Right

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

The promised follow-up questions (two of them in fact)

What have you been most right about? (The world may or may not have caught up to you on this)

Does being seen as "wrong" or "right" about music by other people bother you much?

Comments

[koganbot]

(13) Sugar Hill Gang, Spoonie Gee, Funky Four Plus One More, Lady B, et al. (admittedly, this was something that it was easy to be right about).
(14) Convo w/ my therapist in 1980 or so where I point out significance of "Get Off Of My Cloud"'s being in call-and-response form; I may or may not have made the statement "the Stones attracted a crowd by saying 'Don't hang around 'cause two's a crowd'"; therapist says "You should write this."
(15) Early '80s, decided that my own music and my musical environs (bohemian postpunk avant gardeish whatever) was one sick puppy. Later in decade fire off legendary but little-read broadsides in which I try to analyze the ailment (I see Stones and Dylan attempt to bring in greater social context and give music greater social reach as inevitable, admirable, and containing seeds of future decline when greater social reach becomes fetishized as Words And Music That Symbolize Greater Social Reach and tied to the self-esteem of progressive rock and then punk rock and then indie-alternative)(and then techno? and then jungle, garage, etc?); also recognize that this tendency is culture-wide and comes from within pop and that Stones-Dylan were just blips; therefore refuse to recognize the existence of "rockism" and refuse to denigrate either social reach or the attempt to be real.
(16) Miami sound, Latin hip-hop, girl twirl, freestyle.
(17) Realize early on in putting out my fanzines that few people are willing to fly with me and that no one will fly all the way. This is something I am not happy to be right about.
(18) L'Trimm.
(19) "Lollipop (Candyman)."
(20) Trick Daddy, Mannie Fresh, Timbaland, et al. (though lots of people beat me to being right about this).
(21) Eminem.
(22) Later realization: Eminem fell short, wasn't willing to keep his brain humming, so rock (or hip-hop or whatever) is potential rather than towering achievement.
(23) Ashlee Simpson (not that I expect her to avoid the usual intellectual nonfollowthrough, since her intellect is barely up and humming as it is - potential and all that - but her own generous eye towards The Life And Loves Of Ashlee Simpson show promise for a better outcome, from her or someone else, since her achievement has never been wedded to being oppositional; in the meantime she's sung some of the greatest love lyrics ever, having to do with coffee stains and not fleeing human wreckage).
(24) Brie Larson at age 17 is one hell of a good writer.
(25) "Britney is asking her most die-hard fans for some assistance in order to name her upcoming album. Possible Album Titles: (1) Omg is Like Lindsay Lohan Like Okay Like. (2) What if the Joke is on You. (3) Down boy. (4) Integrity. (5) Dignity. Members of the Britney Spears Official Fan Club can vote by clicking here!"

Humming beautifully

[koganbot]

Um, "barely up and humming"? Seems to me where her love lyrics are good they're ahead of Dylan's in richness and complexity and generosity, so in some ways she (or she plus Kara or she plus Stan or she plus John or she plus Shelly) is humming way more beautifully than Dylan ever did, but in taking on the social world she's still basically at I get knocked down and I get up again and "I walked a thousand miles while everyone was asleep" - great line, but we'll see how she elaborates on it. So not yet to "Where the home in the valley meets the damp, dirty prison / Where the executioner's face is always well hidden" (Dylan, 1963), not to mention a total twisting itself in and out refracted mirror mindfuck like "Brown Sugar." Or a celeb-relevant "I know there're some people terrified of the bomb. But there are other people terrified to be seen carrying a Modern Screen magazine" (Dylan, 1965).