Compare:
(1) Reich's "Clapping Music" (one of the phasing pieces)
to
(2) Beyonce's "Single Ladies"
(sorry, no embed for this one)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mVEGfH4s5g
I'm teaching a course this summer on the philosophical, aesthetic, and compositional relationship that tie mid-20th c avant-garde art music to 70s punk, hip hop, and disco (and beyond). So, let me tell you, Cage and Reich are all over the radio these days, just in cleverly hidden forms.
This is another favorite of mine. Compare:
(1) Laurie Anderson's "O Superman"
there's even a shout-out to her mom!
with
(2) Lil Wayne's "A Milli" (here's the Lil Mama freestyle, which is in some ways better than the original)
26 May 2009
25 May 2009
Republicans and the one-drop rule, or "He's too moderate!"
So, scholars of social identity and oppression have long known that the boundaries of and membership in privileged groups is incredibly tightly controlled. Gay men aren't fully or properly masculine, just as those with even one drop of non-white blood aren't really white. (Hypodescent, aka "the one drop rule", was a former US law which dictated that anyone with "one drop" - i.e., 1/64th - of black blood was legally black). Similarly, women aren't generally punished for acting somewhat masculine, but men are severely punished (via teasing, disapproval, violence even) for acting even a bit feminine. Privileged groups are interested in maintaining rigorous purity among their ranks.
So, this makes the Cheney/Rove/Limbaugh (notably, all white straight dudes, as far as we know) wing of the GOP's approach to party identity and ideology reeeeally interesting. As the NYT article discusses, Cheney et al are trying to purge the moderate likes of Colin Powell out of the GOP. Read more here:
Anyway, it seems like Cheney/Rove/Limbaugh et al are trying to fashion the identity of the Republican party in the same terms that priviliged social identities like heteromasculinity and whiteness are formed. Republicans with even one drop of moderate blood aren't "real" Republicans. In this model, the GOP can include only those who are most ideologically pure.
Now, I'm not going to make any causal claims here. I don't think we can say whether or not it is because the leaders of this extremely right wing of the party are (as far as we know) straight white dudes that they're adopting this model of group identity. We can't say that they're explicitly modeling GOP identity on white or heteromasculine identity -- in fact, they probably aren't even consciously aware of hypodescent or normative masculinity as such. However, we can speculate about the correlation, and wonder if this sort of purity in group identity is appealing to white males b/c it aligns wiht how they experience their own identities.
So, this makes the Cheney/Rove/Limbaugh (notably, all white straight dudes, as far as we know) wing of the GOP's approach to party identity and ideology reeeeally interesting. As the NYT article discusses, Cheney et al are trying to purge the moderate likes of Colin Powell out of the GOP. Read more here:
Anyway, it seems like Cheney/Rove/Limbaugh et al are trying to fashion the identity of the Republican party in the same terms that priviliged social identities like heteromasculinity and whiteness are formed. Republicans with even one drop of moderate blood aren't "real" Republicans. In this model, the GOP can include only those who are most ideologically pure.
Now, I'm not going to make any causal claims here. I don't think we can say whether or not it is because the leaders of this extremely right wing of the party are (as far as we know) straight white dudes that they're adopting this model of group identity. We can't say that they're explicitly modeling GOP identity on white or heteromasculine identity -- in fact, they probably aren't even consciously aware of hypodescent or normative masculinity as such. However, we can speculate about the correlation, and wonder if this sort of purity in group identity is appealing to white males b/c it aligns wiht how they experience their own identities.
18 May 2009
Flo-Riding the New Wave? or, Postmillennial Black Hipness
So, Kanye West is pretty commonly recognized as mainstream hip hop's acolyte of the New Wave (Gary Numan references, what?), but Flo-Rida's last two singles are totally obvious remixes/reworkings of iconic New Wave tracks.
First, there's "Right Round," the somewhat catchy ode to oral sex based on Dead or Alive's 1985 "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)":
"Right Round" is a straight up synthpop song (with some rapping), and it has a lot more in common with, say, Katy Perry's "Hot n Cold" than with, say, T.I.'s "Dead and Gone". (Now, there's an interesting comparison btw. Flo-Rida's and T.I.'s flow/lyrical stylings...they both are very rhythmically/meter-focused, but TI's content is a lot more substantive than FR's...).
Here's the Dead or Alive version:
Now, here Flo-Rida takes on Echo & The Bunnymen, with the help of Wynter Gordon:
And here's Echo & etc:
Now, the question that's begged here is: All these new wave acts were in some way messing around with binary-hetero gender norms, so what's happening with gender in Flo-Rida's new-wave-inspired tracks? They always use a female vocalist, and thus maintain a pretty standard gendered division of labor btw. singers and rappers. The female presence probably also does something to secure FR's heterosexuality (i.e., she serves as the assumed object of his desires). West has been pretty explicit about his attempts to re-value "gay" (I'll post more on this later); is FR doing something similar here, adopting the trappings of gay white masculinity in order to prove his superiority over other black male rappers?
Let me explain that last claim: "White hipness" () is a cultural logic whereby whites try to dis-identify with "normal" whiteness (e.g., suburban bougieness) by identifying with stereotypical black masculinity (e.g., rappers, bluesmen, etc.) in order to prove their superiority (in taste, knowledge, political progressivism, etc.) over other whites. What West (and maybe Flo-Rida) is doing is dis-identifying with stereotypical black masculinity by identifying (somewhat) with gay white masculinity and its trappings (like New Wave), all in order to prove his superiority over other black male rappers. Is Flo-Rida a scion of postmillennial black hipness?
I promise I'll post more about this concept of "postmillennial black hipness" later.
First, there's "Right Round," the somewhat catchy ode to oral sex based on Dead or Alive's 1985 "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)":
"Right Round" is a straight up synthpop song (with some rapping), and it has a lot more in common with, say, Katy Perry's "Hot n Cold" than with, say, T.I.'s "Dead and Gone". (Now, there's an interesting comparison btw. Flo-Rida's and T.I.'s flow/lyrical stylings...they both are very rhythmically/meter-focused, but TI's content is a lot more substantive than FR's...).
Here's the Dead or Alive version:
Now, here Flo-Rida takes on Echo & The Bunnymen, with the help of Wynter Gordon:
And here's Echo & etc:
Now, the question that's begged here is: All these new wave acts were in some way messing around with binary-hetero gender norms, so what's happening with gender in Flo-Rida's new-wave-inspired tracks? They always use a female vocalist, and thus maintain a pretty standard gendered division of labor btw. singers and rappers. The female presence probably also does something to secure FR's heterosexuality (i.e., she serves as the assumed object of his desires). West has been pretty explicit about his attempts to re-value "gay" (I'll post more on this later); is FR doing something similar here, adopting the trappings of gay white masculinity in order to prove his superiority over other black male rappers?
Let me explain that last claim: "White hipness" () is a cultural logic whereby whites try to dis-identify with "normal" whiteness (e.g., suburban bougieness) by identifying with stereotypical black masculinity (e.g., rappers, bluesmen, etc.) in order to prove their superiority (in taste, knowledge, political progressivism, etc.) over other whites. What West (and maybe Flo-Rida) is doing is dis-identifying with stereotypical black masculinity by identifying (somewhat) with gay white masculinity and its trappings (like New Wave), all in order to prove his superiority over other black male rappers. Is Flo-Rida a scion of postmillennial black hipness?
I promise I'll post more about this concept of "postmillennial black hipness" later.
15 May 2009
"Single Ladies" = robots
Beyoncé is an amazingly talented artist who plays around in very subtle and nuanced ways with “serious ideas” – all while singing some damn catchy hooks. It’s REALLY HARD to make delectable pop that also problematizes ideas in ways that are interesting to academics. Angela Davis argues that Billie Holiday mastered the technique of “working with and against” banal (indeed, second-hand) pop tunes, turning them into both musically and politically/intellectually substantive/enjoyable pieces. (See the “Strange Fruit” chapter in Blues Legacies and Black Feminism). Beyoncé is doing the same thing…or maybe, Sasha Fierce is doing the same thing. Sussing out the split personality thing would be interesting, but that’s not for another entry.
Let’s look at “Single Ladies (put a ring on it)”. Most people – from music journalists to my students – tend to hear this song as a really clichéd paean to marriage and traditional gender roles. “If you like it, then you shoulda put a ring on it” leads people to hear this as a sad then angry break-up song, the anthem of single women everywhere. This interpretation of the lyrics is behind the faddish dance that the song inspired: “single ladies” everywhere were flipping their left hands front to back, indicating where “the ring” should be put. Cuz all women obviously want to be married, right? Traditional gender roles, traditional heterosexuality, materialism, blahblahblah…
But this song isn’t about women. In fact, musically, it’s a really, really weird song for a hit of its size. I mean, it barely holds together as a song. It’s a clap track with sound effects and vocals.
The song isn’t about women, it’s about robots, and those sound effects allude to the sounds of a robot’s joints moving. In fact, the song isn’t an ode to marriage and property and heterosexuality, it’s an Afrofuturist feminist critique of heterosexual courtship.
Video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mVEGfH4s5g
The video for “Single Ladies” was also very popular; it was at least well-known enough to inspire a SNL parody. Most of the commentary on the video focused on the Bob Fosse-inspired choreography, but some (like the ever-vigilant Idolator staff) happened to notice that Beyoncé’s left hand is clad in a jointed metallic glove. Not unlike Luke Skywalker, Beyoncé has a robot hand. When she sings “put a ring on it,” she literally means “it”, that hand that’s not really her. (She doesn’t say “put a ring on ME,” right?). She doesn’t want the traditional property-centric heterosexual union: “Don’t treat me to the things of this world, I’m not that kind of girl,” she assures us. What she does want and “deserve” is “your love”. In fact, what she a man who can her “to infinity and beyond” !! So obviously she wants Buzz Lightyear (or maybe just any old astronaut).
One of the main tenets of Afrofuturism is that Middle Passage was an alien abduction: funny-skinned dudes in crazy duds, huge ships, and speaking some crazy language captured Africans, transported them to another world, and subjected them to experiments and forced labor. Sounds a lot like 50s sci-fi narratives, right? The other main tenent of Afrofuturism is that slave=robot. “Robota,” an early 20th-c Czech slang word, is the basis of our word “robot”. In Czech, “robota” meant worker or slave. Chattel slaves were manufactured (as chattel, as not human) by slave traders and masters to perform specific forms of surplus-value creating labor. Slaves=robots. (You see a lot of robot imagery in the “Diva” video, too).
Beyoncé is arguing that women=robots=chattel. In traditional hetero marriage (as everyone from Levi-Strauss to Irigaray to a Gayle Rubin well knows), women are property, even and especially in the 21st-c marriage-industrial complex. If all she wanted was bling, a registry, a five- or six-figure wedding, and all the legal, tax, and fiduciary rights of a married woman, then why would she threaten any man who offered her less than total love, respect, and devotion “If you don’t, you’ll be alone/And like a ghost, I’ll be gone”?
The fact that she can make this point so subtly, that the song stands alone as a fun, entertaining pop song, makes this song even more of an achievement. There’s a lot of baaad political music that’s more about the politics/ideas than the actual songcraft. This piece manages to do both, just like many of Holiday’s songs. We need to start seeing Beyoncé as an artist, a creative intellectual, rather than just an entertainer. She’s often credited with being a once-in-a-generation vocal talent, but that’s not what I’m interested in here. She’s also often credited with being a grounded, super-savvy businesswoman; I’m not interested in that here, either.
So, can we all just agree that Beyoncé is a whole lot smarter than most people think?
Let’s look at “Single Ladies (put a ring on it)”. Most people – from music journalists to my students – tend to hear this song as a really clichéd paean to marriage and traditional gender roles. “If you like it, then you shoulda put a ring on it” leads people to hear this as a sad then angry break-up song, the anthem of single women everywhere. This interpretation of the lyrics is behind the faddish dance that the song inspired: “single ladies” everywhere were flipping their left hands front to back, indicating where “the ring” should be put. Cuz all women obviously want to be married, right? Traditional gender roles, traditional heterosexuality, materialism, blahblahblah…
But this song isn’t about women. In fact, musically, it’s a really, really weird song for a hit of its size. I mean, it barely holds together as a song. It’s a clap track with sound effects and vocals.
The song isn’t about women, it’s about robots, and those sound effects allude to the sounds of a robot’s joints moving. In fact, the song isn’t an ode to marriage and property and heterosexuality, it’s an Afrofuturist feminist critique of heterosexual courtship.
Video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mVEGfH4s5g
The video for “Single Ladies” was also very popular; it was at least well-known enough to inspire a SNL parody. Most of the commentary on the video focused on the Bob Fosse-inspired choreography, but some (like the ever-vigilant Idolator staff) happened to notice that Beyoncé’s left hand is clad in a jointed metallic glove. Not unlike Luke Skywalker, Beyoncé has a robot hand. When she sings “put a ring on it,” she literally means “it”, that hand that’s not really her. (She doesn’t say “put a ring on ME,” right?). She doesn’t want the traditional property-centric heterosexual union: “Don’t treat me to the things of this world, I’m not that kind of girl,” she assures us. What she does want and “deserve” is “your love”. In fact, what she a man who can her “to infinity and beyond” !! So obviously she wants Buzz Lightyear (or maybe just any old astronaut).
One of the main tenets of Afrofuturism is that Middle Passage was an alien abduction: funny-skinned dudes in crazy duds, huge ships, and speaking some crazy language captured Africans, transported them to another world, and subjected them to experiments and forced labor. Sounds a lot like 50s sci-fi narratives, right? The other main tenent of Afrofuturism is that slave=robot. “Robota,” an early 20th-c Czech slang word, is the basis of our word “robot”. In Czech, “robota” meant worker or slave. Chattel slaves were manufactured (as chattel, as not human) by slave traders and masters to perform specific forms of surplus-value creating labor. Slaves=robots. (You see a lot of robot imagery in the “Diva” video, too).
Beyoncé is arguing that women=robots=chattel. In traditional hetero marriage (as everyone from Levi-Strauss to Irigaray to a Gayle Rubin well knows), women are property, even and especially in the 21st-c marriage-industrial complex. If all she wanted was bling, a registry, a five- or six-figure wedding, and all the legal, tax, and fiduciary rights of a married woman, then why would she threaten any man who offered her less than total love, respect, and devotion “If you don’t, you’ll be alone/And like a ghost, I’ll be gone”?
The fact that she can make this point so subtly, that the song stands alone as a fun, entertaining pop song, makes this song even more of an achievement. There’s a lot of baaad political music that’s more about the politics/ideas than the actual songcraft. This piece manages to do both, just like many of Holiday’s songs. We need to start seeing Beyoncé as an artist, a creative intellectual, rather than just an entertainer. She’s often credited with being a once-in-a-generation vocal talent, but that’s not what I’m interested in here. She’s also often credited with being a grounded, super-savvy businesswoman; I’m not interested in that here, either.
So, can we all just agree that Beyoncé is a whole lot smarter than most people think?
its her factory
"in a man's world, b/c they're not men..."
This is a blog about philosophy, feminist and critical race theory, and popular music/pop culture...or, more or less, this is a blog about my research and things related to it. I chose the title, "It's Her Factory," from a Gang of Four song:
The blog's title captures the confluence of "theory," pop culture, feminism, and post-punk ethos that inform my approach to everything that I find interesting. And that's what I want to talk about on this blog -- things I find interesting, things I'm developing for use in class or in publication.
The point of the blog is to start some conversations - I find all this stuff super-interesting, and I want to talk to people about it!
This is a blog about philosophy, feminist and critical race theory, and popular music/pop culture...or, more or less, this is a blog about my research and things related to it. I chose the title, "It's Her Factory," from a Gang of Four song:
The blog's title captures the confluence of "theory," pop culture, feminism, and post-punk ethos that inform my approach to everything that I find interesting. And that's what I want to talk about on this blog -- things I find interesting, things I'm developing for use in class or in publication.
The point of the blog is to start some conversations - I find all this stuff super-interesting, and I want to talk to people about it!
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