{"id":22322,"date":"2015-02-21T18:23:04","date_gmt":"2015-02-21T23:23:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/?p=22322"},"modified":"2015-02-21T18:23:04","modified_gmt":"2015-02-21T23:23:04","slug":"scarlett-johansson-raises-the-question-what-is-the-joke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/scarlett-johansson-raises-the-question-what-is-the-joke\/","title":{"rendered":"Scarlett Johansson Raises the Question: What Is the Joke?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/TPovKpYs-Z4\" width=\"420\" height=\"236\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Supporters of GIRL POWER, <a title=\"The Singles\" href=\"http:\/\/http:\/\/www.philly.com\/philly\/blogs\/entertainment\/celebrities_gossip\/20150221_WENN_Scarlett_Johansson_launches_girl_band_with_Haim_star.html\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Scarlett Johansson<\/strong> is on your side<\/a>! Johansson, one of the Haim sisters, and 3 other &#8220;girls&#8221; have formed <strong>The Singles.<\/strong>\u00a0They&#8217;re a &#8220;girl group,&#8221; made entirely of &#8220;girls.&#8221; This is so cool! Check it out!<!--more--><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;The idea was to write super-pop dance music written and performed by girls. I love Grimes. And I love the Bangles. And I love the Go-Go&#8217;s. I wanted it to be like those bands: ultra pop but also a little ironic, a little in on the joke.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>What, exactly, is the joke, that Johansson is continuing to pretend anyone has any interest in her music, that &#8220;girls&#8221; can make music in 2015, that the Go-Go&#8217;s and the Bangles were nothing but joke bands?<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m sorry, after a promising start as the dumb, but sexy second banana in the amazing <em>Ghost World<\/em>, ScarJo has nothing to offer me but an eventual Academy Award-grabbing nude scene when she reaches the age of 42, or as YouTube commentator MusicJverstra put it more succinctly: &#8220;Good Scarlett. Now show us your tits!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Sorry if I&#8217;ve offended, but can we\u00a0live long enough to see all &#8220;girls&#8221; take themselves seriously enough to simply start a <em>group<\/em>\u00a0rather than drag up the low expectations of presenting themselves as a &#8220;girl group?&#8221; <strong>Sleater-Kinney<\/strong>\u00a0has\u00a0never stooped to that. They kick ass, and not &#8220;&#8230;for girls.&#8221; As a guy (and one old enough to be their dad) I&#8217;m sure &#8220;girls&#8221; don&#8217;t appreciate me telling them how to present their groups, but I will nevertheless strongly recommend that these young women who happen to be in bands lacking men drop the false humility and apologies of playing in a &#8220;girl group&#8221; and just make whatever music it is they&#8217;re making without dragging other women artists down with them. The Go-Go&#8217;s had a fun, &#8220;girly&#8221; image, but by all accounts they played and partied hard. The Bangles were a real, gritty band before some producer polished them up and helped them never have to worry about paying bills again (I hope). What I&#8217;ve seen of Grimes doesn&#8217;t make me think she&#8217;s some cutesy &#8220;girl&#8221; who&#8217;s playing at pop music while being in on the joke. That band Haim had a song from a year or two ago that I liked. It sounded like &#8217;80s Fleetwood Mac, which may not be saying much, but it was a real song by a real group. Haim didn&#8217;t act like a second-rate, cute &#8220;girl group,&#8221; despite the fact that they&#8217;re cute and women young enough to be referred to as &#8220;girls.&#8221; Scarlett Johansson must be as dumb as the character she plays in <em>Ghost World<\/em>. If she looked like Mama Cass she wouldn&#8217;t be making movies or music. This &#8220;Candy&#8221; song sucks donkey dong, in my opinion, but not because it&#8217;s made by a quintet of &#8220;girls.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Supporters of GIRL POWER, Scarlett Johansson is on your side! Johansson, one of the Haim sisters, and 3 other &#8220;girls&#8221; have formed The Singles.\u00a0They&#8217;re a &#8220;girl group,&#8221; made entirely of &#8220;girls.&#8221; This is so cool! Check it out!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[342],"tags":[423],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22322"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22322"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22322\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}