Lily Allen Makes a Parody

Lily Allen is known for her cute and edgy 2009 track “Fuck You” from her sophomore album It’s Not Me, It’s You and, that’s about it (that is, if you’re not one of her die-hard fans). If you are a die-hard fan of the English synthpop writer of total chick anthems, you probably became one after your girl friend showed you “Fuck You” back when you were still sneaking boys into your parent’s basement. Since those days back in 2009, Allen has sort of slipped out of sight and out of mind. I mean, it makes sense. We have had two Kate Nash albums in that time to satisfy us with quirky jams in our “ew, boys” mood since Lily Allen did her thing in 2009. Yet, Allen is back in the feminist conversation by employing the “Miley tactic”- be as obnoxious as possible so they have to talk about you.

Lily Allen’s Controversial Music Video

Lily Allen has a new music video for her female powerhouse pop number “Hard Out Here”. Before getting into specifics about the video, the song is a very tactless approach to talking about the issue of women and the plastic standards they are held to in the media as wells as outside of it. Even though Allen sings “And if you can't detect the sarcasm, you've misunderstood”, she still could have found a way of saying “Don't you want to have somebody who objectifies you?/Have you thought about your butt? Who's gonna tear it in two?” with a little more wit. The music video is being attacked on the same grounds. Allen attempts to mock the rigor that female artists go through in order to keep an image that is appeasing to men in a male dominated industry. In the video, Allen gets a liposuction and is persuaded to dance provocatively in front of cars and with wads of of cash. You can watch the music video here.

Parody Does Not Always Equal Comedy

Lily Allen makes it pretty obvious that her video for “Hard Out Here” is a parody but, is it funny? Many critics are settling on the fact that it’s insulting. Mostly the insult is to women of color. Lilly Allen, who is white, remains the only fully clothed female throughout the video. Her outfit is tight but, she still isn’t showing any skin. Her ensemble of background dancers, however, are not as conservatively dressed and are definitely taking the bulk of the provocative dancing. It’s like Allen tried her best to make something feminist but then opened up a whole other door of feminist conversation. However, the aim may have been just that, to start a conversation.

Haim Knows How Not To Make Them Laugh

      

Photo by Pooneh Ghana

            Pop rock starlets, Haim, are a class act case of a love-hate relationship. Musically, the all-girl rock trio play it well when they play it safe. Catchy lyric hooks, big stomping beats, positive vibes, and a heavy dose of seductive R&B sensuality sets Haim up to be the perfect crowd pleasure or the pleasant find on your modern indie rock Pandora station. To top it off the girls’ look is just as tight. The smug pouts, the shades, and the ensembles that look like they’re straight off the Urban Outfitters’ mannequins have become signature for the triad. They’re marketable as all heck. You can hate them for all of this but, the one thing you can’t hate them for is that when they perform on Saturday Night Live, it’s about the talent and not the sex.

The Trending Bore of Female Live Performances

        This past Saturday, Haim performed on SNL. It’s a pretty big achievement when you take into account that their hugely successful Days Are Gone is a debut album. It’s not like they’re bombastically sporting themselves as the next Madonna or the next unhinged Brittany. That would be more along the lines of Lady Gaga or the newly re-imaged Miley Cyrus. Both ladies have also appeared on SNL recently and made quite a buzz in live tweeting and overall blog chatter. Of course we can applaud Gaga and Cyrus for being successful female pop stars. That is what they are. Yet, one just doesn’t get the same amount of satisfaction from publicly seeing Lady Gaga assert to R. Kelly that she enjoys a good romp just as much as he might want it. The reason why is because that battle has been won. Our culture no longer ignores the fact that women can enjoy sex just as much as any guy.

Haim Bringing Something Refreshing To SNL

      Haim may not have gotten as much buzz on social media as Gaga or Cyrus, but they did pretty decent. The Village Voice has compiled a few of the live tweets from last Saturday’s performance. If you read through the tweets (and The Village Voice’s article about the performance) you’ll notice that the conversation is not about any outlandish sex appeal. There was no outlandish sex appeal. That wasn’t a part of Haim’s act. The article is about three musicians and how well they played their instruments, carried a note, and performed on stage.

In Love With Lovers

If you’re an active reader in the “feminist blogshpere” then you’ve probably become at least peripherally aware that there is a band from Portland, Oregon called Lovers. You’ve probably been meaning to check them out since Bitch Media gave them a very flattering write up and interview. The female trio’s newest album, Friend in the World has been getting a decent amount of exposure. But, don’t go thinking that if you start keeping tabs on Lovers that you’re going to later be able to tell your friends ‘Yea, I found this new up and coming band’. That would be slightly inaccurate. Lovers isn’t really a new band. Friend in the World is their seventh release. The girls have quite a passionate and eclectic following hot on their heels. Their music is not, necessarily, music approved by the masses but, at the same time, you’re not really a feminist because your views sit well with most folks.

Tired of Dolling Up and Singing About Boys

Lovers are a soft pop outfit who sing sweet and romantically earnest coffee house jams about female relationships. They aren’t trying to be anyone’s “manic pixie dream girl”, they’re just trying to sing honestly about sexual relationships, friendships, and every other ambiguous relationship on the scale of human intimacy. The velvety synthetic drones and the achingly hushed melodies of pillow the metaphoric stream of consciousness lyrics. Lyrically they are more of a band that you feel in your gut than you understand with your head. Yet, some songs, like “Figure 8”, have a clear and direct purpose and message. Ultimately, this is music that will make you want to nudge closer to your partner and put your head on their shoulder.

They Are Totally Okay with Being Your Next Fall Back Make-Out Track

In an interview with Bitch Media, band members Carolyn Berk, Kerby Ferris, and Emily Kingan unanimously replied “Oh no! No! No!” to the idea that they would get upset if they found out that people were listening to their music without purchasing the album. This is great news for the broke college student! Kerby explained to Bitch Media, “I listen to music in so many different ways. Obviously the whole recording industry has had it wrong for so long, we're not trying to be on the wrong side of the winds of history. I think that the movement to monetizing music via live performance is really nice.” Of course this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t purchase the album and have it on file for all future bedroom and break up occasions.

How “Purrfect” Is the Band Perfect Pussy?

Perfect Pussy is a female fronted band that, recently, the blog Pitchfork has showcased and labeled as a “band on the rise”. As can be expected, the band holds a lot of promise. Why? Well, they have a social deconstructing band name and throw out the window the trite female tendency to use discretion. Songwriter and front woman Meredith Graves writes lyrics that could be straight from a 21st century, introspective and self-aware girl’s diary, namely, Tumblr. If you aren’t the girl making borderline self-destructive criticism on that social platform than you’re probably the one who scrolls through and reads everyone else’s. The ending lyrics of Graves' song “I”, “I am full of light/ I am filled with joy/ I am full of peace/ I had this dream that I forgave my enemies” are just waiting to be reblogged on some girl’s “collage of self-scrutiny”.

Is It Just Good Tumblr Material?

Perfect Pussy’s debut four track cassette is filled with heavy latent distortion and lyrical tropes like

Photo by Lukas Hodge

"Her eyes fell low and heavy with shame and cum/ She must have been desperate; she acted so lonely." You could call it harnessing the shock value or you can call it living up one's license to express freely. The lyrics to all of Grave’s songs use big vulgar words to express excruciatingly painful and crude emotions/situations. In an interview with Pitchfork Graves’ commented, “I’m talking about really intense stuff”. When questioned about the fact that many of the band’s songs do not have proper titles Graves responded, "What am I going to call it? 'Song About How My Best Friend Blew My Boyfriend the Day After We Broke Up'?"

So, Is the Band Name Metaphoric, or Not?

Well, let’s put it this way, women get cat called everywhere. On the street, at their local Whole Foods, and on stage during their set. It’s nothing new. Recently, there have been many female artist’s who have been open to discussing and drawing attention to the issue (such as CHVRCHES front woman Lauren Mayberry). Concerning the band name Graves told Pitchfork,          “Another good thing about the name is that it heads off assholes right out of the gate. Nobody can look at me and say shit about my appearance or my body, which is all too common for women in music.”

Is it Liberating Crushing All the Taboos?
Perfect Pussy’s debut cassette probably isn’t anything that any girl wouldn’t say to her best friend when intoxicated but, it is liberating to have that self-expression in a band- if you’re into that sort of thing.

Why is Sky Ferreira the “It” Girl?

Sky Ferreira is making great strides to become a cult icon. She has walked Marc Jacobs this year, appeared on the covers of a few lesser known magazine publications, and has a coordinated look that comes to mind whenever we think of her (just think the American Apparel look we're all trying for). More importantly though, Sky has defined her career on her own terms after having fought the corporate greed in her industry head on, has an equally successful shoegazing boyfriend, and manages to maintain an amusing Instagram with a hip nonchalant flair. Essentially, Sky has everything a college grad could ever even begin to hope for post graduation these days. She’s odd, talented, pretty, and she has a pout that a bunch of millennials can passively aggressively reblog on Tumblr. Just think along the lines of what Winona Ryder was in the early 90s. 

 What's she done?

Sky Ferreira’s greatly anticipated debut LP, Night Time, My Time is self-indulging black

tinsel-pop prowess. It’s largely successful because it’s not outlandishly striving to be anything but one 21 year old woman’s attempt to make a pop record without the crippling and self-effacing input of a myriad of producers. In a recent interview with Pitchfork Sky said, “This record is really honest. In some ways, I was trying to make it universally relatable, but it's obviously about myself.” It sounds honest, and by being honest Sky has made an album that in it’s debut sat at #18 last week on iTunes top albums chart.

What’s her schtick?

Aside from the big hooks and the overall hype, there are motifs on Night Time, My Time that touch on universal dispositions of self-deprecation and educated shamelessness that cause for endless use of the replay button. Songs like “I Blame Myself” and “Nobody Asked Me” are songs that say ‘I am not going to apologize for how I choose to present myself’. Even though Sky points out that these songs were written with her own life in mind, they don’t necessarily have to be taken that way and, they won’t, because we’re millennials and we put the “me” in everything.

Does it go well with a six-pack?

Sky Ferreira’s full length debut is sexually and socially assertive pop music that is great to drink  to when you’re coming back from failing your test, almost loosing your scholarship, or being questioned for having a friend with benefits. It’s well constructed thespian music.