Romance is Dead?

What morons declared the romantic movie dead? Oh, Time, Entertainment Weekly, and every other dog darn publication did. Although every year movie studios force us to watch bridezillas argue over dresses, the great romantic pictures are not dead because they never existed. Say what, Auntie Christopher Robin? Look at Gone With the Wind. It tells a story about self-empowerment that happens to include a crucial subplot involving a stirring romance. Rose and Jack fall in love against a canvas of historical tragedy and personal loss. As assassins attempt to murder Whitney Houston, the diva falls for Kevin Costner, her bodyguard. The supposed "romantic classics" are actually musicals, historical dramas, character studies, or other genre pictures involving love. Every time a director attempts to create "a classical romance" they create epic failures, such as Australia. This occurs because only three things happen in a straight up romance, according to Liza Minnelli: the boy gets the girl, the boy looses the girl, or the boy gets her and then looses her. It doesn't leave many story options available; however, a thriller involving love leaves us with an unimaginable amount of third acts. Romance never died. It just hides beneath Moulin Rouge, High School Musical, Twilight, and the latest Tyler Perry morality play. If only it hid beneath our real life stories. If only.

Let's Imagine A Better World Where Lisa Left Eye Lopes Never Died

"My Hearts At A Low/I'm So Much To Manage/I Think I've Been Damaged."

Those are the brilliant lyrics of TLC, the best selling and greatest female hip hop group of all time, not Danity Kane. You probably don't know these lyrics because their honest and heart wrenching, guitar heavy "Damaged" flopped. Rolling Stone called it the band's best song, but no one knows it because the death of Left Eye (RIP girlfriend) catastrophically ended the career of a band destined to, like Radiohead and Britney Spears only, out last the 1990's both creatively and economically. The trio always kept up with the times. They would never have been VH1 material (sorry, Salt, Pepper, and Spinderella too.)

TLC is hands down my favorite band of all time. I grew up with them. SexyCrazyCool was the soundtrack to my childhood. Unlike the Spice Girls or Destiny's Child, TLC combined discussions of feminism with raw sexual club anthems. "No Scrubs" has the groove of "My Love" and thoughts on the intellectual level of Tori Amos's "Silence All These Years." TLC represents the perfect marriage of commerce and intellectualism. Call them the Where the Wild Things Are of Dallas Austin style R&B. I never got to see them in concert (thanks, you stupid 2000 hurricane) and often imagine what would have happened if Left Eye would have lived to hear Chinese Democracy. Considering they released an album every three to four years, we would have seen two albums. I have decided to contemplate on this post what they would have sound like.

The 2005 Timbaland Album It was the year of Timbaland and why would these queens not work with him? They would definitely need an update and their more mature older woman anthems against his avant hop beats would have been what Hard Candy supposedly was: mature, dance floor ready, urban, insightful, and fun. Imagine a discussion about being a single mother set to the "buh buh dum cha" of Timbaland and Justin. Can you say lost magic? Maybe they could have saved those disastrous Miami VMAS with some out there outfit promoting safe sex.

The 2009 Blackout and Techno Influenced Album Elctro is big and you know these girls would have been all over it. Chances are Lisa would have gotten crazier and the other girls more mature. With all the hell in 2007, I would have expected some TLC drama. While they danced to urbanized french house, they probably would have metaphorically discussed their inner problems and life in their 40's. Perez Hilton would have been all over THIS!

Unfortunately, I can only dream...

R.I.P. Lisa Lopes

Congratulations, You FINALLY Discovered Postmodernism. Now Will You Please Shut Up

Listen, I'm just as excited for Where the Wild Things Are as the next "accidental hipster" or trendy teenager, but this movie is not INDIE or new. Its post-modernism and it is PRODUCED BY A MAJOR CORPORATION. (While I'm at it, I might as well burst another bubble. The Gap owns Hot Topic. Goths, start shredding your Slipnot tee now!) Also, taking a children's book and making it into a movie is not new. Everyday at school, I hear countless people talk about how they will cry as they watch the trailer and have always owned a Wild Things doll, even though, we all know they bought it at Urban Outfitters. (Also, a corporation. Sorry for bursting SO MANY bubbles.) The movie looks great, but stop acting like you just discovered Fellini and Spike Jonze is some underground hero. They sell his music videos and/or Adaptation at Target and Best Buy. Get real.

This is the eqivilant to Cat in the Hat or Transformers. It's a children's icon transformed into a movie...except, this time the movie has substance...which is great...but its still a refurbished icon turned into a movie. It's the "Man in the Mirror" of a picture book turned into an adult product. Jonze takes an awful corporate idea and makes it into thought provoking art. Which rocks! I'm just sick of people finally realizing post modernism rocks and thinking they are the first to discover it when others (I'm looking at you, Caroline. Everyone else, read her FANTASTIC blog http://lareinehedoniste.blogspot.com/. ) have been blogging about it for MONTHS! I hate to compare Spike Jonze's movie to a Miley Cyrus song, but this is the same thing as the jock at my high school discovering the brilliance of catchy pseudo-country disco. I'm glad everyone digs post-modernism, but stop acting like it makes you hip. I found it over the summer, but I knew I wasn't the first. Art History text books beat you and me to it a long, long time ago in a galaxy called 2001.

And on that note...

COMMENT AWAY!

Call Me Blasphemous, Courtney Love and Hole Kicks Kurt Cobain's and Nirvana's Bum!

"If the world is so wrong, you can break them all with one song."

Courtney Love

It was 1994: the year grunge died. Across our cardigan wearing nation, kids rampantly blasted Nirvana: Unplugged, Channel horribly designed flannel coats, and the media relentlessly attacked the new Yoko Ono, the new Nancy Spungen: Courtney Love. Except this time, fans thought (incorrectly) that Nancy transformed into Sid and murdered Gen X's reluctant John Lennon, transforming herself into a global, tabloid sensation.

Amidst all this, people lost sight of the one true thing about the Miss Love. This Yoko Ono made kick ass music BETTER THAN HER HUSBAND. Despite often being called a poseur, Love never lies. As a celebrity, she sings about "Malibu," and as a Seattle scene queen, she sings about "Teenage Whores." Bob Dylan, now signed now to Citi Group, is a poseur, not Miss Love. Some say Cobain manufactured her dread, maybe he helped, but he never wrote as beautifully deranged a song as any of Hole's great pieces on Celebrity Skin, their only album released post Cobain. "Violet" may not represent angst as clearly as "Smells Like Teen Spirit," but it sounds more honest and truthful. Courtney Love, peels back her "Celebrity Skin" on Live Through This, revealing her true pathos. When she laments "I'm Miss World/Somebody kill me," she sounds like Vivien Leigh, always on the verge of a mental breakdown, the type of vulnerability other artists die for.

Sure, Celebrity Skin and American Sweetheart cannot compete with the suicide letter found on In Utero, but Live Through This, Hole's major label debut, is a more compelling album than Nevermind, the album most people cite as why they love the band. No one can deny that "Doll Parts" offers more emotional insight than "Polly" ever did. Say what you want, in my book, Courtney Love is not Yoko Ono, nor John Lennon, she's a Van Gogh, an underrated voice which will be appreciated more than today's idolized in due time.

The Resurrection of Pop

Each generation, a blonde pop icon lacking talent but possessing charisma and mystery is born and until last January, it looked like the Bush era would end without a Madonna or Britney, cementing the lameness of the last ten years. Thankfully, God has blessed us with an ugly New Yorker with an avant soul and pop sensitivity. Dancing with Gaga on a skit last night, Madonna finally found a modern artist she SHOULD WORK WITH. Screw Weezy, Madge, this is your girl.

Before her arrival last fall, we had seen standard blonde bimbos, such as Aubry O' Day and Brooke Hogan, attempt to join the dancing diva reigns. Ironically, the ugliest, most strange, and edgy artist took the throne. Gaga does not make avant songs. This girl writes and sings catchy electro pop. Like all great artists, she embodies thoughts behind her trashy "poker face." EW originally declared The Fame, her debut, as a forgetful, unmemorable, great recession shaking, jam; however, after listening on repeat and watching those bizzare performances, she has shown the depth and creativity of "Just Dance."

During her second SNL performance last night, Gaga sang "Love Game" as a sad lament over her own happy recorded version. It emphasized the sad irony of this mistress of insanity. Then, she went to the piano, quite awkwardly in a weird spinning outfit, and knocked out the dark and catchy "Bad Romance" as a Sinatra ballad. Her performances are like covers of her own songs. Her New York medley emphasized this so well and showed why we love Gaga. She is original, yet classical, yet poppy, yet avant garde. By writing odd but commercial music, she allows their true souls to ring more truly when rearranged. Gaga beats Cat Power at Cat Power's cover game. Gaga is not Britney. Britney is not Madonna, and neither is Gaga. Gaga is Gaga, and that is why Gaga is an icon. Lady Gaga, welcome to the palace of Pop.