# Rebecca Black "Friday" **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 25, 2011, 12:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951 "2011-03-25T12:08:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![wayward](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a87d85/32.png) [@wayward](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wayward)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2011, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/121 "2011-03-28T22:10:17Z")
I love it when the internet takes something and just runs with it [Rebecca Black as interpreted by a bad lip reader](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GaKaGwch0U) ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2011, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/122 "2011-03-28T22:30:32Z")
> [@wayward](#): > > I love it when the internet takes something and just runs with it > > [Rebecca Black as interpreted by a bad lip reader](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GaKaGwch0U) Beatcha to it–see post #68 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2011, 8:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/123 "2011-03-29T08:13:40Z")
The song’s awful, but I fail to see how it’s vastly worse to other similar efforts that aren’t vanity effort. [I did enjoy Charlie Brooker’s unusually mild piece on the vitriol.](http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/28/charlie-brooker-rebecca-black-friday) ---
**Author:** ![Count\_Blucher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Count\_Blucher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Count_Blucher)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2011, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/124 "2011-03-29T13:51:02Z")
> [@wheresgeorge04](#): > > It’s the most inane, nonsensical song I think I’ve ever heard. > > Joe Well…ah…confidentially…[I’ve heard worse](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwvqdXR3XnI). ---
**Author:** ![Reloy3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c68b51/32.png) [@Reloy3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reloy3)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2011, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/125 "2011-03-29T15:20:30Z")
> [@Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](#): > > I’m sure they never really expected anyone other than her and her friends to ever see it, it was just supposed to be something nice for their daughter, who happens to be at the time in her life when girls’ self-esteem takes a big hit. I’m not sure this is true. Ok, when I’m not practicing law, I work on the side as a DJ (nothing great, just a wedding/school dance/church group kind of thing). Because I have just enough business to justify it, I have a subscription to a DJ CD service that sends me promotional releases a month ahead of the formal release in hopes that I will expose people to it. It is the same (or one of the same) sent to radio stations and the like. “Friday” was on the CD a while back. Someone planned to release it. Granted, only about a third of the songs on any given CD get any serious airplay, but it seems clear someone wanted this exposed to the world before it became a youtube joke. ---
**Author:** ![bucketybuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@bucketybuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bucketybuck)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2011, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/126 "2011-03-29T15:26:41Z")
> [@Count\_Blucher](#): > > Well…ah…confidentially…[I’ve heard worse](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwvqdXR3XnI). That was fucking awesome!!! ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/127 "2011-03-31T15:39:41Z")
> [@Mister\_Rik](#): > > Yeah, I just posted that in sort of a “here she is not autotuned, judge for yourself” way. IMO, she can at least carry a tune _fairly_ well, but her voice _quality_ needs quite a bit of work. It would be interesting to hear her sing a _good_ song to see how she sounds, because “Friday” just doesn’t make for a good vocal showcase. There’s a [clip on ABC news](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjFIzWjT5I4#t=3m33s) of her singing a little bit of the national anthem, and she sounds a lot better. Not perfect, but better. For some reason she wants to go all nasal on “Friday.” I think she’s mimicking what she hears in Auto-Tuned pop, but that’s normally added by the filter and the mixers, not the voice itself. She thus gets a sort of double dose of the effect, and it’s too much. > [@Enderw24](#): > > Ben Folds linked to [this video](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87CIz_HWuyo) and wondered why it never got the love that Rebecca Black’s has. Because that video is painfully cheesy and isn’t pretending to be pop. It was either recorded long ago, or is a throw back to a much older style. The thing that freaked people out about Black’s video is that the video quality is rather good, and confirms rather well to the way modern music videos are constructed. It is a rather well crafted video. The problems are in the voice and lyrics (and perhaps the less than model perfect extras). There’s so much about this video that is right. The problem is that there is currently a large backlash against bad singing and bad lyrics in pop, and this takes it a lot further. It takes it so far that many people thought the whole thing was a joke until Black started defending herself. And once it appeared on Tosh.0, it officially became cool to make fun of her video (as that’s what that show is all about). Of course, at that point, it’s in the media, and the counter-backlash started. Celebrities started defending her. Talk shows and news shows wanted her to appeal to a younger demographic. They don’t want to be caught behind the meme like they were with Rick Astley. There is now a big controversy over whether she deserves to be insulted as she has been, and controversy means popularity. Combine the TV and the Internet, and you have a modern pop culture sensation. And if she gets what she wants and gets Bieber to do a duet with her, she’s going to create even more controversy, and her 15 minutes are going to last even longer. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/128 "2011-03-31T16:01:43Z")
> [@Reloy3](#): > > I’m not sure this is true. > Ok, when I’m not practicing law, I work on the side as a DJ (nothing great, just a wedding/school dance/church group kind of thing). Because I have just enough business to justify it, I have a subscription to a DJ CD service that sends me promotional releases a month ahead of the formal release in hopes that I will expose people to it. It is the same (or one of the same) sent to radio stations and the like. > > “Friday” was on the CD a while back. Someone planned to release it. Granted, only about a third of the songs on any given CD get any serious airplay, but it seems clear someone wanted this exposed to the world before it became a youtube joke. It’s an odd mixture. She originally wanted in just as a little fun thing with her friends, but the studio wanted more. The story as I understand it is that Black had written a song, and wanted to do a video for her friends. She spies an ad in the paper that wants young singers for a video, if they pay for it. She goes to an audition, and they decide that, while they don’t like her song, she has a good voice, image, etc, and give her a choice of two songs to sing. One is about teen romance, which she doesn’t feel comfortable with, so she picks the other song. The studio had actually put out the ad to try to make a real pop video, and they see Black as their best chance. She is told that, while it’s a long shot, she might become popular. Black had wanted to be a singer-song writer eventually anyways, so she jumps on the chance. As a reward to her friends who got her started in all this, she gets them all in the video. They all assume it’s going nowhere, but it’s a fun little project. Of course a studio is going to push as much as they can for their new pop attempt, so it doesn’t surprise me that they didn’t just release it on YouTube. They definitely weren’t expecting Tosh.0 to pick it up. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/129 "2011-03-31T16:19:28Z")
[Friday](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Rv1BZcksIc) done like it was an actual song. Somehow it’s worse. ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2011, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/130 "2011-04-02T18:22:42Z")
I thought about making another topic for this, but I’ll just post it here: [Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, and The Roots Perform “Friday.”](http://tv.gawker.com/#!5788237/watch-stephen-colbert-and-jimmy-fallon-perform-rebecca-blacks-friday-on-late-night) Easily the most amazing, epic version of this song. Videos like these should make everyone just pack it up and go home. It can’t be topped. ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2011, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/131 "2011-04-02T18:58:21Z")
[This](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ti1D9t8n0qA) is proof that God loves us and wants us to never sleep again. ---
**Author:** ![koeeoaddi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/koeeoaddi/32/408_2.png) [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2011, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/132 "2011-04-02T19:04:09Z")
> [@Count\_Blucher](#): > > Well…ah…confidentially…[I’ve heard worse](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwvqdXR3XnI). Worse? Worse?! That’s the best link in the thread! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![GrandWino](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grandwino/32/67_2.png) [@GrandWino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrandWino)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2011, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/133 "2011-04-02T22:55:29Z")
[The Letter From Rebecca Black’s Mother Regarding Her Safety.](http://www.funnyordie.com/pictures/586c36e63b/the-letter-from-rebecca-black-s-mother-regarding-her-safety?playlist=featured_pictures_and_words) ---
**Author:** ![Mister\_Rik](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mister_rik/32/491_2.png) [@Mister\_Rik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Rik)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/134 "2011-04-03T04:46:17Z")
> [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > I thought about making another topic for this, but I’ll just post it here: > > [Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, and The Roots Perform “Friday.”](http://tv.gawker.com/#!5788237/watch-stephen-colbert-and-jimmy-fallon-perform-rebecca-blacks-friday-on-late-night) > > Easily the most amazing, epic version of this song. Videos like these should make everyone just pack it up and go home. It can’t be topped. At this rate, “Friday” may soon pass The Beatles’ “Yesterday” as the most-covered song in history! ---
**Author:** ![bucketybuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@bucketybuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bucketybuck)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2011, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/135 "2011-04-04T16:55:58Z")
You heard the song, now play the game… [http://www.bored.com/game/play/151297/Rebecca\_Whack\_Its\_Friday\_.html](http://www.bored.com/game/play/151297/Rebecca_Whack_Its_Friday_.html) ---
**Author:** ![Savannah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@Savannah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Savannah)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/136 "2011-04-05T04:44:53Z")
> [@Count\_Blucher](#): > > Well…ah…confidentially…[I’ve heard worse](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwvqdXR3XnI). I really liked that. I’ve saved the video, and am converting to an mp3. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/137 "2011-04-05T05:42:50Z")
Then there is this version, more about Sunday than Friday, from some USC Film School folks: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEI-KRf9WgY](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEI-KRf9WgY) ---
**Author:** ![Skara\_Brae](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f0a364/32.png) [@Skara\_Brae](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skara_Brae)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2011, 12:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/138 "2011-04-05T12:11:57Z")
> [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > I thought about making another topic for this, but I’ll just post it here: > > [Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, and The Roots Perform “Friday.”](http://tv.gawker.com/#!5788237/watch-stephen-colbert-and-jimmy-fallon-perform-rebecca-blacks-friday-on-late-night) > > Easily the most amazing, epic version of this song. Videos like these should make everyone just pack it up and go home. It can’t be topped. Is it wrong that this version made me kinda like the song? I cracked up about 4 times watching it… ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2011, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/139 "2011-04-22T16:19:35Z")
I hate this song but it’s catchy. I do, however, understand all the hatred and death-threat-levely amount of bile this song and Black inspires. If I didn’t get so much pleasure mocking it, in a parallel universe I might have been one of those people. ---
**Author:** ![fusoya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecccb3/32.png) [@fusoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fusoya)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2011, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951/140 "2011-04-22T22:25:31Z")
All I can say is thank god that Weird Al didn’t parody Friday for his lead single, as I feared he might… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rebecca-black-friday/575951.md?page=8)