|
She's not crazy to say this, for Madonna has defied pop culture's gravitational pull, one that sends stars up into the heavens, and then brings them crashing back to Earth. Like Spears, the singer began by delivering the masses dance music sans message. Then again, Madonna quickly moved beyond into controversy, irony, iconography, and skank. Whereas feminist critic Camille Paglia wrote in 1991 that Madonna "has rejoined and healed the split halves of woman: Mary, the Blessed Virgin and holy mother, and Mary Magdalene, the harlot," one gets the sense that when Spears sings "Oops! You think I'm in love/That I'm sent from above/I'm not that innocent," she's not fooling anybody. What Spears is then, is not a complex new model of contemporary womanhood(you just realized that?), where sex can be wielded as power or given up in submission at the woman's whim, but a tease. Yet, do not underestimate the power of the tease(what if I do??? what are you gonna do?). When Spears bumps, and grinds, and coos, and moans her way through her top-of-the-chart hits (okkkay, that was a bit too close for comfort), she manages to strike a pose directly between innocence and impetuous sexuality. This appeals not only to the female audience, but also to male voyeurs who help to boost her image(because of course image is the most important part). Sex sells. But so does sex's broken promise. Just ask Humbert Humbert. Before Spears's concert begins, an M.C. struts on-stage and asks the audience to give it up for an unfurling, two-story Britney Spears banner, which shows the famously buxom pop star with a milk mustache under the familiar ad tag line, Got Milk?(i doubt that's a milk mustache)"Britney's got milk!" the M.C. screams with no trace of irony. That this tour is an ideal venue for America's Dairy Farmers makes perfect sense. "Britney is wholesome and edgy at the same time," says Sal Taibi, of Bozell New York(Britney is as wholesome as a cigar), which created the Milk Mustache campaign. "She helps milk's image, but she's not too risque(of course she's not risque, because it's 'tasteful' to pose half-naked on a world-renowned magazine). I think she's trying to balance her audience and her broad appeal."Spears doesn't admit outright that she will have to strategize in order to maintain her audience's interest (she can't even freakin' pronounce 'strategize'). "Maybe I should be thinking about [career longevity], but I'm not,"(we can thank God for that) she says, just before going into "lockdown," when she privately psyches up for her performance. However, she's obviously given her future some thought (she thinks? Oh my God, then it must be time for the 5th apocolypse). Spears hopes to start writng her own songs(i recommend 'Hooked On Phonics')(her first effort can be found on the Oops! album, a sweet number called "Dear Diary"), and her co-manager, Larry Rudolph (Note to Self: Buy loaded gun, and find directions to Mr. Rudolph's house), says the pop star will soon be expanding her empire to feature films. "When Britney is thirty, it will be hard for her to do songs like '...Baby One More Time,'" Rudolph allows(anyone who thinks that stupid excuse for a living object, will be around for more than 5 more years, should have some type of sharp object thrown at them. By the time Britney is thirty, she'll have been just another has-been, and she'll probably be living in a trailor park; if she's lucky). "So it makes sense for her to become a multimedia artist, and not just a recording artist. Her career has to evolve."
Picture, if you will, thousands upon thousands of overwrought five- to fifteen-year-olds (with their parents, of course) screaming "Britney!"(OH THE HORROR!!!!!!!) and frenetically waving green glow sticks that they purchased from the concession stands. This is just one of the eighty-four shows that Spears will do on this six-month international tour, and judging from the slick professionalism of it all, one could expect that each show is almost the same as the last. As well-packaged as a pot of lip gloss, Britney is dramatically lowered to the stage in a gigantic metallic orb(can we say tacky?). When she emerges, she is bedecked in a silver-and-pink costume reminiscent of Barbarella(how traditional...). During the highly polished and tightly choreographed first twenty minutes of her show, Spears sheds her clothes piece by piece until
she's clad in a white halter top and white jeans(Wow, big surprise, Britney is again half-naked in front of thousands of people). She enthusiastically dances her way through perky hits like "Crazy" and her bluesy version of the Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction,"(why the hell does she
always have to screw with classic songs on all three of her insignificant, pathetic little albums???) which she performs while swinging flirtatiously on a pole like the kind found in a strip bar (no surprise there. She's such an idiot... did she forget that she was performing in front of kids and
their parents; she always seems to out-do herself every time). The star then disappears for a costume change, and returns at the top of a silvery staircase in white evening gown with a fifteen-foot train that cascades down the steps in a blinding flash of sequins and feathers(Look
mommy! It's Princess Britney!!!....gag me with a shovel). The music stops. A hush falls over the throng. It is time for Britney Spears to deliver the consummate Britney Spears--the moment when the tease meets the sweet Southern girl, when the coy hussy who can't get no satisfaction is also your most trusted best friend(what the hell is a 'coy hussy'?). "Thank you all, thank you all so much for coming tonight," Britney says, her voice aglow with warmth and enchantment. "I want to thank all my fans for making this small-town girl's dream come true. I love you.
The crowd quite literally loses its collective mind, caught up in the wonderment of it all. Britney loves us. Britney loves us! And, judging from the enraptured look on a little girl's face as she hold's up a sign that reads "BRITNEY, MAKE YOURSELF AT HOME IN DALLAS, TEXAS," we love Britney, too(yeah, sure...).
Don't feel bad for me, it took me 20 minutes to copy and paste this article and add in my comments. So I still have time for my life... |
|
