[solved]and I hate modern music, disco boogie and pop

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Kinda at a loss here.

been really enjoying the first few aerosmith records

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What is this and how does it have 16 million views?

Beyonce is so unbelievably uncool, it's almost sickening



The music itself ain't the worst thing in the world, but...

I thought you kids all loved Beyonce?

She's not my favorite. I thought her last album was really interesting musically. I liked all those songs when people played them for me, not super familiar with it though. There's 3-4 really good songs, I think.

Her brand of corny, commercial feminism/blackness is super lame though. All she's trying to do is sell some damn Pepsi Cola. It's pure coincidence that the ca$h out move for her in this day and age is to hop on some BLM/Flint Water crisis shit. And there's a place for that, since her music is decent and those are good causes. But it doesn't make me say "YAAAAS QUEEN". I'm indifferent.

This is good: http://www.theroot.com/articles/culture/2016/02/beyonce_went_full_black_apparently_i_m_here_for_it.html?wpisrc=mostpopular

Duff... wrote:This is one of the very worst things I've heard in a while.

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http://blissout.blogspot.com/2016/02/my-names-blurryface-and-i-care-what-you.html

Ugh, is this making a come back? "Beneath contempt" about says it all, yeah.

jasperness wrote:She's not my favorite. I thought her last album was really interesting musically. I liked all those songs when people played them for me, not super familiar with it though. There's 3-4 really good songs, I think.

Her brand of corny, commercial feminism/blackness is super lame though. All she's trying to do is sell some damn Pepsi Cola. It's pure coincidence that the ca$h out move for her in this day and age is to hop on some BLM/Flint Water crisis shit. And there's a place for that, since her music is decent and those are good causes. But it doesn't make me say "YAAAAS QUEEN". I'm indifferent.

Good to see Chronodiggity is still Chronodiggity.

I actually thought her last album was pretty great from start to finish. I'm indifferent to her place in pop culture and think she is basically a hip version of Oprah Winfrey for the millennial generation... But who knows, those kinds of things almost never appeal to me. We should all be able to admit though that "Heaven" and "Blue" are basically the most transcendentally beautiful tracks of the past few years.

There's so many think pieces on this Beyonce thing I just don't know how to feel.

I haven't read any or watched her Super Bowl performance but I'm assuming that she did something to make #BLM look corny.gif

Sausage wrote:been really enjoying the first few aerosmith records

Here's a guy who knows the danged score!

undo wrote:I haven't read any or watched her Super Bowl performance but I'm assuming that she did something to make #BLM look corny.gif

As far as I can tell Chrono is literally the only person who thinks this.

Duff... wrote:

undo wrote:I haven't read any or watched her Super Bowl performance but I'm assuming that she did something to make #BLM look corny.gif

As far as I can tell Chrono is literally the only person who thinks this.

She says the word "negro" in the song four times, and name checks Red Lobster, collard greens, and cornbread. I can't see that as anything other than her attempting to play up her blackness in a moment when making a racial statement is very trendy in the mainstream, progressive culture. It's very safe for Beyonce, who has been criticized in the past for not using her immense platform to advocate for black people, to do so now when it is also profitable to do so.

As I said, there's nothing wrong with that message. It's a good message. There's nothing wrong with a pop artist trying to be commercially successful and relevant. It isn't worthy of all the "analysis" that it gets (and, believe me, I understand the irony in me wanting to analyze why this is not worthy of analysis). It is entirely predictable.

It's corny.gif to me is the way the media eats this up and declares that Beyonce has "made a statement" or is herself a political actor. It's not and, to me, she isn't. It's a pop song that makes allusions to the pop culture moment. Broadly, it could be seen as an important thermometer for the culture--if Beyonce feels like she can make these statements, it says a lot about where pop culture is. It means that certain aspects of blackness are more mainstream, which is a victory. But it is not a radical step--it reflects (perhaps radical) changes that have already happened.

i actually kinda agree w this

I always edit my posts too much

Edited my post while Petey was typing. Worth rereading to make sure you still agree.

fair enough

i still stand by "i actually kinda agree w this"

Maybe Chronodiggity is being harsher than I really feel. I think that Beyonce is latching on to a groundswell of an opinion and making it popular. Or bringing light to it thru her popularity. In any event, I don't fault her for it at all, but I certainly don't think anyone should be on their knees genuflecting before "Queen" because she's a queen. She's basically doing what numerous artists before her have done before albeit in maybe a more political sense. In any event, no hate, and I don't think she's corny, but certainly nothing revolutionary on her part either. And a very large part of me thinks it's very well calculated on her part. But who can tell these days?!

Solid! I just think that seeing Beyonce as "savvy" is more accurate than "visionary".

But because there's this synergy between commercial artists like Beyonce and commercial media brands and writers, I understand why there's a knee jerk overreaction of "OMG BEYONCE CHANGED THE GAME AGAIN!" That's basically the way it has to be at this point.

I'll still gripe.

petey wrote:I certainly don't think anyone should be on their knees genuflecting before "Queen" because she's a queen.

I also find it very hard in our current meme-obsessed culture to pinpoint to what extent people say things like this precisely because it is a meme. Because it is intellectually easy and on the tip of everyone's tongue already. Beyonce has been "Queen" in the past, so in some sense she will always be Queen.

reuben wrote:There's so many think pieces on this Beyonce thing I just don't know how to feel.

Agreed!

jasperness wrote:

petey wrote:I certainly don't think anyone should be on their knees genuflecting before "Queen" because she's a queen.

I also find it very hard in our current meme-obsessed culture to pinpoint to what extent people say things like this precisely because it is a meme. Because it is intellectually easy and on the tip of everyone's tongue already. Beyonce has been "Queen" in the past, so in some sense she will always be Queen.

Was going to respond with some intellectualization of memability-to-think-pieceability ratios or some shit but honestly I just don't understand how the internet and young people work anymore so I'll just keep reading what you guys say.

Duff... wrote:

undo wrote:I haven't read any or watched her Super Bowl performance but I'm assuming that she did something to make #BLM look corny.gif

As far as I can tell Chrono is literally the only person who thinks this.

Not according to this thing I just read on Slate dot com.

reuben wrote:

Duff... wrote:

undo wrote:I haven't read any or watched her Super Bowl performance but I'm assuming that she did something to make #BLM look corny.gif

As far as I can tell Chrono is literally the only person who thinks this.

Not according to this thing I just read on Slate dot com.

lol, I saw that (of course on slate) right after posting that.

It's not that I really disagree with much anyone's saying in this thread, I just don't see a need to gripe. For starters, this Beyoncé began last album cycle: "#Flawless" was as much (perhaps more) about being specifically a black woman than just being a woman, and pulling back from the sorta political, sorta social thing she'd been dabbling with at this point in history would be kinda weird. And it's not as if BLM is universally held in high regard. There is a risk of alienating a mainstream audience by playing up blackness. And I mean a couple years ago the entire world was falling all over itself pretending Mylie Cyrus and her foam finger and Beetlejuice-clad male counterpart did a single thing new or shocking that Madonna hadn't done way better decades ago. This is a good thing to be buzzing around, and it's a good song. Just embrace it.

Duff... wrote: it's a good song.

it's no "Partition"!