Comments on: Jody Rosen on Eva Tanguay:The Googoo(gajoob) of (Lady) Gaga

By: Donette Zuchara

Donette Zuchara — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 16:00:59 +0000

So after all talking about her do you guys think she has a penis ?

By: Devin-Weiss

Devin-Weiss — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 11:50:31 +0000

I read gossips all over, that absolutely nothing in Drag queen Gaga is original and that she is a copycat I however love Lady Gaga coZ she roCks!!

By: Barry Mazor

Barry Mazor — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 18:39:14 +0000

I take up the “personna selling personnas” line in “Meeting Jimmie Rodgers,” for what it’s worth–and the Rodgers to Dylan to Bowie multiple image marketing aspect directly. For what it’s worth.

By: caspian

caspian — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 13:44:56 +0000

another early source for “pop” would be shakespeare and his globe theatre - it was punk rock up front with the london yobbos hurling vomit & mead while the players went on very much ado about nothing…the art house meets the beerhall

By: john

john — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 20:52:26 +0000

When Dylan jumped from Columbia to — Asylum? — for a couple albums in the early ’70s, Columbia, seemingly in revenge, released an album of — “Self-Portrait”? — outtakes (!) under the title, “Dylan,” which included a cover of “Mr. Bojangles.” I never heard that record, and haven’t even seen it for a few decades, but I heard tell it’s his worst.

Thank goodness for the High Rockists like Derogatis. It is good to have an aesthetic “other” against which to bounce.

And yeah, I see your point about how Dylan confused people, while Bowie and Ferry merely telegraphed rock’s theretofore hidden relationship with showbiz. Sinatra went through a few personas over his career too. As did Streisand. In showbiz, that’s normal. Bowie and Ferry — they called it “glam” for a reason.

By: zoilus

zoilus — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 19:49:31 +0000

And John: Yeah, Dylan was doing everything Bowie/Ferry/et al would do, ten years in advance, but much more opaquely: Bowie & Ferry telegraphed all their moves (on the Warhol model of self-advertisement and transparent plasticity) while Dylan just made his. Thirty years later the difference looks small but at each point along the way he confused the hell out of people - the best thing about I’m Not There is that it reanimates that sensation. Although maybe for that all you need is to look at the reactions to the Christmas album, like the Sound Opinions radio show calling it “not just Dylan’s worst album but one of the worst albums ever made” - that from the “reliably dense” Jim Derogatis, as (to bring this full circle) Jody Rosen described him in this Slate post: http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/browbeat/archive/tags/Bob+Dylan/default.aspx

By: zoilus

zoilus — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 19:41:38 +0000

Good call on the Peaches connection w/ Gaga, though the flaw in the analogy with Liz/Avril is that Bad Romance is better than almost any Peaches song.

By: malstain

malstain — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 17:27:32 +0000

Turnabout is Phair play? I dunno, I kind of agree with the critical consensus on later Phair, although I have a slight guilty enjoyment of that particular song.
I was thinking this morning that Alanis Morrisette is a more appropriate analogy for a mainstream/corporate version of Liz Phair (or 90s grrl music in general).
But I digress.

By: Matt Collins

Matt Collins — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 03:27:39 +0000

Malstain: what did you think of Liz Phair pulling a full Avril and turning to The Matrix for a hit?

By: john

john — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 01:44:28 +0000

Thanks, Matt, I hear what you’re saying now, though I’d say that Dylan’s game is trippy in that he’s a persona that sells personas that his devotees all continually re-absorb into his Dylan-ness. I suppose that’s true with Bowie too, but Dylan-ism as religion seems more fervent than other classic rock fan-isms, even Elvisism.