And books are written by gasp people.
Actually, his reaction to that South Park episode is one reason why I can’t stand the guy. He claims his feelings were hurt. :rolleyes:
Kanye may be a talented musician, but he takes himself way too seriously, and if there’s one thing I hate, it’s a person who can’t laugh at himself. (Dude was hurt by being called a gay fish! C’mon!)
Whoa. That really, *really *sounds like something my psycho ex would say. He probably *has *said that. Now you guys see what I’m dealing with.
Fair enough, I just picked what they both most known for.
They’re not both musicians? He may not make the distinction between genius in a field and genius in a general way but it’s all I’m willing to credit him with - if I don’t think he’s the former, I’m hardly going to entertain his claims to the latter.
Dunno, but popularity or sales is not a good idea. If you go by that metric then Ke$ha is a bigger genius than Lennon/McCartney.
To paraphrase The Dude, it’s just, like, my opinion man. Although I am certain that The Beatles will be recognised in 100 years; they’ve had lasting influence over nearly half a century already. Whether Kanye will be remembered in the same breath, who knows.
You must really not have looked through that to present it as evidence of her being even marginally talented. Over 95% of the listings are her playing herself in various inane Kardashian “reality” shows. The other few are her in some T & A shows in which she is universally panned. One reviewer expressed surprise at somebody with such a curvaceous body being so flat in her delivery and affect.
You are actually equating Kim Kardashian with Tina Fey’s creative success? Tina created and brought to life characters over a period of years on SNL. She was head writer for a number of years on same. She developed and wrote the sitcom 30 Rock. She won Emmys and Golden Globes for her acting on the show.
Here is how Kardashian “earned” her first $5 million: In February 2007, a sex tape made by Kardashian and Ray J in 2003 was leaked. Kardashian filed a lawsuit against Vivid Entertainment, who distributed the film as Kim K Superstar, and dropped the suit and settled for $5 million. (From the Wikipedia entry on our dear girl)
I admit that I worded what I said here poorly. I did not intend to convey that half of Vogue’s readers are billionaire’s wives :rolleyes:. By “represents” I meant that she is somewhat like a standard-bearer, someone who is known by the magazine’s readers and, if not looked up to, at least held in some esteem. I do assure you that people who read Vogue regularly know who she is, as well as the other Trump women.
As far as the demographics, I’m pretty sure that one magazine cover is not going to have much impact on it. It will be interesting to see how it skews going forward though.
(Damnit - now my post looks like one of yours. At least I’m just addressing one person’s post and not taking on all comers. Do you sleep?)
I have to admit this is baffling me. This is the cover of Vogue we’re talking about. Kanye West and Kim Kardashian are celebrities. How is this a controversy?
I just googled Vogue covers: I’m seeing Rihanna, Lana Del Rey, Beyonce, Anne Hathaway, Kristen Stewart, Jennifer Lawrence, etc.
It would be helpful if Sarah Michelle Gellar would tell us what her problem is.
I just noticed that this thread has been linked in the comments section of a related Gawker article: http://gawker.com/an-erogenous-slice-of-clavicle-the-best-lines-from-the-1550720454/all
Most people are only commenting on the body of work he’s produced as a popular recording artist, which is definitely more recent (relatively speaking), but also makes the above more interesting. On the other end, his career has been taking place behind the scenes since the 90s IIRC, as I used to hear his contributions on the production end for a number of other artists, some of which are more obscure.
Personally, I wouldn’t say his vocals are specifically noteworthy compared to a number of others, but he is the sum of his parts and has a unique style.
The “blah blah blah” portion that you’re overlooking is the specific content of those lines and you’re missing the more complex portion, where he’s actually rhyming the words before “reputation”. It’s a spin on a fairly common theme in rhyming called a “multisyllabic rhyme” or some variation of that name. Also, this is consistent across six or seven lines in that verse, including the four you’ve listed.
Back in the 80s when it was less technical, there existed far more emphasis on the absolute final word of a line, but since then, an evolution has taken place where artists don’t obey convention while putting together some increasingly complex schemes and material. If you’re familiar with Kanye’s specific work, he regularly breaks those rules, but even then, he doesn’t use an especially complex rhyme structure or vocabulary, and places much more emphasis on delivery and some wordplay.
This isn’t meant as a knock against you and it would be hyperbole to call the quality of his writing “genius level”, but the above is a more honest explanation and understanding of what he’s doing, and a less avid listener of the music probably won’t pick up on it.
Hell, just look at the evolution of English language poetry over the last couple hundred years. Masculine end rhymes and simple AABBCCDD structures have long gone the way of the dodo and sound quite dated (and a bit nursery-rhyme like) to my ears.
Now, I’m not saying that Kanye’s lyrics are poetry or genius. They may or may not be, but that’s not pertinent to my point. (For me, the genius is in the sonic qualities, although I enjoy the lyrics, too, some more than others) And, as you note, his euphony is not necessarily particularly complex. The rhymes in that song are “bad reputation,” “mad reputation,” and “Brad reputation” (a reference to Brad Pitt in Fight Club), so, as you note, he isn’t even employing identity rhyme, but rather a type of simple internal rhyme, while using the repetition of “reputation” for emphasis, in a rhetorical/poetic device called epistrophe. Rhyme and repetition are among the basic prosodic and rhetorical units of poetry. It’s rather strange to level that as a complaint against a type of lyric writing that is basically poetic in form.
While they are both musicians, music has changed so much over the course of a few hundred years that they are barely doing the same thing. It’s like comparing basketball players in Naismith’s day to Lebron James. I suppose they are both playing basketball, but comparing them directly would probably be a fruitless and arbitrary exercise.
The Beatles are far more popular and have sold far more records than Kesha. That said, how could you even attempt to directly compare a classical composer and a modern musician objectively.
Why? A lot of that influence is because people who grew up with the Beatles are still alive. Half the Beatles are still alive. What makes you so sure there will be hardcore fans 50 years from now when the original ones are mostly all dead?
What is the threshold for marginally talented in your mind?
You said:
Kim fits all of that as well. I don’t like her as much as Tina Fey, but the narrative is fairly similar.
Based on what? What makes you think Vogue readers know her as anything other than Trump’s wife who rarely speaks on TV? What makes you think they know her at all, or think she is held in higher esteem than Kim Kardashian? Any evidence of this at all?
Poster calluses on the Gawker site (note, not sight or cite) sez:
Lovely! Great! Wonderful! Thanks to someone (brickbacon), now every viewer on the Gawker site (note, not sight or cite) thinks that we are their fan-base!!!
Let it be known henceforth that I gave my opinion to a thread questioning the furor raised by the Vogue cover in the forum In My Humble Opinion, and that I was stridently against them being on the cover.
Not fan-base!
Not fan-base!
I think we’re just gonna have to agree to disagree; I’ve had a renewed listen of his most well-known tracks on YouTube to see if there’s something I’m missing and I just can’t get it. So while I’ll never accept his musical genius by the same token I’m not gonna convince you he’s not, and the more I think about it the less I’d want to. If you enjoy his work, fill your boots.
I’m thinking that may not be a coincidence.
Somewhere far above Kim Kardashian’s smirking little head.
You know, I didn’t go to all the trouble of writing the five sentences about Tina Fey that you quoted just to have them be ignored. Here they are again:
If you call that “a similar narrative” to Kim Kardashian’s struggle up from the depths, then I am truly arguing with insanity - and the shame is on me.
You know, I had actually asked each and every Vogue reader how they regarded Melania Trump, had all the data set up in a nice, not-little database, and then made a Right Inner Join and lost it all.
So, for now, and in summation:
This is my opinion.
They are both unrepentant douche bags.
That’s not a matter of opinion.
Couldn’t agree more, nice post.
The parallels are there with poetry, and though this discussion is more slanted towards Kanye, lyricism is an interesting study, given how relatively “young” it is (as an element of hip hop) and how artists didn’t develop so much through formal means. IMO, it’s a very innate and beautiful growth, though the details aren’t to everyone’s liking (which I totally understand, btw).
Honestly, who cares, the poster is misinterpreting (no shock). brickbacon is more challenging cliched responses, not declaring himself a member of a fan-base for reasons given. Agree or disagree, I don’t know how anyone reading this thread could arrive at the conclusion that his fan-base resides here. There are an infinite amount of other sources for examples of that, all of which are at least music focused.
I think on some level, maybe this discussion has gotten off track. Regardless of whether or not you accept the term “genius”, one has to admit that Kanye West is very, very critically praised. He is arguably the artist with the highest critical praise of any artist out there today.
For example, here is a what Pitchfork (which tries to have the same elite-like persona on music as fans of Vogue think that magazine does on fashion) had to say in their review of “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” (which got an incredibly rare 10/10):
And if one want to continue to intellectualize, the idea of “epistrophe”, repetition of words and phrases at the end of a line, you could draw parallels to “preacher” speak, where anaphora (repetition of beginning phrases, think “Blessed are the…” type constructions) and epistrophe (think the repetition of MLK at the end of sentences with “We Shall Overcome”) are common. Once again, my point is not to equate Kanye’s lyrics to either of these two examples, but to point out that these are common rhetorical/prosodic techniques in English (and I suspect most, if not all, languages.)
Are you a fragile, self-conscious teenager or something? Who cares what some random internet people twice removed think you like? I freely admit to being a fan of his music. I don’t I think I am in the minority on that, and it’s hardly something I would run from, or that most seem to run from given his popularity and critical acclaim.
Glad you got that cleared up least people think you deviated from internet group think too much.
Fair enough, I appreciate the sentiment.
Why? Based on what? How does someone who is not at least marginally talented have multiple hit shows often running concurrently? How do they keep acquiring acting work and gaining success in multiple fields. You act like that is high praise to begin with.
It’s also worth nothing that you have twisted the initial claim. You first said:
Let’s review shall we. I gave you a fairly complete list of productions. She is clearly a SAG member. She has acted in multiple productions, and clearly had to memorize lines. Additionally (as we will get to), the comparison was not to Tina Fey, but to people like Blake Lively and Keira Knightly. Are you really making the argument that they are more deserving of a Vogue cover because of their acting? Has anyone ever said they can’t wait to see that new Keira Knightly movie?
I ignored it because I was not equating the creative success of Tina Fey and Kim Kardashian. Let’s review the tape here. In a weak attempt to justify putting Tina Fey, an exceptionally talented woman who nonetheless has no fashion credibility, on the cover you said:
I said Kim could claim the same, meaning she is also fairly well-renown for her creative success which was forged against the prevailing currents in her industry. I was not saying that Kim is better or more creative than Tina Fey (not that such a thing could even be measured).
Then you followed up with another stupid comment about how oxygen thief, Melania Trump was “at least half of [Vogue’s] intended audience”, and how I needed to be introduced to “reality”. Just nonsense. There is not even circumstantial evidence that Trump herself is particularly famous or held in high esteem by anyone let alone Vogue readers. I guess you can shrink away now by trying to say it was just your opinion, but I figured someone who such confidence in their stances would have based it on some evidence of some sort.
The bottom line is that you can ask anyone who is working in the entertainment field, and they will tell you the level of success someone like Kim has had is not an accident. She works hard, is talented, is generally a good role model, seems to connect with a good amount of people, and has a wide appeal that is marketable. That ALONE, is enough to justify her being on the cover. Add to that that she is there with arguably one of the biggest and most talented musicians working to today, and that they both have made a (minor) mark on the fashion world, and this argument that they don’t “deserve” it, and that they didn’t “earn” it even more silly.
It also doesn’t make it okay to call him retarded (I thought we were trying to phase out that word), or to make tire, hacky jokes about how big her ass is (Is it okay to objectify unlikeable women now), or to denigrate her because she had a sex tape leaked against her will by almost all accounts (We can slut sham again?). It just makes it very sad that grown adults so sincerely invested in tabloid culture and fame that they think famous people being on a magazine cover invites such derision and discussion. If you are above it all, BE ABOVE IT ALL. Stop acting like these people sullied the reputation of this collection of ads in the form of a magazine when Ryan Locte was on the cover a few months ago. Ryan fucking Locte. A guy known primarily as the second best athlete in a sport people only care about once every 4 years. You don’t have to like Kanye or Kim, but acting like they are the “BIGGEST ASSHOLES ON EARTH” or that they aren’t talented people with a high level of success in their fields is bordering on insanity. Admitting it doesn’t make 30 Rock less brilliant, or Beethoven’s music less influential, it just means you are paying attention.
Pay attention people!
So what if she has a SAG membership? A lot of people have one. It’s not that hard to get one. Hell, I think PAULY SHORE’S a member.
Doesn’t exactly make her Meryl Streep.
Yeah I guess I shouldn’t have said she was Meryl Streep… oh wait I didn’t say anything remotely like that. The question was whether she had a SAG card, and she does.