All The Single Ladies: The Problem with Feminist Anthems

Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
December 15, 2009 | 1 book mentioned 18 4 min read

Related Books:

coverOn The Sexist, Amanda Hess lists the Top 5 Pseudo-Feminist Anthems, and as an introduction to these questionable songs, she declares, “Empowerment has been a convenient posture for pop music to assume.”   This is often true, but I took umbrage with a couple of the songs included on her list, and perhaps with the implicit suggestion that pop songs can and should function as purveyors of messages.  (Wait–isn’t that what Christian rock is for?)   Yes, girls and young women need mentors and positive role models, but might this article be taking that idea too far?   I don’t want a feminist anthem if it requires aesthetic restraint and an avoidance of emotional honesty.

When I was young, I loved Madonna’s “Material Girl.”  This song did not ruin my ability to have a healthy and meaningful romantic relationship as an adult, nor did it rot my sense of self worth.  I am a feminist, and I still like this song.   I also like Beyonce’s “Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It),” which Hess includes on her list.  She argues:

The sheer awesomeness of this song is almost enough to make me overlook the anti-feminist weirdness. Beyonce looks and sounds even stronger on this track than she does in the more traditionally girl-power songs in her catalog (”Independent Women Part I”; “Survivor”). I mean, she has a bionic arm in the video. What’s not to like?

Well—a few things. Beyonce referring to herself as “it”? Equating herself to bling? Handing herself over to a man who will determine her self-worth through a demeaning, years-long game which can only end with Beyonce emerging triumphant as his symbolic property, or crawling away as a meaningless ex?

I must disagree with Hess’s interpretation of the song, which assumes a lot about the speaker.  Firstly, when Beyonce says, “Put a ring on it,”  she certainly isn’t, as Hess says, “equating herself to bling.”  That would mean she was singing, “If you liked bling you shoulda put a ring [bling] on bling.”  Huh?

The song’s cleverness lies in the instability and elasticity of that word “it.”  One could argue that “it” refers to her finger, but the phrase uses “it” twice:  “If you liked it, you shoulda put a ring on it” [italics mine].  The second use of “it” refers, literally, to her finger–one places an engagement ring on the left ring finger.  But the first “it” isn’t so literal–or is it?  The speaker seems to refer to both her literal body, and thus, her vagina,  but also the “it” that was their relationship, the pleasure of being together, of being close and intimate.   “If you like having sex with me, you should have committed to me,” is the gist of her argument.  (Notice that it’s “if you like it,” present tense, but “shoulda” is “should have”–as in, you missed your chance…maybe.)

Perhaps it’s anti-feminist for sex to lead to marriage, or to desire that.  But why?  Why is it unacceptable for a woman to require commitment from the man she’s sleeping with?  Hess’s brand of feminism prohibits marriage as a viable choice for women, and the goal of feminism–or so I thought–was to give a woman choices.  To marry, or not  marry.  To have sex or not have sex, with whom she chooses.  To have children, or not.  To be a working mother, or a stay-at-home mother.

In “Single Ladies”  I get no inkling that Beyonce is “crawling away as a meaningless ex,” as Hess believes.   She’s in the club (or, ‘da club), singing a final ultimatum.  She knows her lover is jealous, that he’s ruing his past behavior.  She isn’t putting up with his shit any longer.  She admits, “Your love is what I prefer, and what I deserve,” a bold announcement of desire and self-worth.  And–okay–I love when she says, “Pull me into your arms.  Say I’m the one you own.  If you don’t you’ll be alone.”  Yes, the notion of marriage as “ownership” might make one uncomfortable, but, then again, what if that ownership is requested?  If it’s consensual?  There’s the implicit sense that once this man owns her, and her body, she will also own him, and his body.  Here, the “ring” signifies a union of love and sex, and that it will, by necessity, carry with it the whole fraught history of marriage as a cultural institution.  I might go so far as to argue that Beyonce’s playing a little wink-wink game with the notion of wife-as-property.  It’s her mandate, not his, and she’s in control.

One can’t separate “Single Ladies” with its phenomenal video, where Beyonce and two other women dance in black leotards and high heels.  Beyonce’s waist-to-hip ratio and strong quads are out of sight, as are her dancing skills.  This video is actually an homage to Bob Fosse, who choreographed a slightly similar routine for his wife and two other dancers, and also shot on a stage in one take.  Beyonce’s video modernizes this choreography, much in the same way the song itself modernizes, or at least complicates, a traditionally female desire for commitment.   Perhaps “Single Ladies” can’t be a feminist anthem because, to reduce it to a rallying cry, a slogan, does not acknowledge it for the complex song that it is.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must head back to the library to dissect Taylor Swift’s “You Belong With Me.”  (Or, like everyone else, maybe I’ll go film a living room-homage to Beyonce’s video and post it on YouTube…)

is a staff writer and contributing editor for The Millions. She is the author of the novella If You're Not Yet Like Me, the New York Times bestselling novel, California, and Woman No. 17. Learn more about her writing classes at writingworkshopsla.com.

Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music

How I Got It: Snoop Doggy Dogg’s ‘Doggystyle’

Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
October 20, 2016 | 1 book mentioned 5 min read
I’m not sure how I knew when Doggystyle would be released. The debut album from Snoop Doggy Dogg -- as Calvin Broadus, Jr. was known before changing his handle to Snoop Dogg, then Snoop Lion, then Snoop Dogg again -- came out in November of 1993, and I can’t imagine that I read about it in any of the newspapers or magazines that cluttered my parents’ house. We didn’t have cable TV, so Kurt Loder didn’t tell me about it, a cartoon globe spinning behind his head. I can only assume that my friends were talking it up: "Snoop Doggy Dogg, from The Chronic? I heard his album’s coming out next week." That was how information spread in 1993. I was 14 years old. I was also a huge hip-hop fan, with a long and checkered history of signing up for BMG and Columbia House, receiving the first shipment of CDs or cassettes -- nine or 10 of them, an impossible bounty -- before writing them frantic I’m-just-a-child letters when they later demanded their cash. I would buy whatever I could with whatever money I had -- A Tribe Called Quest, N.W.A, Tim Dog; it didn’t matter much. And although I don’t recall loving Dr. Dre’s The Chronic at the time, I must have been taken by the then-obscure Snoop, who appeared all over it, his silky nihilism leavening Dre’s stern-uncle delivery and the album’s squealing synths. Or maybe I just got swept up in the hype. Either way, I had to have Doggystyle. There was a CD store one town over that managed to seem simultaneously new and run-down, as if its owners, after hustling to finance its opening, had been too exhausted to properly set it up. Its interior was heavy on milk crates and cardboard signage. It was open for a few months at most, and none of my old friends remember it; when I bring it up, they frown as if I’m describing a poltergeist. But I know that it existed, and that it was open for business on the week of November 23, 1993. I usually got my music from a shopping mall a few miles out of town, and I’m not sure why I didn’t go there for Doggystyle. I wouldn’t have faked an illness to stay home on the Tuesday of its release -- I only did such a thing once, in the second grade, to obtain a few packs of Garbage Pail Kids’ long-awaited third edition -- so I must have waited until that Saturday, only to find that, for whatever reason, I couldn’t hitch a ride to the mall. I had to take matters into my own smallish hands. I’d only been in the store once or twice before, and I’d never bought anything there, but it represented my best chance at obtaining Snoop’s debut. My father had recently upped my allowance to a Zuckerbergian $20 a week, so I didn’t have to go through the ordeal of scraping up loose change -- which I’d once done to buy a Bon Jovi cassette (the unlistenable 7800° Fahrenheit). Cash in hand, I likely lied to my parents about where I was going -- playing basketball with friends, not searching for murder-and-misogyny-filled music -- and set out. It was about a mile and a half to the shop from my childhood home, but as I remember it, the walk had an epic, questing feel. I crossed the busy street perpendicular to my own quiet one and proceeded down a hill that bottomed out near the entrance to a soccer field. On game and practice days, the rutted, tree-hung drive to the field fills with cars; you can hear cheers and murmurs from the open space beyond. But it was too late in the year for soccer, and the place was desolate. The drive peters out at the lip of the field, where the trees recede and the sky seems suddenly huge above the expanse of grass. My first burst of vivid memory of that day occurs here: me, alone, walking towards the woods on the field’s far side. When I think of Doggystyle -- and even when I think of Snoop Dogg -- I think of myself, simmering with teenage need, moving across that empty field. A slim path wound through a patch of woods into which was hacked the Department of Public Works, its snow plows and pickup trucks parked beside a junk-strewn creek. I curled around an abandoned, graffiti-wracked DPW outbuilding and climbed the metal steps of a bridge that led to a surviving copse of trees. The area had a forgotten, suburban-outlaw feel, the sort of hidden place where '90s kids smoked joints and '80s kids got drunk and — if the tabloids were to be believed — sacrificed their weak in praise of Great Lord Satan. An overgrown path led through a second field -- three baseball diamonds the merging outfields of which created another soccer pitch -- until I got to the first street, the first real bit of civilization, in the neighboring town. I was almost there. A left, a right, and I was at a car-choked thoroughfare lined with shops. My objective sat wanly on the other side. I crossed the street and entered the store. A little bell might have rung. Of course, I was the only customer. As I recall, the person behind the counter was a light-skinned black man who wore a tight paisley shirt and oversized glasses, like Get Up With It-era Miles Davis. Though there was never a guarantee of finding what you wanted there, I quickly located Doggystyle — success! — paid, and hurried out, excited to get home and listen to my treasure. I’d like to say that I recall tearing up to my room, ripping off the disc’s cellophane, and blasting “Gin and Juice” and “Who Am I (What’s My Name?),” but that would be a lie. I have no recollection of actually listening to the album once I returned, or what I even thought of it in subsequent days and weeks. I probably thought, as I do now, that the record was crowded with filler, with too many lackluster skits and too many subpar guests. I don’t know. As is so often the case -- as is maybe always the case -- the getting of the thing was more important than the thing itself.
Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
| 1 book mentioned 5 min read
● ● ●
● ● ●
Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music

Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music #3: Sidelined By Pete Doherty

Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
April 6, 2009 | 1 book mentioned 1 3 min read
This isn't the music post I'd planned on writing today. I was going to tell you all about the time a certain British guitar legend from the 60s shouted at me and a friend (yes, at us - specifically at us) across a packed hall in Greenwich Village eleven years ago. I was all set to tell you about that. But that'll have to wait. Another time.You see, I've been sidelined by a contemporary album. This almost never happens. But on Friday I bought Grace/Wastelands, the new solo album from Pete Doherty. I popped it into the CD player when I got home, strapped headphones onto my unsuspecting head, and within seconds I knew I was done for.I'd always had an appreciation for Pete Doherty. Despite all his personal problems and addictions, the few tracks I'd heard from The Libertines and, later, from Babyshambles, I'd liked. I found his writing to be sharp, engaging. But I still wasn't prepared for this. Grace/Wastelands is a masterful album from start to finish. Thoughtful, evocative, musically textured and, above all, beautifully written and sung.It's been about 55 hours since I first put the CD into the player, and virtually every waking hour has been spent listening to it. Even when I was physically elsewhere - with friends or family - I had it going through my head. I was pretty much useless as a friend or son for the last couple of days. I was mentally trying to redirect every conversation toward contemporary music. I wanted to talk about this record, but without getting sidetracked by a discussion about Tabloid Doherty.I wanted to express to people just exactly why their lives were incomplete if they hadn't experienced the sweeping organ in the final minute of "Lady, Don't Fall Backwards," or the way the vocal melody of that song floats down and then up and then down again. I wanted them to experience the opening acoustic strum on "Arcady", the lovely, lilting harmonies that belie the sadness of "Sheepskin Tearaway" and to hear the catch in his voice when he sings the word "scars" near the end of the song. They needed to hear the ragtime piano on "The Sweet By and By". They needed to both hear and feel the rhythmic pulse of "Last of the English Roses" and the way one is left hanging before hearing the final consonant in the phrase "...her Winstons from her Enochs." And, especially, the evocative "Salome" - perhaps the finest song on the album - with great guitar-playing by Doherty and Graham Coxon from Blur who share guitar duties on almost every song on the album. This is an album full of melancholy - sometimes wistful, sometimes painful. Always gently poetic.This level of musical obsession happened frequently when I was younger. In school and in early university I would breathe Beatles and Rolling Stones albums. Then a bit later I would inhale albums by The Kinks and Bob Dylan. In the years that followed, the occasional album would turn into an obsession - but it, too, was generally something from an earlier era. Rarely something contemporary. In the past decade, I can clearly recall the few cases of me obsessing over something current: In The Belly of the Whale by Canadian songwriter Danny Michel, Blur's 13, Michael Penn's Resigned and, especially, each successive release from The Walkmen who hit a new peak last fall with their stunning You and Me (about which - more [much more] in a future post). So it's a pretty limited list. There's nothing fleeting here. Every one of these albums is part of me, even after the initial obsession subsides. And I can add Pete Doherty's Grace/Wastelands to the list.
Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
| 1 book mentioned 1 3 min read
● ● ●

18 comments:

  2. Agreed – I always interpreted the message of this song as, “We could’ve had a life together, I could’ve loved you, but you lost your chance because you would not give me what you need.” The song felt similar, in message, to the other songs that Hess references (“Survivor,” “Independent Woman”) rather than disparate, because Beyonce was proclaiming that if the relationship did not fulfill her emotionally (as well as sexually) than she wouldn’t stay with the man. “If you liked it than you should’ve put a ring on it” was her way of playfully saying, “you missed your chance at something good. Because I didn’t get what I deserved from you, you have lost as a companion.”

    I didn’t know that the music video was prolonged Fosse reference – that’s very interesting.

  4. Thank you, Stephen and Kaelan!
    Catie, thanks for your comment. There used to be a full video of the original Fosse return, but I can’t find it anymore. A friend told me there’s a Beyonce-Fosse mash-up, which, when I find, I shall post. Unless my friend (hi, Doug), does it first…

  5. Pingback: Bites: Bolaño and Borges, Nin on LSD, Nick Cave Photoshopped, the Greatest Metal Tour EVER, and More « Vol. 1 Brooklyn

  6. Love your argument and I completely agree with you about the use of the word “it” in Beyonce’s lyrics.

    The only slant that I can see where Beyonce could be seen as anti-feminist is her over-sexed image in many of her videos. The sexualized image is not just targeted to “All the Single Ladies” video but her overall image. Frankly, not just Beyonce, but other pop performers as well.

    I would love to see some of these performers where a baggy sweatshirt, some loose jeans, a t-shirt…not just tight clothes all of the time.. Don’t get me wrong, I loved the video, but I would just like to see more sides of a female performer rather than just the “sexy” side.

  7. I always thought the line was “Say I’m the one you WANT.” “Own” would certainly take it into anti-feminist territory. Bouncy is very much a Southern black woman with many of those traditional gender views on display (said as a black woman who grew up in the northeast and has lived in the south for a decade). An underlying theme of her songs is that a man should provide and pursue.

    I don’t think the song is particularly feminist or anti-feminist though. Party A wanted a commitment. Party B didn’t. Party A left. Party B is upset. And Party A says “Too bad. So sad. You missed your chance. And I am angry for you for not loving me the way I love(d) you.” Swap the genders in any combination, and it’s the same story.

  9. Tiffany, you may in fact be right about the lyrics–though “own” makes the song a wee bit messier, which is always more exciting to me! And thanks for the link–it’s great!

    Tracie, you make a good point, and my friend Christine recently echoed a similar sentiment. It’s true, Beyonce could do far more. Being sexy is what she seems most comfortable with, and, beyond her obvious singing and dancing talents, perhaps that’s what she’s best at, performance-wise…? I do wish she would get a little more exciting in that regard.

  11. Wait wait wait – a song by a married female-bodied artist pronouncing heteronormative patriarchal desires and a prescription for groups outside of her current experience (“single ladies” and “men in the club”) is all about choices? Beyonce ain’t empowered here – hell of a dancer, but not an empowering role model.

    In response to “What if it’s consensual?” Cultural pressure and coerced consent to patriarchy is not simply something that makes me uncomfortable, but rather it reinforces a narrow mode of thought that touches off on many other issues that I find carry towards distressing and unhealthy experiences for all parties involved. I agree with Hess: this is a portrayal of pseudo-empowerment for commercial appeal with no real radical analysis. Again, though – wish I could dance like that.

  12. Thanks for your comment, Trevor. I think you make an excellent point about Beyonce speaking for groups she’s not a part of–I hadn’t thought of that.

    I take issue with faulting her for having “heteronormative patriarchal desires”–it seems to impose a reading on a song that’s not intended to be a feminist anthem. And, again, the reading suggests that a straight woman who wants to be involved with a straight man cannot ever be a feminist. That excludes a lot of women from the movement, and it places requirements for behavior on women, which seems to defeat the purpose of feminism in the first place.

    I’m not so sure Beyonce’s “consent to the patriarchy” is “coerced”, either. I guess, overall, I don’t think anyone can really duck out of this patriarchy, or that this patriarchy is a static, monolithic structure. We just can’t say, “No thank you, Mr. Patriarchy.” That shit is everywhere, and we are all participating in it, in one way or another, even if it’s in rejection of it.

    On a side note, this reminds me of a line from Margaret Atwood’s wonderful novel The Robber Bride:

    “Male fantasies, male fantasies, is everything run by male fantasies? …Even pretending you aren’t catering to a male fantasy is a male fantasy: pretending you’re unseen, pretending you have a life of your own, that you can wash your feet and comb your hair, unconscious of the ever-present watcher peering through the keyhole, peering through the keyhole in your own head, if nowhere else. You are a woman with a man inside watching a woman”

  13. You are completely wrong. It’s anti-feminist because she’s using her body to get back at the man. She’s handing herself out to some stranger to enact revenge. She shouldn’t even be trying to get revenge in the first place, it’s childish and immature. Still she objectifies her body, like a possession, and hands it around to see how some guy that didn’t want her feels. She is desperate for marriage. She wants to marry a guy who doesn’t even want her. She’s begging to be taken, to be domesticated. She wants to be owned. A feminist song? Give me a break.

  16. ps. yeah the whole intention of the song is muddled. She wants to be all strong and break away from her previous relationship? dont ‘Say I’m the one you own” or break up with a dude simply to run to someone else. Be single for awhile!!

    Perhaps he ‘didnt put a ring on it’ because you kept nagging him to.

    and besides, isnt beyonce married to Jay – Z? the song is completely redundant.

  17. Pingback: In the News: Politicising Beyonce. « The Early Bird Catches the Worm
  18. Pingback: Politicising Beyonce. | The Scarlett Woman

Add Your Comment:

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music

Pump Down the Volume: On Writing With Background Music

Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
September 28, 2015 | 1 book mentioned 13 6 min read
As I write this, I’m listening to the new Beach House album. This is not because I like the new Beach House album (although I do), or because it gives me the chance to say so, thus making me sound slightly cooler (although it might, in a desperate sort of way) or because I’m plugging the record (although it is great, if you enjoy the band’s drunk-on-a-beanbag effect). I’m listening to it because I’m writing -- an activity that for me, in recent years, has demanded musical accompaniment. Far from being a background diversion -- something to make kitchen chores a little less soul-killing -- I’ve come to believe that the music I listen to while writing bears a definite, if ineffable, relationship to the words that wind up on the screen. This paragraph might not carry the woozy dreaminess of a Beach House song -- but how would it have sounded if, while typing, I’d been listening to Public Enemy? Or Def Leppard? Or nothing at all? In 1999, Nine Inch Nails's The Fragile was released to a flood of media attention. This was when a new CD could seem like a cultural event, and, as such, though I didn’t particularly care about Trent Reznor, I read dutifully about the album. And although I’ve largely forgotten The Fragile -- I think it gave me a headache -- one nugget from its publicity blitz has stayed with me: Chuck Palahniuk was quoted as saying that he listened to Nine Inch Nails as he wrote Fight Club. I remember being sort of shocked by this, not because it didn’t make sense -- one can certainly picture Palahniuk in a dim little room, gritting his teeth at the monitor, bashing out his story as Reznor screams at him -- but because until then, I’d thought of writing as a monastic pursuit. Writing, to me, was Philip Roth in a cabin somewhere, the only sounds the tapping of his fingers and the wind rushing through the trees. That was the ideal. To write, you needed calm, and for calm, you needed silence. Perhaps the image of Palahniuk mustering a novel against the shriek of industrial noise helped to change my view. Because not only do I no longer believe it, I’ve gone in the opposing direction: music is now as central to my writing as an idea and a comfortable chair. I now feel almost unhinged if I try to write without something playing to whisk my mind along. Music has become a brace that props up my thoughts, fences them off, prevents them from slipping away. Silence has come to feel like an unfamiliar field, with too much space to roam. Along with Beach House, Boards of Canada -- makers of beat-driven, dystopian electronic music -- has lately been my brace of choice. Such sounds somehow hem me in and push my focus outward, into whatever I’m writing. When I need less help, some sort of jazz usually does the trick -- with something buoyant like Vince Guaraldi’s Peanuts scores reserved for the easiest days. Which brings me back to my original question: what is that music -- Boards of Canada’s creepy soundscapes, John Coltrane’s hard bop, Snoopy’s dancing tunes -- doing to the words? I went online in search of answers, and was at first encouraged by what I found. A number of sites have devoted space to the topic, with pieces ranging from the listy (“10 Top Authors Share Their Secrets for Summoning the Muse”) to the self-helpful (one Goodreads thread, “Listening to Music While Writing,” sits under the “Struggling Writers” heading). There are endless suggestions for albums that will not only “summon the muse,” but keep her with you: In a Silent Way, Music For Airports, anything by Philip Glass. No mention of Nine Inch Nails. The cumulative effect of these posts was the feeling that, with the correct music, you can become the next Joyce Carol Oates, effortlessly meeting your daily quota of words. It’s a tempting narrative, and one that fits with the Internet’s culture of simple solutions: If you’re having trouble with that short story, just put on some Brian Eno. Your latent genius will be unleashed. But mixed in with all this good feeling were numerous studies and papers the results of which were both consistent and surprising. A New Jersey Institute of Technology study found that “background music significantly disrupted writing fluency, even though no response to the music was required.” The explanation: “music may increase cognitive load because the brain has to handle the additional information.” A University of Windsor study found that its subjects’ “time-on-task was longest when music was removed.” Another, from Indiana State University, on the “Mozart Effect” -- the idea that classical music can somehow boost intelligence -- found that “playing background music in the creative writing class had a significant improvement on the student’s behavior, but not a significant improvement on the student’s writing.” In other words, music can provide the inner calm that I used to imagine in my Philip Roth fantasy. It just won’t help me write the next American Pastoral. Time’s Annie Murphy Paul, in a synthesis of such studies, provided the most concise blow to my assumption of music’s benefits: “Playing music you like can lift your mood and increase your arousal -- if you listen to it before getting down to work. But it serves as a distraction from cognitively demanding tasks...when you need to give learning and remembering your full attention, silence is golden.” And on and on. If the science is correct, my Eno-loving peers and I may be deluding ourselves as to music’s utility. We’re most likely being too romantic. “Writing can get lonely,” a Quora contributor wrote, “but when Moby is in my ears, it feels like he’s on the journey with me.” It’s a charming sentiment. But maybe we’re being too eager to make an unappealing task seem less so -- the ice cream cone after the doctor’s office -- without any thought to the consequences. Maybe Boards of Canada is less of a brace and more of an anchor, slowing down a part of my mind that otherwise would be free. There’s no way to prove that the things I’ve written would have been better had they been written in silence -- but what if they could have been, even just a tiny bit? Though I’ll never know, it’s unsettling to think about. It’s equally unsettling, though, for me to picture a future in which I write in a totally quiet room, with no one “on the journey with me.” The idea is as unappetizing to me as Palahniuk’s habits once seemed. So what, then, to do? On the one hand, I have my habits and experience, my comfort with routine. On the other, studies that show that music is, at best, a nonfactor, and at worst, a hindrance. Hovering over both is the thought that I’m being unserious, the kid who can’t get a flu shot without the promise of a mint-chip cone. I’m not sure what to do. I’m now listening to Miles Davis’s Someday My Prince Will Come. I’ve listened to this album, while writing or reading, close to 200 times. It’s delicate and warm, gentle and easy. I’ve got the volume turned down low. Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.
Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
| 1 book mentioned 13 6 min read
● ● ●
Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music

The Weird Sisters: CocoRosie’s Grey Oceans

Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
May 11, 2010 | 1 book mentioned 8 7 min read
CocoRosie's mythology is equal parts Victorian childhood and modern Gothic. The freak folk/trip hop duo are innocents who know about the dark side, but still believe in angels, fairies, God, St. Nicholas, rainbows, unicorns, Armageddon. The sisters' haunting, perverse lullabies tend to make lovers or haters of their listeners pretty quickly.
Torch Ballads & Jukebox Music
| 1 book mentioned 8 7 min read
● ● ●
● ● ●
● ● ●