Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Okay, seriously?
There are so, so many things to be annoyed with here that I couldn't possibly write them all in one swoop. Do you notice how the lyrics constantly confirm her straightness, over and over? It's important to be clear about that, just in case a woman actually being attracted to another might threaten collective dudehood or make *any* dicks *anywhere* soft in *any* way. God forbid. Thanks for being a relentless advocate for bro dudes and their erections everywhere, Katy Perry (and the two men who helped you write your masterpiece)! What would boners do without you?
Oh, and ps: Being anything other than heterosexual is not what "good girls do," in case you forgot.
Ugh.
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7 comments:
oh shit. i keep hearing this girl's name everywhere & how she's "not as good as everybody says" but she "does look like zooey deschanel" etc etc. and now seeing this i realize ive heard the song before too but didnt know it was this mysterious katy perry. she is bullshit. this is crap. nice legs. i guess we think youre sexy. thanks for touching your lips a lot while you look at the camera. i dont think we're actually hearing a human voice through most of this.
i've also seen that video before! my boy-cousin's boyfriend posted it on my lesbian cousin's facebook and was all, "this song sounds like you!" so she's either got a problem with kissing straight girls or we are so desperate for images of young queer girls in pop culture that this video is exciting to some people or something. which i can understand, i guess, i feel similarly when i watch the l word.
way to give femmes a bad name, KATY PERRY, INCORPORATED. "i kissed a girl and i liked it/hope my boyfriend don't mind it." jesus.
but it's not really *different* than the pop music that's been coming out for the last 8 years or so in that the songs are obvious hetero male fantasies penned by washed up fat balding middle aged dudes, sung by girls so desperate for stardom they'll say anything & fit any shape they're told is marketable. i'm thinking of 17 year old britney spears in a sexy schoolgirl outfit in the video for "crazy" and on the cover of rolling stone.
i think it makes it easier to see "artists" like britney spears or this katy perry chick as the singing, dancing mascots for massive patriarchal corporations, who have sold their voice for champagne baths.
well, easier in that it makes some kind of sense, but definitely sadder.
Wow, listening to this song and looking up her myspace, here are my thoughts:
1. That non-mullet version of that haircut works really only on Zooey Deschanel, Jenny Lewis, and company, but not necessarily on Katy. The mullet-y version of the haircut would work on no one, which is why I'm surprised Katy has decided to use it.
2. This song wouldn't be good even if you changed the lyrics to be so not annoying.
3. "Ur so gay" is also annoying. To a brand new degree of annoying. Actually, I think I'm left speechless at how annoying this song is. The English language fails me.
(P.S. Hi! I was sent to your blog by one of your friends because she said you listen to good music [and apparently you bake delicious foods], and I'm moving to western Mass soon and was advised to contact you. That sort of thing!)
@ Sarah: I JUST heard this song the other day for the first time, but apparently it's been number 1 on TRL for like a week or something? I know every generation says this about the one following it, but I am SO TERRIFIED of the next generation. I so can imagine my 12 year old neice lip synching around her room to this song, dancing all sexy in the mirror. And did you notice how she is literally STROKING A PUSSY at the beginning of the video? It's like, "Oh, come ON!"
@ Linz: I actually read some comments on songmeanings.net that were similar to that idea; women claiming to be lesbians or bisexuals who said they really appreciate this songs existence somehow. I guess maybe if you don't actually listen to the words? But how can you NOT, you know?
You're totally right about how deeply ingrained patriarchal fantasies are in pop music. Like I said to Sarah, it makes me fear for 8-13 year old girls everywhere. We had cheesy pop music too, but it was Mariah Carey singing "Vision of Love" or Paula Abdul doing "Opposites Attract," you know?
Do you think a day will ever come when a Justin Timberlake wannabe will get up on stage and be all "I kissed a boy and I liked it?" It would be very, very interesting to see how THAT video is handled, heh.
@M: Hey, hey! Nice to meet you! What part of Western MA are you moving to? Get ready to fall in love- it's pretty amazing out here.
Wasn't there a brief period of time 4 or so years ago where every young, hollywood elite female sported the mullet? http://www.divavillage.com/images/Oct05/scarlett_johan_mullet_web308.jpg, for example? Maybe Katy's PR guys, in their rush to make her all sexilicious for dudehood everywhere, forgot to mention that they haven't read People magazine in a few years?
I *almost* wrote about Ur So Gay as well, but once I got started I felt like it was actually making me feel DUMBER just talking about it. Clearly, it's obvious that her music is specifically meant for 15 year old boys, all "Lesbians? Hot, bro! Effeminate men who even just ACT in un-"manly" ways? Totally gross, man." Obviously, Katy Perry and her songwriters just REALLY think the concept of gayness, pseudo or not, is HilARious. I'm not a big proponent for violence, but SOMEONE desperately needs a slap in the head here, and I think it may be America collectively.
None of this Katy Perry stuff would be so bad if her voice were in any way interesting to listen to. Maybe she could tour with Prussian Blue to add a little kick, as the Food Network might call it, to her Christian-singer-turned-even-more-annoying persona.
I remember that horrible haircut that Ms. Scarlett thought she could pull off just because she was making out with Benicio del Toro in elevators-- or whatever she was doing that year that made her the darling of Nylon magazine. Or maybe then she was the darling of Venus. I can't be expected to remember It girls in their passing glory.
Anyway, hi, I'll be moving to Amherst in, oh, two weeks. I'm off to grad school at UMass. From what I've heard, it's totally easy to fall in love with the area, but I'm still a bit horrified to move far far far far away.
I heard this song for the first time last night as I was driving home and sat in the middle of the street out front of my apartment, mouth agape, because I literally could not parallel park while that stupidity was happening. WTF. WTF. WTF.
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