The Decade In Pop

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

My enormous Pitchfork piece on "The Decade In Pop" is up: http://pitchfork.com/features/articles/7703-the-decade-in-pop/

Spotify playlist to go with it here: http://open.spotify.com/user/freakytrigger/playlist/6cudPLlniOyOrpX5M5Dnnz

Comments

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

Well, Beyonce is actually a tough example, as is Justin. Generally I don't think Beyonce is particularly deserving of persona investment, and almost casts herself as an aesthete, despite the sometimes intensely personal nature of her songs. I'm not sure what it is about her (or Justin), but she seems to actively discourage that kind of investment, even as she's become a kind of figurehead for personal investment! But then I feel the same way about Avril, and it's almost exclusively because of Avril. (Paris is a tricky one; I made the "vessel" argument, but I've come around to how coherent her persona on the album actually is. But that's not really what the conversation was all about, for the most part, that was a more meta convo.)

I was surprised at analyzing "Single Ladies" with sixth graders this summer. When we did a straight lyrical reading, like prose, it was clear that the story in the song was not the story in our heads when we listened to the song. And yet I don't think that the story that's literally happening is quite right -- regardless of how accurate it is to paint the specific story, it's not what I would really say "Single Ladies" is about. Though I do think the literal reading does nicely knock down weirdly shrill arguments about what the song is said to "represent," but those arguments are dumb because they're dumb, not because of the ambiguity of the song. (The problem with those arguments is that they claim to take the lyrics at face value without understanding what the face value actually is; my argument is that the face value isn't the real value, is kind of a "side" value, but this still wouldn't lead to speculation on the "real argument" or the effect it might have on hypothetical listeners.)

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

"persona investment" isn't a typo. I've devoted a lot of personal investment to trying to figure Beyonce out, but it hasn't really worked so well for whatever reason. I'm still somewhat baffled by her.

[koganbot]

Could you elaborate? E.g., what is the story line on paper, what's the storyline in our heads when we listen, how is the first not quite right, what are the shrill arguments, etc.?

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

Well, the storyline on paper is, literally:

Beyonce is in club. Ex-boyfriend sees her. She sees him. She walks up to Random Guy, and starts dancing with him. She looks back at Ex-boyfriend and taunts him: "if you liked it then you shoulda put a ring on it."

Pertinent details: She's been in a relationship with him for "three long years," has gone through agony after the break-up ("cried my tears") and now is getting some payback in the club.

The loose interpretation of it fails in both directions, which are too extreme: one side says it's about "celebrating singledom," is directed primarily at "all the single ladies" (in the audience). The other side says it reinforces traditional marriage, means that marriage is the only logical end to a relationship, forces heteronormative blah blah.

The reason these are both "shrill" responses is that they miss the personal complexity of Beyonce's situation. She thought she was with a guy she might spend the rest of her life with, and he couldn't commit. Now she wants to move on, but she can't quite -- she still wants to hurt him. She's using her new boy as a prop to get back at HIM. He still has power over her. This is clearer in the bridge:

"Here's a man that makes me then takes me and delivers me to a destiny, to infinity and beyond. Pull me into your arms, tell me I'm the one you own. If you don't you'll be alone, and like a ghost I'll be gone."

There's problematic language in there, "one you own," but she's essentially saying -- commit to me or I'll leave you. Just like I left that guy. And anyway, it's unclear to whom she's referring in the bridge; is she expressing her old feelings for her ex-boyfriend? Talking to the stranger, imagining the possibilities of where they could go? Either way she's projecting the previous relationship onto this one -- I wanted more, he didn't, we split; I don't want it to happen again, not least because it's a waste of my time, since I have a destiny to be with someone.

Anyway, the idea that this is just about being single is crazy, but the idea that it reinforces a narrow view of marriage is an overread, I think, or basic projection. Why shouldn't Beyonce want to find a soulmate? And how does this mean that she thinks it's appropriate for all women? Why shouldn't she be upset when the guy with whom she wants to settle down turns out not to want to settle down with her? She's hurt, but it also appears that she ended the relationship, because she doesn't want to spend three more long years with someone who doesn't give her what she wants.

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

But the story in the song, I think, is more celebratory than this seems. "Got gloss on my lips, Man on my hips, got me tighter in my Dereon jeans." There is a sort of "me and my girls out at the club" feeling to it, which seems to be somewhat at odds with how specific the narrative is. It's a song that does generalize, as a dance anthem and by privileging that put-down as a sort of mantra for other women ("all my single ladies [repeat after me]") but the lyrics themselves aren't particularly generic, and nothing about the general thrust of the song, or the feeling of the song, can totally undo what she's actually saying, which is complicated.

[koganbot]

Thank you for this.