complaining

[veronica_rich]

A Titanic reenactment tracing the original route of the sunken ship doesn't seem in any worse taste than reenacting battles of a war. In the fake battles, though, the actors are using blanks and fake fighting; I'm pretty sure in order to trace the voyage of the Titanic, you need to set foot on a ship heading into potentially ice-laden waters, which is all the original passengers did. And most of them died; just saying.

*******

And thoughts on my latest CD purchase (which I only make about once every year or three; I'm cheap)-

An Open Letter to Madonna:

Hey, Madge - I started listening to you when I was about 10 years old and you weren't but about 24. I never dressed up like you, but a lot of girls I knew did, and you helped at least a generation of girls grow up not feeling bad about wanting to go out and try new things, and flaunting authority to do what we wanted - which is good for society sometimes. You didn't cure cancer, but hey, nobody else has, either. And, art is valuable.

For the last 30 years, I've bought every album you released and always liked most of their content. The last couple or three were waning, but I thought, well, you're transitioning. You did that for most of your career and managed to stay out ahead of whatever the next trend was going to be for a long time. I kept waiting for whatever the next thing was going to be. And then we got it - and it's you trying to be 24 again.

Don't get me wrong, you can still dance and perform, and I was hunky-dory with your Super Bowl halftime show; it was a lot of fun. But that's because it was mostly old stuff, and your old stuff is almost always good. You should keep performing it. It's the new stuff I'm not so sure about ... because it seems an unsuccessful (to me) bid to retread the good old stuff, except in a not-so-good way. For one, constantly referring to yourself as "girl" - I'm not quite sure how to say this, but you're not a girl anymore. Hell, I'M not a girl anymore. You can get away with that up to about your early 30s, but then it just creates eyebrow-raise.

But the biggest thing is you're still singing about rebelling and partying. Now I understand you and your daddy issues aren't exorcised and likely never will be; that's cool. Many of us have a degree or two of that in our lives. But that's what your old stuff is for. You're coming up on 60 years old and you've spent three decades establishing what kind of personality you are; we know already you're not a "good girl" and we're OK with it. You don't have to keep pushing the issue; you already recorded Erotica 20 years ago and it was good. You don't have to redo it. How about some music more reflective of your experiences since the age of 24, like being a mother or a traveler, or a businesswoman or wife, or successful career gal?

The thing is, it's easy to listen to the music of rebellion and flaunting authority from a kid of 18 or 25 or even 30; they're still at a point where almost nobody is taking them seriously and that's frustrating. It works as a message by and for them. But at this point, you ARE an authority. You're a mother, a producer, several people's boss, and a cultural icon. We know you eat your fiber and jog and stay in good health and aren't out drinking and partying and snorting ... so it's kind of an unsuccessful dichotomy to pass yourself off as Ke$ha. You're not writing a book, where it's easy to not know who the author is when reading it. We hear your voice, we see you sing and dance, and we know darn well who you are, that you're at an advanced stage of career, and some of us (okay, maybe just me) wonder who you're rebelling against at this point. American Life seemed to be a good turn for you, heading somewhere you never really got; what's up with that? The follow-up was not what I anticipated, and not in the good way. MDNA has a few things on it, but I could live without it - and I really don't like saying that.

Anyway, there's my first-world problem for the week. Just thought I'd share. Write some more adult stuff, mmkay? Pretty please?

Yours,
VR

Comments

[weyrlady.livejournal.com]

Hah, your cut text made me think of this song. The theme is even similar to your opinion. Sort of.

[veronica-rich.livejournal.com]

The thing is, she used to change and adapt - not a whole lot, just enough to stay fresh and relevant. It's like she's decided the thing that made her most famous is where she ought to go to and stick with again, and she forgot like the 20-some years in between.