For those who are ill-informed about the current state of literary contribution, it is advised that one should view the latest top-40 music video, popular movie franchise, or any YouTube video. Indeed popularity is dynamic, and in today's society, fifteen seconds of fame is obtained as easily as creating a nonsensical song that's lyrics are sheer escapism from conventional pop-lyric writing. The reference is to a song named 'Friday'[1] by young artist, Rebecca Black. With nearly a hundred million views on YouTube, and spawns of parodies across the internet, the question "Who has the last laugh?" must be asked. Millions who have expressed aggravated threats of hatred, or a thirteen year old girl whose infamy has generated enough revenue to help the Japanese disasters more than me or you could ever do.
One should not be hasty to dismiss her song and a recent Billboard article[2] claims that self-proclaimed music elitists would dismiss the song but many are embracing it. Its melody and standard beat do allow for its simple message to be caught up in one's mind. Most would say Rebecca Black is simply another "fifteen seconds of fame" or "one hit wonder" artist and eventually her song and presence will dissolve in the sands of time. Yet history has always been kind to most artists whose work has been under-appreciated, many painters such as Van Gough were never understood nor relished until postmortem, as with poets including Emily Dickinson whose nonsensical words are now studied in high school institutions. These people were considered the 'Rebecca Black' of their time, and yet now go down in history as great artistic geniuses. Who is to say Rebecca Black will not go down the same?
Unfortunately it is the intelligentsia, the select group of literary intellectuals who stipulate the canon: the film, book, song, and art critics who decide the impact a piece of art may have upon the world. They rarely get it wrong and as such, their revised manuscript does usually dictate mandates of artistic significance. Music critics cringe at the idiocy of Rebecca Black's song. Her character and contribution to the zeitgeist should rather be judged on her reaction to society's critique on 'Friday' and not the song itself. Conducting numerous interviews and acoustic covers, she has never resigned herself to the 'haters'. Whether or not she has been influenced by her record company to continue raising interest thus revenue is irrelevant, she is one artist who has "stood by her dump"[3] on the zeitgeist and that is what should truly be commended. Now what seat should i take?
N.B. The random rapper in the music video should reconsider his job as a rapper and producer of music.
References:
[1]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CD2LRROpph0
[2]http://www.billboard.com/news/rebecca-black-looks-to-move-beyond-friday-1005093722.story#/news/rebecca-black-looks-to-move-beyond-friday-1005093722.story
[3]Family Guy: "Brian Writes a Bestseller" Season 9 Episode 6
Further Reading:
Links between Rebecca's Work and other literary contributions: http://thedailywrazz.wordpress.com/2011/03/20/rebecca-black-puckers-up-to-kiss-the-zeitgeist/
Satire on Friday's 'true' meaning: http://procrastinatorsrant.wordpress.com/2011/03/17/yesterday-was-thursday-today-it-is-friday/
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