Rolling Teenpop 2007 Thread

When I first saw Freaky Friday, I knew basically nothing about Lohan. Half way through the movie, I was sold--this girl was often wiping the floor with Jamie Lee Curtis, whose no slouch, and doing a better Jamie Lee than Jamie Lee did a Lohan.

Her pratfalls in Mean Girls were brilliant--her delivery of the voice-overs uniquely droll.

The only problem with her in A Prairie Home Companion was that every single person aroud her was at least 30 years older--how could she not seem out of place? And even then, she fully ehld her own against the vets---I got this real sense of her existing within this very well-thought-out chracter space of her own, no small feat considering, again, the competition.

in Bobby--a dire film in every other way--she was the sole element of stillness, of, again, being in that space, that person's skin.

I completely agree with Frank with the Foster/Silence thing. If she gets her shit together, I see no reason for her not to emerge from the teen thing just as Jamie Lee emerged from the slasher queen thing as a highly credible actor.

On that note: I love Lohan's acting. And Frank, I think words like "sincere" or "earnest" or "authentic," when taken with acting, are absolutely absurd. They condescend to the actress (whether it's Lohan or Ali), assuming that her persona is far less fluid than a "real" "talented" actress. Which relates to Lohan's music career too. If an established actor/actress released a poor album (or a poorly received album), we'd feel comfortable saying that they made a misstep - or that the album is far weaker than their acting. But if Lohan is really an overarching persona, and not an actress, than we can't separate the music from the acting.

On that note: I found Lohan's singing unremarkable and unnecessary. I also found her acting excellent, and enjoyed watching every movie she's appeared in that I've had the opportunity to watch. And I don't feel one feeling necessarily has anything to do with the other.

Now I'm gonna go lie down in the bathroom and moan pitifully. This again has little to do with my enjoyment of Lohan's performances - except in the extant that I may even now be delusional. But that's a bad road to go down.

I take Lindsay's music seriously too (whatever we want to mean by "take seriously"), I just get the distinct impression that she doesn't seem to care about it too much one way or the other. And unless she shows that she genuinely wants it and she's willing to work her butt off for it, it'll never succeed. That's how JLo successfully made the switch.

For what it's worth, what I was trying to say before (even though what actually I wrote made no sense -- hopefully the change clarifies it) was that very few people do either of these things with Lindsay. They don't take Lindsay's singing or acting seriously (like in the review I linked; it's not so much that Lindsay's a bad actress, but that she doesn't deserve to be considered as an actress at all!) but they also take her, Lindsay the celebrity, VERY seriously, arms crossed, and they don't assume that she's funny or smart or self-aware enough not to be completely literal in, say, "Rumors." Or a magazine interview. "Confessions" is different, but it also isn't a representative example of her music and still needs to be understood in the context of her other work (and, like Lex said, the fact that the tabloid stuff was part of that context in this case can complicate reception of it, too).

haha, i know what you're saying, but this is ironic because lindsay's vocal srategy is heavily earnest, even when she's being funny - on the second album it's heavily cathartic and, as she tells us, RAW. (more playful on the first album.) whereas j-lo's vocals are the epitome of botherd-about-this can-we-hurry-up-my-car-is-waiting detachment. (both are v good at what they do.)

they also take her, Lindsay the celebrity, VERY seriously

people have odd attitudes towards celebrity - it seems to be treated in common parlance as some sort of prize, which one has to prove oneself for, by either obvious hard graft or obvious talent, and people like lindsay lohan, paris hilton, and jade goody (recently-disgraced-due-to-vile-bullying-and-racism uk reality tv star) are castigated by somehow being celebrities while sailing merrily and uncaringly through a series of parties and public appearances.

("singing teenpop songs" never seems to equate to "obvious talent" unless the singer has xtina-level pipes; lohan's acting DOES but she doesn't do enough of it) (i cannot believe i have yet to see mean girls)

And, for me, LL has only had three and a half good roles. (Granted, I haven't seen A Prairie Home Companion yet.)

Just My Luck was awful--the screenplay was the culprit. But even then, Lohan totally, almos recklessly, invested herself in it.

It was rather charming when she went on jay Leno and did everything she could do NOT to talk about it--her whole vibe screamed 'contractual obligation' and 'God, thos ine sucked'.

country

country w/ recurrents

mainstream top 40

mainstream top 40 w/ recurrents

Christian AC

Christian AC w/ recurrents

mainstream urban

mainstream urban w/ recurrents

alternative

alternative w/ recurrents

AC overall

AC overall w/ recurrents

CHR/pop (These are now labeled "Top 40" and are basically the same as the "mainstream top 40 lists," which are also labeled "Top 40" but have slightly different totals)

CHR/pop w/ recurrents(ditto)

CHR Rhythmic

CHR Rhythmic w/ recurrents

active rock

active rock w/ recurrents

Limitations of these numbers: Obviously, they only take into account stations that report to Mediabase, and the rankings are based on total plays without regard to the size of the listenership or what time of day a song is played (though info on that is included in the chart).

The basic Mediabase URL is http://w2.mediabase.com/mmrweb/AllAccess.

For KDIS in Los Angeles, click on "7-Day Reports," click on "Station Playlists," tick "Station" rather than "Market," then type in "KDIS" and hit "Go," then click on "7-Day Playlist" on the right. Radio Disney has 51 affiliates, I think, so multiply each song's number by 51 to get national plays.

If you want to know whois playing a song, find it on some list and then click on the song. For instance, if you go to the "mainstream top 40" list you see that Avril Lavigne's "Keep Holding On" is 25th with 2,134 plays. If you click on "Keep Holding On," you get a list of the 50 stations in the genre ("mainstream top 40") that are playing it the most. She's doing pretty well in Salt Lake City, Raleigh, and Wilkes-Barre. (If you want to see who's playing her in different formats, choose another format.)

"Celebrity" being a modern-day analogue to what "juvenile delinquent" was in the the '50s, perhaps? (E.g., mainstream culture didn't take rock 'n' roll seriously as music but did take it seriously as a potential cause of vandalism and crime. And now pop - with the aid of reality TV - is a potential cause of celebrity.)

Forget where it was (Poptimists?) but there was a discussion about artists coding male/female, and about the new crop of emo rock stars trying to have it both ways (or something)...anyway, I think the idea was floated, or at least I took from it, that Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton were the only two unapologetic rock stars to make any kind of impact in 2006 (Lindsay maybe tail-end of '05?), with Britney on the back-burner since it's been a while since she recorded anything.

*Me.

Paris and Lindsay are too apologetic. Rock stars don't play dumb and then insist they're smart, or confess to eating disorders and then take it all back. Britney comes closest to the kind of iconic, defiant rock stardom you're talking about, Dave, in that she seems to really not give a shit.

Not that I really value the rock star archetype. I'm just saying. I'm also saying that I have erred by helping to prolong a discussion that is way past its sell-by date.

Who are these "people" who don't want to Lindsay do that thing? Somebody bought her album. I'd also argue that plenty of people don't want to hear Mick Jagger, either--is that relevant to whether or not he's a rock icon?

Britney's apology was not really an apology. "Ha ha, sorry I didn't wear panties, y'all! But seriously, I'm just gonna go fuckin' crazy for a while. Laterz."

2. What was more popular, dance-pop Lohan or emo Lohan, is my point.

3. Check the record, yo. Just neglecting your children doesn't make you Courtney Love.

2. So if she's not popular when acting rock-y, she's not actually acting rock-y? Also, if you close your eyes, people can't see you. It's true!

3. Yeah, but neglecting your kids and getting lots of plastic surgery does. Dropping a baby is TOTALLY rock-n-roll, dude!

Vying with Stone for Worst Actress will be repeat offender Jessica Simpson (nominated this year for EMPLOYEE OF THE MONTH), teen-idol (and terrible role model) Lindsay Lohan in JUST MY LUCK, newcomer Kristanna Loken in BLOODRAYNE and spelling-challenged risible siblings Hilary and Haylie Duff in MATERIALS GIRLS.

What I heard, I liked. Though I'm not sure what makes her special -- didn't we also make the Arctic Monkeys famous? Or is Youtube more special than Myspace?

http://www.rollingstone.com/rockdaily/index.php/2007/01/25/youtube-phenom-mia-rose-has-her-thorns/

The Stone writeup on Mia Rose is coyer and more irritating than she is, but in a dull journalistic way that tries to hide its tracks. "In the last few weeks, vlogs from Mia Rose, a disturbingly well-packaged 18-year-old singer-songwriter, have become some of the most-viewed videos on YouTube. Rose is a well-scrubbed but coy girl-next-door with decent guitar skills, a welcome-to-Hollywood worthy voice and a knack for bearing her midriff without seeming trashy (harder than it looks)." "Obviously this girl is manipulating the YouTube system for her own gain, but is there anything wrong with that?" Well, Elizabeth, I don't know, you're the one who called her "disturbingly well-packaged." Why don't you tell us why you think there's something wrong with it, rather than suggesting that there is and then covering your ass by rhetorically implying there isn't, and not giving a single reason one way or another? "And what do you think of the tunes?" Well, Elizabeth, what do you think of them? Pretend social analysis, pretending to rise above the slime sell while being a dull little slime sell all its own. Journalism seems full of this.

(Writers of "Lose You" are Linda Sundblad, Tobias Karlsson, Alexander Kronlund, Klas Åhlund, the last of whom is in Teddybears STHLM and produced a lot of the most recent Robyn album. Producer of "Lose You" is Tobias Karlsson.)

Anyway, I enjoyed a couple of the songs that were posted, and didn't like a few others. I think there is definitely something charismatic about the girl - very sincere. And part of why her music is interesting is because of that personality. And I think that her circumventing of the traditional artist/audience divide (which isn't unique, but nonetheless) is very charming. Though I think the question of "is she for real?" is important, just not for the reasons that RS states. I think it's important because a lot of her appeal is her authenticity - not because it's undermining expectations if she's not. (And if it turns out she's not 'real,' whatever that means, she'll be interesting for that reason instead.)

Posing pirates, pink perky riots
Big D.P. bottles about to pop
Flamboyant peacocks, straight out of detox
And total chaos, it never stops... right?
--Linda Sundblad "Pretty Rebels"

If RS asked the first question outright, would you still consider it muddled?