Boobies oopsies

If you can equate the controversial with the groundbreaking, then one of the most groundbreaking performances the world – and I literally do mean the world – has ever seen came from Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake at the 2004 Superbowl.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npF1lkKEM9o

Immortalized as the “Janet Jackson wardrobe malfunction,” this performance merits closer study as a premeditated, defining moment for both singers. I unapologetically reject the claim that Timberlake accidentally ripped off part of Jackson’s clothes because of the statement the artists were making through the whole performance, the major stylistic shift from previous performances and because of the long lasting effects of the gesture.

Jackson unfairly took the huge share of the blame, with many critics calling it a publicity stunt to help promote her newest album at the time. I agree that it was a publicity stunt, just not in the same sense. Jackson needed a new public persona, one that would be associated with breaking convention and defying social norms and would stand for the values of independent women. She looked at the culturally accepted and condemned practices and determined she could create a new form of art through an outrageous, but simple gesture. Through her intense costume, Jackson was presenting a more masculine image of herself and her performances than ever before in her earlier work.

Timberlake, who escaped the public’s wrath nearly scot free, was making an equally significant statement to the world viewing the Superbowl. In this performance Timberlake solidified his public image as a grown up artist with a lot to offer independent of *NSYNC and the guts to be outrageous. By collaborating with a powerful and beautiful female singer and showing he could hold his own in front of television’s largest audience of the year, Timberlake established his coming of age, and successfully broke free from *NSYNC’s dead-end teen idol image.

This performance was remarkably different than any previous performances by either artist. Jackson and Timberlake exemplify all the best elements of liveness, defined in this class as that sensational feeling of being wrapped up, bodily, in a musical performance. The show is riveting, from the intensity of Jackson’s costume and style of dancing to Timberlake’s posture toward her. They do a phenomenal job of playing up the sexual tension between them, creating a simple, but powerful narrative through song and dance. Jackson clearly took embodiment – defined in this class as the way a performance involves the body of the performer, audience, and the relationships between them – to a whole new level, and I don’t just mean that as a bad pun. Clearly the wardrobe malfunction involved the body, specifically the bare right breast, but Jackson also makes a statement with the movement of her whole body through her provocative dancing. Going through with the plan for the song all the way to the exposure at the end showed courage (although it wasn’t perceived as that by the world) and follow-through to the extreme. In that moment Jackson took the fullest advantage of the opportunity every live performance offers by presenting herself completely in the raw and unmediated. A similarly rebellious stunt in a studio recording would never have made it past the record company’s censoring.

For Timberlake, the performance was carefully crafted to be a huge turning point in his career. Starting with his casual but mature clothing, everything he did on stage was a way to distance himself from his teenage heartthrob days. The song’s lyrics (Rock Your Body) showed a capacity for moving on beyond the boy band days of lamenting heartbreak and lauding revenge.

This performance greatly impacted both Timberlake and Jackson’s careers. Timberlake successfully reinvented himself, going on to win two Grammy awards that year thanks to his newly created identity. For Jackson, the stunt evoked an unprecedented reaction from the audience (both in stadium and worldwide via the live television coverage and the miracle of YouTube). The sheer force of the public’s reaction presents the question of whether this powerful public statement was appropriately suited to the audience. Obviously the FCC thought not, but I’m talking even more specifically in terms of how well the audience helped Jackson achieve her goals. I would argue that it did not, since the world focused more on finding someone to blame for the blatant disregard for standards in mass communication, rather than on the new persona Jackson had created for herself. While Timberlake has managed to keep himself relevant and stayed in the public’s good graces, Jackson has largely faded out of the public eye, rather than becoming the symbol of women’s liberation and counter-cultural rebellion.

This breakthrough performance provides a great case study for the importance of the worldwide audience’s collaboration for an artist to achieve his or her goals. For Timberlake, the massive audience was the perfect test group for the new JT, but for Jackson, the public outcry nearly negated the effects of her incredibly bold move.

The 'other' music

I am fascinated by the alternative genre of popular music. Just for starters, I find it curious that a whole collection of artists are comfortable being defined by a synonym for the word “other.” The other question I’ve always wanted answered is what is this genre “alternative” to? As in other contexts where the word “alternative” is used on its own (Alternative Spring Break, alternative apparel), the word is used to refer to the binary of the mainstream sound versus the sound that deviates from the mainstream. I’m going to assume, for the purpose of this blog post, that alternative music is defined largely in contrast to rock and pop. I also think that it’s impossible for artists to not be affected by the connotation of the word “alternative.” Thus the concept of creating music in contrast to the mainstream rock and pop genres is very much a goal for alternative artists, and that’s what I want to explore with this blog post.  

If you look at a list of alternative artists from the last 30 years, you’ll see that it encompasses a huge variety of types of music, and it’s often hard to believe they can all be classified under the same genre.

For example, all of the following artists are considered alternative:

Arcade Fire

Augustana

Beck

Imogen Heap

The Goo Goo Dolls

Iron and Wine

Lifehouse

MGMT

Alanis Morisette

Neon Trees

O.A.R.

The Offspring

Muse

Mumford and Sons

Relient K

U2

… are just a few of the more well-known alternative artists. What I like most about this genre is that it usually features: 1) lyrics that engage the mind, rather than just the hips 2) puns 3) a willingness to break away from the magical “four-chord-song” 4) satirical criticism of commonly accepted practices 5) complex vocals. Because of these elements, I think alternative music is usually represented more fairly than other genres by critics, but it is still worth examining. From the list of artists above I have found examples of the five aspects of alternative music that I listed above, and I’ll tell you why they keep me coming back for more.

Lyrics:

One of mine and my roommate’s favorite verses by Mumford and Sons comes from their song “Winter Winds.”

And if your strife strikes at your sleep/ remember spring swaps snow for leaves/ You’ll be happy and wholesome again/ when the city clears and sun ascends.

The alliteration with the letter‘s’ in a verse so hopeful and encouraging just thrills me to the core. But unfortunately, the artistry reflected in these lines is often taken for granted. Rock and pop songs don’t often present such carefully crafted lyrics. The authenticity of the artists shines through in work like that of Mumford and Sons, whereas it’s often hard for the lyrics to stand out amid the haze of stimulus overload (from heavy use of electric guitar, drums and synthesizer) typical of many rock songs.

Puns:

“And it just kills me how they get away with murder” – “Mood Rings” by Relient K. This pun is simply a classic, and it’s featured in a song playfully pleading the case of every man baffled by women’s ways, but it does so in a clever and respectful way with an infectiously catchy tune. Puns seem to have pervaded alternative music of the last decade much more so than in past decades, as audiences get tired of the same old pick-up lines used over and over in popular music, but can still savor a tongue-in-cheek verse like an inside joke with an old friend.  

Musical creativity:

With every Tom, Dick and Harry learning a couple chords on the guitar to impress his girlfriend these days, artists need to do a little more to distinguish themselves.  Beck stands out with the variety of sounds blended together to create a generally pleasing overall sound, especially in the song “Where it’s at.” The artist ignores the guitar entirely, demonstrating the potential of the keyboard and throwing in some unconventional sounds such as the record scratching.

Social criticism:

U2 lead singer Bono exemplifies the popular singer who has taken up advancing a cause as his personal mission through his music. The song “One” might sound at first like a song bemoaning the difficulties of one-on-one relationships, but Bono reaches deeper, asking the hard questions of why people hurt each other. At the concert I attended in Raleigh, Bono dedicated this song to Aung San Suu Kyi, and delivered a powerful social message through the juxtaposition of her life story and this song’s simple message.

Vocals:

I can’t think of any song that better shows off the emotional power of the voice when it’s allowed to carry a song than “Hide and Seek” by Imogen Heap. Alternative music has the room to cast off the chains of dependence on fancy fretwork to cover vocal inadequacies, or appease the masses with a drum solo, as many rock and pop songs resort to doing.