Being the Internet man-about-town I am has a number of advantages, including the ability to learn about the many monstrosities spawned by the Internet before they seep into mainstream culture. I've managed to avoid some of the worst evils the Internet has to offer, from Rickrolling to 2Girls1Cup, and I can now add “Friday” by Rebecca Black to that prestigious list.
The first time I heard about Rebecca Black, I was convinced she was just some sick joke cooked up as the feminine counterpart to Justin Beiber. Accompanying the generic picture of some 13 year-old brunette, I found some of the most inane lyrics ever formed with the English language, like something Ke$ha would freestyle from the inside of a toilet bowl after a three-day bender:
“Partyin’, partyin’ (Yeah) / Fun, fun, fun, fun / Lookin’ forward to the weekend.”
I had a laugh, looked at the endless stream of comments describing how unbelievably terrible it was, and went on with my life, never expecting to hear about it again.
That was Saturday, March 12th, a day after a Tosh.0 blog post opened up the song up to an unknowing audience across the Internet. The video only had a few thousand views, and Internet was still at peace.
As of Monday night, Rebecca Black's official music video has over 30 million views.
Somehow, this cheesy pop song, autotuned to hell and back, written by a tiny L.A. record label and recorded for $2,000, has become a phenomenon that threatened to overshadow one of the deadliest natural disasters in human history.
That's the Internet for you.
Honestly, I've yet to listen to this song. I've been fighting against it for weeks—especially since last Friday, when the fervor surrounding the song reached truly unbearable levels.
As endless links of the song and its many covers blanketed Facebook news feeds worldwide, I stuck to my guns, refusing to listen to a song Yahoo! Music actually declared “the worst song ever.” But I fear my time has finally come.
I've made similar stands against obnoxious pop songs in the past—including “Whip My Hair,” Justin Beiber's “Baby,” and everything Ke$ha's ever done—but I eventually ended up listening to them all, somehow. (I heard “Baby” for the first time at a family barbeque last summer. I laughed until I cried, and then debated its artistic merits with by 10 year-old cousin for hours.)
As a (technical) member of the music press, I feel that it would be downright irresponsible of me not to listen to a song so culturally significant. So here goes: my immediate reaction to hearing “Friday” by Rebecca Black for the first time.
(Three minutes and forty-eight seconds later.)
Not gonna lie... I'm a little disappointed.
It was only slightly less grotesque than 2Girls1Cup (though just as hilarious), but honestly, my musical palette is more offended by the average Glee episode.
Maybe I'm just turning into a grumpy old man, but this just sounds like pop music to me. The vocals are worse than usual, and the video is a whole other level of bad I'm not comfortable with addressing in this forum, but the song itself is simplistic, fun, and almost catchy for a few brief seconds at a time.
Leave the kid alone. There is much, much worse music out there. “Friday” is easily better than “TiK-ToK,” and judging by her unplugged performance on ABC News, she's already infinitely more talented than Ke$ha is.
If you really have that much personal hate for a 13 year-old singing a song about “lookin' forward to the weekend,” then you have a blackness to your soul that even I cannot begin to comprehend.
Let's be clear here: this is a terrible, terrible song, without a doubt. But it's inherently terrible.
To call it “the worst song ever” is completely missing its true nature. This is art circumventing the very definitions of art itself, vaulting itself into a level of intellectual brilliance so lofty that only the most truly unhinged fans of music, people completely free of all artistic, critical, and musical limitations, can appreciate it.
Critics around the world are tearing this song to pieces, just as they once ravaged Bitches Brew, Led Zeppelin, The Velvet Underground & Nico, and countless other works that were ahead of their time. No surprise there. But unlike my aging brethren, I'm not in the business of prematurely rejecting art I simply can't comprehend.
“Friday” will be hailed for generations to come as the breakout song of the “post-good” artistic movement, which will be carried on by the likes of Lil B, BrokeNCYDE, and the Black Eyed Peas in complete and unrelenting opposition to all critical forces that renounce them.
They will one day be recognized as the triumphant new carriers of the Dada torch, using it to burn everything in their path and build a new creative landscape where the old world once stood, enshrining their limitless musical forms as a model to wave after wave of bright young talent eager to break barriers where no previous barriers stood.
And I will be right beside them, championing them until my last breath.
“I don't want this weekend to end...”
- 5/1/11
No comments:
Post a Comment