What qualities do you look for in a pop star?

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Obviously musical/singing ability is required (well, most of the time) but what else?

- Eccentricity?
- Frivolousness?
- Dancing ability?
- Number of white towels in their rider?
- Appearing on Saturday morning kids' telly/Christmas specials?

Phrasing the question slightly differently: What makes you think an artist is 'pop'?

Comments

[koganbot]

Well, one of Xgau's ideas when he created the term "semipopular" was that you had people with all the attributes of stardom except fame (Xgau had other ideas about semipopular too, not all of which were consistent with this one; but then, there doesn't have to be a single consistend attribute to "semipopular," or "popular," or "stardom"). He called Iggy Pop "semipopular," and Iggy was the perfect example, because Iggy was acting like a rock star, which means as a performer he was reaching out to and against his listeners, reaching out to unknown audiences, making them take him on as a performer, trying to turn the audience into performers themselves. So he's not just addressing/reflecting people like himself.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

M.I.A.!

Actually I just want all pop stars to be able to pull off photos like this one of Mariah:



CHAMPAGNE. In the SNOW. That is BEYOND FIERCE.

[koganbot]

Interestingly, Mariah's "offstage" behavior has nothing to do with why I think of her as a star. It's really the voice, what it does - in my book I compared it to a horse out for its gallop - that is her crucial star attribute. I'd probably say the same thing about Courtney Love. It's the content of their music that made them stars for me. But that doesn't mean that all good music makes stars of the people it features. Again, JoJo is a good singer who to me is not a star, since I don't feel an adventure in her singing to which I can affix the name "JoJo." This doesn't mean that there's no adventure in her music, just that this adventure doesn't focus itself on a character called "JoJo."