So everybody’s talking about the sudden popularity of sea shanties and I have a theory about something that’s been overlooked
namely, a couple of viral antecedents
One is from a video game: the insanely catchy “Keep Your Rifle By Your Side,” from FAR CRY 5.
The other is from a TV show: HBO’s THE RIGHTEOUS GEMSTONES earworm “Misbehavin’.”
You will note these songs have some things in common:
1) they are melodic, not beat-centered 2) they are catchy 3) they are fun to sing 4) they are produced by ingroup as examples of things that outgroup likes: one is designed to be scary, the other cringe
but here’s the thing:
they were made by ingroup to be ironic fun for ingroup, mocking outgroup
...but the ingroup audience discovered *they actually loved these songs.*
I have been thinking for a while that this heralds a change in pop music.
People are starved for songs with catchy melodies they can actually sing.
Sea shanties fit the bill.
So which pop label will capitalize and give the people what they’re hungry for? Time’s a-wasting.
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ME. “And you’ll never guess what the Boogaloo Bois did next!”
EVERYBODY WHO READS MY TWITTER, dully and in unison. “They kept using Discord”
ME. “THEY KEPT USING DISCORD” leftcoastrightwatch.org/2021/01/citize…
“well, there’s the official proof the Boogaloo is a right-wing movement”
“the content of their Discord, huh”
“...content?”
RADICAL RIGHTIES. “The entire platform of Discord is compromised!Let’s go elsewhere”
ME. “Gonna make one big chatroom?”
RR. “Uh, yeah”
ME. “Gonna advertise it via general publicity in public forums?”
RR. “Of course”
ME. “Gonna let anybody join?”
RR. “Absolutely”
ME. “...carry on”
Very interesting after-action report from the Hard Lefty side of December 12 in DC. Quite unlike Hard Righties’ comments in similar circumstances: Hard Lefties are very tactically minded and are also willing to admit failure when they fail. itsgoingdown.org/d12-report-bac…
Hard Lefties also think socially, in terms of making friends.
Lots of frank thought about successes and failures, with ideological shoring-up after having had to rely on police protection.
Watching Dario Argento’s PHENOMENA (1985) with Jennifer Connelly (!!) as a movie star’s daughter who sleepwalks and has a psychic link with insects
and Donald Pleasence (!!!) as the entomologist who enlists her talents to catch a psycho killer
and, for some reason, a chimpanzee
PHENOMENA is clunky, but the gimmick is interesting, and the Swiss locations are gorgeous and unusual.
The scene chemistry between Pleasence and Connelly is interesting. It’s not avuncular, and it’s not creepy; it’s a little distant but respectful.
Jennifer Connelly is bullied by her boarding school classmates and amasses a goddamn enormous horde of flies to unnerve them and this movie was a formative inspiration for the webnovel WORM, wasn’t it?
Today’s background movie is ELECTRA GLIDE IN BLUE (1973) with Robert Blake as a tough but sensitive motorcycle cop who wants to move up to homicide. Really good so far!
Nothing much happens in the first half hour but establishing Blake as a gentle weirdo — but that’s adorable.
ELECTRA GUIDE IN BLUE has one of those scenes where a cop’s instincts about a case are ignored — except instead of the usual tough cop being ignored by wussy superiors, he’s a sensitive cop whose instincts are ignored by the tough guys!
It’s a dynamic you’ve see a million times, but swapping the personalities on either side makes it fresh and compelling.