Tag Archives: music videos

Kanye West – “Famous”

OK, “Famous”. Watched the whole video.

Very heterosexual. No guys next to each other. The only women next to each other are Amber Rose and Caitlyn Jenner. Very voyeuristic.

Even the artist whose giant mural inspired the video, Vincent Desiderio, was taken by how his own feelings toward the people depicted flowed from ridicule to empathy for “Slumbering gods, they were, but also like babies or small children at the height of vulnerability.” Obsessed to a point with power. All famous people, most of them being attached in some way with whom they had sex or were publicly obsessed (or who simply had their own public sexual histories).

Too many pieces already written about the deliberate placing of women next to/in the same bed as the men with whom they had toxic, well-publicized or distant relationships; Lena Dunham’s takedown comes to mind. Oh, and Bush and Wintour. Who have they had sex with and how? The public needs to know, I’m sure.

#Lemonade

Just finished watching #Lemonade on Facebook.

I wonder if Lemonade is Beyonce’s magnum opus album, or her magnum opus video anthology.

But, going off of the film, this is NOT a pop album. None of this is pop. This is higher concept than her self-titled album. This is her most thematically-compact album to date.

Sasha Fierce, 4 and Self-Titled fit within a thematic trilogy of exploring feminism, beauty, power, love and self-expression in the world. Lemonade is new territory, in which she explores Black womanhood, infidelity, inheritance, pain, anger and appreciation in history.

The pacing is incredibly taut, like a one-hour religious ritual. Everyone, every dancer and guest, is posed exactly as they should be posed, to be canvasses for the story, like they’re dreamy expressions emanating from Beyonce’s mind. But it’s all a process. It goes from reacting to betrayal to reconciling and rebuilding with one’s love.

It goes beyond some mere “Becky with the good hair” to a wider theme of being true to those who you will meet when you wake up: oneself and each other.

I’m back from Atlanta. I thank those who drove me up and back. I enjoyed myself, and I even shed my catharsis for a departed friend with peers before I left. Saw so many people from all over the world, danced my ass off, ate good food, learned lots of ideas. I await next year! But for now: #BackToLife #BackToReality