1) The Scissor Sisters singer. Wouldn't you like to thump him in his smug, preening, PoMo mug? Again. And again.
And again.
2) Atomic Kitten. Soft target maybe, and they're splitting, so perhaps it's pointless, but ... Not sure what's worse, their 'we're-mad-us' hedonic partygirl mode or their coy, sidelong downward glances to camera (connoting that they are, y'know sensitive and demure) pose. Well: you don't have to choose, because their farewell single is a double A side, with one video for each mode/ mood. Ker-ist.
3) Janet Jackson's 'smile'. As artificial and sickeningly sweet as a can of vanilla coke. As chillingly insincere as a politician's handshake. As warm and inviting as a Stepford wife's embrace. It seems like Janet's been smiling nonstop for the last twenty years, her dental dazzle a wearyingly permanent fixture on the pop landsape. Well, at least it distracts you from the music. Except her forget-them-even-as-you-hear-them self-erasing texts do that themselves. k-punk no-prize to the first person who can name five JJ singles (not including anything off Jam and Lewis's brilliant Control)....
Posted by mark at March 30, 2004 08:23 PM | TrackBackSpeaking of "Control", I always thought that Rhythm Nation was copied by Cabaret Voltaire on Microphonies...
Posted by: paul "I've fallen" meme at March 30, 2004 09:59 PMDon't you mean the other way round, Paul? Wasn't Microphonies circa 84 and Rhythm Nation about 87?
Posted by: mark k-punk at March 30, 2004 10:09 PMRhythm Nation was even later, like '89 (some of us bought the cassette when we were 12).
Posted by: jd at March 30, 2004 10:31 PMNaturally, for the Cabaret Voltaire like qualities.
Posted by: jd at March 30, 2004 10:33 PMMark, despite your Janet hateration, you really should check out:
1) If
2) Someone To Call My Lover
3) Empty
4) Doesn't Really Matter
5) Free Xone
Bah! There would have to be an afficianado spoiling my little game...
Posted by: mark k-punk at March 31, 2004 07:53 AMAnd I thought it might have been the other way round...
I remember talking about this with Gen in a pub in Clerkenwell in 1989. No wonder he looked confused...
Posted by: paul "I've fallen" meme at March 31, 2004 09:23 AMas i said to you the other week, atomic kitten were originally set up by andy mccluskey with a view to becoming a ztt pomo mockery of girl groups. but kids don't and didn't (in their instance) like buying irony (cf. daphne & celeste) - even irony has to be sincere (pet shop boys?) - thus they had to go straight and ultimately ditch the omd/ztt element, to pay their record company's bills.
thus a more ztt atomic kitten doing a photocall trying to stick one of their t-shirts on prince charles would have been at least moderately subversive (or staged as such), whereas in reality it turned out just to be more studium showbiz, with p charles obviously in the same situation; his gruesome expression in that picture is enough to remind us that he doesn't really want to be here either, but he also needs to have his bills paid, even if by us.
Posted by: Marcello Carlin at March 31, 2004 10:39 AM