Grimes/Claire Boucher thread

What's the concept of the video?

Claire Boucher: It's loosely based on this painting by my favorite painter, Hieronymus Bosch, called "The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things" (below). I wanted to play with Medieval/Catholic imagery. I was raised in a Catholic household and went to a Catholic school, and my childhood brain perceived medieval Catholicism as an action movie: There's this crazy omnipresent guy who can destroy you at any moment.

If painters could be compared to filmmakers, Bosch is the Hype Williams of renaissance painters.

This whole interview on the Genesis video is great:

http://www.pitchfork.com/features/directors-cut/8929-grimes/?utm_medium=site&utm_source=ticker&utm_name=ticker

Like when she talks about the broadsword woman being a "contemporary muse" and then she's "like the Ryan Seacrest of indie culture".

Girl enjoys her analogies a whole lot.

she's like the madonna of terrible indie artists

This really does sound like those halfheard/remembered songs with wordshaped/evocative sounds instead of audible lyrics I'd have to half make up when there was a party nearby when I was a kid, as a few people upthread have kinda suggested/said. It's pretty amazing atm.

It's very openeded, as a guy who drums said. I was loving a percussion part on Vanessa till I stopped tapping my desk and realised it wasn't actually on the track.

finally checked this album out a few days ago. totally obsessed. picked up the vinyl version of 'Visions' last night - sounds fantastic. great pop album.

Yes it is.

Yeah idg the "lack of hooks" crit. "Circumambient" could be Kylie.

writer J. Shepherd not crazy about "Genesis" video:

http://jawnita.tumblr.com/post/32480860758/i-wrote-this-thing-about-grimes-genesis-and-it-never

As narrative goes, the visuals are purely aesthetic, a laundry list of representational “art” looks popularized by Tumblr, offering nothing more than skewed prettiness; which is why the presence of Candy’s Aeon Flux dancer is so much more problematic. The video is Grimes playing primitivism, using a lens of a vague “future” as a way to execute notions of… well, future primitive. Some of the same critiques of James Cameron’s Avatar—that it continues the tradition of exoticising and idealizing the “advanced” and “pure” primitive other—apply here. Worst of all, the video begins with Grimes singing a refrain that is not on her album: wailing in her airy voice, she seems to mimic the vocal runs of Middle Eastern music, but without offering any context whatsoever. Presumably, it’s her depoliticized sonic interpretation of what is “weird,” “edgy,” or “other,” without any visible evidence that she has any knowledge of global music—unlike, say, MIA, who herself is complicated but travels the world to mine its variant sounds , or even white art-pop band Gang Gang Dance, whose polyglot vocalist Lizzi Bougatsos flips bhangra and traditional Chinese and Arabic singing with the precision of someone who’s studied it.

yeah, nor am i?

i still love the actual album way way more than shepherd does, but the video is iffy, the fashion stuff is iffy, and the random reference to japanese aesthetic philosophy in the parenthetical title for be a body is just... a bit random? and not necessarily motivated maybe? and kind of just a signifier/stand in?

find it sort of bewildering that people could have interpreted the album in such way that that video might be seen as being aesthetically divergent or misrepresentational

(ftr it is all just whatever to me moreso than offensive)

"with the precision of someone who’s studied it" is a big boring canard anyway, isn't it just rather the every poet steals, bad poets deface, good poets renew thing

can't say i'm any fan of gang gang dance either admittedly

oh black keys only paws

As narrative goes, the visuals are purely aesthetic,

the horror!

Presumably, it’s her depoliticized sonic interpretation of what is “weird,” “edgy,” or “other,” without any visible evidence that she has any knowledge of global music

i will not vibe 2 this refrain w/o further evidence (will accept certificate of global music minor, substantial ratio of music tagged "global music" on i-pod)

It's so weird that writers are choosing NOW to get tripped up over the fact postmodernism and globalisation are real as have been for over a generation.

When has rock'n'roll ever given a shit about propriety of cultural borders?

I mean, Buddy Holly never went to Africa.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oh2wWjXgi8k

When has rock'n'roll ever given a shit about propriety of cultural borders?

― Ask The Answer Man (sexyDancer), Saturday, 29 September 2012 15:40 (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

eh i think there are some ok points to be made, this guy just has his head so far up all kinds of ass, that "Presumably," is just...

The rest of that Julianne Shep blogpost offers a bit more balance.

the problem with that video is not cultural appropriation, its that nothing at all interesting happens, just a bunch of teenagers staging a manga / 90s fashion show in the dessert.

i like the music though...

ah but you see ... we are entering "post interesting" era

genesis is a lot more interesting than most music videos i have sene this year in which things actually happen tho

the demand for "high concept" videos takes away from the music I think ... who needs another nerdfest at this point?

Right, there is nothing intrinsically wrong with just dancing around in the desert with your friends/models for your video, but the whole vibe of the song/ way the video was filmed and edited makes it seems like there will be some sort of content that never arrives, or at least some interesting imagery more unique than ohh an albino snake.

i kind of imagined it as the first in a never to be continued series about this crew, or like their intro theme

I makes sense if you watch a bunch of grimes videos in a row ... they all feature dancing around in front of groups of people, whether modern dance troupe in white studio or nude guys in stadium locker room ... they're all kind of about various deserts. the "genesis" one just happens to be about California "superficial" scene

a lot of what this video & cultural appropriation debate reminds me of is that endless part of dorian grey where he's just listing all the exotic furs and perfumes he's collected, like ot1h repulsive & imperialist yet, at least ime (most people i've talked to about it hated that part or skipped it when they realized it was goign to be like 30 pages) intriguing and kind of seductive? felt that within the context of all the ideas going on abt aesthetics & youth & art it's an interesting part of the book, the allure of this massive luxury and beauty, and i guess that's where i'd place this video, too. obviously problematic in a post-colonial/globalizing world but i think to deny it any context besides tumblr is wrong, she seems pretty smart in interviews and like, went to college she prob has sth to say about it

Tim F. posted a Pitchfork interview with Claire/Grimes about this video upthread. Deciding what's cultural homage and what's cultural appropriation is not easy, and it does not appear J Shep read up much on Claire before posting and weighing on a complicated subject. She's done much more effective writing elsewhere.

That blog is ridiculous

I think I get where Shep is coming from but it seems like she piles a lot of suggestive disapproval on quite thin foundations - e.g. aeon flux woman has pink weaves therefore she must be "other" therefore she must be some exoticised (marginalised) ethnic counterpoint to boucher's whiteness. This might in fact be the case but you could find a lot of these rabbit holes to tumblr down in just about every video clip if you try hard enough.

To her credit the rest of the post seems to acknowledge this even if only implicitly (and also supports Edward's "madonna of terrible indie artists" zing).

Not sure if the m.i.a. comparison is a good one to use in service of the point she's making - if m.i.a.'s cultural appropriations are problematic than they almost have to be more problematic than grimes' fairly minor misdemeanours in this regard, and the fact that she gets on a plane to go and "mine" influences from other parts of the world is not a point for the defence but a point for the prosecution. In this analogy grimes is like a local business that buys goods made in a sweatshop while m.i.a. is a wholesaler who flies there to negotiate purchases with the factory owner to be shipped back.

OTOH i guess what is firing shep up here is the thoughtlessness of cultural appropriations by white female artists. Which you couldn't accuse m.i.a. of (for more than one reason).

wait wacky ott colored weave ponytails have been a goth thing for like ever

As narrative goes, the visuals are purely aesthetic, a laundry list of representational “art” looks popularized by Tumblr, offering nothing more than skewed prettiness; which is why the presence of Candy’s Aeon Flux dancer is so much more problematic. The video is Grimes playing primitivism, using a lens of a vague “future” as a way to execute notions of… well, future primitive. Some of the same critiques of James Cameron’s Avatar—that it continues the tradition of exoticising and idealizing the “advanced” and “pure” primitive other—apply here. Worst of all, the video begins with Grimes singing a refrain that is not on her album: wailing in her airy voice, she seems to mimic the vocal runs of Middle Eastern music, but without offering any context whatsoever. Presumably, it’s her depoliticized sonic interpretation of what is “weird,” “edgy,” or “other,” without any visible evidence that she has any knowledge of global music

why are there so many quotation marks there when she's not actually quoting anything... it's totally disingenuous writing imo

The criticism of this video is very silly to me because the concept is very clearly get together with some Burner friends, slap on wacky costumes, dance around, and have other hijinks. I don't think a whole lot of deep thought went into it beyond that.

I've tried on numerous occasions but I can't get into this album. I feel like I have to fundamentally warp and contort my brain's music receptors to even begin to appreciate the aesthetic being presented - which Im not opposed to on principle, but in the case of the Grimes record I don't think it's worth the effort.

why are there so many quotation marks there

to scare u

I feel like I have to fundamentally warp and contort my brain's music receptors to even begin to appreciate the aesthetic being presented - which Im not opposed to on principle, but in the case of the Grimes record I don't think it's worth the effort.

Curious about this. I love the album but whether i loved or hated it I think either way I'd still say the aesthetic is easy to understand. What makes you feel like you need to warp/contort yr brain?

ugh are you assholes gonna me me watch a "grimes" video

it's boring, don't bother

Curious about this. I love the album but whether i loved or hated it I think either way I'd still say the aesthetic is easy to understand. What makes you feel like you need to warp/contort yr brain?

― Tim F, Sunday, September 30, 2012 4:19 AM

What I mean to say is that based on my brains music receptors' default settings this album does nothing for me. Specifically, I find the detached vocal delivery not engaging at all. The songs don't seem to go anywhere interesting and the synths and drumbeats sound kind of cheap and thrown together. At least that's how it sounds after about 4 full listens. I feel like I have to make fundamental changes in what I find aesthetically pleasing to begin to appreciate what's going on here. Given enough time and effort I may be even be able to, but I'm not really up for the task.

Oh you mean you don't like it.

Why does everyone feel the need to dress up their objections to this album. It's okay to just not like some things.

If I just flat out didn't like it, I wouldn't have spent any time trying to appreciate it. I'm actually pretty neutral on the album but I feel like I'm missing the point which I'm more than happy to chalk up to a deficiency on my part.

The criticism of this video is very silly to me because the concept is very clearly get together with some Burner friends, slap on wacky costumes, dance around, and have other hijinks. I don't think a whole lot of deep thought went into it beyond that.

isn't this the exact problem with appropriation in a nutshell? being unthinking - wilfully or carelessly - about other people's cultures and treating them as "wacky" (ugh) costumes

(idk whether the grimes video is guilty of this, i assume so because it fits with her persona and i don't like her)

To me, the video reads a lot less like cultural appropriation and much more like a bunch of ladies getting their cosplay on for Comic Con.

Yeah seriously.

I still like Grimes' music but I can't read another word anyone has written about her.

It's like every writer feels the need to use her music or "image" as some kind of springboard to their most pretentious and self-indulgent waffle, saying nothing about her but everything about their own expectations and issues.

I suppose that's the issue raised about - that her work is quite blank, and yet gives the impression of somehow being ~important~, so everyone rushes to fill up that blankness with their own ideas of what ~importance~ is or should be.

isn't this the exact problem with appropriation in a nutshell? being unthinking - wilfully or carelessly - about other people's cultures and treating them as "wacky" (ugh) costumes

― lex pretend, Sunday, September 30, 2012 8:12 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

every pop video ever