You can’t ignore Taylor Swift. Whether it’s having her mic snatched by Kanye, hosting Saturday Night Live three years ago, or having her hit “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” play as you flip through radio stations [yes, some people still listen to the radio] she’s become a public pop culture icon and she’s not going anywhere anytime soon.
Yes, she’s loved by millions, but also derided by a sizable number. While many of the judgements stem from her seeming inability to hold down a relationship, this more often than not seems like the public concentrating on an aspect of superstardom that they tend to turn a blind eye to when it comes to their respective favourites. What Taylor Swift really receives a lot of flak for [and for better reason] is the content of her music.
I first came across this idea on a blog post by Shelby Fero that has since been taken down. Recently I managed to dig it up again since it had been replied to on another tumblr, and you can check it out here. [EDIT: That has since been taken down as well] There’s a four-minute video you can watch, but if not, Let me recap it:
It’s a follow-up to another post on tumblr where she says, in one line without profanity, “‘Mean’ by Taylor Swift pisses me off so much.” Which is fine. The video goes on to elaborate her point, and is largely about the music video. In essence Fero says that it’s fine to have a song about those bullied because of their sexuality or poverty [both seen in the music video], but you can’t marry or compare that to your own problems about being told you’re not a good singer; you can’t put yourself into this song and still have it be about these other bigger problems.
GORDON: Ladies, gentlemen, voices I hear in my head during the dark, long hours of the night, we’re going to deviate from our past record of discussing television to talk about creating a new literary genre.
EVAN: Which is a daunting task, to say the least. I mean, genres have gotten ridiculously specific as of late. There’s a “gay horror” genre now. It’s not something to spook homophobes, it’s literally horror fiction for homosexuals.
GORDON: There are so many terrible, ignorant jokes I wanna make right now, but I’m not going to. But I agree- we can’t just slap two genres together. Poe is credited with inventing the deective novel- is there a particular profession that hasn’t really been explored much?
EVAN: Hm . . . Everything dramatic and even slightly connected to death is out. That includes forensic scientists, doctors or any sort, lawyers, etc. And the thing is, a genre that revolves around a profession requires an exciting one.
GORDON: Would it count if we revived the explorer/exploration novel?
EVAN: Not if the title of this post is “Evan and Gordon Talk: New Lit. Genre.”
GORDON: Touché. Here’s an idea: a “Nietzschean” novel.
EVAN: Go on-
GORDON: Well, to brutally simplify the philosophy, the only “bad guys” are the people who aren’t doing anything. Otherwise it’s more like an epic tale of colliding forces all of whom technically could be the protagonists and antagonists.
EVAN: That’s an interesting direction, but I suppose my issue is how alternatingly broad and specific it is- So in these novels you’re proposing, the only villains are the idle?
GORDON: the idle, the apathetic, those trapped by their antiquated sense of morality, and those enslaved to their brute instincts and empty rationality.
EVAN: I suppose it works, but have difficulty seeing it as the header to a shelf in a bookstore. Which is sort of what I was envisioning we would do in creating our new genre.
GORDON: Huh. What’s your idea?
EVAN: Well, this isn’t my idea, but I recently came across this brilliant new novel put together by Ryan North, creator of the webcomic Quantz.
GORDON: Go on.
EVAN: He Kickstarted it and it made like, twenty times what they asked for, but basically it’s Hamlet, but a Choose Your Own Adventure story. And it’s for various characters, too- like, you can read as Hamlet’s father, who eventually must die to become a ghost, et cetera.
GORDON: Huh. If we’re going down that track, how about a novel written in such a way where you can rip out certain sections, rearrange ’em, and wind up with a completely different story?
EVAN: It would work, but sounds exceedingly difficult to pull off. I’m trying to think of how exactly one would go about writing one . . .
I think, keeping in discussing literature, we could devise a new medium of sorts- it would be a marriage of the graphic novel and the traditional novel. Heavy on both text and imagery, a seamless integration that showcases both the artist and the author.
GORDON: That’s sounds like your average Alan Moore book.
EVAN:The Watchmen comes close to it, but it’s ultimately still a graphic novel which prioritizes that sort of storytelling over the bits of prose sandwiched in between the panels.
How about we look at steampunk, and see if we can branch out from it? That seems to be the newest sort of genre out there nowadays.
GORDON: Fair enough. I’m just struggling to figure out an era of technology to “punk.” After all, steam power was really the first major leap in technology.
EVAN: And “cyberpunk” is already a thing as well.
GORDON: This is true. But what else is there? Modern tech? “Modpunk”?
EVAN: Well, we don’t necessarily need to “punk” something. We just need to look at what makes/made steampunk so popular and work off of that-
GORDON: It’s the art, the world, the fancy suits. But yeah, it’s the rich world that’s created; it appeals to us.
EVAN: It’s also a union of history junkies and the sci-fi/fantasy crowd, I think that’s a pretty large aspect of it.
Are there two sort of interest groups that we can intertwine? I mean, it’s already been done with horror and romance, long before Stephenie Meyers ever came along.
GORDON: Huh. I’ll admit, I’m having trouble trying to think of one that hasn’t already been covered. As of yet, I think my Nietzschean idea was the strongest lead we yet have.
What if went down that route? Trying to twist philosophies into narratives- the allegory of the cave would make a good story.
EVAN: I think the main issue is how broad it could get- though I suppose it could just be “Philosophical Fiction.” That I could see in a bookstore.
GORDON: That’d be cool. I mean, it all appeals to the questions and struggles we already have. Yet barring Rand (may raccoons urinate on her grave) and LeGuin, I can’t think of any explicitly “philosophical” novels.
EVAN: That may speak for their effectiveness/popularity.
I was thinking about taking a genre that’s immensely popular to this day, and smashing it together with another one. Self-help books.
GORDON: Heh.
EVAN: People eat ’em up.
GORDON: I’m just imagining a really sarcastic self-help book.
EVAN: Comedy and self-help has probably been done . . . hm . . . I would love to see a whole line of books that masqueraded as self-help books that you could gift to the naive.
GORDON: Heh, that’d be cool.
EVAN: They’d be excessively over the top, but just believable enough for people to [literally] buy them.
GORDON: That’d be funny, but it’s really not a genre.
EVAN: I think if self-help books are a genre then fake self-help books would be as well.
GORDON: It’s really more of a gag.
EVAN: Yeah, I suppose you really couldn’t have that many of them.
How about an exaggeration of the choose your own adventure book?
GORDON: Like forcing you to branch out into multiple novels?
EVAN: Ooh, that’s an idea! So your choices would determine what novels you get next; that’s brilliant.
GORDON: Ain’t it? You’re welcome, America.
EVAN: And Canada. And the world. Let’s open up our borders here.
GORDON: Except Luxembourg. **** you guys.
EVAN: You don’t even know anyone from Luxembourg.
GORDON: Exactly- what makes ’em think they’re so good they don’t talk to me?
EVAN: We are going to lose the viewership of an entire country because of you.
GORDON: Boo hoo.
EVAN: All . . . possibly one of them.
GORDON: Hey, Luxembourg! Andorra called, they want their quaint charm and history back!
EVAN: And with the slamming of an entire nation done, and with a few very decent ideas about exciting places literature could go, we should look forward to what we talk about next-
GORDON: New film style?
EVAN: Seems like we’d be following very closely the same sort of conversation. Not to mention really most of what can be done has been done.
GORDON: This is true.
EVAN: Hm . . . How about . . . nerd culture, just in general- The Big Bang Theory, the current conversation about “nerd girls,” the whole shebang.
GORDON: Sure thing.
EVAN: Okay, that fully wraps up our time. Say good-bye to the nice people, Gordon.
For those of you who don’t watch a lot of American TV, The CW is a television network that hosts a lot of show featuring attractive young people, like The Vampire Diaries, Gossip Girl, America’s Next Top Model, et cetera. Last fall they decided that what they didn’t have enough of was game shows, and thus the idea of Oh Sit! was born. Watch this:
Oh Sit! is essentially a combination of two things that I quite enjoy: musical chairs and the gameshow Wipeout. Knowing that, it should have been nothing but pure, unadulterated entertainment. Unfortunately, much like shrimp and pumpkin pie, not everything you love should be mixed together.
“…a fun, high-stakes, high-octane musical chairs competition, in which 20 thrill-seeking daredevils race head to head through five physically demanding, obstacle course-style eliminations as they each compete to claim a chair, to the sounds of a live band.”
I am not going to pretend I have watched even a full episode of the show. Thoroughly reading the above review has convinced me that it is not worth my time, and that I would probably not enjoy it. Gordon also said, in coming up with the Shame Day/Fame Day feature, that these would be short posts, so I strongly recommend just reading what they wrote.
The main reason I write this is because a little bit of browsing on Wikipedia has revealed that Oh Sit! was actually renewed for a second season. That’s at least ten more episodes of a show Variety‘s Brian Lowry described as feeling “like more of an ordeal than fun.” A second season of what the A.V. Club calls “yet another reality show that’s so depressingly static, so devoid of imagination, interest, or anything redeeming beyond a slightly promotable logline and a punny title.”
It’s about two in the afternoon on a Friday, and I’ve clearly surpassed my self-imposed noon deadline. This is kind of an awkward place to be, because I’m clearly lacking the motivation to write, and all of the topics that I’ve been planning on tackling require a lot of research, so . . .
I’m going to talk about a topic that I know little to nothing about: music.
Last summer I wrote a post called “Holly Brook is Skylar Grey,” about singer/songwriter Holly Brook Hafferman, who took the stage name Holly Brook, released an album, and years after rebooted her persona as the current Skylar Grey.
If you really don’t have time to read the six short paragraphs that make up my first post, I hypothesized that her song “Dance Without You” was a clear indicator of her wanting to start anew without the baggage of her past self. With that being said, I was legitimately surprised when I discovered recently exactly where her new path has taken her.
I subscribed to Skylar Grey’s email newsletter a while ago for curiosity’s sake, and found a link in my inbox one day exclaiming that the lyric video for the song “C’mon Let Me Ride” had hit YouTube. Here it is:
It’s definitely catchy. It’s also a song that begins with the lyrics “If you got a sweet tooth / You can taste my watermelons.”
Skylar Grey began her career singing the bridges to rap songs such as Dr. Dre and Eminem’s “I Need A Doctor,” and Lupe Fiasco’s “Words I Never Said.” While not the best use of her songwriting abilities, at the very least they tackled common topics such as loneliness and regret. “C’mon Let Me Ride” is a song about sex.
The following is an acoustic session of Holly Brook performing the titular song from her album “Like Blood Like Honey”:
I don’t want to hammer this point, because I feel it’s obviously overstated after watching both videos. At the very least let me point out that both songs have their foundations in comparison, riding a bicycle, and blood and honey, and leave it at that.
According to Wikipedia, what Holly Brook was to indie-pop-rock, Skylar Grey is now to pop and hip hop. I definitely get that artists of every medium are going to grow and evolve in their craft, but have difficulty getting behind her choices. According to Rolling Stone the song is supposed to be satirical, and “a jab at ‘overly sexified music, media and the girls who try and imitate it.'” I guess I’ll leave it up to you whether or not that’s communicated well.
That same article also reveals that her original project under the Skylar Grey moniker, “Invinsible” is being reworked as “Don’t Look Down,” on which the aforementioned single about bikes will be featured. It just seems like a lot of image refinement in a very short period of time, and if she’s accurate in saying that the song is “about as far as [she takes the playfulness of her album]” I’m not sure what fans are supposed to expect, or how it will ultimately turn out.
I started retweeting people complaining about welfare, food stamps, etc. and then following it up with a previous tweet of theirs that makes them look hypocritical/dumb/etc. I discovered that as I would retweet these, my followers would start @replying these people and let them know they were idiots. They would then delete their offending tweet. Well, I couldn’t let that happen. So, I screenshot away.
What Binder is very aware of is that Twitter is, by and large, a public forum. Anything that you tweet, unless your privacy settings are changed, can be read by anyone and everyone; my local Metro, and other newspapers around the world, have a section dedicated to them. This is something that people like Donald Trump often forget. As he mentions, once the tweets draw enough attention they are normally taken down. While this is unfortunate, screencaps serve to archive these tweets, and I’ve embedded a few for your viewing pleasure. The first two are a few of the more relevant ones, and the last is a wonderful showcase of hypocrisy:
In response to Korean pop artist PSY closing the American Music Awards.
Regarding a few Mexican high school marching bands and dancers marching in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
Just one of the many, many tweet comparisons that highlight the plight of the privileged.
A lot of the “tweets of privilege” happen to be teens and twenty-somethings writing about employment and the economy. There’s a definite trend of people saying that the jobless are lazy, when only months before they were complaining about being unemployed. What Matt Binder is doing with his blog is exposing hypocrisy where it so often festers [the internet], while also helpfully reminding everyone out there to watch what they say. If you stick your foot in your mouth out loud, there’s a chance someone will hear it, but less that someone will actually record it. On the other hand, making a tweet in poor taste about someone’s dead brother online is really all it takes to get on the news. So let’s give a round of applause for this Tumblr and its creator, and for what it is on the internet: a shining light that unveils the words of the wealthy and unwise. You can follow Matt Binder on Twitter at, easily enough, @MattBinder.
The Hobbit is due to touch down in theatres next month [yes, I watched the Grey Cup last night], and with it will come a new, full trailer for Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel. With all of that happening, I’m going to touch on . . . hm, maybe not the best choice of words. . . I’m going to write a little about the new suit we’ll be seeing in the 2013 summer flick.
On the right is what Henry Cavill is expected to look like as the Last Son of Krypton. Many fans have [as usual] expressed great displeasure in the loss of Supes’ signature undies, as can be read in the aptly titled “‘Man of Steel’: Is Superman’s new suit made of fanboy Kryptonite?”
What’s probably unknown to most of them, however, is that director Zack Snyder fought to keep the supehero’s look traditional. In an interview with the New York Post he said:
“The costume was a big deal for me, and we played around for a long time. I tried like crazy to keep the red briefs on him. Everyone else said, ‘You can’t have the briefs on him.’ I looked at probably 1,500 versions of the costumes with the briefs on.”
Ultimately the studio [as usual] had their way, and the iconic red briefs were done away with. There are a few reasons why I think they should’ve stayed, though, and they have nothing to do with the iconic depictions of the character.
The first reason, if you look up, is staring you right in the face. It’s- well, it’s distracting to say the least, and was actually a problem when suiting up Brandon Routh for the 2006 Superman Returns. From what I can tell, costume designer Louise Mingenbach had her hands fu- sorry . . . had a lot to deal with when it came to the suit. The film’s IMDB page tells us:
According to an article in the 12 September 2005 issue of Newsweek, the biggest question concerning Superman’s costume involved the size and shape of the bulge in the front of his tights. Costume designer Louise Mingenbach finally decided on a bulge that wasn’t too big. “Ten-year-olds will be seeing this movie,” she explained.
A less reputable source [The Sun], told second-hand via KillerMovies reports that a source had this to say about the film:
“It’s a major issue for the studio. Brandon is extremely well endowed and they don’t want it up on the big screen. We may be forced to erase his package with digital effects.”
The current costume design is definitely not doing them any favours in that department, and if anything calls even more attention to Superman’s unmentionables.
My second point has to do directly with design. As archaic and old-fashioned as the red shorts over tights are, they were great in breaking up the blue of the rest of the costume. Although the golden belt buckle attempts to do that in Cavill’s costume, it ultimately fails, and in fact draws added attention to my first point.
In the above design Superman’s midsection is broken up by the two red lines and the golden buckle, which form an incomplete belt. This, along with the darker blue of the costume’s sides does wonders in not making it feel like the character is simply wearing a full set of blue tights and a cape.
I suppose we’ll have to wait until next summer to really determine whether or not the new suit works. Until then, these are my thoughts
You can’t ignore Taylor Swift. Whether it’s having her mic snatched by Kanye, hosting Saturday Night Live three years ago, or having her hit “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” play as you flip through radio stations [yes, some people still listen to the radio] she’s become a public pop culture icon and she’s not going anywhere anytime soon.
Culture War Reporters 