I am a huge fan of music and the whole culture that revolves around the creation and appreciation of music. Lately, I have been into house and electronic music. It is a great culture and environment but it is still a culture with the “male gaze”. This can be seen in the song lyrics, Artist names, and the music video’s/ covers. I was looking up more house music over the weekend and the “male gaze” was everywhere. This got me thinking of how much of this is out there and what type of music it is most prominent in.
I started with just the house and electronic music for this weekend. By simply going through my iPod I was able to find names that were from the “male gaze”. The first one that stuck out like a sore thumb was PANTyRAiD. The songs that I have from PANTyRAiD are electronic/house contain one line repeated or no words at all. It is just the name itself that caught my attention. The name is just there to catch people’s attention and has nothing to do with the music. While I love the music the name is funny and completely unnecessary. The artist PANTyRAiD should rely on his talent and music to get followers instead of such a name. Another artist I found was SOFI. SOFI stands for Some Other Female Interest and is featured on a lot of other house/electronic artists. The interesting thing I remembered about this artist is that SOFI is female. She is sticking to the “Male Gaze” with her name and her lyrics are about getting used for entertainment of men. The songs are good but they fit the “Male Gaze” almost perfectly.
I also found that the covers for the house music mixes almost always have a half-naked girl on the cover of the mix that has nothing to do with the track lists. The models are most likely strung around a expensive car or on the beach. There is no reason for them on the cover other than having people check out the mixes because of the girls. Its complete “male gaze” marketing for the songs and it seems to work because most comments on the mixes are about the girls and not much about the songs in the mixes. It is sad because the music itself is great but it seems to be degraded to just background music for the girls on the convers.
The interesting thing that I found going through all this music and all the covers is that it seems that the artists have to stick to this formula of fitting the “Male Gaze”. Some artists fit this formula through their names alone. This seems to bring in people who are just sifting through music and draws them to the songs of the artist just because of the name. If the name is not fitting in with the “Male Gaze” then the lyrics of the song can be found within the scope of a male audience. Even if the lyrics or artist name do not have an overly obvious male scope to them, music video’s or performances do. There were two that I remember that fit into this last part.
The song “Destination Calabria” by Alex Gaudino is a great song that I heard at a club in Europe. The song was so good that I went and looked up the music video. The video actually made me laugh the first time I looked at it. The song itself has a heavy use of saxophones. The director used this to make the video about an overly-sexual marching band. The uniforms are practically non-existent. The formations are there to get the women in sexual positions. Even the instruments are used in a way that over sexualizes everything. It honestly was hilarious to see how the song and the video could ever be linked.
The other “Male Gaze” that sticks with me is a concert I went to last year in Athens. The concert was for a new house/electronic group called “The Glitch Mob”. The concert was amazing as the group plays songs with a heavy synth/computer influence with little to no words. Never before have I seen any of the group’s songs or performances with a clearly defined male viewpoint. Half way through the concert, however, a dancer was brought up into the air on a rope almost like a pole dancer. It added the “Male Gaze” to a songs and a group that has never used the male scope before. I thought it was interesting but it was talked about after the concert. That seems to be all the artists care about now. If it helps them get themselves and their music out their then some boundaries may be pushed to gain those fans.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGtLJDP1BIk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDndZn0YPdI&ob=av3e
For the “SOFI needs a ladder” song, the top rated comment is “SOFI needs to get back in the kitchen”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APtj3EvhfWA&feature=fvst
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMYjWzg8tYU
Video
Get the Money. Perf. PANTyRAiD, . 2009. Web. 21 Sep 2011.
SOFI Needs a Ladder. Perf. DeadMau5, SOFI. Ultra Records, 2010. Web. 21 Sep 2011.
Destination Calabria. Perf. Alex Guadino, . 2009. Web. 21 Sep 2011.
The Glitch Mob In for the Kill with awesome dancer: New Years Athens GA. Perf. Glitch Mob, . 2011. Web.
Images
"Gotta Love House Music." Photograph. Chubby Beavers Fat Music. First Last. 2011. Web. 21 Sep 2011.
"Artist Spotlight:PANTyRAiD." Photograph. Rage!Chill.. First Last. Web. 21 Sep 2011.
"Passion Pit Sleepyhead Borgore Remix." Photograph. Hypster.com. First Last. 2010. Web. 21 Sep 2011.
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