The Hardest Part of My Day: A JT Love Story

 

 

This is a story about a girl.

This girl has first world problems.

And this girl just decided she doesn’t want to write this story in third person.

So, anyway. I was listening to some JT today, pumping through my busy work, generally and metaphorically wading through the songs’ pretty alright verses and choruses to get to some of the sick, sick breakdowns.

That’s what blows my mind about Justin Timberlake. He’s talented. His songs are catchy. But his breakdowns. Mercy. I always anticipate the end of every song. I only ever listen to Mirrors to get to the breakdown because, as much as I hate Mirrors, the breakdown makes me want to weep.

I hadn’t listened much to his FutureSex/LoveSound album, so I was giving that a try today. Two things happened: 1) I have a new favorite JT song. And 2) I’m going to slap whoever is responsible for this album.

The song? Well technically, it’s called “Medley: Sexy Ladies/Let Me Talk to You (Prelude),” but that’s just stupid.

So instead, we’ll call it “Cowbell Sexy.”

Cowbell Sexy takes up the last bit of the song, which would make it appear to be the breakdown. But, it’s not. It’s actually a type of prelude/remix of the more popular song “My Love.” Which is the next song. On its own track.

Cowbell Sexy has nothing to do with the first part of the song. In fact, the first part of the song is actually not very good. It’s boring. Not catchy at all. One of my least favorite JT songs. It drawls on for about 3:45 minutes, and then?

A hard stop.

Not a choreographed transition.

A literal moment of silence. Awkward, painful, pungent.

And then it goes into Cowbell Sexy. Like nothing ever happened, and no idiot ever made that horrible, horrible decision to combine those two unrelated songs on one track.

So, what does this mean for my day?

I have to listen to 3:45 minutes of shit to get to my 1:00 favorite song.

I’m so sorry JT. I love you. But you need to talk to your manager or something and get this album you released eight years ago fixed, or I’m going to talk to him for you.

You ruined my day.

I love you.

 

I Am a Hipster and I Love Ke$ha

People have called me many things. A girl, “hey you,” and a hipster.

That’s all I can think of right now.

As a society-labeled hipster, I have to be very careful about the interests I have. I must prefer Bon Iver to Jack Johnson. I must like men with beards. And I must end my love affair with Ke$ha.

It’s just so hard, Internet. It’s. So. Hard.

I don’t think I have a single person in my life right now that supports my love of Ke$ha’s music.  “It’s not natural. It’s disgusting. It’s like you have chlamydia.” There is not a single loved one of mine that loves me as much as they want to. All because they haven’t accepted that I love Ke$ha yet.

So I’m going to defend myself.

I started listening to Ke$ha halfway through college. When I graduated highschool I was an organic hipster, as pompous as they come. I refused to listen to the radio, unless it was the local grassroots station that played crunchy Jazz between 2 and 4 pm. Yeah, I had to listen to crappy crunchy Jazz as I drove just to prove my commitment to art. Stupid art.

I don’t know what came over me, but I think I was pushed over the edge one day. It was my second year of college, and I think the last of one too many Ani DeFranco songs caused me to spasm and change the station.

Katy Perry. “What is this strange magic?”

I listened to all this new music, interested but not surprised. Black Eyed Peas had lame lyrics. Katy Perry had lame bridges. Pink had a weird anger that seemed very unfounded and directed at nobody in particular. Fun. had been cool, but they turned to the dark side. Kelly Clarkson SHOOT ME. For the most part, I felt assured that I hadn’t been missing anything spectacular in the world of popular music.

Except for one.

Ke$ha.

That spectacular, spectacular bitch.

I couldn’t explain it at the time. All I knew was that I continued to listen to pop radio for the rest of my college days, and I believe it was all out of the hope of possibly hearing “Tik Tok” that day.

I’ve had plenty of discussions with my more philosophically-minded friends about the issue, and all I ever get in forms of a retort are statements along the lines of “Ke$ha? KE$HA?” “You’re just wrong.” and “She has a dollar $ign in her name.” But no other artist makes me want to dance like Ke$ha, and hers is the only celebrity hair I’ve ever seeked out the forums of the interwebs to recreate for myself.

Her obsession with glitter is insane. It feels like she’s tapping into a magic that not enough people know about yet.

She looks like she’s hung over all the time. It’s fantastic.

She is always yelling a little bit. YEAH. LETS YELL ABOUT BOYS. THEY LIKE IT.

Her melodies have very little diversity, but all her thumping chord progressions back them up. Her lyrics are all about partying and boys, but every once in a while she’ll word something in a way that makes me go “Huh. I never thought about partying and boys that way. U R a dinosaur.”

The most philosophical I can get on the matter is by suggesting that she is the ultimate embodiment of freedom and confidence. She likes boys, and she likes looking sexy for them, but she doesn’t need them. She’s there for her girls and to dance. She’ll kick them boys to the curb.

(Unless they look like Mick Jagger.)

She wears ripped leggings, gnarly tops, all sorts of disorganized braids and feathers in her hair, and she looks great while doing it. Anyone who advocates the use of yesterday’s eyeliner as today’s eyeliner is my ultimate fashion goddess.

There’s something about her whole demeanor, and the way that it reflects directly onto her songs, that is incredibly empowering. I promised myself I wouldn’t even argue the fact that she’s apparently a genius, but it’s interesting, isn’t it? So many people would argue “Why isn’t she doing something useful with her intelligence?”

Maybe that’s why I listen to Ke$ha. I’m smart and I’m artistic, but when I listen to her music I don’t feel like I owe my talents to anyone.

I JUST WANNA DANCE AND YELL.