Tuesday, November 10, 2009

One Step Beyonce

Andre at Alien Project sent me this picture of Beyonce chilling out with Zahi Hawass in Giza at sunset. Zahi must have been in heaven, especially since Beyonce was nice enough to dress as Isis for him.

  Beyonce played at a Red Sea resort on Friday 11/6 (=17), over the objections of Islamicist groups, who branded it a "sex party" and called Beyonce a "Satanist." You'd think they'd have more important things to worry about these days.

Beyonce is married to Jay-Z, who's been toying around with 'Illuminati' imagery. Which shouldn't surprise anyone- these stars live like pashas, why wouldn't they see themselves as one of the "Enlightened?" It's yet another case of propaganda blowback- when you create this image of all-powerful, all-knowing 'Illuminists' who have all the money and all of the fun, why would some narcissistic pop star not want to sign up for that?

It's just like how Fundamentalist anti-metal hysteria in the 70s was the primary inspiration for bands like Venom and Slayer in the 80s. All of the ridiculous propaganda about innocuous party rockers like Van Halen and AC/DC made Satanism infinitely more alluring than the cranky old rock 'n' roll hater Anton LaVey ever could. 

By the same token, I'm willing to bet Jay-Z and whoever else wasn't exposed to that material by checking Morals & Dogma out of the local library- it was almost certainly through conspiracy literature.

As to some of the 'transgressive' or 'occult' imagery you see in some of these music videos these days, to be perfectly honest it's all so repellent that it's difficult for me to pay any attention at all. 

I don't need to look for any hidden subtext with Lady GaGa- she already lost me with the text. It's as if the Marilyn Manson aesthetic* has taken over mainstream pop, which has inspired the original model to unleash some truly offensive imagery in his latest clip, just to stay ahead of the curve.

But in the end, what these people want most is your attention. Positive or negative, they don't care either way - in fact, negative publicity sells better these days. I'm tempted to predict a backlash, but we may be too far gone for that. But changing the channel is a good place to start.

UPDATE: Oh, how incredibly timely: Lady GaGa's new video was released tonight. I couldn't make it through the whole thing. I literally started to feel nauseous. Definitely a case of Marilyn Manson syndrome- the contrived provocations acting as talent substitute. That whole milieu becomes more and more diseased with the passage of time. 

Dehumanizing.

*None of it is nearly as shocking today as it was when bands like Throbbing Gristle and SPK were doing the transgressive thing thirty years ago. Manson was simply doing the Hot Topic version.