I'm not sure what's worse, the fact that a girl with a dollar sign in her name (that kind of juvenile silliness is traditionally reserved for one-hit wonder hip-hop stars) has a number one song or the fact that my nieces and nephew dance to it and know every word. At six years old (the age of my youngest niece) I danced and sang every word to Main Street by Bob Seger. I can't imagine for a minute that my parents would have let me listen to music with lyrics about chugging Jack Daniels. Of course, plenty of music from my dad's collection referenced drugs and drinking, etc. But, generally the songs didn't spell it out like today's "smash hits".
My fascination with degrading music started in middle school with 2 Live Crew. They had some shockingly vulgar songs. Often, the girls I knew on the bus would sing along to the tapes being played in the back. It was somewhat sick that they giggled along with lyrics about "bitches", "hoes", "sluts" and "whores".
Ke$ha's song Tik-Tok is definitely not as vivid as anything by The Crew, but joking about "boys tryin' to touch my junk" is a little much for a six year-old, no? The Billboard Top 40 has always been chock-full of asinine, yet, danceable songs about sex and cliché pop-culture references.
I'm not saying I'm shocked by the song. I have successfully ignored all that bullshit for thirty years. All I'm sayin' is that maybe we shouldn't let our young ones listen to it. If they choose it as adolescents, that's fine. But, six years old? There's so much music out there with positive messages! At the very least, there is harmless, benign pop music that, despite not being challenging, is just as danceable!
Music is my nectar.
- Bert says:
- Music is life. It has taught me so much about the history of the United States and about myself. It gets me up in the morning and puts me to sleep at night.
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2 comments:
I couldn't agree more Nick. What a shame that this has become the new idol for our youth. I only learned of this girl recently and was not impressed when I looked her up. Her lyrics, sound and persona were all disappointing. Of course this is just my opinion and I'm sure I would have a line a mile long to disagree. I only hope that if and when we decide to procreate, that our kids have the good taste to avoid such waste. This topic reminds me of a proud moment in my teen years when my 3-year old sister learned all the lyrics (her own version) to her favorite song, the "fishbowl song", also known as Wish You Were Here. What a great day that was.
Apparently, my nephew is also a Spoon fan despite the High School Musical, Miley Cyrus, etc! Your sister must be old now!
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