After this week’s searing, fiery tears of unfathomable horror, I stayed away from FB and Twitter for the most part. I didn’t want to get angry at those who posted incessant streams of religious-themed “prayers” (in the history of the world, prayer has never – ever – helped anything other than the emotions of the one doing the praying) and sickening “heaven has new angels” shit. Unparalleled and unimaginable horror and the slaughter of children can not be made better, even briefly, by treacly (even if well-meaning) mythologies.
But then I saw this.
Whether you watch the Voice, or whether you’re a fan of Blake Shelton, Adam Levine, Christina Aguilera, Cee Lo Green or this season’s contestants matters not (I’ve not seen an episode since Season 1). This was a much needed moment…a simple act of grace in the most agonizing, harrowingly painful 100 hours we’ve had to bear. And it was beautiful. Heartbreaking and beautiful.
Direct contributions may be sent to:
Sandy Hook School Support Fund C/O Newtown Savings Bank 39 Main Street, Newtown CT 06470
Newtown Youth and Family Services, a nonprofit mental health clinic, that provides emergency counseling for families. All donations made to the organization will benefit those affected. https://newtown.uwwesternct.org/
Newtown Parent Connection, a nonprofit that addresses issues of substance abuse and offers bereavement group counseling. http://www.newtownparentconnection.org/
I’ve always hated Christina Aguilera’s histrionic melismatics and pretentious, over-the-top trilling, so when she flubbed the lyrics to the “The Star Spangled Banner” a few months back during the Super Bowl, as funny as it was, her memory lapse didn’t offend me as much as the overall performance did (there’s rarely a half-note she doesn’t deem worthy – despite the unworthiness of the result – to elongate into five. Besides, in my opinion, “The Star Spangled Banner” is a heinous song that shouldn’t be our national anthem anyway. I’ve long been a proponent that “America The Beautiful” should immediately replace it as our country’s anthem – but that’s another conversation).
So, as a non-fan, when her BURLESQUE film – far and away the worst film of 2010 – was critically reviled and royally flopped, I couldn’t have cared less. It deserved to be loathed and unseen.
It didn’t phase me, too, when her “Bionic” CD – far and away the worst CD of 2010 (I’m sensing a theme here…) also bombed. It was a fiasco of epic proportions. Again, when shit is, well, shit, it should be called out as such.
And, while divorce may be tragic, it happens to everyone, and maybe more so in the entertainment industry.
So, you might ask why I bring up all these tidbits about a performer I think of only once a week while watching NBCs “The Voice”? Well, she talks about all these issues in the new issue of W magazine.
Still, why do I care? Well, I don’t.
What I DO want to know, though, is WHERE THE FUCK did the other half of Aguilera go?!
Now, before I’m accused of being cruel, this is not meant to be an insult to Aguilera. This isn’t about mocking her size, which she vauntingly displays. It’s about the Curse of Photoshop.
I know that photo-shopping has been the norm in magazines for years, but this is beyond specious. I mean, bad enough it’s 2011 and the press is still defining beauty/glamor/style by the waistline of our female stars. And we all know Aguilera recently gained weight as the mother/maturing woman she has become. But are the editors at W that stupefyingly, uhhhh, stupid that they don’t realize that we can see as such every week while watching “The Voice”? The girl has curves, and she flaunts them. I wonder, has Aguilera approved this cover?
Is this really what a girl wants?
Recent magazine covers of other plus-size female artists have also been photoshopped, if to a lesser degree. If you were unaware of her already, perusing recent tabloids (e.g. Rolling Stone, Q, Elle, Out) you’d never garner that the prodigiously gifted Adele was a lusciously plump powerhouse. And Britney Spears and Janet Jackson are amongst the most blatantly airbrushed/photoshopped female entertainers of the past decade or so, trimming inches off their bodies. Following Mariah Carey, of course.
It’s not a new phenomenon, as I already noted, and it’s not merely for the overweight either (paging Madonna…). But the acceptance into our pop culture mindset doesn’t make it any less offensive.
So much hullabaloo online today regarding Christina Aguilera’s Super Bowl rendition of “The Star Spangled Banner”. You’da thunk she gave the middle finger to the President or took a shit on the Constitution (what, she’s not a Tea Bagger or the previous President’s administration!). As someone who loathes Aguilera’s usual sonic assault on the senses, I still must ask, who the fuck cares that she flubbed one line of the National Anthem? That this transcendentally awful song is our anthem to begin with should be the real discussion (I’m forever in the “America, The Beautiful” camp, even with its allusion to a god). In any case, Whitney Houston – for all the adoration that’s heaped upon her powerful yet soulless rendition – lip-synched it back in 91. As did Jennifer Hudson 2 years ago. And far better singers than Aguilera will ever be have blundered the song as well. At least Aguilera sang (shrilled) live. Let’s give her that.
Me? I appreciated her lyrical mishap. Heavens forbid, if all went well, we would have been subjected to Aguilera’s melismatic norm. Something akin to, well, this:
When it comes to music – as well as other art forms – I often depend on trusted sources to enlighten me. Friends, of course, are key. I’ll also spelunk the internet, read music journalists I admire, and even browse iTunes – all to turn me on to something new and exciting. The fact that I receive hundreds of free CDs a year thanks to the field I work in doesn’t hurt either, naturally.
But I must be getting crotchety in my old age because 2010 was the second lightest listening year for me in a row. As in 2009, where I barely heard 100 new releases, the sum in 2010 hasn’t been much higher. I can’t explain the lack of enthusiasm, either, other than that in this year, impetus became impotent – my lack of fervor grew as my impatience doubled and my frustrations tripled in what little seek-and-find transpired.
Why? Well, because while perusing – or, mostly, browsing (and there is a difference) – the musical blogosphere – as well as word-of-mouth recommendations from the aforementioned other sources, in 2010 I’ve been prescribed an overt quantity of self-indulgent, self-important, head-scratchers. A lot of which was, well…crap.
I mean, historically, my tastes in music never skewered toward anything other than, well, my tastes, which are seeped in diverse genres. I can’t loath an album – nor worship it – merely because it’s the hip thing to do., or because it reached #1 on Billboard. That’s why I can’t ever really be a critic. Or, say, write for (hipster bible) Pitchfork. But then again, it’s never been my will or desire to adhere to a New Hipster Order, and if that explains my near-depleted motivation, so be it.
Perhaps I’m missing out, one might argue, by disallowing myself the openness and expansion of my musical mind and palate. Please – that’s a moot point because I don’t disallow myself from what is my aesthete. My distaste can’t (always) be attributed to a Pitchfork recommendation. For example, their top CD of the year actually made MY very own Baker’s Dozen (Kanye), as well as another Top 10er (Vampire Weekend).
However, that only one other Top 20 “finalist” (Janelle Monae) made my list too is, sadly, indicative to my frustration. And I tried, really, I tried. But of the other 17 releases that landed on their Top 20 and the dozen or so I actually attempted, I could barely make it through half the tracks of each individual CD before I threw my hands up in the air in abstract awe and gave up (best not to mention the bulk of their Top 50…)
I know, I know – I’ve often repeated the mantra that a voice that touches a listener is a personal matter and any such listener shouldn’t be derided for their tastes. And what is ‘taste’ other than someone’s opinion? And who the hell am I – or, are you – to cancel out someone’s emotional connection? If I had a dollar for every Facebook post from one of my queenliest friends, boasting orgasmic adoration for artists I consider monumental earworms (Britney Spears, Katy Perry, Ke$ha, etc), well, I’d have enough money to buy Facebook from Mark Zuckerberg. Nope, all we have is our opinion (I’ve certainly got mine – and have been disparaged as a negative Nellie for it on Facebook because more-often-than-not, it’s the negative forces that push my passion).
One might surmise that I’m doing exactly what I deride against by my seeming disparagement of Pitchfork. But, that’s not my intent. For one, there was no objective to single out Pitchfork – I could have easily said Brooklyn Vegan or Music Snobbery or Stereogum or even the Village Voice – or any various other such music blogs. And I’m sure they’re all proud of their snooty reputations. To be honest, I’m too stupid to understand a helluva lot of what Pitchfork’s writers pontificate. Who knows…maybe I’m just getting too damned old to care anymore. Or too feeble to grasp.
However, not being one to give up tooooo easily, I decided to use Metacritic.com an alternative barometer. They do, after all, collate thousands of reviews from countless sources, thus no agenda. And, I’ll be damned! I was surprised to find how much in common I actually indeed have with many “critics” – many titles that made the 2010 inventory of best-reviewed releases match more than just a few of my own!
Wow! Maybe I actually could be a critic if I so deemed!
I just can’t write for Pitchfork. Or Brooklyn Vegan. Or…oh, you get the idea.
So, here, in no particular order of importance or gratitude (save for WELDER), are my baker’s dozen – the most pleasurable times I’ve had this year immersed within my headphones (the Beauties…). Followed by the most painful (the Beasts)…
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The Beauties…
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…the Beasts…
Lee DeWyze | Live It Up
Christina Aguilera | Bionic
Lady Antebellum | Need You Now
Santana | Guitar Heaven: The Greatest Guitar Classics Of All Time
My New Boyfriend 