Shania Twain's Ramones T-shirt: C/D?

No, there is no secret catch. The Ramones and AC/DC shirts (whether they were Shania's doing, or -- in all likelihood -- some stylist's) are just crass tools to juxtapose the country-pop diva with genres she has really has nothing to do with (any argument there?) for the sake of fresh take beyond: "here's Shania in a tank top" or "here's Shania in a leopard skin jumpsuit" or "here's Shania with a cowboy hat on." It's just that the appropriation is offensive to we that take the iconography she's adopted a bit more serioulsy (then we arguably should). No apologies here either!

Your fiancee's tastes are your own problem, Tom.

Oh come on Alex, THAT is fucked. I didn't see Tom saying anything about what your significant other thinks of your taste.

Her husband's tastes are her own problem, Ned. (And ours).

I'm not offended at all by that - but the fact is Alex claimed that if Shania fans were exposed to superior options they wouldn't be as passionate about Shania. Now I happen to know a Shania fan very well and offered to test this claim: why Alex would turn down such a challenge I have no idea!

Try "His".

"Now I happen to know a Shania fan very well and offered to test this claim: why Alex would turn down such a challenge I have no idea!"

Because it's a stupid, pointless challenge. For a start, I shouldn't *NEED* to make a tape for your fiancee, as after reading my posts here for the last year and change (and being that you seem to be convinced that I listen exclusively to what you so charmingly characterize as 'tiresome cock-rock,') you should be able to save me the trouble and dowload the stuff for her yourself. Moreover, I don't *CARE* if your fiancee chooses to sully her aural cavities with the soulless warblings of Shania Twain. They're her ears -- she's perfectly within her rights to do so. Just pardon me if I think your wife-to-be is rather undemanding when it comes to music.

Memo to ILX: after 2 years trying we have found a counter-weapon to 'mindless pabulum' - use at all times!

Wrong. Shania's sporting of Ramones shirts will assuredly *NOT* prompt any Shania fans to rush out and buy up the Ramones' back catalog. It's merely a shallow fashion statement. The Ramones don't stand to make one thin dime from her sporting of the shirt.

"What interests me is that if Shania wore a Killing Joke shirt and loads of pop-country fans went out and bought the entire Killing Joke back-catalog Alex would complain, wouldn't he?"

I wouldn't complain, but it wouldn't happen, would it? The shirt isn't functioning in this context as a marketing tool, but merely as a artefact to lend its wearer a modicum of perceived coolness that would otherwise seem completely illogical.

Goddammit. I fucked that one up didn't I. In my rage, I misread that statement. Fuck, I hate that.

Well, of course Alex is wrong about that. The whole "classical"/"other" schism should render that entire line of thinking moot. All I'm saying is that expecting someone to seriously back up a hyperbolic statement is an exercise in futility (unless it's me going for a laugh).

Shania wearing a Ramones T-Shirt
or
Billy Idol wearing a Billy Ray Cyrus T-shirt?

C'mon, Tom, you prefer this?

Rod Stewart singing "Do You Think I'm Sexy?"
or
Iggy Pop singing "Do You Think I'm Sexy?"

I stand in the Shania's Ramones Shirt is Horseshit camp simply because I suspect that Shania doesn't care a whit about the Ramones either way, and something about that rubs me the wrong way. This doesn't make Tom's (or Mark S's) position -- that nobody gets hurt, and in fact the Ramones stand only to benefit, so why get all lathered up about it -- hath to it some pith, though it does seem a point that gets overstated quite a lot, presumably for rhetorical purposes. Tom's right to say that of course Shania might actually dig the Ramones, but doens't it seem more likely that her handlers chose the shirt in question? Or that the photographer did? Naturally Shania might like the ramones, but given what we know about the workings of high celebrity, do we honestly suspect that she does -- or does the question only get raised to score points? What I feel, and I'm guessing Alex feels as well, is that the whole enterprise of having a photographer pick out one's clothing is kinda icky, & that said enterprise is somehow symptomatic of a greater social ill...

...which would be some alleged crisis of authenticity or something, and since my longstanding position has been that there was no "turning point" at which the world abandoned authenticity and began pursuing its recent course but rather that things have always been more or less as they are now & only the tools have changed, this leaves me with few legs left to stand on. I just don't think that it's constructive to caricature the other side of the debate, and think it'd be useful if we began by conceding that there's something to each side. And if we then all agreed to just agree with whatever unstable position I happen to have randomly landed on, since I am so wise ;)

Rod Stewart surely defines tiresome cock rock but I love him too.

(The 'conversion fallacy' deserves its own thread which I will start when I work out how to phrase it)

This doesn't make Tom's (or Mark S's) position -- that nobody gets hurt, and in fact the Ramones stand only to benefit, so why get all lathered up about it -- hath to it some pith,

to this:

This doesn't make Tom's (or Mark S's) position -- that nobody gets hurt, and in fact the Ramones stand only to benefit, so why get all lathered up about it -- any less valid, and I think said position hath to it some pitch etc.

"Based on her press, she's has nothing but contempt for her audience and positively LOATHES being a "public person.""

Cf. "Based on Kurt Cobain's press he has nothing but contempt for his audience and positively LOATHES being a "public person""

-thetics? -thenics? I haff never known for sure

I think we can assume he thought it was the brand name.

Hey, I'm still your hero too, right Dan? *tear in eye, lip quivering*

(see, I'm agreeing with Alex in NYC pretty much! Except he dislikes this and I don't.)

(Alex there is a 'bollywood' version - the International version - judging by the first single it is ace and the others are rotten.)

This is a beautiful explanation of what you mean & bodes much further thought by me: offhand I'd say that the tension here is between an essentially rational impulse (yours) and an essentially religious impulse (mine, Alex's though I'm guessing he would/will resent that)

v. v. interesting indeed

You are the wind beneath my wings.

Is Tom's position rational (in the sense you describe it?)? Wouldn't it be more accurate to say iconoclastic vs. iconophilic?

The opposing position is certainly religious since it relies on gigantic Logos ideas of immutable Signifigance etc -- since I am religious & like religious thought (& think it's religious styles of thought that tend to produce singers of good songs & authors of good books) I tend to feel more sympathy with what I feel is essentially the less rational position

Surely the answer is yes. If you accept it's true that the Ramones will benefit from the exposure (by gaining Shania Twain fan's) then it's equally likely that their cultural stock amongst their diehard fans will be debased.

Since one of their main selling points is an anti-establishment, irresponsible, rebel pose, if it can be easily assimilated by a 'safe, corporate, family' act then what value does it have? Or does it mean that the features of that brand been assimilated into the mainstream and they've triumphed in the end?