Cool As Kim Deal
People — writers, fans, music executives — don't really know what to do with an aging female musician. I'm not talking about someone like Celine Dion or Cher, whose popularity was never based on some amorphous idea of coolness or relevance. I'm not even talking about our beloved
Liz Phair, who still plasters short, tight dresses on her meticulously muscled frame and projects an image of socially desirable sexuality. I'm talking about Patti Smith, who was
interviewed by Deborah Solomon in this weekend's
New York Times Magazine and asked more than one question about her use of conditioner and reigning status as "the queen of split ends." And even more so, I'm talking about Kim Deal, the lead singer of the Breeders and former Pixies bassist who headlined a big summer concert yesterday in Brooklyn to support the Breeders' April release,
Mountain Battles.
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chit chat
Yesterday Jessica and I went to see the musician Liz Phair play an intimate concert in commemoration of the 15th anniversary of the highly underappreciated cult album
Exile In Guyville. The crowd was somewhat disappointingly subdued, chiefly because they couldn't really sing along word-for-word as one usually does in such situations because Liz Phair has a very, very, very low voice. (Occasionally you'd hear little yelps from fangirls, desperately singing along in the next octave up like Liz Phair as told to Juliana Hatfield karaoke.) (And yes some of those yelps came from us!) Anyway,
we attempted to Liveblog the excitement via Twitter, but the subterranean venue had no cell phone reception. How nineties! So we've attempted to recreate the experience in all its shimmeringly, sensually poignant totality the only way we know how anymore: IM exchange! In short: don't believe
the haters! It was fun. Well, in that "despite the fact we are really fucking old" way!
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exile in guyville
Jane Czyzselska thinks that women in music are
rarely referred to as geniuses. The
Times of London writer claims that Rufus Wainwright gets plied with the "genius" accolade frequently, while similarly blessed female musicians like Kate Bush, Bjork and Goldfrapp are not given the genius label. Um, Jane? Goldfrapp? You're really arguing that Goldfrapp is a "genius?" Maybe the term genius is being tossed around entirely too frequently, regardless of gender. That made me doubt Czyzselska's original thesis, so I decided to google Jezebel fave "Liz Phair" and "genius" and found this
incredible review of Phair's third album whitechocolatespaceegg by Laura Sinagra. I checked out the Billboard Hot 100, and as
five of the top ten albums are by women, maybe we need to lament the lack of "genius" females in music writing, not music making.
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all the sad young indie rock girls
Moe is not the only
Phair-lover on staff; I, too, listened to
Exile In Guyville at least once a week for the entirety of my college career, not to mention the time spent on
whitechocolatespaceegg and
Whip Smart. I was shaped by Phair, but not just by her alone — I also spent many, many ponderous hours with Sleater-Kinney and Kim Deal and Belly and lots of other disaffected, apathetic, introspective white ladies. Carrie Brownstein, former Sleater-Kinney guitarist was on NPR
yesterday, talking about the "sound of a generation" — i.e., how music can define a specific era. Much of the talk focused on the difference between Generation X's musical preferences and Generation Y's. Although I am
technically part of Generation Y, as its often defined as those born between 1982 and 2002, my musical tastes are very staunchly X, and hearing Brownstein talk made me wonder: what happened to all those sad young indie rock girls?
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exile in carpool
It is the fifteenth anniversary of
Exile In Guyville. What
more, at this
point, could we
possibly say about
Exile In Guyville? WRONG QUESTION, bitches! (Better question: Why on earth isn't Jezebel devoting a post to each song on
Exile In Guyville? Answer: Why, what a capital idea! How did
you go about becoming a blowjob queen, Anna?) Anyway, Liz (incidentally a Hillary supporter)
was on NPR today talking about the album, and the interview — salient quote: "I had this crush on this guy in the scene…" — would have probably brought a tear my eye if Liz hadn't so effectively schooled me in the ways of repressing emotions. Fifteen years ago, see, I was a fourteen year old passenger in the carpool of Francis Chung whose most defensible CD was probably En Vogue's "Funky Divas." I was a virgin and a nerd who hadn't learned to pluck my eyebrows or roll my kilt correctly or swear off barrettes. Francis Chung was a dork too but he liked "alternative" music, and he, and that one line in "Fuck And Run" —
Even when I was seventeen, fuck and run, fuck and run, even when I was twelve… — would become my "salvation" of a sort.
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dirt bag
- Nelson Mandela personally called Amy Winehouse and asked her to sing at his birthday party on June 27! The former president of South Africa phoned her! Bono, Elton John and Annie Lennox are expected to perform as well. This UK paper says,"Let's hope [Amy] bee-hives herself!" Yuk, yuk. [Mirror]
- Meanwhile: Does Blake Incarcerated have a secret mistress? Is he plotting with the "mystery blonde" to run away with her — and a chunk of Amy's £10 million fortune? [The Sun]
- Britney Spears and Kevin Federline are due in court today for a progress review. A completely uninformed opinion? She's doing better. [People]
- Owen Wilson allegedly picked up some chick (not Kate Hudson) and invited her back to is boat and propositioned her to join him in a threesome with Vince Vaughn. There was a time that a Butterscotch Stallion/Money Baby sandwich would have been soooo hot, and that time was 2001. [Perez Hilton]
- Britney's back at work on How I Met Your Mother. She looks cute dressed to match Neil Patrick Harris! [TMZ]
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love burns
Crappy Valentine's! And welcome to our all-time favorite hateful love songs post. The thing about love songs is that they only seem good when you're really really miserable thanks to love. In fact, if you're
in a relationship and you find yourself listening to, say, "
Divorce Song" or "
I Am Trying To Break Your Heart" or "
Unsatisfied" or "
She's Gone"...or "
I Want You" or "
Song Cry" or anything Smiths or off that pink Beck breakup album or that suicidal wrenching Jennifer Hudson number from
Dreamgirls...yeah, you're maybe not going to be in that relationship long because that song is actually
trying to break your heart. Anyway! In the spirit of this, which is to say, the fact that the only thing any of us single people ever got from love was an iPod full of aborted dreams...
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Jezebel
Jess and I are going to see Liz Phair. We'll be twittering about it. Come, experience our fabulous lives vicariously, one misspelled 14-word text message missive at a time!
Just Pointing Your Body Wherever It Seemed Like A Good Idea
