. Only an idealism that saw human beings as separate from nature would posit a social revolution that excluded the “natural.”