THE ARDUOUS ROLLOUT of Katy Perry's seventh studio album was a rare gaffeonly product launch. While 143's lead single, "Woman's World," signaled an aggressive pivot to the disco of Beyoncé's "Break My Soul" and Lizzo's "About Damn Time," Perry's play at a comeback was derailed by the lyrical simplicity on display, which felt better suited to pharmaceutical ads. The music video's absurdist gestures so confused its feminist intent that Perry later claimed it was satire. The presence of hitmaker Łukasz "Dr. Luke" Gottwald, whose nearly decadelong legal war with Kesha over sexual-assault allegations was finally settled out of court last year, undermined the theme of women's empowerment. Neglecting to sufficiently address the thorn in her charm campaign, the singer instead spoke of triumph over emotional adversity and an itch to have fun again: "If you don't find a way to sow seeds in the valleys," she recently told radio DJ Zane Lowe, "you never find those fruits in the peaks." 2020's Smile was her exploration of those lows, but 143, which revels in joy without urgency, is stilted by its own one-note message.
Yet to anoint it a contender for Pop Flameout of the Year would be to ignore the trends that merged to form this Infinity Gauntlet of missteps. Two years after Beyoncé's Renaissance-and ten after Taylor Swift's bubbly juggernaut 1989-neat, unobtrusive synth pop feels perfunctory. Everybody's doing it because everybody's doing it. The Weeknd single "Dancing in the Flames" huffs the glory of "Blinding Lights"; the 1989-core on Swift's The Tortured Poets Department was outshone by the deluxe edition's folk musings. This decade (in which even Paris Hilton is reworking old house anthems) may well be marked by a torrent of popular but noncommittal dance music.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة October 07-20, 2024 من New York magazine.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة October 07-20, 2024 من New York magazine.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
Early and Often: David Freedlander - Momentum vs. Machine The Trump and Harris campaigns battle it out for every last vote.
WIth two weeks left to go, the contours of the 2024 presidential election are clear: Both campaigns need voters who usually don’t vote, and Kamala Harris needs to bring the Democratic coalition, including its Trump-curious members, back home.While the Republican side plans to spend the remaining days of the contest trying to lure low-propensity voters to the polls, the Harris team will attempt to persuade voters of color to return to its side and will try to increase numbers among white voters in previously red suburbs.
Drowning in Slop - A thriving underground economy is clogging the internet with AI garbage-and it's only going to get worse.
SLOP started seeping into Neil Clarke's life in late 2022. Something strange was happening at Clarkesworld, the magazine. Clarke had founded in 2006 and built into a pillar of the world of speculative fiction. Submissions were increasing rapidly, but “there was something off about them,” he told me recently. He summarized a typical example: “Usually, it begins with the phrase ‘In the year 2250-something’ and then it goes on to say the Earth’s environment is in collapse and there are only three scientists who can save us. Then it describes them in great detail, each one with its own paragraph. And then—they’ve solved it! You know, it skips a major plot element, and the final scene is a celebration out of the ending of Star Wars.” Clarke said he had received “dozens of this story in various incarnations.”
The City Politic- The Other Eric Adams Scandal The NYPD shot a fare evader, a cop, and two bystanders. He defends it.
On Sunday, September 15, Derell Mickles hopped a turnstile, got asked to leave by cops, then entered the subway again ten minutes later through an emergency exit. This was at the Sutter Avenue L station, out by his mother's house, five stops from the end of the line. Police said they noticed he was holding a folded knife. They followed him up the stairs to the elevated train, asking him 38 times to drop the weapon.
Can the Media Survive?
BIG TECH, Feckless Owners, CORD-CUTTERS, RESTIVE STAFF, Smaller Audiences ... and the Return of PRINT?
Status Update
Hannah Gadsby's fascinatingly untidy tour through life after fame and death.
A Matter of Perspective
A Matter of Perspective Steve McQueen's worst film is still a solid WWII drama.
Creator, Destroyer
A retrospective reveals an architect's vision, optimism, and supreme arrogance.
In Praise of Bad Readers
In a time of war, there is a danger in surveying the world as if it were a novel.
Trust the Kieran Culkin Process
First, he nearly dropped out of Oscar hopeful A Real Pain. Then he convinced Jesse Eisenberg to change the way he directs.
The Funniest Vampires on TV
What We Do in the Shadows is coming to an end. Its idiosyncratic brand of comedy may be too.
