The Blessed Madonna
11 Likes
one of the things I think TBM has done really well is tie up her personal brand with her own identity politics. I think it’s a really good thing for dance music culture to have someone become so popular who is so unrelentingly outspoken about feminism, queer rights, BLM, etc and I think a culture where Ten Walls and Vakula can still make bookings is one that needs more diversity in it.
But the music she makes is really bad. It takes a real skill to take a song as beautiful and powerful as “Stand On The Word” and make it sound like standardised personality-free filter house.
2 Likes
Definitely agree about Nick Cave. But Lou has his moment even if he was rather cantankerous.
I’d like to throw in Joni Mitchell (does nothing for me) and The Band vastly overated there are maybe 2 or 3 songs the rest dull as ditch water.
i hear ya- i get told off on the regs for that. Ive phased out licking the plate tho…
1 Like
MAW < Kenny & Louie solo
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Drag. By that I mean men parodying and imitating women for financial gain. Seems to be everywhere at the moment.
Something irredeemably naff that should have been left behind in the 80s along with moustaches.
I went to a house party in Manchester in the early 90s. They had one of those CD changers where you put like 5 CDs into a big tray, set on shuffle. They were all New Order CDs.
4 Likes
this is massively down to RuPaul’s Drag Race becoming super popular. It was very minor when it first aired here but thanks to Netflix and word-of-mouth it ballooned up. It’s a very entertaining show in the early series, now it’s got that insular self-referential universe that makes it harder to commit to - and also it just seems more focussed on drama than any actual skills of costume design, comedy skills, dance and performance ability etc.
I’ll defend drag - increasing numbers of people are finding the gender binary doesn’t make sense for them, they don’t want to feel limited in their behaviours by the expectations of what being a man or being a woman entails, and feel more able to express themselves in the way that feels most comfortable for them. The mainstream-ification of drag has contributed to that, as it shows how much of our gendered behaviour is learned and performed rather than natural. I think it’s great that the cast of one of the most popular contemporary shows around is made of icons of queer visibility.
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Absolutely, I do find it weird though there are no female > male artistes in the show… seems a very blinkered view of Drag to my eyes at least.
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oh the show itself is very limited in that regard, and RuPaul has a very obviously narrow-minded view of the concept of drag itself. If you’ve been watching the show you’ll have noticed the change from “may the best woman win” to “may the best drag queen win” which suggests a flexibilty in eligibility for competitors, but the judging feels increasingly like a row of four old people chastising 20-somethings for not understanding cultural references from before they were born.
(this kind of gender stuff is like one of my hot-button topics!)
2 Likes
Just to clarify for me drag has nothing to do with transsexuals, transvestites, crossdressing or someone who just likes to slip on a silky pair under their work clothes. I’d even question how it fits into gender fluidity. There is maybe a fine line between expressing oneself and performing an offensive parody of women, for money.
The crucial thing is the ‘for profit’ nature of it. It very much bows to the shrine of capitalism like a Pepsi/Cola tweet of BLM.
I do know a lot of women who find it a complete turn off and question why prime time television can find space for men impersonating women but not women.
Maybe I’m scarred by memories of really awful acts in 80/90’s gay pubs, when someone piped up “duckie” it was very much time to leave.
1 Like
On a similar tip: Burlesque
It’s neither particularly sexy nor entertaining IMHO
If you want to be a stripper, have the courage of your conviction and be an actual stripper
8 Likes
I don’t get that people are booking hotels and flights for things that more than likely won’t happen…
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People travelling in the middle of a global pandemic then complaining that their holidays have been ruined after last minute changes to government travel policies.
12 Likes
Yves Tumor
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Yep, To Pimp A Butterfly i just find verrrrryyyyy long & dull
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Marvel films, basically Eastenders with more sfx and lycra.
12 Likes
People who don’t think MadMen is the greatest TV show ever made.
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People who don’t think the wire is absolutely the best tv show ever made
6 Likes