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  • Kali Uchis and Ravyn Lenae (Sweetly) Dig the Knife on “Cry About It!”

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    To further establish the ethereal, dreamy sound of Sincerely, Kali Uchis has offered fans the first amuse-oreille, as it were, from the forthcoming deluxe edition of the album, Sincerely, P.S. Titled “Cry About It!” (that exclamation point continuing the trend of each song on the album being accompanied by punctuation), the song features Ravyn Lenae—who’s sure to get a name recognition boost thanks to Uchis—and favors a doo-wop sound that Amy Winehouse herself would surely approve of.

    Co-produced by Uchis and Spencer Stewart (best known for his work with Laufey, including most of the songs on A Matter of Time), the rich, layered sonic landscape is complemented by the expectedly divine vocals of Uchis, who urges her listener, more or less, to feel their emotions in the moment so as to purge rather than suppress. And, if anyone knows something about the value of that, it’s Uchis, who lost her mother to lung cancer soon after giving birth to her first child.

    The extremes of having those degrees of happiness and sadness arrive back to back are part of what makes Sincerely, such an emotional, intense record. Wherein a track like “Cry About It!” fits right in. And yet, it’s a song that differs from the others thus far in that it’s as much about braggadocio as it is telling someone to mourn and then move on. This ostensible “someone” being the ex-girlfriend of Uchis’ current boyfriend—at least in the “narrative” depicted by this single. Of course, musicians often like to pull the “it’s a fictionalized version of things” card, but there does seem to be a lot of genuine knife-digging aimed at this “mystery woman” Uchis is speaking to, particularly in the verses, “Too bad, so sad/You should cry about it/Llora, llora, hasta que/Ya te deje de doler [Cry, cry until/It stops hurting]/Too bad, so sad/Go cry about it/Cry about it, cry about it/Go cry about it/Yo sĂ© que te duele/Cuando escuchas mi nombre/SĂ© que me odias/Solo por un hombre [I know it hurts you/When you hear my name/I know you hate me/Just for a man]/SĂ© que la envidia [I know the envy]/Is killing you softly/Every time I step out/Put the nail in your coffin.”

    In short, Uchis is taunting this woman with the fact that she’s superior not just in the looks department, but in every other way. Or at least superior enough to have pulled the guy that said woman used to be with (which, in real life, would point to Don Toliver). However, it’s Ravyn Lenae’s verse that cuts the deepest as she croons, “Creeping under the surface/I know I make you nervous/Tell me, what is the purpose/If it’s out of my control?/Baby girl, take it easy/Losing sleep over envy/Through you, I can see clearly/And I know why you’re hurt.” Although, on the one hand, she tries to offer something like “empathy” for the woman who feels she’s been wronged, on the other, Lenae only helps Uchis twist the dagger in further, essentially brushing off this person’s pain as, well, not really any fault of her own. After all, it’s not like she can control if another woman’s boyfriend is attracted to her, n’est-ce-pas?

    To serve the necessary level of cunt on a song of this nature, Uchis appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (with Lenae eventually at her side to deliver her own verse) to embody an angelic aesthetic designed to prove all the more that she’s innocent (“who me?”) in the matter at hand. Thus, appearing on a stage designed to look like a dainty music box as two backup dancers dressed in ballet attire accented said “music box aura”—complete with turning in circles just like the ballerinas of such music boxes typically do. So it is that, with this performance, Uchis underscored the genius of the track, which is delivering a “bitchy” message in a sweet way.

    Even so, there remains an aspect of the song that does feel rooted in kindness. This effect achieved by telling someone how to best cope with the pain of loss—whether that means death or another person “stealing” your significant other away from you. With Uchis’ key set of instructions being, “Go cry about it/‘Cause sometimes you just got to cry/You just got to cry about it/So cry about it a bit.” And then, for your own self-preservation, move on. And hopefully, without too vengeful a heart. Perhaps even going the extra mile by “wishing roses” on the person who wronged you.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Ava Max Sets Stereos on Fire With Don’t Click Play

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    In her Man’s Best Friend interview with Zane Lowe, there comes a point where Sabrina Carpenter says that people don’t have to listen to an album if they’re not ready, declaring, “Don’t click play.” Perhaps unwitting proof that Ava Max has a more subliminal influence on “the culture” than one might think (even though many of the cuntier gays would insist otherwise). Or perhaps it’s that she has her finger on the pulse of language more than people give her credit for. In any case, her third album, Don’t Click Play, has been a long time (by pop music industry standards) in the making, with her last record, Diamonds & Dancefloors, being released at the beginning of 2023.

    Although the critical reception was “warm” enough, the album didn’t seem to “take” with listeners as much as her debut, 2020’s Heaven & Hell. This, in some sense, applying to the long-standing notion that Max never carved out a “distinct” enough identity (apart from the haircut) for fans to glom onto. Instead, the frequent Lady Gaga comparisons only added to the idea that she wasn’t “her own” pop star. Max addresses this and many other recent dramas in her life on the album. Not least of which is the fact that, per Rolling Stone, “The music on Don’t Click Play was
born from heartbreak. For the first time in her career, Max cut ties with Cirkut, her former boyfriend and long-time producer, and Madison Love, her ex-co-writer and former friend. (Both were staples across Heaven & Hell and Diamonds & Dancefloors.)” Yes, it’s just the sort of juicy drama that gays can get on board with.

    However, Max is sure to set the tone for her “I will survive” mode immediately by making the title track the first song to commence the record. And, naturally, it’s a dancefloor-ready number, courtesy of production by Pink Slip (who recently worked with Kesha on songs from Period) and Inverness (who recently worked with JADE on songs from That’s Showbiz Baby). Opening with an almost “Tom’s Diner”-esque “Dum-dum, da-da, dum-dum, da-da,” Max quickly assures her listeners, “Whole world wanna talk that talk, but I’m so unbothered.” It’s a song that also reinforces her statement to Rolling Stone, “I made this album because I wanted to prove that I can make the album of my dreams without my last collaborators.” As a matter of fact, despite some of the harsher reviews, Don’t Click Play offers some of Max’s most memorable bangers yet. Perhaps because they’re among her cheekiest, most notably the part where she addresses the internet commentary about her with, “She a sample-singing Gaga imitation
 But I’m lovin’ myself even if you hate it” (that “lovin’ myself” line referring to a song that serves as track three the album).

    As for the “why” behind the name of the record, it makes itself known in the lyrics, “If you didn’t come to dance/DJ, don’t click that,” followed by “‘Cause you gon’ like it, love it, wanna play it twice/DJ, don’t click that, replay, don’t hit that/‘Cause you gon’ like it, love it, want it every night.” In other words, she’s confident her music has such a “once you pop, you can’t stop” effect that it’s certain to make any listener become an “addict.”

    To further clarify the meaning behind the title, and that it wasn’t actually her plan to “go all Garbo” ahead of the album’s release, she also told Rolling Stone, “
because everyone is so confused about the title, it doesn’t mean ‘don’t click play.’ It means ‘don’t click play if you don’t want to, because
this album was made to prove to myself that I could do it on my own.’ I think at the end of the day, sometimes you just have to do things that feed your soul.”

    And something that definitely doesn’t feed the soul is being in an oppressive relationship with an overly controlling person. “How Can I Dance” instantly captures that feeling with the demand, “How can I dance when you tie my hands up?/How can I lo-lo-lo-love if you keep me in chains?” The answer, of course, is that she can’t. With any remaining shred of love also turning to hate as she grows to resent the man that treats her like “property.” Thus, telling him, “Think you can lock me, baby? I’m not a bird in your cage.” She then takes more than slight inspiration from Alice Deejay when she says, “I’m better off dancing alone.” A realization she had to come to after being treated so poorly by her ex(es). The additional interpretation of “How Can I Dance” applies to how the music industry has treated Max from the start of her career, telling her who to be and how to act—which has only stymied rather than facilitated her growth.

    So it is that she’s led to the conclusion on the next song that self-love is the best medicine. As the second single from the record, “Lovin Myself” (which, title-wise, sounds like “Feeling Myself”) deviated from the more “80s power ballad” sound of “Lost Your Faith” (the first official single from Don’t Click Play), providing yet another “I will survive” type message soundtracked to a danceable rhythm. It also marks the second time Max wields fire imagery (much like she does on the album cover itself) in her lyrics, having previously asked, “You wanna play with fire?” on “How Can I Dance” and now describing, “Woke up on fire, shining brighter.” As anyone would in the wake of having what can be called the “‘Flowers’ by Miley Cyrus” epiphany. Which is, of course, “I can love me better than you can.” Max is certainly of the same mind when she sings, “I don’t need nobody, I’m lovin’ myself/Tonight it’s all about me, yĐ”ah, it’s good for my health/And I know how to please mĐ”, I don’t need no help/Nobody, nobody can lo-lo-love me like I’m lovin’ myself.”

    Having achieved such a level of self-empowerment, it’s only natural that Max should follow that song with the braggadocious “Sucks to Be My Ex” (that means you, Cirkut). Beginning with the line, “Stilettos sharper than a knife, I’m in my villain era,” it reminds one of Taylor Swift’s (who was in her “villain era” with Reputation) opener on Midnights’ “Vigilante Shit,” “Draw the cat eye sharp enough to kill a man.” Max might be ready to do just that as she rises from the flames to pronounce, “What don’t kill you makes you hotter/Ooh, I’m livin’ proof/Now I’m wild and free and younger, blonder/Ooh, I look good, but boy, I feel bad for you/It must suck to be my ex/‘Cause after me, where do you go next?” The level of confidence in that question, if it is directly aimed at Cirkut, might have more bite if Don’t Click Play wasn’t Max’s worst-charting album to date, but, even so, it’s the perfect anthem for anyone who has just come out of a breakup and is looking to hit the town and paint it red.

    And while “Wet, Hot American Dream” might aim for a painting the town red (, white and blue) vibe as well, it does land with something of a thud considering the current state of affairs in the U.S. Even so, if there’s anybody who understands the “American dream,” it’s Max, who saw both of her immigrant parents (originally from Albania) work three jobs each (without being able to speak English) to support their new life in Wisconsin, the state where Max was born. Later, she would come to understand a different facet of the dream by becoming a pop star—lending credence to the idea that, “no matter who you are” in the U.S., you can become whoever you want to be with nothing more than hard work and a bit of grit. Or so the tale goes. “Wet, Hot American Dream” isn’t about that, but rather, being something of a one-woman welcome wagon to a visitor on vacation as she declares, “You’re on vacation from out of town/I wanna put you in my pocket, let me show you around/So, don’t, don’t be shy/Show me yours and I’ll show you mine/You should know that I don’t kiss and tell/Tell me all your dirty secrets/All your fantasies/I wanna be your blue jean, white tee, wet, hot American dream.” With another kind of sound, it could easily be mistaken for a Lana Del Rey song.

    But the 80s-centric instrumentation (which, at times, has tinges of Michael Sembello’s “Maniac”) is only further emphasized by the accompanying video, which has a “VHS aesthetic.” Not to mention the fact that Max seems to be existing in an alternate timeline where it’s okay to ignore the blatant cataclysms of the moment
almost as though it is the 1980s under the Reagan administration. In fact, in Max’s world (at least on this song), she appears to be living like a Republican, all baseball, hot dogs and watermelons as she plays up her “wetness” by getting hosed down in her various skimpy outfits, including her red bikini, which she wears while standing in front of a giant American flag (again, Lana Del Rey-core) while assuring, “I’m not like other cowgirls/Unless you want me to be/I wanna be your blue jean, white tee, wĐ”t, hot American dream.” To which maybe the observer who saw her in this guise would say, “Blue jeans, white shirt/Walked into the room, you know you made my eyes burn.”

    Max keeps the up-tempo rhythm going on “Take My Call,” opening it with the chant-like command, “La-la-la-la-la-la-la-la, call.” And if whoever she wants to call her won’t be the first to do it, she’ll have no sense of shame about being the one to call him, once more flexing her grandiloquence when she asserts, “Wherever you are, wherever you go/When you see my name,/I know you’re gonna take my call/No matter how far, if I wanna get close/When you see my namĐ”, I know you’re gonna take my call.” Relishing the power she has over whoever this person is, that kind of hauteur disappears on “Know Somebody,” the track that kicks off the second half of the album. Which can best be described as the “neo-power ballad” portion of Don’t Click Play. Because, to get certain things off her chest, Max requires the appropriate level of sonic emotionalism to match her own.

    And yes, it seems fairly apparent that “Know Somebody” is directed at both Cirkut and Madison Love, the friend and collaborator who broke one of the cardinal rules of “girl code.” So it is that Max laments, “You think you really know somebody/But all you really know is their name/You think it’s gonna last forever/You’re only just a pawn in the game/You let them in your life, back into the knife/They take away your love and then take your life/Just when you think you really know somebody.” In certain regards, its motif echoes Selena Gomez’s 2020 song, “People You Know,” during which she also bittersweetly muses, “We used to be close, but people can go/From people you know to people you don’t/And what hurts the most is people can go/From people you know to people you don’t.”

    Max also serves a bit of Olivia Rodrigo on “deja vu” when she asks of her ex, “Do you still see me when you kiss her?/Convince yourself that’s what you need/You say I’m fully out the picture/But you still see mĐ” in your dreams.” Or nightmares, if Max is doing something right/living up to her promise of having “stilettos sharper than a knife.”

    Transitioning to the equally as emotional “Lost Your Faith,” it, too, explores the motif of a boyfriend who no longer exhibits the same fervor for her that he once did. To be sure, there’s something of Sabrina Carpenter’s “My Man on Willpower” in the track, with Carpenter also mourning the loss of the same romantic intensity her boo once showed for her (but, at present, “He fell in love with self-restraint and now it’s gettin’ out of hand/He used to be/Literally obsessed with me/I’m suddenly the least sought after girl in the land”). There even comes a point where Carpenter also touches on the religion metaphor of a relationship by saying, “My man’s forgotten his devotion/Where he’s gone, God only knows.” But God doesn’t appear to know much in “Lost Your Faith” either, with Max describing, “I used to have you on your knees all night [plenty of double meaning there, just as Carpenter would approve of]/But now, you never pray/And when you looked at me, you saw the light/But now, you’ve turned away/Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah [look out Leonard Cohen]/You used to hold me in a holy place/But now, you’ve lost your faith.” And, in turn, so has Max lost her faith in him—and in the entire relationship.

    Regardless, it doesn’t stop her from insisting, “Fight for Me” on the next song of the same name. Even though it’s more about Max wanting the object of her affection to fight for her in a sexual sense (hence, the Pussycat Dolls-reminiscent beat, co-produced by Lindgren and Inverness). As in, “Shit boy, show me what you’re working with and really turn me out. Prove to me how much you care with your dick.” So it is that she sings, “Need your love comin’ at, comin’ at, comin’ at me [more innuendo]/Oh, I might just turn around, go and leave you on your knees [the “on your knees” imagery having also just appeared in “Lost Your Faith”]/So fight for me/Want your hands up and down me/You can’t live without me, let’s go, baby, fight for me/Before I walk out that door, boy, give me somethin’ more, fuckin’ go crazy.” The idea of Max asking him to “put up a fight” for her doesn’t just pertain to fighting to stay with her, but also to show his ability to “throw down” in the boudoir.

    As for Max discussing that much-talked-about subject in pop songs by female artists—being neglected and/or taken for granted—it has shades of one of Madonna’s earliest tracks, “Think of Me,” during which she warns her own lover, “You better/Think of me/I know you want to, baby/Think of me/It won’t be long before you/Think of me/‘Cause I’ll be gone/And then you’ll think of me, oh yeah/You walk in and you see me cryin’/You apologize say you lost track of time/I’m not gonna cry anymore/You’re gonna lose me too if you don’t/Know what’s good for you.” So it is that both Madonna and Max just want someone who will show that they’ve got “Skin in the Game.” This track being a continuation of the sexual aura radiated on “Fight for Me,” with Max repurposing the expression to reflect the physical and emotional pull her relationship has over her—though mainly the former, as evidenced by the first verse, “Oh, baby, your tongue set a fire [the image of fire showing up yet again]/I was doomed when you kissed me in the kitchen/Your lips tasted like/Dark red wine and reckless decisions [a bit of a Taylor-esque lyrical flair].”

    Then, er, comes the carnal description, “Satin sheets [“are very romantic,” as Madonna would say], Christian Dior/All our clothes fell down to the floor/Yeah, that night was two years ago/And I’m still sleepin’ in this bed we made/Of fuckin’ and fightin’ each day/I try to leave, but I just stay/‘Cause I’ve got/Skin in the game/You touch me and letting go just goes down the drain.” Here as well, Max channels Sabrina Carpenter, specifically on “We Almost Broke Up Again Last Night” (which also bears similarities to JADE’s “FUFN” on That’s Showbiz Baby).

    But Max seems determined not to break up with this person thanks to her accursed skin in the game. Though it’s difficult for the listener not to want to play her the “World’s Smallest Violin” (a song, incidentally that was originally intended for Diamonds & Dancefloors in one of its earlier incarnations) for being such a masochist (Ă  la Carrie Bradshaw with Big). Except that, in this particular song, Max is the one playing it, so to speak, for the man who keeps trying to come crawling back to her after treating her like shit. Refusing to accept his half-assed apologies (or “sugar talking,” as Carpenter would call it), all Max can say to them is, “Boy, this ain’t therapy/Don’t come here cryin’/Words don’t mean shit to mĐ”/When it’s all lyin’/Sing your heartbreak symphony/WhilĐ” I play the world’s smallest violin.”

    Besides, it seems as though she’s already moved on by the next song, the grand finale of Don’t Click Play. Indeed, the video game-sounding opening to “Catch My Breath” that leads into another up-tempo, 80s dance-inspired sonic landscape is very grand (and frankly, could have easily worked as the song that plays while Thelma and Louise drive “over the edge”). What’s more, “Catch My Breath” clearly indicates that Max wanted to end the album on an ultra-upbeat note, one that finds her in the proverbial getaway car as she urges, “Get in the car, take me down to the boulevard/Shut up and drive [okay, Rihanna]/We can ride all through the night/Into the day, screaming my name/Like oh, ah-ah, oh-oh, ah-oh’/I feel the rush every time we kiss and we touch/I lose control, baby, keep your eyes on the road.”

    But the only one keeping their eyes on it (de facto, the prize) with this album is Max, who illustrates just how committed she is to further cultivating her own signature sound with each new record. And even though, as usual, the reception (especially chart-wise) to Max’s work isn’t quite where it should be, she has undoubtedly proved what she set out to do with Don’t Click Play: remind everyone that she was always the talent behind the work—not any one producer or co-songwriter.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • The Life of a (Real-Ass) Showgirl: JADE’s That’s Showbiz Baby

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    Long before Taylor Swift bandied the phrase, “And, baby, that’s show business for you” in honor of her forthcoming album, The Life of a Showgirl, JADE had announced the title of her debut as That’s Showbiz Baby. A record she had started to work on, even in its roughest incarnation, around 2022. Meaning that it took three years for her to finally “birth it out.” A measured decision on her part in that she didn’t want to follow in the footsteps of Little Mix, releasing a record almost every year since 2012 in a bid to “stay relevant.” So it was that she took a little more time to find her own voice as a solo artist, working with everyone from Jodie Harsh to Tove Lo during the process. The result might not necessarily be a “sonically cohesive” album, but it is an album that is uniquely and decidedly “JADE.”

    To immediately carve out her solo identity, she kicks off the record with “Angel of My Dreams,” a track that, by now, the masses are well acquainted with. As the first taste of what she was capable of on her own, it revealed that JADE was unafraid to make a daring and meta statement about the industry she can’t help but love despite the way it chews up and spits out pop stars on an almost monthly basis. One day, your “shtick” might be all the rage, and the next it’s not drawing in enough “sales” (whatever that means anymore). As for the haunting use of the Sandie Shaw sample at the beginning of the song, like Addison Rae, JADE has described herself as a “student of pop.” That shines through in manifold ways throughout the record, and it begins with harnessing Shaw’s “Puppet on a String” to commence “Angel of My Dreams.”

    As for the love for the music industry that (mostly) outshines the hate on “Angel of My Dreams,” it quickly gives way to outright hate on “IT Girl,” during which JADE (once again) mimics the average suit by urging, all Faustian-like, in the first verse, “Sign on the line for me/Baby, smile, but don’t show your teeth/Say goodbye to autonomy/Now your body belongs to me.” But, whereas the JADE of the early Little Mix days might have been “content” to go along with that oppressive, “do as I say” bit, the JADE of the present bites back, “Kitty got fangs and kitty got claws/Clause in the contract, contract gone/Gone is the girl that you could con, con.”

    As if that weren’t enough of a “fuck you” (and not just “for now”), JADE delivers another coup de grñce via the chorus, “I’m not your thing/I’m not your baby doll/No puppet on a string/This bitch can’t be controlled/I’m not, I’m not, I’m not your thing/No puppet on a string.” That “puppet on a string” mention reminding listeners that her Sandie Shaw love didn’t stop with “Angel of My Dreams” (what’s more, “Puppet on a String” is the connection that helps so closely “relate” these two songs to the point where they feel like “companion” pieces—as such, it’s no wonder JADE called “IT Girl” the “cunty little sister” to “Angel of My Dreams”). After all, why waste an opportunity to repeat this metaphor for what it’s so often like to be a pop star? Particularly of the more “manufactured” variety that comes out of shows like The X Factor, which rejected JADE twice when she auditioned before finally accepting her in 2011, placing her in a group that was initially called Rhythmix (the group later changed their name to Little Mix when a music charity based in Brighton with the same name wanted to get legal about it). Incidentally, she wasn’t planning to audition for the third time—it was her older brother that encouraged her to try again. And, were it not for his nudge, JADE would have given up the dream and pursued a degree in theater production “and stuff.”

    Luckily for the music industry, the third time was the charm. Though it wasn’t exactly “great” that JADE was just coming off a very vulnerable moment in her life, having recently been discharged from the hospital for her anorexia when she got the news of her acceptance. Indeed, JADE remarked earlier this year, “In retrospect, if the show had done a proper mental health assessment, then they wouldn’t have let me on.” But then, that was probably JADE’s first glimpse into how little “the industry” cares about an artist’s physical or emotional well-being. And so, the shade thrown at The X Factor reaches a peak with the last line of “IT Girl,” “It’s a no from me.”

    It’s also a “no” from JADE when it comes to putting up with any bullshit in a relationship, detailing that moment in an argument when one person finally snaps (more than the other) and declares, in no uncertain terms, “Baby, back off out my face right now/Don’t you tell me to calm down/No more words, just ‘fuck you’ for now.” In other words, JADE needs to cool off before she can even think about talking to her bloke again. Especially after all the patience she’s shown him before. Or, as JADE summed it up, “‘FUFN’ is the escalation of an argument we’ve all had, knowing it’s not the end but feeling all the anger in the moment. It’s the channeling of female rage into a badass big pop banger.” As for those speculating as to who inspired the track, surprisingly it wasn’t one of JADE’s exes (e.g., Sam Craske or Jed Elliott), but rather, her current boyfriend, Jordan Stephens (in case you didn’t already know). As JADE tells it, “[The concept] stemmed from actually having a dream about my boyfriend cheating on me and then waking up the next day fuming. So that’s how it kind of began
 It’s quite relatable, we’re all guilty of being fiery and arguing and then afterwards being, ‘Maybe, it wasn’t that big of a deal.’”

    But during the period when it does feel like a really big fucking deal, it’s only too believable to hear JADE warn, “I’m about to hit you with the worst of me/I don’t want your angry text/I don’t want your sorry sex/I just want you out my fuckin’ face.” Because, yes, every woman, sooner or later, reaches this kind of inevitable breaking point in a relationship—particularly when it’s a long-term one that keeps hitting the same walls without any sign of either party making a change. So it is that those caught in this type of dynamic keep having such flare-ups, often leading to the break up-and-make up pattern (hear also: Sabrina Carpenter’s “We Almost Broke Up Again Last Night”). Perhaps because the thought of “starting over yet again” (to borrow a fake book title from Sex and the City) means having to go through the rigmarole of being jealous of the new person’s ex. This being the very topic that JADE explores on the following track, “Plastic Box.”

    And while some might make a certain connection to Olivia Rodrigo’s “Obsessed” (on which she sings, “I’m so obsessed with your ex”), JADE is less focused on the former girlfriend in question (presumably, Amber Anderson) and more on the idea of how her current boyfriend loved someone so vehemently before her. Which is why JADE described the theme as being “about the irrational and toxic insecurity within us when we think about our partner’s previous relationships.” Ergo, her unabashed request, “Can I have your heart in a plastic box?/Never used, fully clean, untouched/Like I’m the only one you’ve ever loved.”

    In a way, it’s like the female version of how some guys still bristle over a woman’s sexual history, preferring instead that it’s her vag which remains “fully cleaned, untouched.” In any event, JADE has billed “‘P’ Box” as “one of [her] favorite songs [she’s] ever written.” High praise like that might make one think it would be a very tough act to follow, but no, “Midnight Cowboy” more than delivers (and is, in truth, much more sensual than Selena Gomez and Benny Blanco’s plain “Cowboy” from I Said I Love You First), in no small part thanks to some lyrical contributions from none other than RAYE (everyone’s doing mononyms in all caps nowadays), who also co-wrote “FUFN,” and JADE’s own aforementioned boyfriend, Jordan Stephens. But what really puts the cherry on top (apart from spoken word contributions by Ncuti Gatwa) is the rhythmic bassline—produced by additional co-writers of the song Jonah Christian and Stephen Mykal—that practically oozes the feeling of sweating it out on the dance floor while grinding up against any number of randos (and here, too, another Carpenter song comes to mind: “When Did You Get Hot?”).

    With such a sound, the lyrics must accordingly keep up with the sexual tone. So it is that JADE refers to herself as the “ride” for a midnight cowboy (also a film allusion), announcing, “I’m a real wild bitch, yeah, I’m mental/I’m the ride of your life, not a rental/I’m the editor, call me Mr. Enninful.” This being a very specific kind of kink (and for those who didn’t guess, “Mr. Enninful” is Edward Enninful, the former editor-in-chief of British Vogue and the former European editorial director of CondĂ© Nast, Vogue’s “parent” company). To be sure, JADE wants to keep it nothing but kinky as she sings the additional disclaimer, “No vanilla, let’s experimental.” And so, it’s quite possible that not since Ginuwine’s 1996 hit, “Pony,” has a song wielding such strong innuendos about cowboys and rides been this sexy. Complete with such verses as, “I’ma saddle him up, hold him down, I’ma saddle him up/Fantasy, leather chaps on the floor.”

    And, speaking of “fantasy,” it’s not only the song that fittingly succeeds “Midnight Cowboy,” but also served as the second single from That’s Showbiz Baby, leaning into the only musical trend more common than country right now: disco. To match the sonic landscape, JADE tapped David LaChappelle to direct the Soul Train-inspired video, during which JADE does her best impression of Diana Ross (who also gets another nod on the album via “Before You Break My Heart”)—though she said it was Donna Summer’s vocal stylings she was trying to channel the most. Granted, Diana Ross gives way to Carrie White (to keep the 70s references coming) by the end of the video. And besides, who but Carrie W. can better understand sentiments like, “Passion, pain/Pleasure, no shame/If you like it weird, I like it strange”? That is, except for Tinashe, who goes into similar territory when she asks, “Is somebody gonna match my freak?” on 2024’s “Nasty.”

    Even so, JADE continues to cite Donna Summer (“meets MGMT meets Beth Ditto”) as an influence on the next track, “Unconditional,” which may arguably among the best tracks the album has to offer (which is really saying something considering that each one is a banger). As a love letter to her mother, Norma, who has suffered from lupus for years, JADE promises, “I will hold your hand forever/Even if my heart explodes/Unconditional/I can’t put you back together/But I’ll always love you so.” That phrase about “always loving” something also appearing in “Angel of My Dreams” (“I will always love you and hate you”)—so clearly JADE is occasionally at war with who (and what) she must always love the most. But “Unconditional” makes it apparent that her mother would (probably) win out every time against show business. Especially if JADE’s “Self Saboteur” behavior transferred from her personal life to her professional life.

    But no, as “Self Saboteur” is sure to emphasize, JADE has a greater tendency to sabotage a romance than a gig. Maybe that’s why she wastes no time in getting straight to the heart of the matter with her opening announcement, “I’m always fuckin’ it up, self saboteur/I know I’m worthy of love, but I hit and run/I hate when I give up/I don’t get hurt if I hurt you first.” Or, as MARINA (another all caps mononym lover), back when she was Marina and the Diamonds, once said on “How to Be a Heartbreaker,” “Rule number one is that you gotta have fun/But, baby, when you’re done/You gotta be the first to run/Rule number two, just don’t get attached to/Somebody you could lose.”

    In addition to some MARINA vibes here, there’s also an air of Selena Gomez, intionation-wise, with the part of the song where she sings, “You’re bringin’ heaven to me” sounding a lot like, “Can’t keep my hands to myself” (the chorus from Gomez’s 2015 single, “Hands to Myself”). As for the rest of the chorus of “Self Saboteur” (which should, in truth, be “Self Saboteuse”), JADE further laments, “Why do I put me through hell?/I’m feelin’ shackled and free/I’m fuckin’ scared, can you tell?” Which is when the Britney Spears influence seems to appear, for there’s no denying that the motif of “Sometimes” is all over this as well (“Sometimes I run, sometimes I hide/Sometimes I’m scared of you/But all I really want is to hold you tight, treat you right/Be with you day and night/Baby, all I need is time”).

    JADE’s vulnerable side quickly dissipates as “Self Saboteur” transitions into “Lip Service,” which, in essence, amounts to JADE’s version of Sabrina Carpenter’s “Sugar Talking” (or is it Sabrina Carpenter’s version of “Lip Service” considering JADE co-wrote this song before hers?). With both women talking about the mouths and lips of men in a way that definitely doesn’t pertain to using them for “communication” (because, quelle surprise, JADE is not using the term “lip service” in the conventional sense). Though, of course, communication can be achieved, let’s say, nonverbally. Which is all that both JADE and Carpenter are really asking for, with the former telling her would-be boo, “You know I’m thirsty for a kiss/Give me a picture of your—/You say you never had a vibe like this/So fuck your friends and come and vibe with me instead/In my bed, get ahead/I make my moves on you and then I know you can’t/Take your eyes off me/Let’s get loose, loose, yĐ”ah.” Such “sauciness” isn’t entirely helmed by JADE’s mind. She had a bit of help from the one and only Tove Lo, which makes sense considering that Tove is not just a woman who prides herself on oral sex- and sex positive-centric songs, but also a woman with an album called Blue Lips (the feminine version of blue balls). Also serving as co-writers are TimFromTheHouse (Tove’s frequent collaborator), Johan Salomonsson and, once again, MNEK.

    So yes, Carpenter is very much being given a run for her money in terms of songs about wanting to be eaten out and lyrics laden with double meanings and innuendos, with “Lip Service” making “Sugar Talking” sound positively chaste by comparison (e.g., “Your sugar talking isn’t working tonight/Put your loving where your mouth is”—because, obviously, she, too, just wants some head).

    But perhaps all these “demands” from JADE (and women in general) are what give men a “Headache,” the title of the next track. Something JADE feels inclined to acknowledge as she tells the object of her affection (presumably Stephens), “Headache like a drill inside your brain/Headache ‘cause I’m driving you insane/Most people couldn’t tolerate this/I’m such a headache, but you love me anyway.” Such is the nature of true love (or maybe resigned love, in many instances). As another up-tempo, club-ready track, JADE once more taps into 70s and funk-inspired sounds, with Sabath entirely in charge of the production on it. And, as is typical with just about every JADE song, its tone and musical style changes tack entirely at another point, concluding with a “dream rock” kind of sound as JADE repeats, “You still love me” in a manner that’s less declarative and more like a spell that commands her boyfriend to continue loving her no matter how much of a headache she might be.

    Of course, as has been a trend on the record, “Headache” segues into a song that provides an “inverse” kind of theme, with “Natural at Disaster” instead turning the lens of focus onto a boyfriend who sounds like far more of a headache than JADE. And this stems from, as the listener is informed from the get-go, how “it’s hard to love you when you hate yourself/Can’t be there for you without negatively impacting my mental health” and that “tryna fix you made me break myself.” So it is that JADE channels Selena Gomez anew in that she’s effectively telling this man, “I needed to lose you to love me.” Because, a person who doesn’t love themselves usually can’t love someone else (or, as RuPaul likes to say, “If you can’t love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love somebody else?”). Worse still, they tend to transfer their own self-hate to the other person. Starting out calmly, the song crescendos in a big way during the chorus, with JADE serving Billie Eilish on the third verse of “Happier Than Ever” as she sings, “‘Cause you were all snakes, no ladders/You’re happiest when you make me sadder/Tried to help you, but it didn’t matter/You’re a natural at disaster.” Which, one supposes, is better than being the “Queen of Disaster.”

    As for the abovementioned Taylor Swift correlation, JADE brings it back to the fore with “Glitch,” which is also the title of track eighteen on the “3am Edition” of Swift’s Midnights. But, unlike, er, Taylor’s version, JADE’s is hardly a love song (nor is it about the irresistibility of going from friends to lovers). In fact, it’s more of a “fuck off to the negative voice inside your head” anthem (in lieu of a “fuck you for now” one). This made all the more apparent by the chorus, “You’re just a glitch/Get out of my head, get out of my fuckin’ skin/You’re telling me liĐ”s, telling me how it is/Sick of you talking to me like I’m your bitch/When I’m that bitch.” To create the effect of a “glitched out” vocal sound, co-producers Lostboy and Inverness give JADE an assist. All in service of emphasizing her intent with the track, which is to do everything in her power to eliminate the “glitch” of negative self-talk. And, as she stated on It’s Out, “It’s actually me just talking to myself, like, gettin’ in my own head, which I sometimes do, I’m sure everyone’s been there where you kind of have a bit of an imposter syndrome, so that song is basically me having a go at myself like, ‘Stop it. Stop doing that to yourself.’” Indeed, this is the type of “bop” that Charli XCX and Lorde could get on board with.

    Though not so much the more disco-fied dance aura of “Before You Break My Heart,” yet another standout of That’s Showbiz Baby. As well as a track that persists in proving just how serious JADE is about pop music history, in all its forms. For The Supremes can easily be considered one of the first “girl groups,” long before the likes of Little Mix entered the fray. And so, tapping into her inner Diana Ross energy (just as she did for the “Fantasy” video), JADE pleads, “You’re the dream that I’ve had for so long/You’re the one who inspired all my love songs/And now you’rĐ” tryin’ to leave/It’s a crime to mĐ”, call the love police/You keep hurting me, I’m beggin’ you to/Stop!/In the name of love/Before you break my heart.”

    To play up the notion of That’s Showbiz Baby tapping into all the different “Jades” that have existed in order to make this one rise from the ashes, Sabath repurposed a home video of JADE singing The Supremes’ hit for a talent show when she was a child to use for the famed chorus, now as rendered by JADE. Something that she rightly felt was “really special,” as she told NME, and how, as a result, it’s also clear that “the song’s about me sort of not forgetting my younger self and how, like, far we’ve come together, not losing sight of that in this showbiz world.”

    Not to mention how far she’s come as a “student of pop.” And, as any such person knows, it’s always best to round out an album with a slow jam like “Silent Disco,” which comes across as an unvarnished love song to Stephens. Embodying the same kind of breathy vocals as FKA Twigs, JADE informs her “special someone,” “Oh, when you make love to me/With a passion, blow the roof off/Baby, these stars are blushing.” This before diving into a chorus that speaks to how, so often, the language between two lovers is arcane, as though they’re dancing to music that others simply can’t hear. This conveyed by JADE pronouncing, “And it’s our private party/Might look a little stupid to them, but to us, it’s something/And I love it/Our silent disco, we madĐ”.” Naturally, there are some who might still to interpret it as being about her relationship with her fans. A dynamic that’s only bound to intensify now that her debut record is out, chronicling the life of a showgirl in all its lurid detail.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • JADE’s Love is “Unconditional”

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    Marking the seventh song to be “unveiled” from That’s Showbiz Baby just ahead of its release, JADE’s “Unconditional” embodies another disco-fied sound that’s comparable to “Plastic Box.” And, though each song was crafted by different producers (the former by Grades, Oscar Görres [a.k.a. OzGo] and MNEK, and the latter by Sabath), both of their sounds and lyrical motifs share some DNA, with “Plastic Box” representing one kind of love and “Unconditional” another. In the former, she speaks to romantic love (as inspired by the “toxic energy” she had toward her boyfriend, Jordan Stephens, at the outset of their relationship—mainly due to her own jealousies about his ex) and, in the latter, she speaks to familial love. For she was specifically motivated to write the song because of and as a tribute to her mother, who has had an ongoing battle with lupus ever since JADE was a child. Hence, a verse like, “If only my love could be your medication/I could fix you so much better than your own prescription/If I lose you now, then I lose it all/If you’re going down, I can take the fall.”

    In a certain sense, it has a similar theme to Taylor Swift’s 2019 song (dedicated to her own mother), “Soon You’ll Get Better”—except “Unconditional” is far less of a cheesy buzzkill. Indeed, it was JADE who commented to The Guardian of the danceable disco beat (one that’s Robyn-worthy, which is saying something), “How can I write a really sad song that we’re all going to want to shake our tits to?” The answer lies, perhaps, in her characterization of the track as “Donna Summer meets MGMT meets Beth Ditto.” Though it definitely fits in more with Donna’s oeuvre than MGMT’s or Beth Ditto’s. As for the “official visualizer,” directed by twin sisters Fa and Fon (who previously worked with JADE on “Midnight Cowboy”), it actually comes across more like a right proper music video, with JADE bringing her A-game in terms of treating it like there should still be some sort of narrative.

    So it is that the “visualizer” starts out with her getting hair and makeup done in her dressing room, then anxiously pacing around in it once her glam team is gone. Almost as if she’s nerve-racked about something—like, say, her mother’s health. Or any other loved one that might be suffering, whether emotionally or physically. Such concerns are apparent in the first verse, during which JADE frets, “If I lose you now, then I lose it all/If you let me down, don’t know who I’d call.” Her sense simultaneous of anxiety and devotion continues to radiate from the subsequent pre-chorus and chorus, “You got me kickin’, shakin’ and screamin’ for ya/Got nothin’ you could do to make me leave/Ah, ah, ah, ah/Unconditional/I will hold your hand forever/Even if my heart explodes/Unconditional/I can’t put you back together/But I’ll always love you so.” Whitney and Dolly know something about that, too.

    Amidst her pacing and panicking, someone else walks in and, per the caption, tells her, “Jade, we’re ready for you.” With more than just some degree of reluctance, she leaves the room, at which time the disco-fied beat drops, echoing the one in Anita Ward’s signature disco hit, “Ring My Bell.” From there, we see her engage in all manner of different photoshoots, perhaps meant to remind her fans that she had to do many style changes for the sake of her album cover, which features her in five different guises (sort of like a one-woman Spice Girls [since Little Mix didn’t have five members]). At one point, while she’s on the phone with someone (yet again), she bemoans, “I can’t talk right now. I’m in a fucking teacup!” (yes, literally—she’s sitting in a giant teacup). This “said,” once more, through a caption. Granted, most of these captions are lyrics to the song, with JADE conveying the same emotionalism evoked by her words. This done mostly via looking as though she’s on the verge of tears at any given moment, especially when she’s on the phone. Perhaps intending to instill the idea that she’s talking either to her mother or someone who’s giving her a health update about her mother.

    Whatever the case may be, the award for best actress goes to JADE, who also indicates that there is an immense amount of pressure put on performers to always be “on,” even when the turmoil of their personal lives might be weighing on them. This conveyed as JADE is forced to go through shoot after shoot, enduring the rigmarole of being “done up” and restyled over and over again.

    Indeed, there is a moment when she’s getting her makeup done (while sporting blonde hair and a generally Showgirls-meets-Euphoria kind of aesthetic) that has shades of Britney Spears’ disaffected look while playing Lucky in the video for the song of the same name. Further reiterating the idea that being a “star” can actually be quite inconvenient when it comes to nurturing one’s personal life. And as the song comes to a close, with JADE belting out the chorus for the final time, it all gets to be too much for her to keep doing the work. To keep being constantly photographed and “handled” by everyone.

    Thus, there comes a breaking point where, amidst the cameras flashing, she proceeds to run away from everyone (in a scene that has plenty of Madonna in the “Drowned World/Substitute for Love” video vibes). All iterations of herself effectively fleeing the scene. But it’s the blonde JADE that we see carry out the escape in its entirety, running down the street with her phone while still wearing underwear that reads, “Ride of your life” on the back. Because, yes, she’s ready to drop everything and “just ride” (rather than be ridden, as it were) if it means she can be there for the person she loves.

    As for the mĂ©lange of disco meets rock sounds (so maybe that is where the Beth Ditto influence shines through) that take turns dominating throughout the track, JADE noted to Zane Lowe, “There’s, like, a merging, and I think that’s where I strive, is, like, the merging and sort of Frankenstein-ing of sounds to create what is the JADE of it all.” With “Unconditional” being one of the best examples yet of said “Frankenstein-ing.”

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Thing Comes to Wednesday Season 2’s Rescue

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    While some would say that Lady Gaga “makes” season two of Wednesday (between her cameo and the song she provided for it, “The Dead Dance”), there’s no denying that what spared it from the problems of season one was none other than Thing. More specifically, the gradual unfurling of his (or “its”) backstory as it relates to a newly introduced character, Isaac Night (Owen Painter) a.k.a. Slurp. That latter nickname being what Pugsley Addams (Isaac Ordonez) gives to him after being the one responsible for reanimating his corpse in the wake of hearing a “ghost story,” of sorts,” about him on his first night at Nevermore Academy, joining Wednesday (Jenna Ortega) there for his inaugural year (which Wednesday is none too enthused about).

    As Ajax Petropolus (Georgie Farmer) recounts the tale of Isaac (in a very “submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society” kind of way), a ninety-second flashback sequence—that took Tim Burton and co. eight months to create—shows how the former Nevermore student went from being a “normal” human to a cold and ambitious mad scientist. The black and white flashback that illustrates this transition is one of the standout moments of the season, drawing easy comparisons to Burton’s earlier work, including Frankenweenie, Vincent and even The Nightmare Before Christmas. And, as Burton himself said of making the sequence, “We needed to pretend like I’m back in my student days and do it like I did it in the beginning.”

    So it is that the story of Isaac’s transformation from mere “mortal” (by Nevermore standards) into a boy with a clockwork heart (for he invents a heart-shaped mechanism to replace his real heart “so that his body could keep up with his dazzling mind”) leaves an indelible imprint not just on Pugsley, but also the viewer. As does the mention of how Isaac died while conducting yet another one of his diabolical experiments, electrocuted and ejected from the window of Iago Tower. At the end of the story, Ajax baits the youths of Caliban Hall with the mention that only the bravest have ventured out in the middle of the night to try and listen to the tick of his clockwork heart buried beneath the Skull Tree (this obviously having some very strong shades of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Telltale Heart”). So it is that Pugsley, feeling like a loser (and not in an “embracing it” sort of way à la Tame Impala and Beck) and wanting to prove himself in some way, predictably goes to the tree.

    Unfortunately, Wednesday isn’t one for paying much attention to her brother in general, let alone when she has her own additional problems to deal with—namely, trying to stop a premonition of her roommate (and, to her dismay, best friend) Enid Sinclair’s (Emma Myers) death. This unwanted vision occurring at the end of season two’s first episode, “Here We Woe Again.” Along with Pugsley going to the Skull Tree with a shovel. However, before he can do something stupid like dig up the grave, he does something even stupider by getting scared by a bat that flies out of one of the tree’s “eyes.”

    This shock causes him to fall and, in turn, shock the ground with his powers of electrokinesis. So it is that Isaac’s corpse is “miraculously” reanimated, albeit initially in zombie form, emerging almost instantaneously from beneath the ground. This sets a key “subplot” off for the rest of the season, with “Slurp” (as he’s initially branded by Pugsley) slowly but surely regaining his human form—thanks to the steady consumption of various people’s brains. Confiding only to his roommate, Eugene Ottinger (Moosa Mostafa), the secret of his new “best friend,” who he hides in a shed
chained up, of course.

    In “Call of the Woe,” the matter of Thing’s general neglect by the Addams family of late (including everyone forgetting his birthday like he’s Samantha Baker [Molly Ringwald] in Sixteen Candles) is brought up right away, with Morticia (Catherine Zeta-Jones) commending Gomez (Luis Guzman) for being able to get an apparent masseuse named Stassa (Neri Zaccardelli) to rub him down, as it were. A small reconciliation for all the bullshit Thing constantly has to put up with. Including, in this particular episode, having to go along on a camping trip. The first one of its kind put on by Nevermore, courtesy of the overzealous new principal, Barry Dort (Steve Buscemi). The replacement for the now disgraced Larissa Weems (Gwendoline Christie), who manages to stick around for season two by conveniently becoming Wednesday’s new spirit guide. With “Call of the Woe” reverting to leaning into that Harry Potter/Hogwarts Academy aura it radiated so strongly in season one (along with some overt nods to Charmed, Gilmore Girls and Chilling Adventures of Sabrina), it’s an obvious “filler episodes” with its most significant plot point being Slurp’s capture at the camp after he devours the brain of Ron Kruger (Anthony Michael Hall, once again playing a part that goes against his original dweeb typecasting, which Burton helped undo by making him the bully in Edward Scissorhands), a scoutmaster who leads the competition between his Phoenix Cadets and the Nevermore students after a double booking of the campsite leads them to “fight” for it.

    As the episode draws to a close, more cornball-ness takes hold as Wednesday delivers a voiceover that repurposes Robert Frost’s overused “The Road Not Taken” to say that she needs to keep investigating the goings-on at Willow Hill Psychiatric Hospital, where Tyler Galpin a.k.a. the Hyde (Hunter Doohan) of season one is being held captive. And, now, as the end of this episode shows, so is his master, Marilyn Thornhill/Laurel Gates (Christina Ricci). Of course, her grand return is short-lived, with Tyler turning against her in the episode that follows, “If These Woes Could Talk,” which also acts as the “Part One” finale, ergo plenty of “scintillating” details at last revealed. Like the fact that Judi Spannagel (Heather Matarazzo, at last getting some deserved acting work), executive assistant to Dr. Rachael Fairburn (Thandiwe Newton), is the one behind a nefarious program called Lois—which, naturally, Wednesday had previously assumed to be a person.

    But no, it’s an acronym for Long-term Outcast Integration Study, a program started by Judi’s father, Augustus Stonehearst. The purpose of the experiments? To remove outcasts’ powers and reassign them to normies (this providing plenty of meta commentary on how “weirdness” is increasingly commodified—particularly since Burton’s 90s heyday, with Gap grafting grunge for its own products, and now, with Burton’s “style” itself being ripped by AI). Or, as Judi tells it to Wednesday and Uncle Fester (Fred Armisen), who “broke into” Willow Hill by doing his “insane” shtick, “[My father] loved outcasts. He wanted to be one. Imagine being able to extract their abilities and share it with normies.” Wednesday immediately cuts in, “You mean steal them and exploit them. This is a basement bargain attempt at Dr. Moreau.”

    But Judi does well to remind Wednesday that the experiment wasn’t an “attempt”—her father succeeded. For she then confesses that she was born a normie too, but now, thanks to Augustus’ work, she’s an Avian, therefore possessing the gift of being able to control birds. In this case, of course, opting to wield crows to do her evil bidding throughout the first four episodes, particularly one “lead” crow. Identifiable as the “red-eyed” or “one-eyed” crow. And while the unveiling of who the Avian really was might have been enough to sate the audience for now, there are those who still have lingering questions about who the red-eyed crow really is, because that part of the plot sort of just fell off. However, a through line that remains consistent—by becoming retroactively visible—is the way that Isaac and Thing are mysteriously “connected.” This first made slightly apparent at the end of “If These Woes Could Talk,” when, after everyone breaks out of the asylum, Isaac catches a glimpse of Thing amidst the chaos and casts it a look of simultaneous longing and recognition. One that the viewer doesn’t think much of, especially since it’s quickly broken by Isaac being shot multiple times (not that it has an effect on him).

    Still “at large” at the start of “Part Two” of the second season, “Hyde and Woe Seek,” other dangerous escapees include Tyler a.k.a. the Hyde and the woman we find out is his mother, Françoise Galpin (Frances O’Conner), formerly Françoise Night. As in, that’s right, Isaac’s sister. So it is that this macabre family reunion is an integral part of the episode, along with the reintroduction of Principal Weems as Wednesday’s new spirit guide (who first shows up while Wednesday is in a coma). Which means plenty of interjecting and needing to allow Wednesday a Dexter Morgan amount of time to respond to people since she’s so in her head talking to someone who isn’t there. At least not to others. All as she hatches yet another scheme designed to avert the premonition she had of Enid’s death. This time, it involves trying to become Tyler’s new master, now that Thornhill is dead (killed by none other than Tyler himself).

    Another key part of the story is anchored in Pilgrim World’s (yes, that throwback to Addams Family Values returns) Los Spooky Noches!, an expectedly appropriative “celebration” of Day of the Dead. It’s the site where Pugsley reunites with an increasingly human-looking Isaac, and chooses to set him free despite all the carnage he continues to leave in his wake. Something Gomez bears witness to, only to have Pugsley lie to him about not seeing the former “Slurp” anywhere. A lie that Pugsley confesses to in the Freaky Friday-inspired episode that follows, “Woe Thyself.” Needless to say, it’s Wednesday and Enid who end up swapping bodies, which is why the first scene is of a literally color-allergic Wednesday outfitted in pastels and makeup while dancing to the tune of Blackpink’s “Boombayah” before actually deigning to go out into the quad area so that everyone at Nevermore can see her like this. From the outset, it’s plain to see that Enid’s influence is somehow at play. Though it takes a bit longer for the viewer to find out that Lady Gaga—in the role of a now-dead ex-Nevermore teacher named Rosaline Rotwood—is responsible for Enid’s, let’s call it, pull over “Wednesday’s” choices.

    And while Wednesday and Enid deal with their Lindsay Lohan/Jamie Lee Curtis issues, Thing decides to attend a support group held by the detached head that is Professor Orloff (Christopher Lloyd, who played Uncle Fester in The Addams Family and Addams Family Values), called “Some of Your Parts,” a play on, what else, “the sum of your parts.” A phrase that comes up in a stirring speech he gives to the appendages in attendance, all of whom want to know from what body they originally came from. To this, Orloff says, “We may never know who we were attached to. You can’t see yourself as an appendage, but as a whole person, worthy of love and respect. We are more than just the sum of our parts. But sometimes, the parts are greater than the whole.”

    It’s a statement that, in many regards, applies to how Thing is the part that’s often greater than the whole of Wednesday. Serving as, for all intents and purposes, their family dog, it is his story that turns out to be the most jarring and compelling plot twist of all—that Isaac was the whole body he once belonged to. Of course, that unexpected revelation doesn’t arrive until the finale, “This Means Woe.” After the humiliation of Principal Dort that occurs in the previous episode, “Woe Me the Money,” wherein Wednesday’s grandmother, Hester (Joanna Lumley, looking a lot like Jane Fonda), also cruelly insults Gomez for having no “abilities,” deriding him as a useless normie.

    This is something Wednesday makes Hester pay for—literally—by the end of the fundraising gala (when Enid and Wednesday’s invisible stalker/groupie, Agnes DeMille [Evie Templeton], find their moment to engage in some choreo for “The Dead Dance”). That’s when Hester and Morticia both realize Dort made Bianca (Joy Sunday) siren them into doing things they otherwise wouldn’t have. In Hester’s case, donating her entire fortune (from being, what else, a mortuary mogul) to Nevermore and insisting no normies shall ever be allowed to attend again. Wednesday couldn’t agree less, changing her tune from the second episode, “The Devil You Woe,” when she condemns Judi for championing Fairburn’s book, Unlocking the Outcast Mind. Judi, as Dr. Fairburn’s assistant, is naturally sycophantic about it, prompting Wednesday to ask whether Dr. F is even an outcast. Judi says no, but what does that matter? Wednesday replies, “It’s like a vegetarian writing a book on cannibalism.” Just as it’s like Daria dressing up as Quinn, at times, to watch Wednesday’s emotions shine through so often in season two. Though, mercifully, not half as often as in season one, wherein that notorious kiss was shared between her and Tyler.

    Ortega seemed to understand (too late) that such behavior did not align with the character whatsoever, later reflecting, “Everything that Wednesday does, everything I had to play [in season one], did not make sense for her character at all. Her being in a love triangle? It made no sense.” Hence, the ousting of Percy Hynes White’s character, Xavier Thorpe, in season two. And besides, any residual traces of mawkishness (including the Freaky Friday conceit) are made forgivable by Thing’s incredible journey to understand “who” (not what) he is. Or, more precisely, who he comes from. And, just as any human discovering their true family origins, Thing comes to realize that maybe life really does boil down to nurture over nature. Or, from the Addams family’s perspective, un-nurture over nature.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Madonna’s Influence Once Again Makes Itself Known in the Work of Sabrina Carpenter—This Time Via Her 2025 VMA Performance

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    Just when you think Sabrina Carpenter might be taking a break from her busy schedule of making Madonna references (whether doing her interpretation of M as Marilyn for Vogue [after already doing her interpretation of M as Marilyn from the 1991 Oscars] or infusing “Like A Virgin” aesthetics into a “Bed Chem” BRIT Awards performance), she goes and does something like her live debut of “Tears” for the MTV VMAs. And while most pop culture connoisseurs were quick to make the connection between Carpenter’s “Tears” performance and the rain-soaked “
Baby One More Time” performance from Britney Spears’ 2001-2002 Dream Within a Dream Tour, the overall Madonna-ness of what was happening onstage couldn’t be denied. Starting, perhaps first and foremost, with the set design taking its inspiration from late 70s NYC.

    This blip was, of course, not only one of the heights of the city’s “creativity bursts,” but also the very era when Madonna herself blew into town to become part of that vibrant creative scene flourishing amidst the urban decay. Because, yes, the mid- and late 70s were also the peak of New York’s financial crisis—hence, the infamous New York Daily News headline, “Ford to City: Drop Dead” when ol’ Gerald refused, initially, to give a bailout to NY when it was on the verge of bankruptcy. A reality that became glaring in its ever-crumbling buildings and infrastructure. Accordingly, the town devolved into a crime-ridden horror show, the stuff of nightmares. To the point where law enforcement actually distributed a now notorious pamphlet at the airport called “Welcome to Fear City,” designed to warn visitors about all the various perils that would meet them should they dare to set foot inside the cesspool.

    Despite all the warnings to people about visiting this modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah, let alone living there, dreamers and “free spirits” (so often “code” intended to refer to people in the LGBQTIA+ community) couldn’t be dissuaded. The arrival of these “brave souls” who chose to set up shop in the city at a time when it wasn’t just affordable, but actually dirt cheap resulted not only in a hotbed of experimental creativity, but also a hotbed of sexuality—oozing out of everyone’s
apertures. Even after the AIDS epidemic cast a dark pall over everything as soon as the 80s arrived. Almost like a swift punishment for all those unmitigated, orgiastic good times in the 70s.

    The kind of times that Madonna conveys so well in her work—revisiting it often in her visuals and sounds. Case in point, her performance of “Deeper and Deeper” during 1993’s The Girlie Show. Awash in sweltering, rhythmic writhing, Madonna and her dancers, all outfitted in 70s, nightclub-ready attire, turn the stage into one giant, festering pore of sexuality (a look and theme also revisited in the video for and live performances of 2005’s “Hung Up”—another very 70s number, and not just because it samples from ABBA). Carpenter attempted a tamer version of that for “Tears” during the VMAs (but then, the entire ceremony was decidedly tame this year, with Carpenter’s appearance standing out as the most “salacious” of all—and mainly because it was the queerest). Because, although there might have been plenty of flamboyant gays to go around, it didn’t mean things weren’t going to remain “family friendly” (since so many pearl-clutchers make the correlation that to be gay is to be “unfriendly” toward the proverbial family). After all, the show was being broadcast for the first time ever on CBS. The type of network that generally reaches an older demographic than MTV was once accustomed to.

    That said, many viewers likely had no idea what Sabrina and co. were talking about with all their mention of “dolls” on the protest signage being paraded around the stage. A stage that looked almost as fraught and filled with queerness as the segment in The Girlie Show that begins with “Express Yourself” and segues into “Deeper and Deeper” (itself a 70s-themed video). Emphasis, of course, on “almost” for Carpenter and her dancers’ performance. For while it might be intentionally visually chaotic, there is nothing sexually fraught about it, with Carpenter using words (through the abovementioned protest signs) instead of physicality to get her pro-LGBTQIA+ message across.

    Madonna, in contrast, was never afraid to get visceral—“uncomfortably” sexual—when it came to showcasing queer love. This done at a time when it was considered especially “disgusting” by conservatives (and “liberals” alike) as a result of AIDS. But rather than recoiling from the idea of showing physical touch among her queer dancers, Madonna leaned into it all the more, in both the Blond Ambition Tour and The Girlie Show, which both toured the world at a time when the AIDS scare was still at a peak. For, as she puts it during her The Girlie Show rendition of “Deeper and Deeper,” “Sometimes you gotta tell the world the way you feel. Even when they don’t wanna hear about it.”

    While Carpenter is “noble” for addressing a topic that “the world” doesn’t want to hear about and for being the only musical act during the 2025 VMAs to say something even remotely political (shit, even Lady Gaga couldn’t be counted on for it this time around), she still didn’t go as “all the way” as Madonna surely would have. And it isn’t just the 70s stylings of this segment in The Girlie Show that draws easy comparisons to Carpenter’s “Tears” performance. There’s also her 2019 “God Control” video, during which she, once again, returns to the 70s for a night out at the disco where gun violence breaks out within the erstwhile “safe space” for queer people.

    The song, like “Tears,” also has 70s-infused musical backing, produced in the spirit of disco. Yet another reason why the “Deeper and Deeper” connection was made to “God Control” (with both videos sharing a club setting, albeit the latter with a far more macabre tone). And as Madonna dances all devil-may-care in the moments before an armed white male enters to shoot up the place, the contrast between what the viewer sees and the chirpy sound of her voice singing, “This is your wake-up call/We don’t have to fall/A new democracy/God and pornography” is of a breed of irony and sardonic humor that Carpenter has yet to master.

    In her own 70s-infused way, Carpenter is also saying “this is your wake-up call” to those who don’t understand that the loss of trans rights is the loss of human rights. And that when one sect of humanity is degraded in this way, no one else is safe from such harm either. She just happened to present it in a less “in your face” manner than Madonna would have, opting to incorporate a random Britney reference as well. One that seemed to be done mostly for the sake of looking “hot” while being political. Something Madonna has also frequently done without being quite so random about her allusions. In any case, one modern hetero blonde pop star advocate for the LGBTQIA+ community is better than none.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Apart from Sabrina Carpenter, the 2025 VMAs Keeps It Pretty Tame (and Straight)

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    Perhaps it was only right that Doja Cat should kick off the 2025 MTV Video Music Awards with a performance of her lead single from Vie, “Jealous Type.” Not just because it throws shade at the notion of how artists get so competitive with one another at these sorts of award shows, but because, with her “new” sound embodying the sonic landscape of the 80s, it’s in keeping with the identity of the erstwhile “cable” network that was born at the dawn of said decade. A channel that changed the entire industry forever in that it made musicians fully grasp that their music was in need of a visual just as memorable (and/or “iconic”) as the song itself.

    To further heighten the overall “80s-ness” of her performance, Doja Cat appeared amidst the kind of set design that can best be described as something out of Patrick Nagel’s wet dreams. And then, of course, there was her decision to tap Kenny G as the person to perform the opening saxophone solo of the track (though, obviously, no saxophone solo will ever hold a candle to the one in “Careless Whisper”). She was also certain to evoke more than slight hints of Janet Jackson in the musical dance break toward the middle of her performance, which was rounded out with a keytar player that looked like a former member of Jem and the Holograms. All of which is to say that there’s definitely a reason the word “nostalgia” was used to describe the ceremony. Since, of late, that’s what MTV has been coasting/banking on in terms of staying afloat. This clearly being part of the reason that, for the first time, the ceremony was also aired on CBS, a network not exactly known for appealing to “youths.”

    In this sense, it’s as though MTV has decided to pander to the Gen Z view of their network as something dated, out of touch and generally “dinosaur-y” (a reality that still seems unfathomable when considering how “edgy” it once used to be). And yet, a great many of the musicians that dominate TikTok were in attendance, including Doja, Tate McRae, Sabrina Carpenter, Sombr and Conan Gray. However, those considered of the “older” generations now, including Mariah Carey and Lady Gaga also took precedence in terms of their performances.

    As for Mariah, who received the Video Vanguard Award this year (marking her first Moonman ever), her medley touched on “Sugar Sweet,” “Fantasy,” “Honey,” “Heartbreaker,” “Obsessed,” “It’s Like That” (interpolated with “Dangerous Type”) and “We Belong Together” (complete with a violin-playing ensemble behind her). And even her alter ego, “Bianca,” made a little cameo onstage. Her first appearance being in the “Heartbreaker” video as “the other woman” that Mariah catches Jerry O’Connell with at the movie theater. Alas, the homage to her greatest hits was more than slightly flaccid, especially since, after Carey’s appearance, she was quickly outshined by the greater dynamism of a live broadcast of Lady Gaga’s performance of “Abracadabra” and “The Dead Dance” from her Mayhem Ball show at Madison Square Garden. This (the fact that Gaga didn’t actually perform at the VMAs venue), however, further proving, in some sense, that the awards show was mostly phoning it in.

    What’s more, Gaga didn’t have a very queer performance, at least not in a “hit you over the head” kind of way. Nor did she have a very sexual one. Even so, there were errant moments of “spiciness.” Namely, when it came to Tate McRae dancing to her hits, “Revolving Door” and “Sportscar,” with her coterie of muscular male backup dancers starting out as “statues” on platforms before jumping in to join her for “Sportscar” and, then, to quite literally play in the same sandbox as her.

    Then, of course, there was Sabrina Carpenter, who, in the absence of both Madonna and Chappell Roan, appeared to take up the mantle for showcasing queerness onstage thanks to her rendition of “Tears.” That queer and trans advocacy being on-brand for the accompanying The Rocky Horror Picture Show-themed video. Throwing it back to late 70s-era New York vibes (since, again, most of the musicians at the VMAs are relying on already overdone sound tropes of the past for their “current” selection of music), Carpenter emerges from a sewer next to a trash bag as drag queens gather ‘round to have a kiki. Toward the end of the performance, there’s a bit of an “It’s Raining Men”-meets-Flashdance-meets Britney singing “
Baby One More Time” during the Dream Within a Dream Tour (and Carpenter is no stranger to imitating her at the VMAs either) moment when water begins raining down on Carpenter and the stripper-looking cops dancing next to her. The queer folk parading around the stage with protest signs that offer such insights as, “If you hate you’ll never get laid,” “Protect Trans Rights” and “Dolls Dolls Dolls” reminded the audience that, with the current administration in office, these are messages well worth reiterating. Particularly before the boot comes down completely, and all such forms of free speech are suppressed.

    Swinging the pendulum back toward straightness, Sombr, who comes off like a mash-up of Benson Boone (sonically and visually) and Austin Butler (just visually), also did his quote unquote best to “sex it up,” albeit with a very straight male perspective as requisite “hot girls” danced around him while he sang “12 to 12.” This after commencing the performance with “Back to Friends.” His only other “male competition” (in the same age bracket, that is) was Conan Gray, who served as this year’s dose of Kate Bush-meets-Chappell Roan with his romantic performance of “Vodka Cranberry.”

    As for the big winners of the night, Lady Gaga, Sabrina Carpenter and Ariana Grande, all three played up their gratitude and appreciation for the fans (this being the go-to for the VMAs, whereas “God” is usually for the Grammys). And yet, one wonders anymore who MTV thinks that demographic includes. For, the older the network gets, it doesn’t appear to matter if they have the “newest” (ergo, youngest) acts onstage. Because, more and more, MTV is playing it as safe as possible—this extending to a kind of “sexlessness” and general lack of controversy compared to years past.

    It’s also saying something that the tameness of the show comes at a time when Paramount (a.k.a. MTV’s “parent” company) is accused of cancelling The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, ultimately, because of an Orange One-related vendetta. Perhaps prompting MTV to keep its content less “offensive” to certain (political) parties, while also trying to keep appealing to the generations it started out with: X and millennial. In other words, the generations that can even still remember what a marvel it was to have cable.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Lola Young Faces Her Fears in “Spiders”

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    With the upcoming release of Lola Young’s third album (within the short span of two years), I’m Only Fucking Myself (a.k.a. I’m Only F**king Myself), she seemingly can’t stop, won’t stop when it comes to releasing singles from the record. The latest one, following “One Thing,” “Not Like That Anymore” and “d£aler,” is “Spiders,” which is arguably her most vulnerable single from the album yet (hell, maybe even more vulnerable than “Messy”). Presenting herself, more than ever, as an unabashed “sack of need,” Young plays into the long-standing gender stereotypes regarding how a man completes a woman, and vice versa. Just ask Jerry Maguire. This conveyed in the unapologetic, unvarnished lyrics (that are part of the chorus no less), “I’m not a woman if I don’t have you/I’m not a woman if I don’t have you/And you’re not a man if you don’t have me.”

    Such a “retro” admission might seem scandalous coming from a Gen Zer like Young, but then, that’s part of the point. To highlight that, in her darkest moments, these are the types of thoughts that run through her head—even in these “modern times.” Along with another gender-pandering one: “Please kill, kill all the spiders/‘Cause thĐ”y’re in our room, and with them I can’t sleep besidĐ” ya.” Although this is the only mention of spiders in the entire song, the purpose of choosing to make that creepy-to-most-people arachnid the central focus (in terms of both the song’s title and accompanying video) is to heighten the notion of being terrified of something. Something that many other people are also terrified of. In this case, a relationship. More to the point, being vulnerable in one. And also being vulnerable enough to admit, in effect, that she still can’t help but be a victim of centuries-long programming, with women conditioned from the outset of their lives to believe that a man is the “end game” (something that the likes of Taylor Swift and Sabrina Carpenter also obviously agree with, even in spite of their nonstop barrage of “man-hating” songs). Try as many will to insist that things have changed since the proverbial dark ages of gender inequality that essentially brainwashed women into thinking a man was truly the be-all and end-all.

    With such unbridled lyrics at play, it was only right that Young should caption her music video, directed by Conor Cunningham, as follows: “Sometimes, very occasionally, I write a song and feel very proud to have written it. This is one of them. I gave a part of myself away writing it, but it was a part of me that I needed to let go. I hope you can listen and let go too.” In some sense, she’s referring to the part of herself (and the part of others—regardless of gender) that continues to suffer from the idea that you’re never “whole” without a “better half.” Or, put in that other quintessential (a.k.a. Dean Martin) way, “You’re nobody ‘til somebody loves you/You’re nobody ‘til somebody cares.”

    Another reason still for Young to call the song “Spiders” was so that she could have an opportunity to create the video’s simple concept around actually holding a spider (while wearing a t-shirt with a spider’s image on it, to boot) and letting it crawl on her with mostly free rein—an ultimate way to face her fear of something that she’s always found to be terrifying. But by confronting the literal fear, it applies to confronting her fear on a metaphorical level as well. For once she conquers the tangible, the intangible can’t be far behind. And, to be sure, this sort of thinking is part of what makes the video have such a “Billie Eilish flair.” For she, too, is known for taking a “no-frills” concept and having zero trouble drawing it out long enough for the purposes of a video that will make many viewers feel squeamish, often both physically and emotionally. Case in point, “xanny,” during which Eilish surrenders to having her face act as a one-woman ashtray. Or the “your power” video, during which she lets an anaconda wrap itself around her body. Or the similar act of “simplicity made complicated” that occurs when she walks down a dark highway as passing cars nearly run over her in the video for “NDA” or when she’s being chased relentlessly by Nat Wolff in the video for “Chihiro.”

    Young keeps it slightly less stunt-y with “Spiders” (more in line with the “chill sitting” “narrative” of “xanny” and “your power” than the riskier perils of “NDA” and “Chihiro”), holding a spider in her hands far less frequently than she can be seen smoking a cigarette and belting out her difficult feelings. Including, “Make me feel like I’m not incomplete for once” and “And then, then empty me right to the core/And suck me dry, suck me dry like you did before” (this, too, having certain vampiric “spider energy” to it). The brutal honesty of these sentiments is perhaps why the sound of the track is decidedly “90s alt rock” (ergo, so, too, is the look of the video, in addition to the sartorial style that Young sports in it). Produced, once again, by Solomonophonic and Manuka, the moody guitars on the single are just as important to conveying certain emotions as Young’s lyrics (like, say, “And blame, blame it on the gods/So we don’t feel like we did something wrong” or “Don’t say, don’t say a lie/’Cause I’ll see the truth behind your dark brown eyes”).

    What’s more, the video being shot in black and white (a conceit that seems to be having a moment in pop culture lately, if Lady Gaga’s “The Dead Dance” video and Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend interview with Zane Lowe are anything to go by) lends an added layer to the sense of seriousness about this song. The weight of the feelings and emotions that Young needs to unburden herself of. And, as she said, that hopefully unburden the listener of their own feelings and emotions, too.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Cape Fear: The Madonna and Armani Dust-Up

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    Upon Giorgio Armani’s death, at the age of ninety-one, on September 4th (much to Beyoncé’s dismay), the usual outpouring of celebrity condolences arrived. But one notable celebrity who had worked with Armani in the past remained pointedly silent: Madonna.

    Meanwhile, people like M’s self-appointed nemesis, Mariah Carey, posted an image of herself with the designer “lovingly” captioned, “Rest in peace, Mr. Armani,” with an angel wing and broken heart emoji underneath it. Others who “emerged” (online) to pay their respects included Salma Hayek, Celine Dion, Cindy Crawford, Leonardo DiCaprio, Russell Crowe, Jessica Chastain, Cate Blanchett and Michelle Pfeiffer.

    But while Pfeiffer and co. might all be “heartbroken” about the loss, it’s safe to say that said word isn’t necessarily what would be used to describe Madonna’s feelings about it. After all, the two share a famously fraught history, centered on one of Madonna’s most notorious performances at the 2015 BRIT Awards. As in, the one where her backup dancers went to rip off her cape, as previously rehearsed, only to find that the cape not only wouldn’t budge (even though one can clearly see Madonna attempting to loosen the string beforehand), but that it yanked the Queen of Pop down a flight of stairs along with it.

    And so, what would (and should) have been a pristine performance of “Living for Love,” the lead single from her then new album, Rebel Heart, became yet another opportunity for media and internet cruelty against her (particularly of the kind, as usual, directed at her “caducity”—as if a cape pulling her backward couldn’t have happened to someone of any age). With such scrutiny and harshness in the aftermath of the fall, part of Madonna’s explanation for the turn of events was a matter of improper design in that the heaviness of that cape meant that she and her team were concerned it might fall off prematurely.

    So it was that the tie on the collar was knotted extra tightly, sealing Madonna’s tumbling fate out onstage. Armani, however wasn’t about to take any blame, leading with the assertion, “Madonna, as we know, is very difficult.” But before getting into the rest of what he said as his “counter-argument” about the cause of the fall, let us first unpack how that declaration panders to misogyny in general and the specific misogyny so often funneled toward Madonna. In this instance, contained heavily in the conspiratorial “as we know”—like everyone, whether or a friend or stranger to Madonna, is well-versed in her “diva antics.” Branded a diva largely only because of her gender.

    A reality she was already keenly aware of back in the 80s, when she unapologetically announced to People, “I’m tough, I’m ambitious and I know exactly what I want. If that makes me a bitch, okay.” But it still wasn’t “okay” to many men, whether “civilians” or those in and orbiting the entertainment industry. Armani certainly fitting the latter bill, currently being credited as the man responsible for reshaping the red carpet at awards shows (particularly the Oscars). Though, of course, none of Madonna’s signature red carpet looks were ever Armani. Telling indeed.

    As it is that the only thing that really makes her a “bitch” (or “difficult,” the “polite” euphemism for bitch) is the fact that she isn’t a man, the only gender from which such “outlandish” behavior—assertiveness—is accepted. With Armani himself being a, let’s say, very fastidious man himself. The sort of man who wouldn’t take kindly to suggestions about making “adjustments” to his clothes. For, as Armani was also sure to add to his defense in the matter of M’s BRIT Awards fall, “This cape had a hook and she wanted a tie, and she wasn’t able to open it with her hands. That’s all there is to it.”

    But oh, there’s so much more to it than that. For a start, his “logic” doesn’t entirely track. Seeing as how hook closure could have easily caused a similar issue, even more so to a certain extent. Because to time, exactly right, the moment when she would need to unfasten the hook as the dancers pulled her cape off would also have plenty of “snafu” potential. In truth, the best “closure mechanism” for the garment would have been a snap—not a hook or a tie.

    Alas, no such compromise was reached, and it seemed their ephemeral working relationship never quite repaired after what would become one of Madonna’s most unforgettable performances for all the wrong reasons. And the entire incident likely only confirmed to Madonna why, when it comes to couture, she had always been such a loyal collaborator with, primarily, Jean-Paul Gaultier and Dolce & Gabbana. And Versace, for that matter. Both Gianni and Donatella. It was the latter who wrote a particularly effusive elegy for her fellow Italian designer: “The world lost a giant today. He made history and will be remembered forever.” To Madonna, however, he will merely be remembered forever as the man that almost made her “RIP” before he did.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Grief, Place and Lost Youth: The Dominating Themes of Blood Orange’s Elegiacal Essex Honey

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    Like Kali Uchis with Sincerely, Blood Orange’s (a.k.a. Dev Hynes) latest album, Essex Honey, is entirely colored by the death of his mother. An event in any child’s life—no matter what their age—that has a deep impact. And an extremely painful one, to boot. So painful that, oftentimes, other people don’t want to look at it. Hence, the ballsy move of Blood Orange to release Essex Honey on the same day as the much frothier Man’s Best Friend from Sabrina Carpenter. However, for those willing to share in the pain (and its exorcism) on Essex Honey, such “listener bravery” is worth it, for the exploration into his own past is something that will resonate (even for those, apart from Charli XCX, who didn’t grow up in Essex).

    Although considered his first Blood Orange album in seven years (following 2018’s Negro Swan), there was the Angel’s Pulse mixtape in between. Released in 2019, Blood Orange also made the album amid grappling with grief, having lost several close friends, including Mac Miller. When his mother died in 2023 (prompting the cancellation of his then slated live performance at Vivid LIVE), Hynes was struggling to find the “point” of making his next record. With her “end,” his reason came: to cope, to make sense of things. The “purpose” of making art seemed to no longer be relevant; it was now an emotional necessity. Though, months after his mother’s death, Hynes engaged in a conversation with Zadie Smith for Interview in which they both “grapple with the eternal ‘why’” of making art.

    As Smith puts it at one point, “For the good of the thing that you are doing, it has to have a sense of necessity. But at the same time, the necessity is complete fiction. You’ve made it up. Nobody is ever demanding you write a song, a poem, a novel—there is no need for these things in the world. It’s not bread, it’s not water. So the necessity is self-created, basically.” Hynes replies, “The eternal ‘why’ that I tend to wrestle with.” And then the answer came with his mother’s death.

    Opening with the elegiacal “Look at You,” the tone of mourning is set as Hynes croons, “In your grace, I looked for some meaning/But I found none, and I still search for a truth/Hard to look at you/Hard to look at you.” Whether he’s talking about his mother or even himself, it’s apparent that Hynes is struggling to reconcile that there isn’t necessarily always “a light at the end of the tunnel.” Though, incidentally, halfway through the song, the tone shifts, almost as though the rain has cleared, and the light (read: sun) has come out. This amid the faint sound of a man talking about rain in England in the background while Hynes concludes, “Falling away/How can I start my day/Knowing the truth/About love and a loss of youth?/Can’t choose your day/You are told you must go away/How can I live/Knowing that’s all we give?”

    The sadness of that sentiment transitions seamlessly into “Thinking Clean,” which like many Blood Orange tracks on more recent albums, looks back at his youth. This announced from the outset when he sings, “I was thirteen/Thinking clean/What for?/Hardly on/Couldn’t see in front of me/Novel/Hide my face/What if everything was taken from beneath?” Indicating an early predilection for “dark thoughts” (i.e., existential dread), the repetition of the line, “I don’t want to be here anymore” also has a touch of The Smiths in it, with Morrissey’s contempt for British school as an entire institution (think: “The Headmaster Ritual”) flickering through. Which makes sense considering that Hynes has unapologetically stated that The Smiths are one of his biggest influences.

    This is also apparent on “Somewhere in Between,” a track that delves into how, after the death of his mother, he’s now starting to reflect less on his youth, and more on what is now the “later” part of his life. How that part is coming at him faster and more intensely now, ergo the double meaning of the title, which refers to being somewhere in between youth and death and, as Hynes remarked in his Genius interview about the song, “finding a center in the chaos that’s happening.” Granted, Hynes creates plenty of chaos himself by opening the track with the weighty chorus, “And in the middle of your life, could you have taken some more time?/And if it’s nothing like they said, it’s somewhere in between/So I surrender to being just a body with tired limbs/When the world is in your hand you can’t be inside of it.” And, again, can one just pause to appreciate what a bold and potent statement that is to kick off a song? As for the “when the world is in your hand you can’t be inside of it” line, Hynes is coming from a Western worldview, noting that, just because someone has all the “comforts,” it doesn’t mean they’re really living. Indeed, the underlying critique of the Western perspective on things—including and especially death—is present throughout Essex Honey.

    As for the lyrical conclusion of “Somewhere in Between,” all awash in its post-punk-inspired sound (not to mention plenty of musical self-references to Blood Orange’s own sophomore record, Cupid Deluxe), he brings back a key line from “Look At You”—“Hard to look at you”— as a refrain that poetically contrasts with his other desire: “I just want to see again.” This, too, is an acknowledgement of the ways in which Western culture denies so much of reality, particularly when it comes to death. Whether addressing one’s own eventual demise or that of their loved ones. This sentiment being a perfect lead-in to the first line in “The Field”: “Feel it every day.” The Western school of thought being something more akin to, “Feel nothing, ever.”

    Throughout “The Field,” it would be difficult to adhere to such a mantra, with its features from The Durutti Column (in that it samples 1998’s “Sing to Me”), Tariq Al-Sabir, Caroline Polachek (who also helped Hynes crack the code on “Somewhere in Between,” hence her co-writing credit) and Daniel Caesar. The sample of The Durutti Column fittingly comes from the album titled Time Was Gigantic
When We Were Kids. This, once more, tying in nicely with Hynes’ overarching theme on Essex Honey: the passage of time, getting further and further away from one’s youth (therefore, closer to their twilight). In the video for “The Field” (directed by Hynes himself), there is a bittersweet aura to the simple concept of friends packing up a car and going on a little journey (“Healthy as we pray for a journey home”) that involves not only plenty of field action (traipsing around in the ones on the side of the road), but also picking up a speaker at one point and then using it for an impromptu party in another field. At the end of the video, however, Hynes’ unmistakable vibe of still feeling hopelessly alone in a crowd (the result, perhaps, of the intense grief he’s feeling) adds to the melancholic overtones of the single. The repetition of the line, “Hard to let you go” (a companion, of sorts, to “Hard to look at you”) also adds to the sense that “The Field” is a grieving track.

    As is “Mind Loaded,” among the first songs from the album to be unveiled. Once again featuring Caroline Polachek, as well as Lorde and Mustafa. As a matter of fact, it was released right at a moment when Lorde was still packing some clout from the promotion of Virgin. Though, despite her presence (in addition to her chatting up her love of Hynes’ work on social media), it didn’t seem as though “Mind Loaded” got the attention it deserved. Maybe it needed more than a “visualizer” (one that clearly aligns with the narrative world of “The Field”) to assist with that. Instead, a full-on video that included the star power of Lorde, and the “cult following” status of Polachek and Mustafa. Perhaps then, people would have paid more attention to such affecting lyrics as, “Still broken, can’t think straight/Mind loaded, heart still aches” and “Everything means nothing to me/And it all falls before you reach me, oh/You wonder/And it’s hard to feel yourself, love.” As for the overt Elliott Smith reference (he has a song called “Everything Means Nothing to Me”), his influence on the sound and tone of this track can’t be emphasized enough. Which makes sense, for there is no better musical beacon for getting in touch with one’s sadness than Smith.

    Despite his too-premature death, he continues to provide a “Vivid Light” for many musicians. This phrase, “vivid light,” seeming to act as Hynes’ explanation of what “the muse” is represented by in the following track of the same name. With its moody yet ambient backing music, Blood Orange sets the scene of an artist struggling to find inspiration: “Nothing makes it better/Still you try and book a room/Hoping something comes to you/And still you’re dry/It’s like you’ve never touched/A six-string guitar/And the more you write/You never get far.”

    In addition to speaking on a creative “dry well,” it also goes back to the abovementioned conversation Hynes had with Zadie Smith, about questioning the “why” of what you do as an artist. A form of self-doubt that can paralyze you when it comes to “feeling creative.” Particularly when something as intense as a loved one’s death is also weighing on you, this being another palpable motif in “Vivid Light.” One made further evident when, as though acknowledging the sudden absence of his mother forever in the final lines of the song, Hynes sings, “I don’t wanna be here alone/I don’t wanna be here alone,” followed by the dichotomous resolution, “Oh, I wanna run away/I think I might just stay.” To be sure, dichotomy is something that’s present on almost every track from Essex Honey.

    What follows is the equally as gloomy and contemplative “Countryside” featuring Eva Tolkin, Liam Benzvi and Ian Isiah. The third (and allegedly final) single from the album, Hynes once again wields the image of “light” in a somber (rather than hopeful) sort of way. The death of his mother is also all over lyrics that implore, “Take me away from the broken lights [or, as The Smiths would say, “There is a light that never goes out”]/Could it be that you’re alive?/Take me away to the countryside/In the fields trying to hide. Apart from the eerie implications of that question, Hynes adds to the spectral nature of the song (which can apply to both the figurative loss of a lover and the literal loss of a loved one) with the verse, “Another morning here without you/Thinking where did our time go?/As my chest begins to tighten/I seek comfort in the leaves.” The symbol of leaves applying to fall—as in, the fall season of Hynes’ own life. Which is something he’s been thinking about more and more since his mother passed away. And, because of being in this kind of reflective mood as his life hurtles ever forward into the future, it takes him further and further away from his past—this likely being why he tries so hard to remember it on the next song.

    As though to really prove just how much The Smiths have influenced him, “The Last of England” has the mark of said band all over it, starting with an intro that features ambient vocals and the sound of a child screaming (yes, something about it bears the characteristics of the opening to “Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me”). If the title of the song alone wasn’t enough to indicate the band’s influence (think: Morrissey declaring, “England is mine/It owes me a living”), Hynes stated that “this idea of ‘England’ is a big theme of this album.” Particularly as it pertains to what “home” even means to him anymore. Without the “heart” of his family—his mother—there any longer, it is now especially poignant for Hynes to ask himself this question. And if there’s “nothing more to do but leave”—forever, as it were.

    By the second verse, the tone of the music shifts, channeling almost more of a Massive Attack feel as Hynes sings, “Elizabeth [a clear nod to the former Queen of England], it travels through/Ilford [another very specific town name check] is the place that I hold dear/All the things we had to do/My sister understands just how it feels.” Whether that refers to their shared childhood experience alone or their shared “England experience” (as well) is left to the listener’s discretion. As it is to determine whether “but then they took you away” refers to England as it once was or Hynes’ mother—or both.

    The melancholia holds tight on the grandly-titled “Life” featuring Tirzah and Charlotte Dos Santos. As for what “life” means to most people, it’s, well, “making it.” And usually, that entails making money. Thus, Hynes repeats, “I want to see you make it, make it, make it on your own.” Tirzah then complements that urging with her sweetly-delivered verse, “Getting through stages/I’m really, I’m really gonna pace this/I’m really gonna pace this/I’m really gonna pace this/I’m gaining waves of daisies.” This latter phrase somehow conjuring in one’s mind the saying, “Pushing up daisies”—the well-known slang (especially in Britain) for being dead and buried. Just another “subtle” way that mortality permeates this Blood Orange album more than any other before it. This also present in the double meaning of a line like, “Want to see me before I go?/See me before I go?” A query that can pertain as much to leaving a place as an astral plane.

    The next song, “Westerberg” (named in honor of The Replacements’ lead singer, Paul Westerberg) featuring Eva Tolkin and Liam Benzvi, is a noticeable standout for its more up-tempo pace compared to the others. But, of course, it’s still filled with sorrow, nostalgia. This tone announced in the first verse, “Regressing back to times you know/Playing songs you forgot you owned/Change a memory, make it 4/3/Visualize what you want to be/In your ear sings Paul Westerberg.” And something else Westerberg sang in Hynes’ ear during his youth was the chorus to “Alex Chilton” (itself named in honor of another iconic lead singer, thereby creating layers of meta-ness in the art of homage). Which goes, “And children by the million wait for Alex Chilton to come around, ‘round/They sing, ‘I’m in love, what’s that song?’/I’m in love with that song/I’m in love, what’s that song?/Yeah, I’m in love with that song.”

    In Blood Orange’s repurposing of those lyrics, he sings, “I’m in love/What’s that song?/I’m in love/With that song/But it’s easier to breathe when the tar floats down your stream/And you squint to see the truth/That there’s no longer your youth.” Thus, the incorporation of The Replacements into this revelation about lost youth adds yet another layer of sadness to “Westerberg,” for there is nothing that gets one more in touch with their youth than the music that they listened to during it. And yet, no matter how vivid the memories of that time seem, it’s only gotten further and further away—fuzzier and less certain in one’s mind.

    With “The Train (King’s Cross)” featuring Caroline Polachek (a staple on this record), Blood Orange persists in sustaining the up-tempo rhythm as a means to mitigate the cold, hard reality of the sentiments, “Stare through the page/For the first time in my life/I can’t see too far/Can’t turn back and the worst is yet to come/For the first time in my life.” This, once again, referring to how, in the aftermath of his mother’s death, Hynes understands that he himself is getting closer to that age—that “point of no return,” as it were. So it is that he also adds, “I am standing on the brink of the abyss.” Except that, to obfuscate the doom of that statement, he says in in German: “Ich stehe kurz vor dem abgrund.” The motif of having no real sense of what “home” means anymore is also at play in the opening verse, “Soon, I was walking to the train/To see my phone/Nothing there can guide me home.”

    Thus, no wonder he’s “Scared of It.” The “it” being life itself. Continuing the “upbeat” musical tone that helps muddle the grimness of his feelings, “Scared of It” also features additional vocals from Brendan Yates and Ben Watt. But it’s Hynes who admits, “Couldn’t face the end of it/Pretend I’m not scared of it/Everything you knew has gone away.” In this sense, Hynes alludes to being scared of “the end” of something, namely an era. With this next one in his life leading closer and closer to death. A subject that has been an ongoing source of fascination for Hynes, even as “far back” as 2016, manifest in an interview with Kindness during which he remarked, “I think maybe because I’m older, too; not a maturity thing because I’m not more mature, but just closer to dying so I feel more willing to just say yes to things. I don’t know.”

    But what he does know is how to create a “vibeable” sound for songs that dissect painful topics. Much like the second to last offering on Essex Honey, “I Listened (Every Night).” Among the few tracks on the record to have no features, the sparseness of the instrumentation compared to the other songs is also what makes the song feel more urgent, with Hynes declaring, “And I listened every night/Falling out the way/Something made you stay/Time will change you.” Or, as Bowie once put it, “Time may change me/But I can’t trace time.” That abstract concept so ready and willing to slip through your fingers just when you think you’ve “tamed” it. The impossible dream. And, talking of dreams, Hynes concludes “I Listened (Every Night)” with the affecting outro, “I couldn’t see/Anything in between that’s soft/I wasn’t there at all/A dream is often solo.”

    With all these realizations confirmed, Hynes decides “I Can Go,” the concluding track featuring Mabe Fratti and Mustafa. Another song with sparser instrumentation than the others, with piano notes occasionally interjecting. It’s Fratti’s line, said in Spanish (once more, perhaps, to soften the severity of the message)—“Pánico cuando ves el camino,” or “Panic when you see the road”—that holds the most power. And the most meaning. With very few lyrics apart from “I can go,” Hynes is again using the force of repetition to create an even greater impact on the listener. On the one hand, the statement can be looked at as though it’s coming from his own mother, crossing into the great beyond. On the other, it can be interpreted as Hynes himself understanding that he doesn’t “have to” keep making music. Or, as Zadie Smith phrased it to him regarding those who just stop making art at a certain point in their lives, “I admire the person who’s able to say, ‘I did my work. And that’ll do.’”

    However, it’s unlikely that Hynes is the type of artist who can “just” stop. It’s in his bones to make music as much as England—whatever it “means” as a construct—or The Smiths and The Replacements are. And that’s surely been a small comfort amidst his grief.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Living (Dead) Doll: Lady Gaga’s “The Dead Dance” Video

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    Lady Gaga’s relationship to Wednesday has, by now, been well-established, with “Bloody Mary” being far more associated with Wednesday Addams’ (Jenna Ortega) signature dance scene than the actual song that was chosen for it, The Cramps’ “Goo Goo Muck.” The dance in question happened toward the end of the fourth episode in the first season, “Woe What a Night” (which might as well now be called “Marry the Night”). And as Wednesday pays homage to Lisa Loring’s disjointed moves in the OG The Addams Family series (specifically, in the episode titled “Lurch’s Grand Romance”), the song that now automatically enters people’s minds (thanks to the scourge that is TikTok) is the “sped-up” version of “Bloody Mary.”

    So it was that Gaga’s association with the Universe Addams became sealed—which is exactly why she was asked about using one of her songs for a certain scene in the second season (namely, when Enid Sinclair [Emma Myers] is performing her “solo” at the gala in “Woe Me the Money”). However, Gaga did Tim Burton one better by deciding to tailor an original composition for the show. As she told Tudum (Netflix’s website for further deep dives into its original series and films),

    “I immediately had a song in mind called ‘The Dead Dance,’ and I had started working on it. But once I knew it was going to be for Wednesday, I decided that I was going to work on it even more and I made it extra special for the show. To me, when you know that music and pop culture and Tim Burton all come together with this cast, that’s a very special recipe. So that’s why I’m here. After that happened, they asked me if I wanted to be on the show, and I said, ‘Absolutely.’”

    That role she secured being Rosaline Rotwood, a now-dead former teacher at Nevermore who ends up being responsible for the Freaky Friday plotline between Wednesday and Enid in episode six of season two, “Woe Thyself.” And so, there you have it: TikTok made all this happen with the viral use of “Bloody Mary.” Indeed, in an alternate universe, wherein “Bloody Mary” actually had a music video made for it, it would probably look a lot like the aesthetic presented in “The Dead Dance,” directed (in black and white, Ed Wood-style) by none other than Tim Burton himself. As such, it’s got all the hallmarks of a Burton movie, complete with creepy dolls—and Gaga playing the “lead doll,” if you will (perhaps, in her own subtle way, playing into the current trans-protective mantra, “Protect the Dolls”). Naturally, there’s no better location for all of this than the infamous La Isla de las Muñecas (The Island of the Dolls) in Mexico City.

    With opening notes that recall the tune of “Dance in the Dark,” Gaga the living (dead) doll slowly comes to life, exhibiting the sort of bodily movements that recall Ian Curtis having an epilepsy attack. Her erratic movements cease as she begins to sing the opening verse, “Like the words of a song, I hear you call.” Her shaking then persists (something in the hand movements reminding one of Edward Scissorhands) as she adds, “Like a thief in my head, you criminal/You stole my thoughts before I dreamed them/And you killed my queen with just one pawn.” With these lines, it’s as though Gaga tailoring the single to Wednesday is already apparent in the ostensible allusion to how Tyler Galpin (Hunter Doohan), who turned out to be a Hyde controlled by Nevermore teacher Ms. Thornhill (Christina Ricci, whose appearance is another meta nod to a previous iteration of Wednesday Addams), did Wednesday wrong. “Making” her fall in love with him despite knowing full well he is a hideous monster inside. Though, to be fair, the Wednesday that most people know and hate would never deign to fall in love (so saccharine and clichĂ© as it is).

    In any event, as Gaga’s range of motion starts to escalate in the video, she begins to prance around in other parts of the wooded area she’s in—a graveyard, as it were (or so they say
though there seems to be no sign of a gravestone anywhere). The other dolls, too, appear to reveal errant signs of life, usually through an arbitrary eyelid flutter or, more eerily still, a slight smile. The lyrics then continue to speak to the unique form of heartbreak Wednesday experienced as Gaga takes it to the chorus, “Yeah, I’ll keep on dancin’ until I’m dead/I’ll dance until I’m dead/‘Cause when you killed me inside, that’s when I came alive/Yeah, the music’s gonna bring mĐ” back from death/I’m dancin’ until I’m dead/I’ll dancĐ” until I’m dead.”

    In Wednesday’s case, the only music that’s bringing her back from death is the distinctive picks she plays on her cello. All while ruing the day she ever let Tyler/a Hyde’s tongue into her mouth. Indeed, right after being the one to kiss him (also very un-Wednesday-like behavior), she has the premonition that leads her to finally understand that he’s been the one who’s been behind the murders all along (not, as she originally thought, Xavier Thorpe [Percy Hynes White]). So it is that she runs away from him and comments to herself, “Of course the first boy I kiss would turn out to be a psychotic, serial killing monster.”

    As for Gaga, the only place she keeps running is to the makeshift dance floor she’s created in the woodsy “island,” with four live people—not dolls—suddenly serving as her backup dancers while she performs some choreo that is decidedly “Vogue”-inspired (but then, Gaga is no stranger to grafting elements of Madonna’s oeuvre, whether intentional or not). Even her hair and ensemble, for as “staid Victorian” as it’s meant to be, has echoes of Madonna’s eighteenth-century look at the 1990 VMAs (while performing, what else, “Vogue”). Though, naturally, most will see only the “nod” to Michael Jackson in the “Thriller” video (on a side note: it’s also very Madonna to freely pay homage to Jackson without thinking about what that means in terms of continuing to deify someone who was a probable pedo).

    Around the three-minute-twenty-second mark, the video gets a suffusion of color, almost as if Enid Sinclair decided to weigh in during the edit, insisting that it was all too dreary (and also, why not add in some more shots of the moon?). Though, of course, any dreariness in visuals is belied by the danceable backing music, co-produced by Gaga, Cirkut and Watt (both of whom co-produced much of Mayhem). The sort of music, in short, that Wednesday would detest, billing it as the kind of thing that only “a trend-chasing, rainbow-loving social media addict whose tastes in clothes and music are a heinous assault on culture” would enjoy.

    That said, it wouldn’t surprise anyone at this point to see Wednesday “vibing” to it at yet another Nevermore school dance. For this is a different kind of Wednesday—a more maudlin kind under Burton’s, and now Gaga’s, influence.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Like Beck Before Him, Tame Impala Embraces Being a “Loser” (With “Steve Harrington” Standing in for His Role)

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    As Tame Impala continues to give his listeners a taste of the next album to come, “Loser” serves as the second single to follow “End of Summer.” And, in contrast to the latter, there’s less “jubilant bittersweetness” to the track, and instead more of a resigned hopelessness. Indeed, very much in the spirit of Beck’s seminal 1993 “anti-hit,” “Loser,” which went on to become a Gen X anthem (and, not to worry, Tame Impala is aware of his reference, further solidified by Beck making a cameo in his “Loser” video).

    Since Tame Impala is representative of the millennial generation, perhaps he’s decided to offer them up their own somewhat belated anthem, now that it’s crystal clear they won’t be holding down steady jobs or buying houses in this lifetime. Or maybe it’s just that Kevin Parker is still stuck in the mindset that he’s a “loser” by sheer non-virtue of being a musician. After all, Parker’s father, Jerry, had drilled it into his head that making a career out of music wasn’t a viable option. Not just because the likelihood of it happening in a way that could regularly pay the bills was improbable, but because, “If you do music as your job, as the thing that puts food on the table, then it will instantly ruin its magic, it won’t be mysterious and fun anymore, it would just be like work.”

    And so, Parker tried his hand at playing it straight for a while, attending university and majoring in engineering. At some point during his tenure, he decided to somewhat rock the boat/say “fuck you” to convention by majoring in astronomy. A decision on which he commented, “I knew that I would be poor and I just wanted to do whatever was fun.” Spoken like a true so-called loser. Or, at least, the definition of a loser that society ingrains within people who couldn’t care less about being rich. Granted, some of the less desirable loser qualities—such as being an unkempt dick—are present in the Sam Kristofski-directed video (shot in the same cinematic widescreen aspect ratio as “End of Summer”), with Joe Keery a.k.a. Steve Harrington (in truth, there’s a lot of Steve during his Scoops Ahoy employee era emanating from this particular “loser”) playing the stand-in for Parker.

    To be sure, Parker must have hand-picked Keery to play him because, from the back, the two look practically identical (it’s the hair, obviously). However, Keery’s voice gives him away as “not Parker” while he chases after the girlfriend he’s clearly just insulted. As she glares at him and indicates that he better get his hands off her fucking Benz, it’s apparent that this relationship is really all he has going for him. So when she drives away, it’s easy to see that “Djo,” as the “character” is called (a nod to Keery’s Instagram handle), feels as though he’s lost the one thing (women always being seen as “things” to men) that at least sort of made him feel like a winner. But with no “dame” to prop him up now, Djo is left to walk to the convenience store (though some call it a grocery store) on his own—with Bob’s Market in Echo Park getting plenty of screen time (and yes, it feels pointed for the video to be set in Echo Park when taking into account that plenty of loser musicians live there).

    But before walking into the shop, Djo is met with a dirty, judgmental look from a cop. Even though briefly fazed by it, he still goes in to collect what he came for: a beer. The drink not of champions, but losers. So it is that, as he pulls one out of the fridge (at least it’s in a “classy” bottle, not a can), the chorus declares, “I’m a loser, babe/Do you wanna tear my heart out?/I’m a tragedy/Tryin’ to figure this whole mess out.”

    And the perfect place, apparently, to figure said mess out is at Bob’s Market. Since, instead of leaving with his beer, Djo just sits outside drinking it—still there by the time night falls. Because, really, where else has a loser got to be? Although mostly staring into space (perhaps such a loser that he doesn’t even have a phone to occupy his blank gaze), Djo clocks a scratch-off ticket lying on the ground and unabashedly picks it up so that he can scratch it with his nail—not even a goddamn penny or something (further proof that loserdom is, in this world, automatically associated with being penniless). Which is why it’s so appropriate that the lyrics, “Desperate times call for dĐ”sperate measurĐ”s” play right at this instant.

    Having no luck with the ticket (quelle surprise), Djo continues to visibly spiral, which makes for the perfect time to introduce the song’s dreamy bridge: “I leave alone and/Dark streets I roam in/Night air, I breathe in/The stars I believe in [again, he majored in astronomy]/I don’t know why I didn’t fight it/I probably tried and magnified it/I cannot lie, I feel defeated/Take it as a sign, you’re badly needed/You’re badly needed/Badly wanted [a woman always being “salvation” to Parker].” During the final scenes of the video during which these lyrics punctuate the bleakness of the moment, a car containing a couple pulls up to the market. The guy in the couple gets out of the car while the woman remains in the front seat smoking a cigarette. As she waits for him to get back, she locks eyes briefly with Djo, flashing him a decided “you’re a loser” look before tossing her cig out the window.

    When their car pulls out, Djo shamelessly picks up what’s left of the cigarette and smokes it (smoking now being a sign o’ the retro times), turning around to see a little boy also looking at him like he can’t believe what a loser Djo is. After receiving the child’s disgusted appraisal, he continues to sit on the sidewalk. Then there’s a few seconds where, after a passerby breaks the viewer’s sight of Djo, we see Parker himself sitting in the same place—same outfit and, of course, same haircut (or lack thereof). And while Parker is still in the “loser” role, we hear the simple outro of the song, whispered like a sigh: “Fuck.”

    Another passerby then breaks the view to bring it back to Djo sitting there looking all forlorn and hopeless in the world. And, just when one thinks there really is no hope for this loser, his face lights up and he smiles at someone in the distance. Presumably, the girlfriend who had abandoned him at the outset of this whole sad affair. Looking at her like a revelation, Parker seeks to prove that, yes, it’s true: god is a woman. Especially in the life of a loser douche who ought to realize no one else is lining up to get with him.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • The Roses Pales in Comparison to Its Far Bolder and Darker Original, The War of the Roses

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    Jay Roach is no stranger to directing remakes of “darker” films that are much more diluted than the original. Take, for example, 2010’s Dinner for Schmucks, the ill-advised attempt to re-create the 1998 French comedy, Le Düner de Cons. In fact, much like the former, Roach’s remake of The Roses relies on its lead actors, Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman, to mitigate the overwhelming inferiority of this new iteration. One that seeks to dilute, as much as possible, the macabre tone of the 1989 version, written by Michael J. Leeson and directed by Danny DeVito. The latter also plays a key role as the narrator of the anti-fairy tale (in fact, without him [or at least someone to “replace” him], the narrative framework can’t help but feel totally lacking, unmoored). And it is a tale
or is it? For, throughout the film, there’s this sense that it could be nothing more than a divorce urban legend, so “absurd” and “implausible” is the behavior of Oliver (Michael Douglas) and Barbara Rose (Kathleen Turner) as their marital “strife” escalates to an all-out war. 

    Even at the outset of their relationship, there’s an element of the fantastical, with Oliver and Barbara initially encountering one another at an antique auction in Nantucket in the midst of a brewing nor’easter. Though this is mostly how it happens in Warren Adler’s 1981 novel of the same name, with Jonathan Rose (as he’s named in the book) encountering Barbara Knowles (whose first name, for whatever reason, remains the same in the movie) at an estate sale auction in Cape Cod. The two have a similar bidding war over a “nominal” item, establishing their competitive natures with one another—and the turn-on it provides to each of them to “spar.” Or, as the “Jonathan” of Cumberbatch’s interpretation, now renamed to “Theo Rose,” calls it, “repartee.” More specifically, he says that what Americans (particularly American therapists) deem unhealthy bickering, the Brits know merely as repartee. A little flirtatious tit for tat that reveals the mark of a worthy and witty opponent, er, partner. 

    Theo and Ivy (Colman)—no longer Barbara either—certainly have that going for them. In fact, tweaking the leads to being British in nationality is just one of many “new elements” in The Roses. Including shifting the setting from the East Coast (Massachusetts, in the beginning, and then the “Potomac area”) to the West. More specifically, Mendocino. But it’s Ivy who makes it her goal to flee somewhere as antithetical to London as possible. Someplace that isn’t so stodgy (and what is California if not, even still, a liberal’s haven?). Before embarking on her escape to America, she encounters Theo at the restaurant where she’s working as a chef whose creativity is being constantly stifled. In a similar fashion, Theo has just entered her kitchen to get a reprieve from a “boss type” who doesn’t understand his rage over his apartment housing design being compromised by the removal of all the balconies. Because, yes, in this iteration of the story, Theo is an architect (not a corporate lawyer like Oliver). With both seeing something creatively stymied in the other, a spark of attraction is ignited, and they end up having sex in the freezer after Theo suggests that he should move with her to America (so clearly, this must be some alternate timeline of the U.S., wherein the orange creature is not the current dictator). 

    Ten years on, they’re living the so-called American dream, entirely on Theo’s architect’s salary (further perpetuating the myth that the job of architect is inherently high-paying). This classic case of “expected” gender roles/women still being relegated to “homemaker” and “household manager” holding true in the update as well. The difference, however, is that there is a reversal of fortune moment at the beginning of the film. Thanks to a storm that not only ruins Theo’s freshly unveiled design for a maritime museum (with a sail-bedecked rooftop as its crowning aspect of the design), but also directs large amounts of foot traffic to Ivy’s erstwhile sparsely attended restaurant, We’ve Got Crabs!. The place that Theo bought for her as a sort of pet project so that she could keep channeling her culinary skills into something other than just whipping up sugary confections for their children, twins Hattie (first played by Delaney Quinn and then Hala Finley) and Roy (first played by Ollie Robinson and then Wells Rappaport).

    Indeed, spending time with her children is Ivy’s most treasured experience—until she realizes just how much her talent has been going to waste with the advent of all these new mouths to feed; mouths that, in turn, lavish praise on her for her cooking. And so, as Theo becomes an unemployed persona non grata in his field (complete with a rash of humiliating viral videos “remixing” the well-documented destruction of the museum), Ivy becomes the premier, most sought-after person in hers. And thus, the two strike up an accord that, while Theo finds a way to get back on his feet, he’ll take over her role, and she’ll take over his. So it is that the children are no longer operating under such a liberal parenting attitude, as Theo takes the helm and turns them into fitness freaks. In contrast, the children in The War of the Roses, Carolyn (played first by Bethany McKinney and then Heather Fairfield) and Josh (played first by Trenton Teigen and then by Sean Astin) end up obese during their childhood as a result of Barbara’s influence and laxity, whereas Hattie and Roy end up hyper-athletic and fit in The Roses as a result of Theo’s. 

    The missing piece in The War of the Roses is this “high-powered career swap” plot device. Though Barbara, a former gymnast (this “little detail” being useful to the story during many instances), does start to parlay her talent for cooking into a catering business around the same time she has the epiphany that she doesn’t want to be married to Oliver another second. This revelation fully crystallizing after Oliver has a heart attack scare (which turns out to be the angina-like effects of a hiatal hernia). Because, upon hearing this news, Barbara doesn’t feel sadness, but total relief. “Like a weight had been lifted.” Like she was finally free
from the oppression of being a full-time wife and mother. For it is only now, as their children are going off to college, that she’s started to regret every sacrifice she ever made. In The Roses, the inverse of this occurs for “the wife” in the permutation, with Ivy regretting that she chose her career over her children as they go off to some special fitness camp at thirteen. She blames Theo for this, too: pushing them away sooner than they needed to go with his “excellence conditioning.” Something she finds ironic considering what a “dud” he turned out to be on the provider front. 

    In this sense, too, The Roses deviates from The War of the Roses in that Barbara ultimately wishes Oliver hadn’t turned out to be such an alpha male, such an “exceptional earner” (as Britney would say)—because it left no room for her to contribute financially. Something she knows is the only way to truly assert some form of power in a monogamous relationship. But beyond that, to feel some sense of independence for herself. And, speaking of having an independent nature, it’s no wonder Barbara is a “cat person,” while needy, constantly-searching-for-validation Oliver is a dog person. As such, they each have what amounts to their own pets: Kitty Kitty and Bennie. Both of whom will serve as collateral damage in the ensuing war (though Bennie does technically survive, per one specific scene shown right after Barbara tells Oliver he’s eating dog-filled pĂątĂ©; however, one imagines that scene of Bennie was only added conciliatorily after a bad test audience reaction). The Roses is markedly missing any pet subplots, just one of many facets removed that serve as a sign o’ the times in terms of studios responding more cautiously toward audience sensitivities. 

    This is also perhaps why, where The War of the Roses starts showing the eponymous war in the second act, the war between Ivy and Theo doesn’t really start until act three (ergo, possibly the reason for just calling it The Roses), after he builds her the house that is at the center of it. Because what was the point of reassigning his career from lawyer to architect if he wasn’t going to build it instead of, as in The War of the Roses, Barbara “finding it.” A.k.a. lusting after it for years until happening upon the owner’s wake at the house one day and becoming the first buyer in line as a result. 

    In both films, the house, in some sense, represents the wish to cling to the relationship in its idealized form. Though not for Barbara. She sees it as the only tangible proof of all the years she sacrificed to marriage and family. Carefully furnishing it and outfitting it with the best objects that Oliver’s money could buy. Particularly a creepy array of Staffordshire figurines. But Barbara’s struggle to find “the perfect Staffordshire figures” for the house is also a nod to the book, in which these figures become something of an obsession of Jonathan’s—hence, the reason why he’s at the estate sale auction that leads to his “meet-cute” (or rather “meet-brutal”) with Barbara. 

    Although, for the present era, Theo and Ivy’s briefly-shown war might seem “nasty,” it is nothing compared to the depths of darkness that The War of the Roses sinks into. After all, as Gavin D’Amato (DeVito), Oliver’s lawyer and friend, says to the would-be client he’s telling this tale to, “We came from mud. And after 3.8 billion years of evolution, at our core is still mud. Nobody can be a divorce lawyer and doubt that.” Speaking of divorce lawyers, the best that Jay Roach and writer Tony McNamara (usually more dependable for a great script, adapted or otherwise—see: The Favourite, Cruella and Poor Things) can drum up to represent Theo in the divorce is his hapless real estate friend Barry (Andy Samberg), clearly some ill-advised stand-in for Gavin.

    As for Barry’s wife, Amy (Kate McKinnon), her entire presence is non sequitur. Providing the kind of “cringe comedy” she’s known for, but that is totally out of place within the universe of this movie. There’s also the numerous glaring issues pertaining to half-assed storylines, like one of Ivy’s employees getting caught having sex with another employee—something that never comes up again. Or the trip that Ivy and Theo take to New York together to “reconnect,” but that serves no real purpose for progressing the plot forward. In this sense, these scenes come off more as “time fillers” to avoid getting to the same kind of “meat” that The War of the Roses was unafraid to dive right into by Act Two. Because, at its core, The War of the Roses is about the fundamental disappointment that comes after you’ve achieved everything you were “supposed to” (particularly as a woman)—the marriage, the kids, the house, the financial security. The Roses is about a more conventional form of resentment related to who makes the money, who serves as the breadwinner in a relationship. And how it leads to power imbalances in different and unexpected ways. 

    Arguably the most vexing thing about this remake is not only that many people (*cough cough* Lily Allen) don’t even seem to recognize that it is a remake, but that it feigns being equally as “daring” in its dark tone as the original, while having the gall to end the movie on a note that suggests the two might actually get back together. In The War of the Roses, Barabara remains steadfast in her contempt until the bitter end. And oh, how very bitter it gets, with her pushing his hand away from her as the two expire at the same time thanks to falling from the ceiling while perched on their chandelier. 

    Worse still, Roach and McNamara don’t have the cojones to actually full-on show Theo and Ivy dying together due to a gas leak in their precious home that Theo unintentionally caused when he smashed the shit out of Ivy’s Julia Child stove. Instead, it cuts to black before the audience can even see an explosion. Which means their death isn’t necessarily “assured” (nor, as mentioned, is their divorce). And so, these characters didn’t categorically die on their respective hills the way Barbara and Oliver did. Making for a more “light-hearted” viewing experience for modern audiences who can’t stomach the notion of two people who were once in love now irrevocably despising each other. Not that such a conclusion should be any shock considering the near extinction of monogamy when compared to the 80s.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Sabrina Carpenter Creates Yet Another Taurus Anthem With “Tears”

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    Evidently continuing to assert herself as the reigning queen of making Taurus anthems (sorry Adele [though “Someone Like You” still slaps, particularly as a Taurus anthem/torch song]), with “Taste” (not to be confused with Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s) and “Please Please Please” being some of the pinnacles of what that means, Sabrina Carpenter has released yet another one: “Tears.” Marking the second hit single from Man’s Best Friend (following “Manchild”), it’s very much in keeping with the tropes of this specific zodiac sign—more to the point, her specific zodiac sign. And yes, it was Carpenter herself who once said, “My favorite thing about being a Taurus is that I get to use the excuse ‘I’m sorry I’m a Taurus.’ It kinda works in every facet of life.” 

    Not least of which is lusting after a man who’s responsible, reliable and “good around the house.” For there’s nothing a Taurus loves more than someone who not only respects the sanctity of their domestic space, but even seeks to further elevate it. For their (usually-not-so-humble) abode is an environment they especially deem their “kingdom” (though they tend to see most everywhere else as part of their “dominion,” too). And, considering that Carpenter has been on tour for the past two years (embarking on the Short n’ Sweet Tour from 2024 to 2025), it’s no wonder she would deliver such comforts-of-home-craving lines as, “Assemble a chair from Ikea, I’m like, ‘Uh.’” Granted, the unabashed decadence of Taurean tastes means you won’t typically find them anywhere near an Ikea. Particularly with a limitless budget like Carpenter’s. 

    What they can be found near, however, are spooky houses with sumptuous interiors, as is the case with the Rocky Horror Picture Show-inspired video that accompanies the track. For what is a Taurus if not adventurous and naughty, paired with a dichotomous penchant for desiring luxury, debauchery and comfort? Then, of course, there’s the “problem” of being ruled by Venus, which applies not just to the planet, but to the goddess also known as Aphrodite. Her sensual nature, which makes the frequently-depicted-in-the-buff deity a natural fit for embodying the Goddess of Love, is what extends to the sign she reigns over, with the Taurus’ sense of raunchiness (and, as Carpenter also represents, general horniness)—e.g., “I get wet at the thought of you/Being a responsible guy
/Tears run down my thighs—getting them into almost as much trouble as their stubbornness. 

    Regarding the raunch factor, it’s at least part of what draws “innocent” (even if only in appearance) Carpenter to the abandoned-looking ramshackle of a house after her incompetent boyfriend apparently got them into a car crash. Then, like Alice down the rabbit hole or Dorothy in Oz, Carpenter stumbles upon a “land” that makes everything suddenly feel like it’s in Technicolor, having formerly existed in a bland, black-and-white way in the life she shared with her now-presumed-dead boyfriend. But Carpenter’s Easter Sunday appearance quickly gives way to clothes coming off (quite literally) as she dances and prances with Colman Domingo (a Sag cusping Scorpio, Taurus’ opposite on the zodiac wheel, which also makes Scorpio something like their diabolical id) in the overt Dr. Frank-N-Furter role. A pied piper bringing out all of Carpenter’s inner kink. On this note, it seems an unfair (and inaccurate) stereotype that Taureans are also often accused of being “boring” when, in fact, that couldn’t be further from the truth. For their love of “responsibility” is matched only by their love of fun and beauty (these things, increasingly, often being what only money can buy and, therefore, part of the Taurean obsession with making as much of it as possible).

    This love of fun and beauty is what Carpenter embodies in the Bardia Zeinali-directed video (following what he did for another one of Carpenter’s Taurus anthems, “Please Please Please”). Her Taurean fervor for the heady combination of vibrant aesthetics and sensuality reaches an especial crescendo as she “just happens to find herself” in frilly lingerie while pole-dancing in some nearby cornfield. And not just because, as an Earth sign, Carpenter can’t help but show some love for “the land.” With cornfields also being a “necessary” clichĂ© in many horror movies (see, most recently: Pearl, with the eponymous character putting her own “sexy spin” on what a cornfield can provide, mood-wise
apart from just creepiness). But the “horror” (or horror-comedy, considering the movie it pays homage to) pastiche of “Tears” is wielded, ultimately, to emphasize a “pure” and “wholesome” girl (read: a Taurus) coming to terms with her irrepressible sexuality (read: a Taurus at war with their so-called dark side). Much like Janet Weiss (Susan Sarandon) in The Rocky Horror Picture Show. 

    By the same token, what awakens the sexual gratitude in a Taurus are the very “normie,” Hestia-oriented types of things Carpenter brings up when she declares, “A little respect for women can get you very, very far/Remembering how to use your phone gets me oh so, oh so hot/Considering I have feelings, I’m like, ‘Why are my clothes still on?’/Offering to do anything, I’m like, ‘Oh my God.’” And, of course, the domesticity “codedness” of, “I get wet at the thought of you/Being a responsible guy/Treating me like you’re supposed to do/Tears run down my thighs” can’t be overemphasized enough. Mixing the pure and the profane as only a Taurus can with that chorus (no rhyme intended), Carpenter then continues, “A little initiative can go a very long, long way/Baby, just do the dishes, I’ll give you what you, what you want/A little communication, yes, that’s my ideal foreplay.”

    It doesn’t get more “banal” than that—and yet, this expression of “just wanting some safeness and dependability” is spiced up in a manner that only a Taurus can do it, with their keen ability to infuse the quotidian with a much-needed tincture of sexiness and sassiness. A skill that, lately, Carpenter has been quite keen to flex. Because, yes, a bit of a “nobody does it better” attitude is also part and parcel of being a “standard” Taurus. Along with plenty of snark “hidden” behind that false veneer of “being slow” (or slow-talking).

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • The Return of Smoking Aligns With the Return of Retro Practices in General

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    It’s a “trend” (read: way of life) many have been noticing for the past couple of years: smoking. Its steady rise back into mainstream culture arguably reaching a crescendo with Brat summer, the Charli XCX-fueled phenomenon-by-way-of-an-album that laid out what constitutes a “brat,” at least aesthetically: “pack of cigs, a Bic lighter and a strappy white top with no bra.” Note that pack of cigs was placed at the top of the list, even if XCX was largely just bullshitting/trolling the press
as is the wont of a true brat.

    And yet, it was as though she “manifested” the full-fledged opening of the floodgates when it came to “social smoking” being back in a big way. Unapologetically so. For, where once there was a stigma about it, the summer of 2024 seemed to confirm something that had been brewing for a while: if the “culture” was going to be subjected to the retro practices being consistently touted and implemented by a certain administration helmed by a certain orange creature, then it wanted to at least get back one “good” retro practice out of it: the joy of smoking. No matter that everyone, by now, is well-aware of the bodily harm it guarantees. 

    Here, too, another factor is at play with regard to the “why” of cigarettes a.k.a. “cancer sticks” taking off so much in recent times: it’s apparent that more and more people aren’t seeing much of a viable future for the world, so why not really find (a.k.a. buy, for an extremely exorbitant price) the thing you love and let it kill you? It’s not like there’s going to be an assured tomorrow anyway, n’est-ce pas? So “let it rip.” Or, in this case, let it burn. Put another way by Jared Oviatt a.k.a. “@cigfluencers” (now the go-to person for articles about why cigarettes are “back”), “The dream of stability, owning a home, financial security feels increasingly out of reach. So the question becomes: why not do what you want? Why not smoke? Nothing matters!”

    However, speaking to that aforementioned point about the exorbitant price, the people smoking are actually the ones who can own a home, do have financial security. To be sure, there seems to be something to the idea that “only” celebrities are smoking again (ergo, in some enraged people’s opinions, trying to make it “cool” again)—perhaps because the cost of a pack of cigarettes, to them, amounts to pennies. Which is why RosalĂ­a brought an entire “cigarette bouquet” to Charli XCX for her 32nd birthday on August 2, 2024. Because, while roughly fifteen dollars a pack (when bought from a metropolitan city like L.A.) is alms to the richies, it makes far more of a dent in the average person’s so-called salary. Hence, the popularity of cigarettes among celebrities not necessarily causing a major uptick in smoking among “the commoners.” Who tend to prefer vaping anyway, a much more dĂ©classĂ© form of smoking, with only slightly less harmful health effects. Even so, Lana Del Rey remains committed to it, despite previously being one of the earlier known celebrities of the twenty-first century to parade her cig habit (once an indelible part of her visuals). 

    But then, that’s because Del Rey was always touting twentieth century views and “ideals” in the first place. It’s only now that “everyone else” has “caught up” to her (as she herself presently chooses vaping instead—to which her recent opening act, Addison Rae, would say, “Ew, I hate vaping”) by allowing themselves to fall behind. And why shouldn’t they, when everything around them reflects a society that has entered a time machine, reinvoking the worst of what “hippies” and “crusaders” fought against in the mid-twentieth century: racism, sexism and an overtly patriarchal society.

    Alas, since all of that has bubbled up to the surface again with a vengeance, many seem to think that, at the bare minimum, that should include the erstwhile “glamor” of cigarettes. Before the myth of their “doctor recommended” cachet was debunked with an early 1960s study that definitively concluded cigarettes cause lung cancer. It was in 1964, with the publication of Smoking and Health: Report of the Advisory Committee to the Surgeon General of the Public Health Service, that things for the tobacco industry started to get really dicey. Because that’s when the PSAs, both in print and on TV, started coming out, making increasingly indelible impressions on people as the decades wore on. 

    The 90s were an especially “anti-smoking” time, in terms of campaigns going hard against tobacco. One ad, seeking to satirize the supposed glamor of smoking now mostly associated with Old Hollywood films, depicted a man and woman with “movie star vibes” as the former asks, “Mind if I smoke?” Her reply: “Care if I die?” The message was out: smoking was decidedly gross, selfish and, worst of all (for men and women alike), caused impotence. And yes, it’s almost certain that’s a problem for “cigfluencer” Matty Healy, who went from dating the “wholesome” Taylor Swift to the “brat-adjacent” Gabbriette, a fellow smoker. Because, despite the 90s being always on-trend with the likes of those in the “Brat orbit,” anti-smoking isn’t something that took hold from that hallowed decade. Besides, even the it girls of the day (e.g., Kate Moss, ChloĂ« Sevigny, Winona Ryder) clearly never paid much attention to such ads. Or the influence their unabashed smoking had on those who wanted to be like them.

    Even so, that didn’t stop the effects of the anti-smoking movement at the government level, with California in particular being ahead of the curve on banning smoking in restaurants, workplaces and bars starting in 1995 (though Beverly Hills specifically started banning smoking in certain public places in 1987). Rather ironic considering that Hollywood was the place that started selling cigarettes as “glamorous” in the first place. The dive that the reputation of the cigarette took by the mid-2000s was so noticeable that it can best be summed up by Aaron Eckhart’s character, Nick Naylor, in 2006’s Thank You For Smoking, when he laments that the only people you see smoking in movies anymore are “RAVs”: Russians, Arabs and villains (the former two often neatly fitting into the latter category for Americans anyway). 

    Enter Mary-Kate Olsen, who, despite her twin also being a smoker, was arguably the first to really bring back cigarettes as a mark of “class” and “wealth.” This while also embodying the brat definition of wielding them as an accessory long before Charli XCX herself crystallized what brat even meant. MK’s cigarette-smoking advocacy reached an apex at her 2015 wedding to Olivier Sarkozy, an event that prompted Page Six to famously describe the reception as having “bowls and bowls filled with cigarettes, and everyone smoked the whole night.” It was a phrase—and scene—that pop culture enthusiasts couldn’t stop obsessing over. And maybe it took XCX’s Brat to “inspire” a new generation glom on to what Mary-Kate had already done for cigs anyway. Well, her and a few other 00s-era “bad girls,” including Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears (as a certain infamous 2008 Rolling Stone article phrased it, “She is an inbred swamp thing who chain-smokes”).

    All of which is to say that, sure, the “coolness” of smoking has survived numerous threats to its clout in the years since the truth about its dangers was made public. But it—smoking—has always been there, just waiting in the wings to reemerge again as a viable thing to do for securing one’s “effortless” chicness. However, the fact that the confluence of retro political policies and stances on gender (de facto, gender roles) has aligned with smoking’s latest renaissance doesn’t seem like a coincidence at all. So much as an additional way to “mirror the past.”  And to further undo all the human progress that was made since.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Caught Stealing With a Hand in Pi: Darren Aronofsky’s Expertise in 1998

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    As Xan Brooks of The Guardian pointed out in an interview with Darren Aronofsky, his latest film, Caught Stealing, “could almost be his parallel-universe first movie, given that it’s set in 1998, around the time he was shooting his actual first film, Pi, on the same East Side streets.” But beyond just that full-circle kind of correlation, there are many marked similarities between Pi and Caught Stealing
even though Aronofsky didn’t write the script for the latter. No, instead, Charlie Huston adapted it from his own novel of the same name, originally released in 2004. A year that found the masses still coming off the “high” of the late 90s. Sobered instead by the new realities of the twenty-first century, which weren’t at all what they had been made out to be as the twentieth century came to a close. Or, as Aronofsky puts it, “People were looking forward to the new millennium. It was going to be The Jetsons. It was going to be sci-fi.” Turns out, it was just going to be a shitshow. And one that greased the wheels for the current horrors plaguing the globe (though the U.S. in particular). 

    Granted, many were still generally feeling plagued (and paranoid) in the late 90s, as Aronofsky shows only too well through his main character in Pi, Max Cohen (Sean Gullette). Although a number theorist, Max is what “the suits” would call “unemployed.” But that doesn’t mean his time isn’t constantly occupied, mainly by an obsession with finding the numerical pattern in everything, even a number as chaotic, as unknowable as pi. And, being the type of person who, the more he’s told something can’t be done, has to do it, it’s no wonder that 1) he thinks he can find a pattern in pi and 2) among the initial voiceovers the viewer hears from Max is that when he a child, his mother told him not to stare into the sun. “So once when I was six I did.” The result was temporary blindness and, in the present, randomly occurring, debilitating headaches. Even so, it seemed Max found it worth it to prove something to himself. More accurately, to find out something for himself. 

    At the same time, denial and avoidance are imperative to the way he lives, functions. The same can definitely be said of Caught Stealing’s anti-hero, Henry “Hank” Thompson (Austin Butler), who descended upon New York’s Lower East Side after running away from his dark past in California, where, once upon a time, he had a bright future ahead of him. For he was slated to become a professional baseball player. That is, until he, like Max, engaged in the kind of self-destructive behavior that was to doom his once-bright future. And, also like Max, Hank might be viewed as “barely getting by” on the financial front. This during one of the last eras in New York when it was possible to just “kind of be there” without an actual career.  Or at least a career goal. But Hank’s lone goal is to forget, able to do so in part thanks to the alcohol perks of being a bartender at a dive called Paul’s Bar. With Paul (Griffin Dunne) filling in for the sort-of mentor role that Sol Robeson (Mark Margolis) fulfills in Pi.

    Hank’s only other “distraction” is Yvonne (ZoĂ« Kravitz), a paramedic who increasingly wonders just how serious their relationship is (on a related side note regarding Hank’s “emotional distractions,” there’s also, of course, Bud, the cat he’s saddled with early on in the movie). But at least Hank doesn’t come across as asexual in the least, like Max, who clams up if his clearly interested neighbor, Devi (Samia Shoaib), so much as approaches his, er, peephole. And yes, the POV shot from the peephole is among the pivotal filming techniques that Aronofsky uses to assert a “unique style” for his debut. Even if it is the sort of style most commonly associated with debuts: deliberately “esoteric.” 

    Aronofsky’s directorial signatures have, needless to say, been quite fine-tuned since then, with Caught Stealing exemplifying his ease with “slickness.” But not the kind of slickness that was so aware of itself in the late 90s (see also: The Matrix, which seems to have borrowed certain elements of Pi, if for no other reason than modeling the apartment that Neo [Keanu Reeves] lives in after Max’s). And yet, part of what makes Pi such a distinctively “of its time” product is its highly postmodern sense of self-awareness (complete with the voiceover trope that was so popular in “edgy” 90s movies—case in point, Fight Club). 

    What’s more, the soundtrack of Pi is so authentically of the 90s that it would be impossible to fully entrench Caught Stealing’s sound in that way. Try as Aronofsky might with the inclusion of such signature alt-rock hits of the day (with Madonna’s “Ray of Light” also thrown in for some added “1998 musical clout”) as Garbage’s “I Think I’m Paranoid, Smash Mouth’s “Walkin’ on the Sun” and Marcy Playground’s “Sex and Candy.” But he also deliberately ties Pi and Caught Stealing together with a sonic thread. Namely, through Orbital. In Pi, it’s Orbital’s “P.E.T.R.O.L.” that helps add to the overarching feeling of paranoia Max is spreading to the viewer; in Caught Stealing, it’s Orbital’s “Satan” that gets used instead. This along with David Bowie’s “I’m Afraid of Americans,” which casually plays in the background while Hank is hanging out with Yvonne. Because Aronofsky likely couldn’t resist the inclusion of such a timely track. Even more timely than it actually was in 1998 (though the “techno version” of the song was released in ‘97).

    Then, obviously, there’s the inclusion of Semisonic’s “Closing Time,” a highly appropriate track for a movie about a bartender. Though, of course, it’s about so much more than that. However, at its core, like Pi, it’s about a character who’s at the wrong place at the wrong time (the concept of “time” perhaps even extending to the very year he exists in), therefore entangling that character into a nexus of people that ultimately mean to harm him. 

    Hank has a much worse go of it than Max in terms of that form of abuse. Because, whereas Max does most of the harm (physical and emotional) to himself, Hank is so roughed up by the multiple parties in search of his next-door neighbor Russ’ (Matt Smith) key that it costs him a kidney. To boot, an obsession with “the key” takes on a different meaning in Pi, but it still means that multiple parties are fixated on getting Max to give them the information—the “key”—they want, just as it is the case for Hank and the literal key he’s found himself in possession of. So desired that even the Hasidim are after it, specifically the Drucker brothers (played by Liev Schreiber and Vincent D’Onofrio). And yes, Judaism is an instrumental aspect of Pi as well, with Max, like Hank, eventually turning to the Jews for help when he finds himself in painted into a corner with the other people who are after him. 

    Taken to the temple by Lenny Meyer (Ben Shenkman), who he’s been having frequent conversations with about the Torah at the local coffee shop they both frequent, Max is told by the head rabbi that the 216-digit number his computer has been spitting out is “the key to the Messianic Age,” for it can crack the code to the true name of God. The rabbi then continues, “[The high priest] walked into the flames. He took the key to the top of the burning building, the heavens opened and received the key from the priest’s outstretched hand. We have been looking for that key ever since.” Key, key, key, always with the key in these two Aronofsky movies. Not to mention Coney Island, which features prominently in each film for the purposes of Max and Hank’s proverbial “epiphany scenes” (well, one of them anyway).  

    With the tagline, “Faith is chaos,” Aronofsky taps into something similar, narrative motif-wise, with Caught Stealing. Though its own tagline—“Small town boy. Big city problems”—reveals how much more commercial Aronofsky has become in the twenty-seven years since Pi. And yet, it’s evident that the twenty-nine-year-old who, per The Guardian, “subsist[ed] on pizza and liv[ed] in a fifth-floor walk-up,” who “was anxious and ambitious” and who “had his eyes on the prize” still does have it trained on said prize. In this instance, proving that he can still go back to 1998 as if it were yesterday. As if no time had passed at all. For that’s what many people, based on the present circumstances, do wish. Maybe, with the right combination of numbers, the right pattern, a time machine can be created to get us all back there (or, more likely, those with money back there). 

    Until then, Caught Stealing will have to suffice for those seeking, like Cher, to turn back time. For, while Aronofsky might claim, “I don’t want to be one of those old men shouting at clouds. Or shouting at the TV set, ‘Elvis Presley’s moving his hips and he needs to be banned!’ The world is changing. I’m trying to lean into the excitement. It’s time to shut up, stop complaining and dance.” Or, better still, stop complaining and provide music in a movie set in 1998 so that at least the music is more compelling to dance to. 

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • The Sabrina Horror Picture Show, Or: The “Tears” Video

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    Sabrina Carpenter’s vocal doppelgĂ€nger, Ariana Grande, may have once said, “Ain’t got no tears left to cry,” but Carpenter is telling a different tale on “Tears,” the second single and video from her bop-laden seventh album, Man’s Best Friend. A song that indicates she has plenty of “moisture” left to
cry. Only not from her eyes so much as from her vag, ergo the chorus, “I get wet at the thought of you/Being a responsible guy/Treating me like you’re supposed to do/Tears run down my thighs.” Unfortunately, tears running down a girl’s thighs is an increasing rarity amid a climate of irresponsible men (in every possibly form that irresponsibility can take). 

    Like “Please Please Please,” “Tears” is once again directed by Bardia Zeinali (who also, incidentally, directed the Ariana Grande video for “In My Head”). But rather than riffing on a very hetero Bonnie and Clyde theme (complete with Barry Keoghan in the “Clyde” role), this time, Carpenter opts for a rightfully kitschy homage to the masterpiece of camp that is The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Borrowing key elements from the first act of the movie, the well-timed-for-the-advent-of-fall video opens on an overhead shot of a car that’s clearly crashed (though into what is never made apparent), with Carpenter lying face-down off to the side of the passenger seat, as though she was thrown from the vehicle. 

    Dressed in what can best be described as her Easter Sunday best, Carpenter “comes to” as the sound of a howling wolf in the dead of night only adds to the creep factor of her environment. Seeing that they’ve conveniently crashed right near someone’s spooky house (much more convenient than the distance Brad [Barry Bostwick] and Janet [Susan Sarandon] had to walk in order to get to Dr. Frank-N-Furter’s [Tim Curry] castle), Carpenter decides to approach the seemingly abandoned abode to get help. Even if all the signs point to the fact that she ought to just run the other way, lest, like Brad and Janet, she ends up going down a “dark path” from whence she can’t return. 

    When she knocks on the door (with the “spooky vocalizing” of the song briefly playing), no one answers. Yet when she peers through the boarded-up window emanating a glowing red light, she sees a “sexy leg” with a fishnet stocking on it, lifted up on a chair. Dropping her hat at the “salacious” sight, she steps backward and sees that the front door is now partially ajar. It doesn’t exactly emulate the way Brad and Janet are greeted by the handyman, Riff Raff (Richard O’Brien, who also wrote The Rocky Horror Picture Show), suggestively remarking to the couple, “You’re wet.” Soon after, he adds, “I think perhaps you better both
come inside.” These, of course, being the kind of innuendos that Carpenter can readily get on board with (and likely part of her attraction to the cult classic). 

    Just as she gets on board with Colman Domingo in the ostensible Dr. Frank-N-Furter role, along with his coterie of “colorful” guests (a polite word for pearl-clutchers to say “trans”). Guests who make Carpenter feel right at home as they sing along to such lyrics as, “A little initiative can go a very long, long way/Baby, just do the dishes, I’ll give you what you, what you want/A little communication, yes, that’s my ideal foreplay/Assemble a chair from Ikea, I’m like, ‘Uh.’” 

    In the next scene, she’s thrust into a “red room,” with a number of disembodied hands (with over-the-top acrylics) disrobing her as one of them passes her a Coke-inspired can with the “brand” Tears on it and the tag line, “Get wet.” To be sure, these eerily detached arms and hands recall something out of Jean Cocteau’s La Belle et la BĂȘte more than they do The Rocky Horror Picture Show. 

    Before she knows it, she is getting pretty wet over “Colman Frank-N-Furter’s” vibe and lifestyle, finding herself pole dancing in a cornfield (something about this feeling very Pearl) as this ringleader of “dolls” (as in, “Protect the dolls”) observes her with something like aroused approval (but, like, a gay man’s kind of approval) from his perch on a tractor. Talk about campifying “butch” paraphernalia. 

    The 70s (a.k.a. disco-fied) sound of the track intensifies after Carpenter announces, “Dance break,” which singals yet another backdrop change. One that showcases Carpenter in a showgirl-y number (think: Cher on The Sonny & Cher Show) as she prances along the streets of some alley (for this house is apparently magical in its ability to provide all kinds of milieus at the literal drop of a hat). 

    It would seem that, having been out of the house for so long in these random outdoor settings, the abode evidently realizes it can’t sustain Carpenter’s fundamental heteronormativity, spitting her back out after her choreo with the trans residents runs its course. Once again outfitted in her “Easter Sunday” ensemble, Carpenter tries to get her bearings just as her boyfriend, billed as “the guy who has to die” (Joe Apollonio), randomly appears to say, “Baby! I’m so glad you’re okay.” Carpenter, on the other hand, doesn’t look all that glad that he’s okay, responding, “Wait
no.” 

    Perhaps blaming him (and his straightness) in some way for getting her “bounced” from the house, she continues, “You died earlier I thought.” He replies, “Babe, what are you talking about?” She then meta-ly explains, “It’s a thing, it has to
someone has to die every video.” This being a reference to “Taste” (another one-word single that starts with a “T”). Looking and sounding horrified at what she’s suggesting, before he knows what’s happening, Carpenter says, “Sorry, we’ll always remember you though.” And with that, she boomerangs her high heel into his chest. 

    Carpenter then gets up from the porch and declares, “You have to give the people what they want.” And what the people with, that’s right, taste want are references to The Rocky Horror Picture Show from a mainstream artist at a time when transphobia in the U.S. has ramped up at an alarming rate. Thus, Domingo’s tweet announcing the arrival of the video with, “Protect all the Dolls.”

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend Is a Best Friend to Frustrated Women Everywhere

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    It took four albums for Sabrina Carpenter to truly hit her stride, to “find her niche,” arriving at just the right formula with 2022’s Emails I Can’t Send. By 2024, when her sixth album, Short n’ Sweet, was released, the industry was ready to embrace her as one of the next “it” girls of music (along with two other women who had been around for years already: Charli XCX and Chappell Roan). The release of “Espresso” as a single in the spring of that year helped to grease the wheels for her, and by the time “Please Please Please” (the first track that signaled her new musical partnership with Jack Antonoff) was put out as the second single, listeners embraced her to the point of “bequeathing her” with her first number one hit on the Billboard Hot 100 (yes, that’s right, “Espresso” never actually made it to number one). 

    By that point, too, Carpenter’s “A-list” cachet had also been further confirmed by her relationship with a certain Academy Award-nominated actor named Barry Keoghan, who also appeared in the “Please Please Please” video, with Carpenter commenting, “I, genuinely—like, a not-even-biased opinion—I was like, ‘Who’s the greatest actor that I can find for this music video?’ And he was next to me in a chair. And he was so excited about it!” That level of excitement cooled soon after, with Sabrina and Barry breaking up in December of ‘24. And there’s no denying that he still remains an inspiration for her lyrics. Maybe even the first track that kicks off Man’s Best Friend, “Manchild” (arguably the only true “runaway hit” of Summer 2025, and, needless to say, inspired by a lyric from Lana Del Rey’s “Norman Fucking Rockwell”). 

    As the song that sets the tone for the entire concept and theme of the album—that men are hopeless disappointments—it doesn’t get any stronger than this. A Dolly Parton-esque lamentation that finds Carpenter resignedly accepting, “Never heard of self-care/Half your brain just ain’t there/Manchild/Why you always come a-running, taking all my loving from me?” And if he’s not taking Carpenter’s loving from her, he’s offering up only a stunted form of love, as discussed on the album’s second single, “Tears.” And no, she’s not talking about the kind that stream from your eyes, instead referring to a wetness “down there” at the thought of her object of affection “being a responsible guy.” Or, as the chorus phrases it, “I get wet at the thought of you/Being a responsible guy/Treating me like you’re supposed to do/Tears run down my thighs.”

    Serving that “Ariana Grande moan” sound at the beginning, this 70s-ified track, co-produced by Carpenter and John Ryan, is in keeping with Carpenter’s brand of chirpily and sweetly saying what the “pearl clutchers” would consider the raunchiest of things. But if it’s “raunchy” to be aroused by a man showing a little effort in both the emotional and domestic departments, so be it. As for the latter category, Carpenter is sure to instruct men, “A little initiative can go a very long, long way/Baby, just do the dishes, I’ll give you what you, what you want/A little communication, yes, that’s my ideal foreplay/Assemble a chair from Ikea, I’m like, ‘Uh.’” 

    Alas, the problem with a relationship becoming “too” domestic is that it can often lead to the man in the equation treating a woman like one of the pieces of furniture in the apartment or house: she’s just there—comfortable and dependable. This tragedy is addressed by Carpenter on “My Man on Willpower,” during which she returns to her Dolly Parton lilt (and according country-esque musical sound) to paint the picture, “My man on his willpower is something I don’t understand/He fell in love with self-restraint and now it’s getting out of hand.” This notion of a man’s “self-restraint” also comes up again later on “Nobody’s Son,” when Carpenter rues, “But no sir-eee/He discovered sĐ”lf-control/This week.”

    Per the tale of “My Man on Willpower,” he discovered it gradually, with Carpenter recalling, “He used to be literally obsessed with me/I’m suddenly the least sought after girl in the land/Oh, my man on his willpower is something I don’t under, something I don’t understand.” In other words, Carpenter didn’t foresee the usual “reversal” that occurs in most relationships, wherein whoever started out as the most ardent one ends up becoming inversely disinterested as time wears on. The person who started out more disinterested, in contrast, only becomes more “involved”—in large part because they can’t understand where all the other person’s passion went, and they want to get it back by any desperate means necessary. 

    Carpenter’s panic continues to set in as she sings, “He’s busy, he’s working, he doesn’t have time for me/My slutty pajamas not tempting him in the least/What in the fucked up/Romantic dark comedy/Is this nightmare lately?” They call it, full-stop, monogamy. Or what Richard Wright (James Remar) faux mistakenly called “monotony” in Sex and the City. 

    SC slows it down a bit on the following track, “Sugar Talking,” (not to be confused with Mariah’s “Sugar Sweet”), a mid-tempo jam that accuses her lover of being neglectful. Worse still, trying to rely only on words a.k.a. “sugar talking” instead of actions to prove his love to her. So it is that Carpenter goads, “Saying that you miss me/Boy, do you win a prize?/You’re havin’ these epiphanies/Big word for a real small mind/And aren’t you tired of saying a whole lot of nothing?” Within these lyrics, Carpenter repeats another long-running motif of hers at this point: calling men stupid, dumb, etc. (hear also: “Dumb and Poetic,” “Slim Pickins” and “Manchild”). While more “traditionalist” (read: misogynist) men would tell Carpenter she might “catch more dick with honey,” she isn’t one for mincing words, playing nice or compromising who she is for the sake of “maybe” “landing a man.” Because any man worth landing, as far as she’s concerned, is one who knows and accepts her for who she really is: sardonic, sassy and salacious. Unfortunately, as she’s already mentioned, “it’s slim pickins” in terms of finding a man who doesn’t want a robotic twig as a girlfriend. 

    Even the man claiming he’s “all about” Carpenter in this song. But no, as she calls out, “You tell me that you want me/But, baby, if you need me/Put your loving where your mouth is [yes, a sexual innuendo, as is always to be expected from Carpenter]/Your sugar talking isn’t working tonight, oh/Say you’re a big changed man, I doubt it/Yeah, your paragraphs mean shit to me/Get your sorry ass to mine.” With these feelings in mind, it’s a natural fit for her to transition into “We Almost Broke Up Again Last Night.”

    The song with the slowest tempo on the album thus far, it’s a resigned ballad tinged with dry humor. Though there’s still plenty of “wetness” for Carpenter to have as she talks about the kind of make-up sex that keeps leading her to repeat the vicious cycle of staying with a man she knows is no good for her. And yet, every time she tries to end it, it’s like he can sense her attempt to break up with him, so he starts acting right. This described by Carpenter as, “And when I reach to pull the plug I swear, it starts working out/And on the days I’m a little much/That’s when I tell them how sweet he treats me/And how no other boys compete/I know how it looks, I know how it sounds/Least will give ‘em something to talk about.” Considering Carpenter’s country proclivities of late, that last line surely as to be a Bonnie Raitt allusion. And when Raitt suggested that thing she ought to give people to talk about, it was “love.” Carpenter is much the same, even if the kind of love she talks about is botched, unrequited or generally fucked up. 

    Nowhere does this apply more than on one of the most standout tracks on Man’s Best Friend, “Nobody’s Son,” a jaunty, up-tempo track with a bittersweet undertone. For it’s a damning callout of a mother’s part in raising a son who doesn’t quite know how to treat another woman right. The blame for a man’s incompetencies (emotional or otherwise) on his mother also comes up in “Manchild,” when Carpenter sings, “Why so sexy if so dumb?/And how survive the Earth so long?/If I’m not there, it won’t get done/I choose to blame your mom.” As she continues to on “Nobody’s Son,” bemoaning on the song’s indelible bridge, “That boy is corrupt/Could you raise him to love me, maybe?/He sure fucked me up/And, yes, I’m talking ‘bout your baby/That boy is corrupt/Get PTSD on the daily/He sure fucked me up/And, yes, I’m talking ‘bout your baby.” The “precious” baby that can do no wrong in Mother’s eyes. Because, from her point of view, it’s always “that slutty bitch” who did wrong. 

    After having already expressed so much contempt for men just halfway through the album, it’s no wonder Carpenter would offer up a song called “Never Getting Laid.” Except, contrary to what the title might suggest to the person who hasn’t yet heard it, Carpenter is merely wishing her ex “a forever of never getting laid.” Indeed, it’s difficult not to imagine she’s speaking directly to Keoghan when she sends these “well wishes.” 

    Either way, Carpenter tells the tale of a love turned cold as she recounts, while speaking to her now ex, “No way to know just who you’re thinkin’ of/I just wish you didn’t have a mind/That could flip like a switch/That could wander and drift/To a neighboring bitch/When just the other night/You said you need me, what gives?/How did it come to this?/Boy, I know where you live.” Carpenter then engages in some of her most venomous (but, again, chirpy) sarcasm yet as she says, “Us girls are fun but stressful, am I right?/And you got a right hand anyway.” So, in essence, she’s imagining he might as well “jack off to lyrics by Leonard Cohen” since he “can’t deal” with the so-called pressure of being with her. 

    In spite of the ire she conveys on “Never Getting Laid,” Carpenter does what she warned about on Short n’ Sweet’s “Good Graces”: “I’ll switch it up like that, so fast.” And what she switches up to is having a newfound appreciation for men on “When Did You Get Hot?” With its sweltering, 90s-esque sound that’s most prominent during the intro, Carpenter talks of being in a desert, so to speak, as she oozes horniness in the verse, “So long, untouched/Bone dry, not a plant can grow/‘Bout time I get back on the horse to the rodeo.” A fair share of metaphors in a short span, indicating her sensory overload as she walks into a “prospect convention” (which sounds better than Lana Del Rey’s “Men in Music Business Conference”). It’s there that she encounters “Devin,” a guy she doesn’t remember being so fine, hence her stimulation overload in the chorus, “And I was like [said in a very Mariah on “Obsessed” way], ‘Huh’/When did you get hot all the sudden? I could look you up and down all day/When did you get hot?/I think I would remember if you had that face/I did a double take, triple take/Take me to naked Twister back at your place/Baby, baby, mmm, it’s thickening the plot/When did you get hot?”

    “Devin” doesn’t seem to last very long, however, as indicated by the drunk dialing anthem that is “Go Go Juice.” And yes, it is refreshing to hear from a Gen Zer that actually drinks “good old-fashioned” alcohol to the point of getting so drunk she starts making a telephonic fool of herself. But then, Carpenter reveals herself to be an even “older soul” by the fact that she would deign to use a phone for its original purpose in the first place: making a call. Because no, this ain’t a track about drunk texting—it’s all about “dialing” (a.k.a. choosing an arbitrary contact in her phone) and talking. And, like some of the best “I’m a drunk fool” songs, this one’s decidedly country too, with Carpenter belting out in her “down-home” twang (and an accompanying fiddle breakdown), “I’m just drinkin’ to call someone/Ain’t nobody safe when I’m a little bit drunk/Could be John or Larry, gosh, who’s to say?/Or the one that rhymes with ‘villain’ if I’m feelin’ that way/Oh, I’m just drinking to call someone/A girl who knows her liquor is a girl who’s been dumped/Sippin’ on my go go juice, I can’t be blamed/Some good old-fashioned fun sure numbs the pain.” It sure does, and thankfully Carpenter is here to school her generation on the merits of liquor. 

    She’s also here to teach men that, just because she can be endlessly hurt and irritated by them, it doesn’t mean she doesn’t know how to keep them wrapped around her finger and outplay them on mind games any day of the week. Hence, “Don’t Worry I’ll Make You Worry,” the last track she wrote for the album (though not the last track on the record). During which she forebodingly “assures,” “So don’t worry/I’ll make you worry like no other girl can/So don’t worry/Damn sure I’ll never let you know where you stand.” And, even despite the sex with him being “annoyingly good,” Carpenter still won’t give in to fully acknowledging what the “status” of the relationship is to the one whose head she’s fucking with. So well, in fact, that apparently even the man’s mother can’t talk sense into him as Carpenter taunts, “And your mother even agrees/That emotional lottery is all you’ll ever get with me.” Since bringing a man’s mother into things is her bread and butter of late. 

    As is upping the ante on her sexual metaphors, achieving a new apex on “House Tour” (though she ironically declares, “And I promise none of this is a metaphor”). With its ultra 80s sound, it’s no surprise that Jack Antonoff is a co-producer on the song. And, clearly, he must have been inspired by early era Janet Jackson, with the hopped-up tempo punctuating Carpenter’s flurry of analogies. Mainly, referring to her body as a house a.k.a. “being built like one” (for there’s a reason The Commodores once said, “She’s a brick house”). Thus, such lyrics as, “House tour/Yeah, I spent a little fortune on the waxed floors [read: waxing her vag]/We can be a little reckless ‘cause it’s insured [a.k.a. she’s on birth control]/I’m pleasured to be your hot tour guide/Baby, what’s mine is now yours.” 

    That “mi casa es su casa” vibe quickly changes yet again on the album’s appropriately titled finale, “Goodbye” (unless one has the bonus track edition, which concludes with “Such A Funny Way”). And yes, Spanish is one of the languages Carpenter uses for her kiss-off to a boy that dared to break up with her and then tried to come crawling back after realizing the error of his ways. But no, the rule, as far as Carpenter and every other girl with self-respect is concerned is this: “Goodbye means that you’re losing me for life/Can’t call it love, then call it quits/Can’t shoot me down, then shoot the shit/Did you forget that it was you who said goodbye?/So you don’t get to be the one who cries/Can’t have your cake and eat it too/By walking out, that means you choose goodbye.” 

    Regardless of her appalled anger, Carpenter still retains her condescending politesse when she ends the track with, “Goodbye/Get home safe.” Because there’s no more tour of her “house” for him to be had. In fact, she likely realized she would get more trust and dependability out of a dog. Deemed to be “man’s” best friend, though, in truth, there is no finer companion a woman could ask for (in contrast, a woman really can be a man’s best friend when she’s treated well). Because it is she who is looking for the kind of unwavering loyalty and devotion that, these days, only a canine can give. As for the original album cover (before all the alternate versions started trickling in), featuring Carpenter in her own “dog-like” pose, it’s intent isn’t necessarily to “scandalize” “feminists,” so much as demarcate the lengths that a girl is willing to go just to get a dram of love and affection from an otherwise blasĂ© straight man. With women still foolishly adhering to the Morrissey aphorism, “The more you ignore me, the closer I get.” 

    Carpenter can find the comedy in her pain, obviously, remarking of her most “man-hating” record yet, “It’s a real party for heartbreak, a celebration of disappointment! It’s laughing at yourself and your poor choices as everything is falling apart, it’s wondering how loyalty and love always gets you back to third-wheeling, spoken sarcastically like a true 25-year old!” Or even a true twenty-five-year-old still trapped in an older woman’s body. 

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Caught Stealing: Darren Aronofsky Might Call It a “Love Letter” to New York, But It’s More Like a Requiem (Not for a Dream)

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    It’s been three years since Darren Aronofsky proceeded to break audiences’ hearts with The Whale (written by Samuel D. Hunter, and based on his 2012 play). In that time, of course, the world has only become a darker place. And so, with that in mind, perhaps there was a reason Aronofsky felt compelled to go “back in time” (that is, to “a simpler time”) via Charlie Huston’s screenplay adaptation of his own novel, Caught Stealing (released in 2004, ergo having a fresher perspective on the 90s after the decade had just ended). For yes, it appears that Aronofsky is actually at his best when directing someone else’s material (in other words, there aren’t many “fans,” per se, of Requiem for a Dream or mother!). Accordingly, Caught Stealing signals a marked tonal shift for Aronofsky.

    For, although the material is still quite, shall we say, heavy at times, Caught Stealing has “probably more jokes in the first ten minutes of this than in my entire body of work,” as Aronofsky told The Guardian. Plus, as a native New Yorker, Aronofsky has a certain kind of nostalgic slant to bring to the distinct period he’s depicting: late 90s on the Lower East Side. And, to immediately indicate this is “B911” (Before 9/11) epoch, a shot of the Twin Towers, in all of its romanticized glory, is proudly displayed at the beginning of the film. This being a seminal downtown view belying the seedy goings-on at a joint like Paul’s Bar (which is actually the Double Down Saloon on Avenue A, near the corner of Houston). The joint where Henry “Hank” Thompson (Austin Butler) makes his way in life as a bartender subjected to such jukebox picks of the day as Smash Mouth’s “Walkin’ on the Sun.” The type of bop (or is it the type of MMMBop, in this case?) that can now put the bar at risk thanks to Rudy Giuliani’s “quality of life” campaign that extended to outlawing dancing in bars without a cabaret license (and, of course, most bars weren’t trying to shell out for something like that). Yes, that’s right, Giuliani “Footloose’d” NYC bars starting in 1997—this being just one of many harbingers of doom that his mayorship heralded. Yet another portent of the unstoppable gentrification that Giuliani further aided in opening the floodgates for.

    To be sure, the late 90s was arguably the last time anyone can remember truly seeing some glimmer of what they call the “old” New York. This being why the fall (to put it mildly) of the Twin Towers in 2001 further demarcates a “before” and “after” period for the city and what it once used to “mean.” Thus, Aronofsky and Huston’s organic wielding of these types of details, like Hank telling customers to stop dancing (lest the bar get shut down and/or fined), lends further insight into this period. And it’s part of what makes Caught Stealing feel authentic to the time. 

    Indeed, this form of Giuliani shade-throwing was used even in the era when his “sweeping changes” (read: implementation of a police state) went into effect. One need look no further than the first season of Sex and the City for proof of that (with Miranda [Cynthia Nixon] being the most prone to insulting Giuliani). In fact, it could be said that the season one “look” (a.k.a. how it actually looked in New York at the time) of SATC served as a kind of “mood board” for cinematographer Matthew Libatique, another New Yorker on the crew who has been with Aronofsky since his 1998 debut, Pi. A film that, per The Guardian, “he says could almost be his parallel-universe first movie, given that it’s set in 1998, around the time he was shooting his actual first film on the same East Side streets” (back when Kim’s Video didn’t have to be added into the set design, because it was still there).

    Caught Stealing, instead, has a much greater sense of “levity,” even amidst all its darkness. That “dark aesthetic” of the city, however, is still there. And further aided by the fact that bartenders (and other assorted “shady” characters) live by night. But, more than anything, it seems that with this dark cinematography, Aronofsky aims to more than just subtly convey how much grittier the city used to be. And, as Caught Stealing makes quite clear, that grittiness was most palatable within the crime and corruption sector. With every “organization” from the Hasids (or Hasidim, if you prefer)—played by none other than Liev Schreiber and Vincent D’Onofrio—to the Russian mob to the cops to Bad Bunny (playing the Russians’ “Puerto Rican associate,” Colorado) thrown into this blender of “antagonistic forces” who all suddenly have it out for Hank after his British, cantankerous punk rocker of a next-door neighbor, Russ (Matt Smith), leaves for London in a hurry. And sticks Hank with his equally surly cat in the process. (On a side note, viewers detecting some major overtones of Quentin Tarantino-meets-Guy Ritchie [the latter being an obvious acolyte of the former] stylings wouldn’t be incorrect in making that comparison.)  

    Needless to say, the greater sense of levity in this particular Aronofsky film is supported almost entirely by the presence of this cat named Bud (played by a Siberian forest cat named Tonic). From the start, Hank makes it known he “prefers dogs for a reason.” Luckily for him, Siberian forest cats are described as having a “dog-like” temperament. But it takes his girlfriend, Yvonne (ZoĂ« Kravitz), encouraging Bud’s stay for Hank to fully get on board with the unwanted task. As for Yvonne, a paramedic (hence, her and Hank’s work schedules being perfectly aligned), it’s obvious from the outset that, even apart from her profession, she has a thing for rescuing people.

    And no one is in more need of being saved from himself than Hank, who, much like Henry “Hank” Chinaski (a.k.a. Charles Bukowski), has an alcohol problem. Albeit one that stems from trying to outrun the demons of his past, which, at the time, seemed to foretell an impossibly bright future. Back then, when he was still in high school, Hank thought he would be a shoo-in to play for his favorite baseball team, the San Francisco Giants (because, as it should go without saying, the title Caught Stealing has a baseball meaning too). This very possibility marveled at as he drunkenly drove through some backwater roads of Stanislaus County while his friend and fellow ball player, Dale (D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai), rode shotgun, talking up this future before Hank swerved the car at the sight of a cow and wrapped the car around a pole, launching Dale through the windshield and killing him instantaneously. 

    Hank’s own fallout from the accident, apart from a guilty conscience, was injuring his knee so badly it was never going to be good enough for the major leagues. And so, what would a California boy running away from his problems and looking to forget about his past do but move to New York?—the antithesis of his home state on the other side of the country. The irony being, of course, that his beloved Giants moved from NYC to San Francisco (not unlike the Dodgers moving from Brooklyn to LA). In any case, Hank runs as far as he can from the scene of the accidental crime (/car crash) without leaving the country entirely—that will come later. In the meantime, he thinks he’s going about his business, living his life as “minimally” (read: with a disaffected “90s slacker chic” aura) as possible, only to have every heavyweight of every crime organization on his ass in the wake of Russ’ departure. 

    With no one else to harass/beat to a pulp for answers, Hank is left holding the bag. Or rather, the key. A key he finds in a decoy piece of shit in Bud’s litterbox (this after dealing with another human’s shit in his own toilet since, again, the Sex and the City [de facto, And Just Like That
] connections to Caught Stealing abound). Considering his discovery occurs after two scary Russians (always the Russians, n’est-ce pas?) land him in the hospital for two days, Hank is unsure what to do with the newfound item. Worse still, while at the hospital, doctors removed his kidney because the Russians fucked him up so bad that it ruptured. Which means that, now, alcohol—the one thing that was getting him through it all, holding everything together and making New York seem like the nonstop party it really isn’t—must be off the menu. Otherwise, it’s at his own health risk to imbibe. And certainly a risk to do so with same intensity he did before. 

    Alas, all that resolve, all those promises to Yvonne (and the cat, for that matter) that he has it in him to quit cold turkey, go out the window when he walks into Paul’s Bar to show his boss, the eponymous Paul (played by a man considered a “New York institution,” Griffin Dunne) the key. Walking into the bar as Madonna’s “Ray of Light” resounds through the space (because it was the song of ’98), it’s apparent that Hank is doomed to go down a rabbit hole. The kind that happens after he experiences the adage, “One drink is too many and a thousand never enough.” From the looks of it, as the night goes on, Hank does seem to have very well close to a thousand, getting up on the pool table to sing along with another prime tune of the day: Meredith Brooks’ “Bitch.” This moment amounting to his version of Kat Stratford (Julia Stiles) in 10 Things I Hate About You drunkenly dancing on the table at Bogey Lowenstein’s (Kyle Cease) party to Notorious B.I.G.’s “Hypnotize.” 

    Saddled with “picking him up” is Yvonne, who quickly loses her patience or sympathy for him when he starts drunkenly ranting about how everything in his life is garbage (by the way, yet another band that gets played on the soundtrack), and that he used to have it all. Everything ahead of him. So much promise, so much potential. The dramatic irony here is that the same can be said of New York, seeing it through the lens of the present as compared with the past. This late 90s past, so evocatively shown in Caught Stealing. 

    Of course, there are literally millions who will swear up and down that the New York of the present remains just as viable, as “vibrant.” More so than ever, they’ll insist. Take, for instance, when Taffy Brodesser-Akner told Vulture, in an article discussing the issues of filming Fleischman Is in Trouble in a manner that would make it look like 2016, “The New York you live in now is the best version of New York. You have to keep out the noise from people like me lest you come to think you missed the whole thing by arriving so late—either by being born or moving here more recently than the person you’re talking to.” But no, she’s wrong
and so are all the others who try to maintain their “positive outlook” (a.k.a. daily application of denial) about “the greatest city in the world.” The New York you live in now is patently not the best version at all. 

    And, perhaps as a testament to how effective a job it does as a “period piece,” Caught Stealing is sure to remind viewers who still cling to, er, live in New York (and even those who never have) that such a statement simply isn’t true. Sometimes, the reality is that it really was better before. This is one of those instances. Even so, it doesn’t stop Regina King (as a cop named Roman), meant to be existing in one of the city’s primes, the 90s, from delivering a beautifully bitter monologue that details how she won’t miss anything about New York other than the black and white cookies once she makes her escape. Because “escape from New York” isn’t just a movie, but a wise person’s motto. Besides (barring that traitor, Joan Didion), Californians like Hank never really commit to New York, eventually turning it into just another base stop on the way home.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • A Lust (and Big Butt) Flare-Up Plagues Zara Larsson in the “Crush” Video

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    Following the success of Zara Larsson’s eponymous second single (with its 00s/Madonna in the “Love Profusion” video aesthetics) from Midnight Sun, she’s continuing to drum up interest in her fifth album with “Crush” (not to be confused with Jennifer Paige’s 1998 bop of the same name). Hence, her third video thus far from the seemingly Lisa Frank-inspired world of Midnight Sun. Directed by Grant James Thomas, there is, at certain key moments, a kind of Alice in Wonderland quality to the visuals in terms of the surrealism applied—not to mention that Larsson, by the end, becomes, let’s say, “too oversized” for the house she’s in. Though it’s one part of her in particular that bears the brunt of
enlargement (courtesy of someone named Mathis Laurenceau, in charge of the “butt prothesis” department, so to speak, for Larsson). 

    Before that enlargement happens, however, the spidery stage of the video is set with an opening that features a tropical backdrop that’s more than slightly marred by a pink spiderweb. One that, when the camera zooms out, reveals the spelling of the word “CRUSH.” Almost as if Charlotte of Charlotte’s Web herself had been there. The video then cuts to Larsson also set against a “tropical backdrop” that’s really just a poster as she runs on her treadmill contraption. Thomas then showcases Larsson doing a headstand and some other assorted yoga poses before she’s shown generally checking herself out in the mirror (and why not after all the hard work she’s just put into her body?). 

    Having already described the essence of a crush in the opening verse, “Talkin’ to you/Gives me butterflies/Wanna text you all the time/I can’t help that I feel like this/Talkin’ to you/Stayin’ up all night/Yeah, he knows somethin’ ain’t right/But it’s innocent ‘til we kiss,” Larsson soon experiences the kind of physical pain to mirror that emotional one when, out of nowhere (though it could also be seen scurrying near her feet in a previous scene), a spider descends from the ceiling and scares the living shit out of her. And, right as she jumps so far back in horror that she lands in her bathtub (conveniently filled with water to break her fall), the chorus bursts out, “Oh, baby, I’m crushed/It will never be us/That’s why they call it a crush/It will never be love.” Yes, Larsson hits the nail on the head with why a crush is named as such. Indeed, maybe not since Jim Baker (Paul Dooley) in Sixteen Candles said, “That’s why they call them crushes. If they were easy, they’d call ‘em something else” has someone put it so aptly. 

    Stumbling from the bathroom all wet, Larsson makes her way into the living area as she keeps slipping on the floor, deciding to just run with the slippage and turn it into choreo. Then, as if by magic, she’s suddenly dry—and in a new outfit. Specifically, one that features pink yoga pants with the words “Bite Me” (a ReneĂ© Rapp-approved sentiment) on the back. Which is exactly what this indefatigable spider does as it crawls along her bum and gives it a huge “love” bite (complete with heart eyes being “activated” right after doing so). 

    The Barbie-ish (-meets-creepy anime doll) version of Larsson that’s occasionally been interspersed amid these scenes is then shown with her ass getting blown up from the bite as she’s suspended in midair to showcase that newly inflated “feature” as a heart shape (though, in truth, all the best asses already have that shape). Thomas then cuts back to the real-girl Larsson, her own big butt flare-up slowing her down as she frantically tries to chase the spider with a golf club, breaking and shattering just about everything in her apartment.

    Then, at one point, the “extra weight” on her body is apparently so much that she spontaneously breaks the floor beneath her while standing in heels, with half her body now suspended above her neighbors’ apartment and the other half stuck in her own. Even though, logistically, this doesn’t make much sense since, at the end of the video, the domicile is shown as a right proper house, not an apartment building. But it’s not as though there’s anything “logical” about this entire video premise to begin with. 

    Instead, there’s plenty of “poeticness,” with the spider being wielded as a metaphor. This pesky, uncontrollable thing that Larsson just can’t seem to contain or kill. Something that a woman already in a relationship especially wants to do. And this is the perspective Larsson is coming from, singing such verses as, “What’s the need for destruction?/This might get ugly, you will ruin my life/Tell me, why do I crave your attention?/I got someone at home who treats me right/It’s only just a—/Crush.”

    Prior to that, she also alluded to playing a “dangerous game” by even slightly entertaining this crush by saying, “In the gray zone of morality/Feelin’ dangerous when you’re callin’ me/Somethin’ ‘bout the secrecy of us.” That secrecy being part of what adds to the fuel that’s flaming the passion behind the crush. For part of what makes a crush feel so “ardor-laden” is that, more often than not, it can’t ever be realized. 

    So it is that Larsson finally does manage to “contain it”—that is, the spider. Using a glass topper to quell its dangerousness, the spider miraculously defies all laws of nature by then turning into a butterfly that Larsson soon after unleashes back into the proverbial wild (Larsson, by the way, is very into butterflies for this era). 

    In a scene that serves as the “tag” of the video, an exterior shot of the house that Larsson pretty much destroyed while trying to catch and/or kill the spider (a.k.a. crush) shows the pink graffiti on its façade that reads, “Got the spider!” And then, as Larsson quickly says “crush” one more time, a pair of giant, pink, shimmering stiletto heels comes along to decimate the house entirely. One presumes they belong to the Alice in Wonderland-ified Larsson, now too big to fit inside the house, and too big to deal with small (bullshit) crushes anymore either. 

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    Genna Rivieccio

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