CocoRosie member goes to "Kill Whitey" Ironic dance parties and gets called out by brainwashed.com as racist

CocoRosie made Uncut magazine's list of top 50 albums for the year.

From the Jonathan Dean, Brainwashed piece:

"While reading the article, I came across this particularly heinous quote from a typical, post-ironic urban hipster trust-fund baby:

'[Bianca] Casady was raised in Santa Barbara, Calif., but quickly notes her worldliness by listing the cities where she has lived along the trail to Brooklyn. A regular Kill Whitie partygoer, she tried the conventional (that is, non-hipster) hip-hop clubs but found the men "really hard-core." In this vastly whiter scene, Casady said that "it's a safe environment to be freaky."'

Who do you think that could be making such horrifyingly non-worldly, ignorant and racist generalizations about black men? Surprise! It's none other than Bianca Casady, one-half of sister duo CocoRosie, whose debut album won them high praise from Pitchforkmedia and The Wire, and whose recent album, Noah's Ark, was called "hypnotic" and "angelic-sounding" by Allmusic.com. My recent review for Brainwashed noted that the album sounded like "a collection of willful, calculated eccentricities clumsily juxtaposed with each other."

One of the CocoRosie girls goes to a racially insensitive party!!!!! Scandal!!!!! I can't wait for the somethingawful.com take on this!!! whats the blogosphere have to say?

Get your ass the schwippy the fwap out of here.

They give a lot more leeway to the likes of DIJ and Boyd Rice. But then they're 'serious' industrial artistes dealing with the themes the straight world finds shocking. And big tough guys.

what a shitty article, also obvs this guy as an axe to grind with the Coco girls, check the link to a previous Coco hate screed (this time about how they rip off Dresden Dolls). I can just picture this guy in his unlit basement apartment pacing around coming up with this stuff

Now I don't even like CocoRosie, but finding a regular hip-hop club intimidating (I'm presuming it has more to do with sexism than race btw, although it's hardly spelt out as such) but not finding a hipster equivalent the same = non shocker.

You could make the same assumption about Jamaican Dancehall vs. a Hollertronix party and still be TOTALLY missing the point.

Ellen Allien's said in interviews that she used to go to hip-hop clubs before getting into techno because (aside from digging the music) she didn't get strangers grabbing her behind at them. So, does that make her a racist when she's hanging out with Mad Mike and releasing Kero 12"s on her label?

This is totally more of a sex/class/musical culture issue than outright racism (although it's certainly a factor, but not the whole story).

This sounds like the worst thing

THe thread title is very vague, so newbies to this whole story are not to be blamed for missing it the first time, or not finding it via search..

but please read this, before fortifying another major deja vu thread.

I see that as a bit different. I haven't heard the song, but I don't know what context the word is in. To outright say any white artist who uses the n word is racist is a bit off.

The Brainwashed article is clearly writen by someone who was waiting for CocoRosie to slip up so he could say "SEE, I GAVE THEM A BAD REVIEW WHEN THE ALBUM CAME OUT! LOOKS LIKE BAD PEOPLE MAKE BAD MUSIC AND I WIN ON ALL COUNTS!"

He also brings up HUGE topics and barely deals with them. Don't bring up something like post modernism being the death knell of culture and only mention that you heard it from some neo-Marxist.

And yes, the "dumb rich white girl doesn't really get it" angle was downright offensive in its own way.

I'm presuming it has more to do with sexism than race btw...

http://www.rarebeatles.com/sheetmu/solo/ssmjnigg.jpg

i am sure every city in america has a party like this. the one i used to go to was called "booty bassment". the only difference aside from the name was that they didn't hand out a discount for bringing a fucking bucket of fried chicken (tasteless!) and the DJs didn't act and talk like total asses.

curmudgeon high on crack on the subject of whether brainwashed liking or not liking hiphop has fuck-all to do with anything

Banana Nutrament (straightup@gmail.com), November 6th, 2005.

That's not what I said, Banana.

Wait, is that true?! I've never been the clubbing type (I don't think I've been to a dance club in the last 11 of my 29 years), so forgive me if I seem like a complete naif for being shocked at this. But I am. Men pull their dicks out on the dancefloor? Routinely?

I've been missing out! (kidding). That's fucking awful.

Also yes, there is something so gigantically stupid and bizarre about saying the hipsters at Williamsburg parties are going to become "captains of industry." They're in their late twenties -- if they were ever going to do something beyond live in crappy lofts and play in bands, chances are they'd have gotten started on it by now. The bulk of them will get office jobs like everyone else, and the rest will wind up making cabinets or repairing amplifiers or running record stores or becoming publicisists.

shh nabisco you'll get in the way of the incipient class rage, how we gonna have a revolution without the class rage

E.g. I don't think it's coincidence that constant anti-hipster sneering (usually Williamsburg-related) coincided with the explosion of internet culture-talk: suddenly you can have bloggers with no significant experience of a particular hipster spot or place or scene who can look at the pictures and read about it in record reviews and develop some bizarro fantasy of a whole neighborhood of trust-fund racists with Flock of Seagulls haircuts doing coke all night and feeling superior to everyone. All shit that might, in some extreme instances, kinda vaguely trend toward certain realities, but it's still totally bizarre. Weirdest of all: the way "Williamsburg" become shorthand for NYC hipsters has created this class of people elsewhere who actually think it's a full-neighborhood hipster-trash party, despite the reality that Williamsburg looks and feels not that incredibly different from any "hip" younger neighborhood, anywhere, from San Francisco to Chicago to Philadelphia. That "captains of industry" line in particular is just kinda like ... well, this person's understanding of what he/she is talking about is massively divorced from reality.

How dare you say that about Costa Mesa.

I knew I'd be on the cutting edge of hip one day.

Maybe they should invite Cocorosie to the Collège de France

i never understood this band

xp your point is that fauvelle is white ?

thought it was :

Un professeur dans une université américaine s’étonne de constater cette majorité de « mâles blancs et âgés », inconcevable dans le milieu universitaire anglo-saxon, où enseignent certains des plus grands intellectuels du continent.

Yep.

ah okay. will actually read article next time

"i never understood this band"

their first album has always been pretty good. I've not actually paid attention to anything since.

Is it...possible that CocoRosie are unaware of the racial connotations of the term "shine"?

New album, new song/video.

https://static.stereogum.com/uploads/2019/10/Cocorosie-Put-The-Shine-On-1572439333-640x640.jpg

hasta la vista, rosie

lol phil

They apparently have a new album and this is part of the press guff:

"(They) have released seven albums....each one inspiring controversy and debate in equal amounts to praise; such is their fearlessness and willingness to take risks with their art. This strong creative vision runs through every aspect of their work - from videos to live performances utilizing theatrical costumes and make-up - which they create alongside each new body of songs."

Amanda Palmer goes into the Jeff Goldblum fly machine with Grimes and hits the "divide by two" button.

https://www.hollandfestival.nl/en/interview-with-bianca-casady-from-cocorosie

‘As stated in the first tenet of Future Feminism; ‘The subjugation of women and the earth is one and the same.' In general, our feminism is strongly earth-centered with an unceasing reverence for nature. We see the body as sacred. We are currently interested in a vision of re-wilding as a broader concept both for the planet and for female beings. We were raised with a particular moral compass regarding cosmetic surgery and the transfiguration of the natural body which we have carried forward into our adult lives and in turn, our political perspectives. When we see for example how some women believe testosterone will make a women’s body stronger and therefor better, that’s worrying. It also appears to us that many middle class Western families would nowadays prefer to have a diagnosed trans child than simply a ‘dyke’ or a ‘faggot’. We believe that radical self-acceptance is true feminism and that much of the problem which needs to be addressed is society’s rejection and oppression of female bodies.

Regarding our view on surgery, it is not a dogmatic stance that rejects modern innovation, it’s the ethics of how we use these modern innovations and ultimately who is profiting and being harmed by them. Women and girls are being stripped of their wilderness. This view does not make us trans exclusionary radical feminists. This terminology, “TERFS” is being used to silence women who have a dissenting view on current identity politics. The dissenting voice and a kaleidoscope of multifarious perspectives in a healthy, uncensored discourse is in our opinion essential to reaching the most enlightened and humanly compassionate ideas and goals. Silencing, censoring and disenfranchising women with differing points of view is blatant misogyny and we see it as part of the milieu of the modern witch hunt.’

Oh who's surprised? NOT ME.

"not this" would have been a surprise and it sounds like they were born into it too

funny thing is I was onboard with the first paragraph despite the art blurb buzzwordiness of it all until they got to the surgery part and it was like here we go

woof

hard to think of a less kaleidoscopic movement than terfism though

These girls live in France iirc and would not know that most American families who are DoorDashing to keep the electricity on would probably rather have a “faggot” than have to deal with the tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical costs involved in transitioning a trans child

this is nuts, I was just in the process of c&ping those two paragraphs myself. fucking TERFs

Absolute goofery

the statement that TERF is misogynistic is definitely a thought-terminating cliche used amongst the TERF community which just goes to prove that any label with utility that exists for more than 5 minutes will eventually be abused en masse by people who are seeking to shield themselves from valid criticism

aren't they friends with Anohni

oh right, in that linked interview, it's right there

too lazy to read, does it say what Anohni thinks of their terfery

"In general, our feminism is strongly earth-centered with an unceasing reverence for nature. We see the body as sacred. We are currently interested in a vision of re-wilding as a broader concept both for the planet and for female beings."

Always thought there was something vaguely fascist about new age Earth mother people who talk about "the body" a lot.

Is that translated from the French? Something might have been lost or mangled.

It's really hard for some people to not offer their opinions on other people's bodies

especially in france am I right

Have to check the French stats vs. the Irish

This terminology, “TERFS” is being used to silence women

if only it worked

this doesn't really surprise me coming from them but it is pretty bizarre in the context of an interview for a performance as part of a festival program curated by anohni, alongside a statement from her about the legislative attacks on trans people. #4 in the 'tenets' here does read as a dogwhistle though: https://www.hollandfestival.nl/en/fututre-feminism

Always thought there was something vaguely fascist about new age Earth mother people who talk about "the body" a lot.

it's whole lot more than something!

i'm not going to bother listening to their new song ("witch hunt", lol) but i recommend looking up the lyrics because it is mostly 'we transphobic and are being silenced!!!' the song

I did listen to it (incognito mode on YouTube so this shitstain doesn't influence my algorithm) and I can confirm it's every bit as bad as you'd expect it to be!

lol it's more than just #4 that's a dogwhistle, the whole fucking Future Feminism thing is gender essentialist garbage to put it lightly

women be shoppin and nurturin

so can we assume that Anhoni, despite trans status, has some not very friendly beliefs about all of this

juliana huxtable also present … by one way to reconcile the contradiction might be that they hold that mtf transition is cool but not ftm

xpost I really am wondering about this now!

I might be and probably am wildly misinterpreting it but the lyrics to “My Lady Story” might hold the answer

she goes on to say in the same interview that she's bound her chest and fantasized about top surgery. I'm an apologist for their music, Ghosthorse & Stillborn was great afaic but that essentialist terfy stuff ain't it

While we should all agree that TERFy shit is bad, I think it’s a real bad look to immediately go “What does their trans/nb friend have to say about this” like all trans people have to constantly live their lives as public spokespeople and accountants for their dumbest friends

Like ANONHI is living ANONHI’s life. They aren’t CocoRosie’s publicist or keeper

While we should all agree that TERFy shit is bad, I think it’s a real bad look to immediately go “What does their trans/nb friend have to say about this” like all trans people have to constantly live their lives as public spokespeople and accountants for their dumbest friends

― kirsten gilla band (Whiney G. Weingarten)

mmmm not sure i personally agree with you but i'm also not interested in debating this

---

re: those TERFy paras:

i mean kudos to them for trying to put the "radical feminism" back in TERF ig. it's just... the stuff they're saying is so far removed from my lived experience as a trans person, with the lived experiences of the queer people i know. that's kind of the funny thing, they're suggesting transness as something that erases queer identities and i don't really think of myself primarily as "trans" right now. it's useful only to the extent that people won't fucking shut up about it. i'm trans, sure, but it's more important to me that i'm a dyke, that i'm a faggot, that's a bigger part of who i am, these days.

all of this bullshit about "radical self-acceptance". accept what? that their definition of "woman" is more important than my bodily autonomy? it's goddamn silly. you wind up sounding like the fucking catholics, all of this shit about "acceptance" is the same shit the "natural family planning" people say. i mean under what circumstances does this manifesto consider a hysterectomy _acceptable_?

the only reason I brought it up is that they are all working together on a festival that included this: https://www.hollandfestival.nl/en/fututre-feminism which people pointed out seemed to point to TERF-friendly philosophy. So I thought it was odd that Anhoni would be spearheading it.

I had to google "kill whitey" parties. Another cultural phenomenon I'm happy to have missed.

It’s always someone fascinating when people who were awful from the jump go out of their way to show how much more awfulness they have inside them to share with you

omg how did I end up on this PR list

on wednesday 2.21, CocoRosie will announce their upcoming Elevator Angels EP (to be released 3.8) as a start of their 20th Anniversary celebrations. "Beautiful Boyz" HERE is their first track released wednesday 2.21.
this Fall, the sister duo will also release a brand new studio album.
CocoRosie - Elevator Angels EP: https://on.soundcloud.com/XZqFd
embargoed press release, with photos, quote, artwork etc HERE
would you be into connecting?

"dear CocoRosie, eat a brick of shit"

they fucked up by not becoming mainstream country, they could have been ilx country thread darlings with their complex opinions and contradictions

Hardy har