What Pop Girls Might Teach Us About Ourselves
A few weeks ago, I came across a TikTok video that I still think of now: what happened to the “white people indie bangers” of the 2010s? The short video transported me to my early to mid-20s, days spent looking for the next cool album that will give me some social currency of coolness. Those years meant attending concerts of hip indie bands and shunning “mainstream” music because the sheen of pop did not do much for one’s credibility. This is not meant to litigate the legacy of indie bands, but more of a confessional. I am not one to shy away from my faults, and so I will admit it: in the aftermath of my brooding 20s, pop may have helped saved my life.
In 2013, Stereogum published an essay entitled “Deconstructing: HAIM, Lorde, and The Monogenre,” a piece I still look back to in trying to figure out at what point in time we started looking to pop music—especially female pop music—as the present and the future. In the essay, Chris Deville writes that there are motifs in pop music that “always come together” converging it what he called the “monogenre.” He makes the case for the monogenre as perhaps a response to cultural stratification.
We are living at a point in history where we are divided along clear-cut lines more than ever. In fact, one may argue that we are living in historical times where one is always urged to take a stand. It’s an unforgiving world with sharp edges, pushing and pulling at us until we find ourselves splintered and broken. I found that the balm that soothes is a return to unapologetic sentimentality. When I lose my bearings from the overtly political demands of the world, there are always places where honest music takes me. Vulnerability through the articulation of feelings can sometimes be a refuge.
If one may make an addendum to Deville’s arguments, it is the raw yet nuanced takes on longing and emotion that we are seeing now from female pop musicians that represent our best, imperfect selves. And a what refreshing feeling it is, to be honest from time to time.
With the much-anticipated release of Taylor Swift’s Midnights and Carly Rae Jepsen’s The Loneliest Time (on the same day!), I found myself thinking of what their songs could teach me or remind me of. In “Anti-Hero,” Taylor is as blunt as it could get: It’s me, hi, I’m the problem—and everyone agrees. Meanwhile, CRJ in “Sideways” gives a warm reassurance that in the middle of the messy business of love affairs, things will eventually fall into place: in time, I get all my confidence from you. Two albums with two distinct sounds, styles, and origin stories, yet one cannot help but feel that this is what we must deal with growing up, as lovers and as women. It’s all fun and games until feelings creep up, for which we have to take up the cudgels for ourselves and our sanity. These pop girls give us the pieces we need to come up with a resolution.
Falling in love and growing old can be dreadful things, but they can be the greatest teachers. They are moments in our existence when we bow to our truest selves, success guaranteed or not. That is what listening to CRJ’s “Run Away With Me” did for me during the depths of heartache, or being utterly emotionally confused by Jessie Ware’s “Spotlight,” or relishing Lorde’s “Supercut” in its entirety. These songs by powerful female voices speak for us in each unique human moment of connection and fragility. That we can still dance, hop, and sing like the children we once were, and fall over and over again without trepidation. Maybe that’s the magic behind their songs—we can be honest in a world that forces us to put up a show, a performance.
So go ahead, listen to Taylor or CRJ for the nth time today. Fall in love. Find yourself. Dance in the rain. Hope for the best. Take comfort in what you find sincere. And do it all over again.