Eternia and MoSS - At Last

Fat Beats

It seems counter-intuitive by now that women rappers would rhyme about anything other than leftist politics, feminist ideals, empowerment and sexuality, and anti-corporatism. I’m clearly biased; I listen to Invincible and Missy Elliott and spoken word artists like Ursula Rucker. But in the genre that is righteous, emboldened female hip-hop, Eternia is the reigning Canadian queen. On her new album At Last, along with producer MoSS, she speaks against pay-to-play and sponsorships, confronts an abusive past, and admits she looks for love in all the wrong places.

“Pass That” is a particularly intense track, chronicling one woman’s battle against an abusive religious husband and her sixteen-year-old daughter’s sexual proclivity, reasoning, “She figures they gonna take it so why not pay for that.” Other songs address heavy issues like alcoholism (“Dear Mr. Bacardi”), single motherhood, dropping out of school, running away, molestation, abortion, and gang rape (“To The Future”).

The lyrics are tough, raw, and full of references to race (Eternia is white), competition between women (on “The BBQ,” Fergie is called “corny”), and devotion to God and family. Particularly if you’re a hip-hop fiend, you’ll appreciate “Any Man,” on which Eternia explains how she works hard, regardless of the fame she earns, and often shares the stage with the big names you already know and love. “It’s not cockiness, it’s confidence, it’s what I been through,” she explains. Elsewhere, she drops lines like “The game needs me like Jay-Z.” I may be a big fan of the Jiggaman, but Eternia couldn’t be more correct; we desperately need revolutionary ladies on the charts.

A couple of years ago, Eternia put out a T-shirt that reads, “My favorite rapper wears a skirt,” which I could easily wear with pride. Could you?

Review by Brittany Shoot

M.I.A. - /\/\/\Y/\ (Maya)

Interscope Records



A week prior to its July 13th release, M.I.A.’s new album, /\/\/\Y/\ (or Maya), was made available streaming on the artist's MySpace page. The agitprop-meets-cyberpunk video for “Born Free” is the most inspiring thing I’ve seen all year (a clear indication that M.I.A.’s message is as much visual as it is aural), and my guess was that her latest effort would be the most overtly conceptual album that M.I.A. has recorded.

The first track, "The Message," begins with the sound of keyboard strokes that reminded me of early alternative rock heroes R.E.M. and experimental musician John Cage. It creates a rhythmic paranoid beat laid over a mechanical nursery rhyme. A male voice suggests that the body is no longer private property, and spells it out for the “connected” listener: “Headbone connects to the headphone/Headphones connect to the iPhone/iPhone connected to the internet/Connected to the Google/Connected to the government.”

“Steppin Up” will appeal to fans of Kala. It mixes laser and power drill sound effects with a melodic reggae pace while asserting an increasingly cyborgian identity. “Teqkilla” recalls “Boyz” for its hyperactive layers of hip-hop hooks and fluctuating vocals. This is a sexy club song, and would be the closest that M.I.A. settles into mood music.

Although she is stretching choruses and pressing the temporal limits of pop music, M.I.A. still has a knack for constructing tighter melodies, and proves it on “XXXO.” This track is about unrequited love, and calls a potential lover out for his down-low tweets. It’s a beat-heavy examination of familiar odes to obsessive love.

/\/\/\Y/\ is definitely weirder than M.I.A.'s previous recordings, and it will be interesting to see where critics of her ability to balance political and aesthetic ambitions go with this album. Will the media continue to castigate M.I.A. for going too far beyond the pop star galaxy with her overt political agenda? If so, I just hope M.I.A. doesn't go the way of pop feminist icon Madonna and, in the words of bell hooks, "return to patriarchy."

Review by Maria Guzman

Cross-posted at Gender Across Borders

Christina Aguilera - Bionic

RCA Records

Christina Aguilera has been a polemic figure since her breakthrough hit "Genie in a Bottle". She has a sexual aesthetic similar to a young Madonna’s, fashion sense like Cher’s, and raw vocal power comparable to a younger Whitney Houston’s. Her albums contain raunchy sexed-up tracks that appeal to sexually blossoming young adults and stately ballads that appeal to their post-menopausal mothers. Power pop, pop rock, R&B, hip-hop, dance, and even a little alt-rock have been found in some form on her albums. It’s a curse and a blessing for Christina that she can sound like anyone and sing almost anything. She’s always been difficult to categorize. Her ability to be so many things has caused critics to chastise her for not having her own unique presence.

The campaign for the collaboration-heavy Bionic began in the blogosphere with the declaration “Aguilera goes indie.” Ladytron, Le Tigre, Goldfrapp, M.I.A., Santigold, John Hill, and Sia all stepped up to the plate when an apprehensive Aguilera (convinced by her husband) reached out to them. The end result is an album that finds Christina caught between two worlds. Before, she seemed to be making the choice between being a serious singer or a pop star. Now, Christina Aguilera must chose between either being an “indie” darling or being the radio star. In the end, she is seemingly much more interesting doing “indie” impersonations than she is making radio ready pop.

The mainstream songs dominate the eighteen-track standard edition of the album and are, unfortunately, the weakest offerings from the Bionic sessions. Tricky Stewart never really replicates his production magic on his hits like “Umbrella” or “Single Ladies.” The Spanglish “Desnudate” sounds as if J.Lo, Pitbull, and Gloria Estefan went on an all night coke binge and decided to log some studio time in the process. The clunky Spanish translations, which seem to have been lifted directly from an online search engine, cause the track to sink even further. "Glam," touted as a modern "Vogue," is a cute but innocuous gay-friendly track that brings to mind Paris is Burning and Sex and the City. “Prima Donna” is slinky, urban, club fodder salvaged only by a confident hood delivery from Xtina, whose singing eerily sounds more and more like Michael Jackson by the bridge of the track.

Polow Da don’s tracks don’t fare much better. “Woo Hoo” (feat. Nicki Minaj), an ode to Christina’s lady parts, is fun, but the production is too sparse and predictable. “I Hate Boys” is a bratty, juvenile kiss-off that is the biggest stylistic misstep for Christina. It’s whooshing, grating production and taunting melody make it seem as if she’s trying to bite at the heels of Katy Perry and Ke$ha. But, this is a Christina Aguilera album, and with a deluxe version boasting twenty-four tracks in total there is still much more here to be examined.

A feel good collaboration with Le Tigre, “My Girls” is delightfully similar in its levity and playfulness. It combines Le Tigre’s penchant for female assertiveness and Christina’s stiletto wearing, ruby-lipped brand of third wave feminism. The product is a funky, lo-fi, disco-y, '90s, Girl Power pop with a Peaches feature and an adorable riot grrrrl shout-out to her collaborators.

With many of these collaborations Aguilera has been criticized for lacking a true identity and “ripping off” these artists, which I think is somewhat unfair. Can you call it “ripping off” if there is a consensual collaboration involved? In my opinion Xtina has been unable to maintain a clear musical identity out of sheer boredom and dynamic virtuosity. Yes, her voice is the only distinguishing feature that ties her albums together, but in her defense, why do one thing when you can do everything?

One burning question remains. How does one listen to such an album with such extreme stylistic differences from song to song? I’d say treat it like a mix-tape. With this number of tracks, various styles, and collaborators it’s safe to say that Christina Aguilera has made an album for the digital age. There are multiple ten-fifteen track albums that can be created from this lot for everyone to enjoy.

Review by Javi

This is an excerpt from a much longer, more detailed review that can be found at Electroqueer.

Gotta Dance

Directed by Dori Berinstein
Dramatic Forces



Gotta Dance opens with a scene of an energetic NBA game, with all the halftime mascot antics and acrobatic dance routines we’ve come to expect. But the New Jersey Nets are trying out something different this year. We see the feet of a group learning a dance routine, with the instructor telling them not to slap their butts because it’s a family show, and there’s one thing that makes this new hip-hop dance troupe different from any we’ve seen before: they are all over sixty years old.

We come to know the members of the team as they learn fairly complicated routines and tackle their insecurities being a dance group comprised of senior citizens. They’re not professional dancers; they are just people who love to dance, and want to share that love with each other and with audiences. It’s affirming to see people, who many would not expect to succeed at such an undertaking, tackle their insecurities and pull off the routine wonderfully. The sheer athleticism it takes to do the routines is really astonishing. As someone a fraction of most of these people’s ages, I doubt I could do the routines half as well. Plus, seeing someone’s grandma brush her shoulders off and raise the roof to Jay-Z’s “Show Me What You Got” is quite a sight.

But Gotta Dance isn’t just entertaining for the adorable factor. Betsy, stage name Betty, was already in a hip-hop dance class before joining the squad, and commends hip-hop as “for the masses.” She says she learned how to cut loose through the music and just dance. Betsy even brings hip-hop to a group of children in order to teach them about self-esteem and not putting each other down. Seeing old ladies teaching young kids hip-hop dance steps is cute, but it also says something about how we can use pop culture as a way to reach across generations and find common ground.

Even though, at first, the group members might prefer the cha-cha, they get pure joy out of letting go and just dancing. That joy is really infectious, and the confidence the members of the group, and even their teachers, gain through the experience is inspiring to see. As the elderly population in the United States steadily grows in number, Gotta Dance stands as a document of how this population is becoming involved in what’s thought of as youth culture. It gave me a warm fuzzy feeling, something that’s rare in today's films.

Review by Dana Reinoos