Epsiode 1: Post Malone and the Death of Popular Culture

Hi. Welcome. If you’re listening to this, Without further ado, I’m Alex. Welcome you probably know that I ran a mildly to Pop Culture Boner the podcast edition. successful pop culture blog back in 2013 This week, I’ve been thinking about Post or 14. It was called Pop Culture Boner, Malone. and its crowning glory was that it’s the number one Google result if you search I’ll admit, I’m not actually very good at “Matthew McConaughy tiny arms”. pop music and so for a while I didn’t Keeping in mind, this was pre-McConais- really know anything about Post Malone. saince and I still got a bunch of emails ac- I could only really identify him by his face cusing me of being a jealous man with a tattoos, but I couldn’t like…name a song tiny penis. Neither of these things is true. off the top of my head. My dick is enormous. But then this Washington Post article Anyway, I had a bit of a breakdown at came out. If you haven’t seen it, it’s by 23 and stopped writing just as it became Jeff Weiss from like October 2018. No apparent that I probably could’ve made one could ever accuse me of being timely some advertising money from the blog. with my opinions. The headline is “Post Self-sabotage is one of my primary tal- Malone is the perfect popstar for this ents. So now, I’m almost 30 and I real- American moment. That’s not a compli- ised that I haven’t used my brain for a ment” followed immediately, by the while. At least, not for anything more most amazing opening line I think I’ve complicated than yelling half-articulated ever read: “The most popular young opinions on the Fast and Furious movies artist in the most unpopular young nation at my friends in the pub. And now, they’re is a rhinestone cowboy who looks like he getting sick of me, so I thought, why not crawled out of a primordial swamp of scream at the void and give those people nacho cheese.” That sentence is a real the option of pretending they listened to emotional rollercoaster because part of my podcast. me knows that it’s meant to be a dig, but the other, perhaps larger, part of me Every week, I’m going to try and force that loves rhinestone cowboys and nacho myself to get all the screaming out here. cheese is a little bit like “hell yeah, give I don’t know to what end. I genuinely me that horror movie”. don’t think anyone will listen. But, I have journalism degree, so we’ll see if this So the article itself is actually a review of works. And if it doesn’t… you can find Posty Fest, which as far as I can tell is a me back at the pub, I guess? Apologies music festival hosted by Post Malone in to my friends. Dallas. He headlines and brings a bunch of his famous friends out to perform, sort of like Tyler the Creator’s Camp Flo- Which is a really exciting Pandora’s box gnaw, but probably with less booing of to open. You want to write an essay Drake. The review walks us through the about Charlie’s Angels? Sick one. Do it. festival crowd, the prevalence of corpo- You want to talk about the impact of emo rate branding and the calibre of some of music on your teen heart and also the the performances. Eventually, it moves world? Get in there! You want to spend on to broader themes – such as what some time mulling over why Jackass had the success of Post Malone actually says such a huge cultural moment? Awesome. about the state of hip hop and race in Let me know what you come up with… America. (Abridged version: racism is Seriously. Let me know what you come real.) I’ll read out the closing paragraph up with. There’s a like, 75% chance I’m because I think it gives you the flavour of thinking about Jackass at any given the piece: moment.

“What Post Malone so perfectly rep- Anyway, I’m saying that I wanted to resents is the idiotic currents that have write funny, well-thought out pieces carried us to this present cultural sub- about what the pop cultural products mersion – where an objective notion of we consume say about us. That is… not the truth has been systematically what I ended up doing. For a couple of muddied, facts are negotiable and any reasons, which I’ll kind of come back to. hint of criticism – be it for lacking The breakdown mentioned in the integrity, dignity or talent – can be opening is one of them, but there are brazenly dismissed as the pitiful cries of others, I swear. And they’re relevant. the “haters”.” So, having read this totally scathing He then goes on to refer to Post as a article I decided to actually listen to some “greasy discarded barbecue rapper”, of ol’ Posty’s music. I kind of recognised which is a fun play on words. a couple of them from some movie soundtracks and some from unfortunate Weiss is pretty obviously trying to com- recent forays into clubbing. They’ve got pare Post Malone’s success to that of some poppy hooks and I’ll admit some of Donald Trump. He’s effectively implying them kind of get stuck in my head. Weiss’ that one mirrors the other. In fact, I think article refers to this “bubbling if I read you the last two lines, said it was misogyny” in Post’s lyrics. You can’t see from the Washington Post and asked you me, but I’m doing air quotes. Now, as a what the article was about, I think you’d woman battle-hardened by just like… probably say Trump. One of the reasons I having to exist near men, they didn’t really liked this article initially, was that really strike me as an outstanding it was the kind of writing that I example of misogyny. I don’t know if it’s really wanted to do about 10 years ago. bad that I need something more than At the time, I was sort of floating through lines from ‘Rockstar’ like “fuckin’ hoes part of an undergraduate degreee, and and poppin pillies” to get me outraged. realising that you could think and write Or the example of Weiss used, from ‘Too critically about pretty much everything. Young’ in which Post says he’s got a slow bitch, but she keeps him on his toes. There is a long scene where Posty does a Someone correct me if I’m getting the Kill Bill style run through the room, slang wrong… and I’m old, so I’m stabbing everyone who comes at him definitely getting the slang wrong… but while wearing all white and Cuban heels. if you’ve got a bitch who’s a bit slow, and you’re having trouble keeping up with I don’t know how much time you’ve her… are you not…slower? Somehow? spent with teenage boys, but it feels like Is this a self-own? I don’t know. Anyway, a teenage boy’s fantasy after they’ve I’m sure I could find more egregious discovered Tarantino and vintage kung examples in his catalogue, because fuck fu movies. As a side note, 21 Savage, I it, there always is, but nothing did me in. looked him up because I didn’t know that much about him… he’s a pretty fucking I’m a visual learner though, so after I hard dude. He used to be in a gang, he’s listened, I wanted to watch. And I think been shot like 6 times, he’s definitely this was probably the most surprising seen people die. So I really would have part of the whole thing for me, coming paid good money to be a fly on the wall from a place of knowing nothing about for the meeting where Post Malone and Post Malone. The videos are just… so the director showed Savage the concept fucking nerdy. It’s incredible. I’ll walk for the shoot and being like “so we’re you through what I mean. gonna give you a sword and you’re gonna learn some knife choreography”, The first video I watched was for and then the awkward silence that Rockstar, which, as mentioned, is about would’ve followed until someone broke fucking hoes and popping pillies. I want and said “it’s cool… no problem. You can you to think of every music video you’ve just stand on this cool box.” ever watched on a similar topic. Close your eyes with me. Picture it. They’re Anyway, I was like, a little surprised. like… walking slow mo through a club. Then I thought, one weird video is The lights are like neon red, or blue. probably an outlier and shouldn’t be There’s a girl in a thong… her ass is counted. So then I watched Circles. bouncing. It’s also in slow mo. At some Circles is classic “musician trying out point, Post sits down and faces the some sad boy shit” – you see it kind of camera… he’s got a bottle in one hand, often with stadium rock bands, where and probably a stack of bills in the other. they get really big for like a song about He’s gonna throw that stack of bills. That sex and doing coke and then they follow cash is gonna fall… also in slow motion. it up with something about how a woman hurt their feelings one time. And You can see it, right? That’s what this the video is always shot in like, a sepia video is, right? WRONG. Rockstar is in an haze and there’s a wind machine. And all-white room and Post Malone has a everyone is wearing white linen. samurai sword. He beheads some dudes. He bathes in their blood. At some point Circles is not that. In Circles, Post Malone 21 Savage shows up, cos he’s got a verse. is a knight. Yep. Full blown, Dungeons He does not participate in the bloodbath. and Dragons. He’s on a horse. He’s got a suit of armour on. He’s on his way to biggest genre, born defiantly out of black rescue a princess. At some point the dead neighbourhoods, generated as protest awaken. Or he dies. Or both. It’s hard to music and to reflect marginalised say. He has a sword. Again. It’s wild. And experiences, being dominated by a white again, it reads like the same teenage rapper with some face tats and no point boy nerd fantasy. He’s the hero and he’s of view. gonna rescue the princess. But I think I there are like three stum- In another video, he’s on a tank. Three bling blocks I hit with Weiss’ line of nerd-boy fantasies – DnD, samurai and thinking. The first is that, somehow hip war. hop HAS to be thoughtful. Not to sound like a dumb bitch, but there’s nothing So you’ve gotten to this point, and you’re wrong with a good hook and some stu- like “What do these music videos have pid lyrical content. (I mean… with limits, to with rhinestone cowboys and nacho obviously… fuck a Nazi, ya know) Let’s cheese? I thought he was killing the think about Drake for example – he’s music industry.” the most streamed artists of the 2010s. Now, I know Drake makes some emo shit The point is, I read this scathing article lyrically, but his most streamed song is about Post Malone and how he’s this One Dance, which is literally just about mirroring of the decline of American needing to have one more dance with culture, and on listening to and your girl before you leave town, and also watching that content, I somehow some weirdly controlling shit about she expected… something more? It feels has to text him back. There’s a reason it’s weird to be pointed to the decline of so huge – it’s got a good hook, and you American popular culture and find a don’t have to think too hard about it. Or product that feels like just a teenage you can be like me, and hugely overthink boy’s wet dream. it in the context of the rest of Drake’s behaviour… but that’s not for everyone. I think Weiss raises some good points Sometimes you just want a song about about the shallow nature of the music getting drunk and sweaty and having a and the appropriation of black culture. boogie. And yeah, there are definitely He mentions a Post Malone quote where examples of artists that manage to blend Post says that if you want to cry or think thoughtful lyrical content with party about life, you shouldn’t listen to hip tunes, but whether or not they’re better hop. And we know that isn’t true. artists for it is kind of subjective.

There’s an episode of The Patriot Act This line of reasoning also keeps the onus where they discuss the fact that hip hop on artists in a predominantly black genre is such a global product now that it’s to continuously produce meaningful con- overtaken rock music in Nielsen ratings. tent, while simultaneously denying them In fact, Spotify’s most streamed artist of access to the kind of dumb party tunes 2019 was Post Malone. That is something that translate to a mass audience. of a disconnect right? – the world’s My second issue with Weiss’ commentary anyone seen Macklemore lately? … let’s is the white hip hop artists he holds up as go with spent… SPENT more time actively examples of doing something right. The talking about white privilege in public, is artists he mentions by name are kind of a somehow even more irritating. Weiss list of the usual suspects – Eminem, references a specific incident where obviously takes up the most column Macklemore posted a text he sent to inches, but he also namechecks Kendrick Lamar after the Grammys as Macklemore and G-Eazy, praising them an example of Macklemore not reading for confronting their white privilege and, the social cue correctly, but still doing his in G-Eazy’s case, dropping out of a racist best. If you don’t remember, Macklemore H&M ad campaign. beat out Kendrick Lamar for best rap album a few years back and then sent The bar is… too low, I think? I grew up Kendrick a text saying “you were robbed. with Eminem and so, despite the many By me. I’m sorry.” And posted the text to hideous things about him – his liberal Instagram. Let’s be clear – there’s use of homophobic slurs, for example, or absolutely no timeline where the extensive fantasies about killing his Macklemore should be winning if he’s ex-wife that formed the backbone of so in the running against Kendrick, short much of his early music – I still know all of Kendrick recording himself pissing for the words to Lose it and Real Slim Shady. five minutes and calling it a hit. But And I do think he has an element of beyond that, sharing the private guilt of self-awareness – D12’s song ‘My Band’, winning with his overwhelmingly white is essentially an extended bit about how audience who are already ready to slap people only give a shit about Eminem him on the back for being woke or what- and not the 7 equally talented black guys ever is deeply distasteful. Also, there’s behind him. But I don’t think it’s fair to nothing stopping you from just… not say that he’s constantly attacking the taking that award. Just handing it over hypocrisies of contemporary American to someone else if you think they’re culture that got him famous. He’s said more deserving. So even if he did spend some great things in the last couple of a chunk of his album doing some weird years, about police brutality, particularly rap-skit about how his audience needs to as it impacts African American boys. And confront their prejudices about race, he denounced Trump, telling his audience sexuality and thrift shopping, he was if they weren’t with him, they could fuck clearly still learning himself. And then he off. But those statements only came with did that weird anti-Semitic bit on stage a age and enough of a sense of security in few months later (surprise, his career, that telling what I can only anti-Semitism is everywhere) and it assume is half his audience to fuck off became apparent that he was really has absolutely zero impact on his probably not on as much of high horse as finances. He’s already ridden that wave he would have us believe. Also, it would to his current spot. be remiss of me to not also say, while talking about Macklemore, that Same Macklemore, despite the fact that he Love fucking sucks as a song. probably spends…or spent… has I’m not gonna tackle G-Eazy because I chomping of your data. There are men in don’t know anything about him and I saw a room vested interest in billion-dollar his face and was kind of hit with a wave profits trying to understand what might of exhaustion, but the bar shouldn’t be be missing from a black genre to make so low as to count “not participating in a the dollar bills stack even higher – and racist ad campaign” on the list of because of the casual and internalised good-boy moves. My point is, there’s racism that underpins everything we do, this kind of fantasy that Weiss indulges the answer is always white dudes. And in, where there’s a magical threshold that’s why we end up with Post Malone. of “tackling race” that artists need to Or Eminem. Or Macklemore. Or any of achieve in their lyrical content in order them, really. to be able to produce hip hop music. And while I do think that white artists should And while we can hope and pray that our have some sort of fundamental favourite musical artists might somehow appreciation for hip hop’s roots, and have enough of a brain to understand repay their creative debt, to use Weiss’ that this might be the case – that their phrasing, I don’t think there’s a good success is actually probably reflective of way to do it when they’re essentially our prejudices and broader failings as a selling a product. species – they’re probably not going to. Circling back on the point I made Which brings me to my final issue with earlier about why I never made the leap Weiss’ article – Post Malone is an easy to writing funny and insightful think target designed to distract us from the pieces about pop culture – beyond the actual issue. Which is, hip hop is a breakdown, it’s actually really difficult to product now. It’s a global product. get it right. Is there a problem with the Remember all that stuff that I said about fact that Post Malone doesn’t think hip it overtaking Rock in the Nielsen ratings? hop should be smart? Yeah. Does that I had a look at the Nielsen report because say more about Post Malone, or the way I’m a fool who likes a bit of data the genre is marketed? Who knows!? If visualisation. Seven of the ten most we keep pulling on that thread, do we streamed artists were rappers. Of those just end up back at “capitalism is an seven, four are with labels under the inherently racist system that slowly eats Universal Music Group, two are with us all from the inside – nothing and no labels under the Warner Music Group, one is safe”? I mean… yes. Absolutely. and one is currently on an independent That’s where we always end up. label, but was previously on a label associated with Universal. That’s a huge Post Malone just seems like a teenage amount of money funnelling back into a boy with some video game fantasies and very small group of white men who saw an ear for a catchy hook. While literary dollar signs to be made from biting black part of me is like “ah yes, the perfect culture. Not to be wildly cynical but as metaphor for crumbling Americana”, to technology progresses, the guesses that be honest, I’m not even sure he’s the these people make about what’s gonna worst or most insidious example. And the blow up, become less guess, more decline of popular culture is never down to an individual artist. Or the This episode premiered on 10th June audiences who listen to them. If we 2020. really believe popular culture is in decline, then the fault lies with Episode written by Alex Johnson and companies who cynically back and produced by Wes Fahey. promote particular artists in order to continue to generate profit on a known Theme tune by Wes Fahey. (Soundcloud: formula, a therefor keep the status quo lee snipes) white regardless of genre. Visit us: Well… that’s the end. Did I make a point? Hard to say. In all honesty, I Web: www.popcultureboner.com started writing this because I wanted to talk about Posty’s weird as fuck music Twitter: @popcultureboner videos. So, you should check them out and tell me about it next time you see me Instagram: @popcultureboner at the pub.

Peace.