Saturday, January 22, 2005
Raw Like Youth
I always go against the grain. If a woman is not supposed to watch pornography, I will watch it just to prove you wrong. I am Pavlov's bitch: tell me no and I'll do it anyway. I remember as a 12-year-old watching the static on tv and enjoying it. My friend was looking at me like I was mental. I probably was. But it just made me continue listening a few minutes more. Static is the great void: I loved losing myself in it, not knowing if I will be able to get out again. I'm not entirely sure if I love Noise purely because I like the randomness of the sound - the genre itself - or because of people's reaction when I profess my love for Prick Decay, Harry Pussy or... Whatever, the point is that I like to go against the flow. This is why I like(d) Neneh Cherry. It wasn't merely the music - although that was of course a factor - but her attitude. I'd watch her kick the crowd and loved her even more. Was she trying to make the public hate her? Maybe. She wasn't girly like Kylie Minogue or too aloof like Grace Jones. She hovered somewhere inbetween. Neneh wore a mini-skirt with doc martens, which meant, to me anyway, that she liked to gender bend. It was about acknowledging labels and then breaking the rules. Neneh Cherry's music encapsulated every genre I loved at the time and would later discover. She was my female cohort who introduced me to Portishead and the Slits - something Ice T couldn't quite live up to even though he did have 99 Problems, the poor guy, or even Madonna who was too far away (figuratively/literally speaking) to care enough about me. Raw Like Sushi and Homebrew were guides who would push me into other genres. If only she hadn't collaborated with Youssou and Eagle-Eye. Maybe she wanted to go against the grain as well. ¶ 1/22/2005
I always go against the grain. If a woman is not supposed to watch pornography, I will watch it just to prove you wrong. I am Pavlov's bitch: tell me no and I'll do it anyway. I remember as a 12-year-old watching the static on tv and enjoying it. My friend was looking at me like I was mental. I probably was. But it just made me continue listening a few minutes more. Static is the great void: I loved losing myself in it, not knowing if I will be able to get out again. I'm not entirely sure if I love Noise purely because I like the randomness of the sound - the genre itself - or because of people's reaction when I profess my love for Prick Decay, Harry Pussy or... Whatever, the point is that I like to go against the flow. This is why I like(d) Neneh Cherry. It wasn't merely the music - although that was of course a factor - but her attitude. I'd watch her kick the crowd and loved her even more. Was she trying to make the public hate her? Maybe. She wasn't girly like Kylie Minogue or too aloof like Grace Jones. She hovered somewhere inbetween. Neneh wore a mini-skirt with doc martens, which meant, to me anyway, that she liked to gender bend. It was about acknowledging labels and then breaking the rules. Neneh Cherry's music encapsulated every genre I loved at the time and would later discover. She was my female cohort who introduced me to Portishead and the Slits - something Ice T couldn't quite live up to even though he did have 99 Problems, the poor guy, or even Madonna who was too far away (figuratively/literally speaking) to care enough about me. Raw Like Sushi and Homebrew were guides who would push me into other genres. If only she hadn't collaborated with Youssou and Eagle-Eye. Maybe she wanted to go against the grain as well. ¶ 1/22/2005
