Tag Archives: 2010

➤ Status update: QueenLiz2 goes live on Facebook, though Her Maj will not be abused

Posted on 10 Nov 2010 | Leave a comment

Fully connected: No of course it’s not Her Maj, just one of the Queen’s impersonators. Photograph © by Mark Bourdillon

❚ NOT BAD — THE ROYAL FAMILY HAS MADE 209,000 friends in its first three days on Facebook. Rebranding what she has along called “The Firm” as The British Monarchy (TBM), Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II this week opened for business on the web’s biggest social network where democracy in action means that, although we cannot strictly become Her Majesty’s “Friend” as with every other Facebook member, we can express her popularity by clicking on the notorious “Like” button. Nor can we “poke” the Queen or Prince Philip in the jargon of getting acquainted online, but we can certainly scrawl on their wall, though the First Footman of the Interweb reserves the right to remove offensive comments. Indeed, he was kept on his toes on Monday heading off a stream of republican abuse that included the phrase “scrounging layabouts”.

Here We are today: meeting Lance Corporal Johnson Beharry, holder of the Victoria Cross (VC), Britain’s highest award for gallantry

Innovations include an exclusive “Near Me” application which will enable British citizens as well as Al-Qaeda to track the Queen’s every move on a searchable map of the United Kingdom. The Court Circular, the topical record of official royal engagements produced by the royal household, is also available on Facebook. For the past 200 years The Times and two other newspapers have enjoyed this privilege.

The TBM Facebook group is however reluctant to share the monarch’s intimate tastes such as those reported in yesterday’s Times and elsewhere: that the Queen’s favourite tipples are gin and Dubonnet; that her TV viewing includes The Bill (a police soap), and Kirsty’s Home Videos (compilations of the British public at play) which she asks her servants to tape when she’s busy, as well as re-runs of horse-racing; and that her cornflakes reside in a Tupperware container on the breakfast table.

An aide said: “Facebook is probably the last bastion of social media the royal household had not yet entered, and the Queen is keen to be fully signed up to the 21st century. The important thing about Facebook is its international reach, as the Queen is head of state in 16 countries.” The 84-year-old Queen uses a mobile phone, has her own private email address, surfs the web and ventured into online networking in 2007 by launching TheRoyalChannel on One’s Tube, sorry, YouTube, followed by @BritishMonarchy on Twitter last year and Flickr this summer.

Royal.gov.uk remains the official website of The British Monarchy which represents all 17 “working members” of the Royal Family. It confirms their official surname as Mountbatten-Windsor, and reminds us that the traditional greeting from men is a neck bow (from the head only) whilst women do a small curtsy. Otherwise, a handshake is fine.

➢ The British Monarchy at Facebook

LOOK WHO WON GONGS THE OTHER WEEK

Brian Cox, Vicki Michelle, ’Allo, ’Allo, University of Manchester, British Monarchy,investiture

Stars of TBM at Facebook: Brian Cox, TV meteor and professor of particle physics at the University of Manchester, displays his OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) following an investiture ceremony at Buckingham Palace in October when the Queen honoured him for services to science. A Facebook comment asked: “What about his achievements as keyboard player for D:Ream?” The actress Vicki Michelle, best known for her role as the saucy French waitress Yvette in the BBC comedy series ’Allo, ’Allo (1982-92), won the MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire) for charitable services. Her catchphrase when being clinched in the kitchen was: “Ooooooh, René.” © Press Association

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➤ 20 gay kisses in pop videos that made it past the censor

Posted on 7 Nov 2010 | 3 comments

❚ CENSORSHIP! OH DEARIE ME! Digital Spy reports this weekend that the lavish video for Firework — the single currently No 4 in this week’s UK chart by American singer-songwriter Katy Perry — has been censored for British television channels. The ludicrous widescreen promo, which they say “plays out the song’s message of self-belief” (yuk), shows fireworks shooting from Perry’s chest, and from the bodies of prancing extras. More shocking, apparently, are the pyrotechnic depictions of a mugging, a cancer patient, a woman giving birth and two men kissing. The two-second “gay kiss” has been pixelated, presumably to save embarrassing the children, in a version of the video directed by Dave Meyers for delivery to TV channels under a cross-promotional deal with Deutsche Telekom. The European telecommunications group recruited fans from all over Europe to appear in the video when it was shot in Budapest.

It’s all too much. Why, this weekend too, fansites have been twittering that Katy Perry and BFF Rihanna got into an argument over Katy’s new hubby, the amoral buffoon Russell Brand (double yuk). The only good news is that Katy has at least vowed never to strip for Playboy.

Katy Perry, Firework, pop video, censorship,gay kiss,

Fireworks in Firework: British TV viewers see only a pixelated version

According to the star herself, Firework is influenced by Jack Kerouac’s novel about male bonding, On the Road. Digital Spy’s reviewer Nick Levine even accords the song the accolade of being a “straight up self-empowerment anthem”. Pass the sickbag, James.

OK, OK, boys and girls. In Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s immortal words, relax. For any TV viewers feeling deprived of the knee-trembling kiss in the Perry video, which is of course viewable in full 1080p HD on YouTube, there’s plenty more where that came from. The web is replete with more pop videos flaunting gay kisses than mum and dad might wish for. The following links round up the most notorious from both genders — four are viewable only behind age-restricted gateways. And because it’s so darn funky, Shapersofthe80s has thrown in the Pet Shop Boys’ most notorious Bruce Weber video for Being Boring, which contains naughtiness on any number of levels, but you’re going to need gimlet eyes to spot the gay kiss. You’re very welcome to propose your own favourite pop kisses. Thanks to Jobe, we’re up to 20 vidz now.

Lady Gaga, Telephone, pop video, gay kiss

Lady Gaga: a jailbird’s perk in the video for Telephone

Lady Gaga, Stephen Gately, Boyzone, Blink-182

Pop smackers: Lady Gaga in Lovegame, Stephen Gately in Boyzone’s Better, two vamps in Blink-182’s I Miss You

♫ Christina Aguilera’s Beautiful

♫ Lady Gaga’s Lovegame

♫ Lady Gaga’s Telephone

♫ Blink-182’s I Miss You

♫ Peter Doherty’s Last Of The English Roses

♫ Black Eyed Peas’ I Gotta Feeling

♫ Yehonathan’s On a Hot Summer Night

♫ Adam Lambert tongue-diving in concert

♫ Tatu’s All the Things She Said

♫ George Michael’s Outside (uncut)

♫ Matt Alber’s End of the World

♫ Kylie’s All the Lovers

♫ The Strokes’ Juicebox

♫ Paul Oscar’s International

♫ Madonna’s American Pie

♫ Scissor Sisters’ Filthy/Gorgeous

♫ Boyzone’s Better

♫ Pet Shop Boys’ Being Boring — a film by Bruce Weber

♫ In at No 19 (thanks, Rob): Pink’s Raise Your Glass — “Don’t be fancy, just get dancey”!

♫ And one more makes 20 (thanks, Jobediah Ingram): Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’s Same Love

❏+++❏+++❏

➢ Read on in the New York Times:
For Gays, New Songs of Survival

“These artists represent a new wave of young (and mostly straight) women who are providing the soundtrack for a generation of gay fans coming to terms with their identity in a time of turbulent and confusing cultural messages.”

➢ Elsewhere at Shapers of the 80s… Update Nov 2011 – Firework falls out of UK chart after 58 weeks

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Posted in Europe, London, Media, North America, Pop music, Social trends, Youth culture

Tagged 2010, Adam Lambert, Aguilera, Black Eyed Peas, Blink-182, Boyzone, Gaga, gay kiss, George Michael, Katy Perry, Kylie Minogue, Macklemore, Madonna, Matt Alber, New York Times, Paul Oscar, Pet Shop Boys, Pete Doherty, Pink, Ryan Lewis, Scissor Sisters, Strokes, Tatu, Video, Yehonathan

➤ Why Lady Gaga “gets it”, Pixie Lott doesn’t, and the jury is out on Rihanna

Posted on 3 Nov 2010 | 1 comment

❚ WE LIKE POPJUSTICE BECAUSE it’s a website that confronts the heavyweight issues in a field some people regard as lightweight, namely, pop music. With some frequency PJ puts its finger on how our tiny minds work. Today it defines “the best pop music”…

Gets it: Lady Gaga, winner at the 2010 Brit Awards

[From PopJustice, Nov 3, 2010]

THE BEST POP MUSIC OFTEN SUCCEEDS by striking the right balance between trying just hard enough and looking like it’s not trying too hard. Lady Gaga turned things on their head slightly by very publicly and very unashamedly trying extremely hard and — in a world where there is no shortage of overstylised clubkids attempting to posture and preen their way to pseudo-avant garde popstar notoriety — she actually made it work.

Clearly Gaga is a cut above the rest in every respect: combined, her songwriting, style, collaborations, vocals and vision put her in a different league to almost every other popstar of the last twenty years. But her ascent to whatever and wherever she is now is an interesting case study in what happens when the right sort of person (and it has to be the right sort of person, with the right sort of tunes) strikes the right sort of pose…

[Here PJ discusses a Swedish upcomer called Viktorious who seems to “get it” in the same way Gaga does.]

We like popstars who get it. We like loads of popstars who don’t get it, too, but the ones who get it are our favourites. Success does not always come their way but they always make pop a little bit more interesting than the others.

And this is where the knife goes in. PJ has three lists of stars who “Get it”, headed by Gaga, those who “Don’t”, headed by Pixie Lott, and a third option where “The jury is out”: Rihanna.

➢ Read PopJustice’s full list of Gets and Don’t gets, Nov 3

Uh Oh, doesn’t get it: Pixie Lott, chart-topping pop princess

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Posted in London, North America, Pop music, Youth culture

Tagged 2010, Lady Gaga, Popjustice

➤ Was the Band With No Past truly wafted here from Paradise?

Posted on 2 Nov 2010 | Leave a comment

Paradise Point: Roman, Adam, Cameron and Johnnie

❚ THEY’RE BROODY, A TOUCH SULKY, they’re very fresh and very photogenic in black and white. Four songs online show they play their instruments with startling energy — bass, rhythm guitar, syndrums and synth. Their music is high-octane power pop on one track called The Only One. Furious upbeat emo on another called Tears. Whiffs of Duran Duran on Unbearable Without You. The singer does also happen to have a voice, bone structure, mad hands, attitude. Can’t be more than 18. There’s no evidence on their website of ever playing in public. This is the Band With No Past.

Where do bands like this come from, fully formed, straight from the egg? A whisper tells you they’ve already landed a deal, but that can’t be true. Google the name Paradise Point and all you find is a Palm-dotted beach in San Diego.

Somebody else tells you PP are Brits, playing their first date this month, live with, er, actual instruments. Hang on. These aren’t indie scruffs or thrash rockers. These kids are in their teens, unashamedly popsters, writing songs and making their own music like real pop groups used to before boy-bands — and before the Cowell X-culture robbed the pop charts of a generation of musicians. We have to reach way back into the heritage for groups who could play their own pop.

It turns out to be Steve Strange who’s showcasing Paradise Point at The Face, the bleeding-edge Neo-Romantic clubnight of the 20-tens, but hang on again, you wouldn’t call this band Romos, they don’t dress like Alejandro Gocast. Yet. OK, they sing of angsty love, like in two more tunes they’ve covered on video and posted today — live versions of Katy Perry’s Firework, and Rihanna’s Only Girl in the World, just to show they can big-time it. Straight to-camera demos, in one take, in fashionable black-and-white, understated and fearless and fizzing with energy. Don’t say Busted. Don’t say McFly. Really, there’s no need to wince.

Strange, I’ve seen that face before ... the one on the right’s called Roman, and he somehow reminds me of her

So far, there’s no press coverage on the band. There’s no info, even of any kind, on Paradise Point’s MySpace page or at Facebook. Apart from four names in alpha order: Cameron Jones (vocals), Roman Kemp (bass), Adam Saunderson (guitar/synth), Johnnie Shinner (drums). So, Watson, what do you deduce? Kemp’s face, Holmes, looks familiar, seen it somewhere before. By jove, Watson, you’re right — some pretty high-powered friends on MySpace, as well, Lady Gaga top of the list. There’s a clue in their YouTube tags too: if you like the tags, you’ll probably like the Band With No Past. Better trek down to The Face Friday fortnight, see what they amount to…

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➤ Classics of 80s graffiti revived by campaigning collective in New York

Posted on 28 Oct 2010 | Leave a comment

graffiti, Subway Art History,Joan of Arc, Hand of Doom, Martha Cooper ,Henry Chalfant

Joan of Arc at a warehouse along a Brooklyn canal: the graffiti collective Slavery is paying homage to a 1980 work that read “Hand of Doom”. © Robert Wright for The New York Times

[From the New York Times, October 26, 2010]

❚ ANYONE WHO HAS BEEN LOST in the last few weeks around the southern reaches of the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn could be excused for experiencing a powerful Koch administration flashback. On the wall of a brick warehouse there, a huge mural unfurls itself, a loving, seemingly spray-by-spray re-creation of one of the more infamous pieces of graffiti ever to ride the subway: a 1980 work by the artist known as Seen that covered the length of a No 6 train car with the ominous phrase “Hand of Doom”.

It is the work of a newly formed collective of (mostly) former graffiti writers in their 20s and 30s, who have embarked on an unusual citywide campaign to summon 50 or more of the most famous pieces of old-school graffiti out of the history books and back onto the streets. The project, called Subway Art History, is unusual not only because the artists are making the pieces with the permission of businesses, schools and other perhaps nostalgic owners of blank vertical space, but also because of the nature of the pieces themselves. They are expressions of homage in a subculture that has almost always been defined by fierce competition, intense striving for originality and a kill-the-elders attitude toward the past.

“In graffiti it’s like a teenage thing: No way am I going to become my father, no way am I going to make anything that looks like anyone else’s. — Then, of course, you become your father,” said a 32-year-old former graffiti writer who helped form the collective.

➢ Read Graffiti of New York’s past, revived and remade
— in the New York Times

❚ View video — 25th anniversary of Subway Art, bible of the graffiti movement, by Martha Cooper and Henry Chalfant: