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The New Yorker just published a profile of English pop star Lily Allen that's behind their pay wall, but the podcast with the writer of the piece, Sasha Frere-Jones, is not. In it he observes that Allen is a distinctly British phenomenon, the type of female performer we just don't have in the States. "We tend to reward people who are cipherlike, like Britney, or people who seem much more like good girls, like Beyonce. There aren't that many women that age who are that witty and vulgar and brash," he says.
There aren't that many people, on either side of the Atlantic, who are as witty, vulgar, and brash as Allen (just last week she snapped at the New York Times on her blog after they sold pictures of her to OK, which, she's right, is pretty déclassé), but I take Frere-Jones' point. These qualities, and wit in particular, are not ones American popstresses are known for. They're more likely to possess the exact opposite attribute, some virulent strain of anti-wit that renders all of their speech impossibly lifeless. But are our male performers so much more outspoken and clever? Or, rather, any of our male performers besides Lil' Wayne? And, getting to the heart of it, why don't we Americans appreciate wit like the Brits?
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Speaking of women who overshare and occasionally commit crimes against fashion, British pixie and MySpace star Lily Allen's got a very charming album, It's Not Me, It's You, out today. Unlike most musicians, funny is one of Allen's priorities, and she's good at it. Listening to the album is like having a chat about the tabloids and relationships with a very clever, saucy friend who speaks only in rhyme: enjoyable and not particularly taxing.
The album's got three types of songs on it, more or less: 1) Make-up and break-up songs. 2) Jingle-based op-eds about various of-the-moment topics, including drug use ("So you've got a prescription/ And that makes it legal/ I find the excuses/ Overwhelmingly feeble") and celebrity culture ("I want to be rich and I want lots of money/ I don't care about clever I don't care about funny/ Now I'm not a saint but I'm not a sinner/ And everything is cool as long as I'm getting thinner") 3) Musical interpretations of various Sex and the City episodes.
This last category is where Allen runs into some trouble. She's fine when sticking to Charlotte-esque sexcapades, as in "Not Fair:"
"There's just one thing
That's getting in the way
When we go up to bed
you're just no good
It's such a shame
I look into your eyes
I want to get to know you
And then you make this noise
and its apparent it's all over."
But she gets tripped up by lame accepted wisdom on "22," a song about an unhappily single 30-year old. Allen sings, "It's sad but it's true how society says/ Her life is already over/ There's nothing to do and there's nothing to say/ Til the man of her dreams comes along picks her up and puts her over his shoulder." Allen, who is only 23, might be trying to sympathize with this unattached woman, but with sympathy like that she might as well have told her to give up on life and start hording the cats. It's one of the album's few tone-deaf moments.
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Like you, I watched the Britney documentary on MTV. What really bothered me wasn't Britney's mental state (at times she was sparkling, charming, hilarious—performing send-ups of her father that sent her entourage into stitches) but the way she was being treated. Britney's conservatorship (which is rarely implemented legally unless severe mental disability can be proven) denies her any rights whatsoever beyond those of a 7-year-old. Her father makes her breakfast. Her assistant picks out her clothes. She's obviously still heavily medicated, and the paparazzi following her make her a prisoner in her own blacked-out SUV.
Which brings up the question: If Britney's capable enough to record an album, two videos, a documentary; perform on hundreds of TV shows promoting said album; AND rehearse for an upcoming stadium tour, isn't she capable enough to maybe have a bit more control over her own life? Yes, I infinitely prefer this glossy, funny, sad, sedated Britney to the crazy, bald trainwreck who attacked a pap with an umbrella, stripped to her underwear in the middle of a paparazzi storm, and drove incessantly from drugstore to drugstore in a bright pink wig. But I do think she's being manipulated.
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Last Monday, British singer Amanda Palmer wrote on her blog that her record label wanted to reshoot scenes from her music video for "Leeds United." She says:
they thought i looked fat. i thought they were on crack. dude. i'm a vain motherfucker. i know when i look fat. ... but THIS?? this was just nonsense. i thought i looked HOT.
The music industry's insistence on well-toned abs is nothing new. (See: the uproar about Britney Spears' so-slight paunch at the 2007 MTV Video Music Awards; the plus-size Martha Walsh being swapped out of the video for "Gonna Make You Sweat" in favor of a svelte lip-syncer.) But this case is genuinely puzzling. Palmer did look hot. Her bared stomach looks lovely to me—I'd wear those abs proudly. The cabaret-style video doesn't dwell on her body, anyway. Most of the shots are long, taking in the rest of the performance and the audience as opposed to focusing on Palmer. And shouldn't record execs have people on hand at shoots to check out the costuming and ensure that their strict standards of acceptable appearance are being met?
I'd never heard of Palmer before this—my knowledge of music is sadly limited. But I do love that song now. The blogosphere outcry on her behalf has got to be good for her sales—and her self-esteem. A little misogynistic endorsing of unrealistic body ideals can be a good thing if there's enough of a backlash.
(via Feministing)
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