If you are in the mood to be taking suggestions for songs of the week next week, the late great Pete Seeger’s “Talking Union” has been stuck in my head for a wee while.
Hi Freddie. This is weird of me, but it's bothered me all week. On a post this week, you took Madonna's gentle song, "What It Feels Like For a Girl" because it sampled dialogue from film adaptation ofThe Cement Garden, your current book club thing.
And, you tossed in this thing: "the last time Madonna had any relevance" or, "the last time Madonna greedily grasped for relevance", and it was just this really gratuitous thing. "How mockable is Madonna, once relevant, now laughably obsolete as a cultural force", as if it's some failing of her own that the culture has changed so drastically, and that she is pathetic to continue to create pop music.
I am not a super-fan of Madonna's, but I am a fan because as a gay teen dancing to her, she blessed us on the dance floor with a certain benevolence in a hostile world, I admire her building on that, that she ever became a cultural force to begin with. SO, the ONLY people I see relishing trashing her, since forever, are heterosexual white male cultural critics, or "rock" critics, as if that genre hasn;t compeltely passed out of actual relevance itself. As if your tastes in rock music from twenty years ago are more relevant than Madonna busting her ass and being cheered on worldwide by the gays and the Blacks and the women - why is it white guys like your profile that seem to enjoy trashing her when everyone else sort of thinks of her fondly , admires her balls or creativity or longevity, why is it YOU feel superior sneering at her for "relevance"?
What the fuck did Madonna ever DO to guys like you that you relish seeing her fail or becoming irrelevant? Nonstop verbal smirking and trashing her for 40 years, no shit it's almost been that long. And if she's so irrelevant, why did you include and discuss her song with the Cement Gardens sampling, as if this was some idiot unthoughtful choice of hers, and 20 years later YOU know something in her choice then, and Haha, she's so irrelevant now. Really, who the fuck does she think she is? Pavement is so much more relevant, or whatever the fuck band you still love.
I subscribe because I love your writing and unconventional points of view. I like your unorthodoxy and seeing things from different angles. So, it's disappointing that you trash Madonna for being irrelevant so casually, like some obese cokehead lefty-chauvinist douchebag at Spin in 1988, just bone-dumb snickering. It's so basic. That Madonna's not a real artist in pop culture, that's she's ha-ha an irrelevant old bag. Now here's a song where she sampled part of a novel adaptation 20 years ago that you've thought about. But, so irrelevant! My (preferred music choice) is much more relevant.
I know it was a brief throw-off line. But, where does that come from? It's so tired. Male mockery of Madonna as somehow not serious as a great American pop artist, while hundreds of indie rock male artists get a pass, Eternals, "real" and relevant, but Madonna's pathetic and irrelevant because..
Please forgive this expostulation. I just wonder if you've ever asked yourself why you think Madonna's so mockable, dismissable, irrelevant. Hope you had a good weekend.
Goncharova!
If you are in the mood to be taking suggestions for songs of the week next week, the late great Pete Seeger’s “Talking Union” has been stuck in my head for a wee while.
https://youtu.be/C13JFv4JfH8
Getting literally cancelled (drop in subs) for criticizing Joe Rogan. Strange world.
Hi Freddie. This is weird of me, but it's bothered me all week. On a post this week, you took Madonna's gentle song, "What It Feels Like For a Girl" because it sampled dialogue from film adaptation ofThe Cement Garden, your current book club thing.
And, you tossed in this thing: "the last time Madonna had any relevance" or, "the last time Madonna greedily grasped for relevance", and it was just this really gratuitous thing. "How mockable is Madonna, once relevant, now laughably obsolete as a cultural force", as if it's some failing of her own that the culture has changed so drastically, and that she is pathetic to continue to create pop music.
I am not a super-fan of Madonna's, but I am a fan because as a gay teen dancing to her, she blessed us on the dance floor with a certain benevolence in a hostile world, I admire her building on that, that she ever became a cultural force to begin with. SO, the ONLY people I see relishing trashing her, since forever, are heterosexual white male cultural critics, or "rock" critics, as if that genre hasn;t compeltely passed out of actual relevance itself. As if your tastes in rock music from twenty years ago are more relevant than Madonna busting her ass and being cheered on worldwide by the gays and the Blacks and the women - why is it white guys like your profile that seem to enjoy trashing her when everyone else sort of thinks of her fondly , admires her balls or creativity or longevity, why is it YOU feel superior sneering at her for "relevance"?
What the fuck did Madonna ever DO to guys like you that you relish seeing her fail or becoming irrelevant? Nonstop verbal smirking and trashing her for 40 years, no shit it's almost been that long. And if she's so irrelevant, why did you include and discuss her song with the Cement Gardens sampling, as if this was some idiot unthoughtful choice of hers, and 20 years later YOU know something in her choice then, and Haha, she's so irrelevant now. Really, who the fuck does she think she is? Pavement is so much more relevant, or whatever the fuck band you still love.
I subscribe because I love your writing and unconventional points of view. I like your unorthodoxy and seeing things from different angles. So, it's disappointing that you trash Madonna for being irrelevant so casually, like some obese cokehead lefty-chauvinist douchebag at Spin in 1988, just bone-dumb snickering. It's so basic. That Madonna's not a real artist in pop culture, that's she's ha-ha an irrelevant old bag. Now here's a song where she sampled part of a novel adaptation 20 years ago that you've thought about. But, so irrelevant! My (preferred music choice) is much more relevant.
I know it was a brief throw-off line. But, where does that come from? It's so tired. Male mockery of Madonna as somehow not serious as a great American pop artist, while hundreds of indie rock male artists get a pass, Eternals, "real" and relevant, but Madonna's pathetic and irrelevant because..
Please forgive this expostulation. I just wonder if you've ever asked yourself why you think Madonna's so mockable, dismissable, irrelevant. Hope you had a good weekend.