….and yet you’re gush-crushing everyday for Joanna. Fucking. Newsome?! The irony inherent there should cause this site to fold in upon itself.

that said, i still think the music speaks for itself. she does a whole lot to equalize genres that people typically view with artificial barriers, and the attitude of her approach is nearly inscrutable. she knows that the sounds she’s making will fundamentally appeal to the same audience she’s trying to subvert, so there’s an extreme tension behind every song that keeps them re-listenable and propulsive — much like the classic pop formula does. she’s able to smuggle ostensibly “fringe” ideas/sounds/etc. by co-opting the mainstream model, making them danceable, etc.

(as a loose comparison, film theorists make a similar argument re: Douglas Sirk’s melodramas. he gives his audience the chance to radically encounter their own fears, but it’s done within the guise of a popular form.)