something secret

In which I post another Azealia Banks music video.  She does seem to be popping them out rather quickly these days no?  As usual I love. Do enjoy.

There are a lot of things I want to say about this video, so I plan to get back to it eventually, but for now, just know that I love it and Rihanna unconditionally. I will hear no blasphemy against her! :)

This post is painfully overdue! It's been about a week and a half now since Britney's video for her new single "Work Bitch" dropped, and I have some thoughts! Many thoughts. Critical commentary thoughts! Let's get cracking. This song is terrible. There's no getting around that. But I actually really like the video; it's fun and energetic, and it at least makes a show of trying to return Britney to her former glory, but it never quite manages to get to "peak Britney." Firstly, the dancing. Oh good lord the dancing.... Britney's always been a bit of a one trick pony when it comes to choreography. She's lots of arms, torso and face. That's fine, but she's been doing that since 1999, and her repertoire needs a little updating. But all of that could be overlooked if she still had the same intensity of Toxic era Britney. I know that she has a knee injury a few years back and hasn't really been as physically capable since, but there...

I don't think I realized how much I missed Lady Gaga until this video debuted. Gaga has been out of the news cycle for so long that I stopped caring what she was up to, and I wasn't that concerned with what she'd been doing. But this video is clearly a return to form. It's a little bit of Born This Way , Alejandro and straight up art and fashion culture rolled into one. I'm obsessed. The visuals are beautiful, due in no small part to fashion photographers Inez &Vinoodh , I'm sure. I have to say I'm very on board with this new trend of fashion photographers as music video directors. Madonna's Girl Gone Wild by Mert & Marcus is still one of my favourite videos of all time, and maybe  Applause could be next on the list. In the end, I have to say, I wasn't really here for Applause until the video debuted. I didn't dislike the song, but it seemed to me to be classic Gaga. But the visuals really brought it home for me. I'm a fickle fan; j...

There's something about this video. It might be an odd choice to talk about this video on Valentine's Day, but I've loved Rihanna for a long time, and I've felt deeply connected  to her very public story of abuse. The "woman in an abusive relationship" narrative always seems so simple: LEAVE. But it never  works that way in real life, because there are always mitigating factors involved. Rihanna's celebrity doesn't make her immune to the cycle of violence, and I think it was a brave choice for her to make herself so vulnerable for this video. That said, this video make me want to cry. I get that it's performance, but I agree with Refinery29's assessment ; because of the public nature of their breakup and reconciliation, it is impossible to consume this in a vacuum. There's no way you can watch this video and not think back to the last four years of their tumultuous relationship. It's interesting that the public at large seems to carry m...

Here we are again! I actually had a thoughtfully written piece planned for today, but I'm lazy and I don't feel like finishing it. Really all I want to do is watch last night's episode of Dexter, but I digress. This installment of Misc. Music  stars resident witch in chief Kat Graham. If you're plugged in, you'll know that I'm not being rude. She plays badass, lady-witch Bonnie Bennett on the CW's Vampire Diaries. In any case, the dance-only video version for Kat's Put Your Graffiti On Me  single is pretty hot! Apparently Kat Graham is still pursuing a music career and this was her first single released back in March. Why she insists on doing the music thing is beyond me. She's a great dancer, as evidenced by the video, and she's STUNNING, but her singing is mediocre, and things are clearly not taking off for her. This is probably her fifth "first single". NO ONE IS PAYING ATTENTION TO YOU KAT... Especially since she seems determined to...

You might have noticed, but I haven't been around lately.... I've been ill, but more significantly, I've been suffering through my own personal version of hell, wherein I have had no access to the internet (or any kind of web enabled device) for days at a time. I feel like a brat for even complaining about it, ( is there a bigger first world problem in existence?) but in this day and age, not being online for extended periods of time is almost  like being forced to clap after you've had an arm cut off. Especially if you're young and broke like me, and trying to find a job.... In any case, I can't yet say when next I'll be online, or when I'll be posting regularly again, but I thought it was prudent to reassure the silent (and possibly non-existent) masses that I am not yet dead. Hopefully I'll have this problem sorted soon, but no promises. In the mean time, please enjoy this lovely little tune that Rihanna apparently released while I was in a tec...

Ugh, you're probably so sick of hearing me talk about how amazing Azealia Banks is, but she IS amazing and so I have to talk about her all the time, always.  Banks is on a roll these days, and this latest video installment is just another reason to get on her bus. The visuals as usual, are stunning. Banks has been slowly but surely creeping into the fashion world, but it's pretty clear that her image is refined. She knows what her look is, and she stays consistent. I love that. You'd be hard pressed to find a look in this video that wouldn't also fit into her Van Vogue video. She's rough but still refined. It's a difficult line to straddle. And she's pulling it off spectacularly, and sporting her new MAC  Yung Rapunxel lipstick to boot. via Karl is my Unkle In any case, do enjoy. What do you think of this video? Do you like Azealia Banks' look and/or her music? What if anything do you think she should be doing differently?

Azealia Banks is so fab that my eyes are bleeding. I love her so much. Van Vogue is Bank's latest video. The song is on her EP 1991, which is amazing, and you should buy it.  Azealia Banks is going places. What I love about her is not just her ridiculous style, but also her personality and her swag. She knows she's got the goods, and she's not afraid to be proud of that fact.  via On The Cover Of Banks is just 21, and yet she's dominating the industry. She's coming up at the time when the path is pretty clear for a female emcee to take over. I can't wait until she's everywhere. I think that we need more women in hip-hop who are true to themselves, and unafraid to make their marks on pop culture. Banks is ridiculous on every level and I love her. I'll likely be mentioning her a ton in the coming months! Check out her EP 1991 , and her mixtape Fantasea . Also, look out for her debut album coming early netxt year, and check her our on this month's cover...

Photo via VH1 It's here! Nicki Minaj's video for her fourth single Pound the Alarm has finally been released. Filmed entirely in her (read: my) native land of Trinidad and Tobago, the video celebrates Trinidad's annual Carnival (read: NOT Brazil ). My favourite part of watching this video was recognizing every scene. I know where every inch of this video was filmed and that makes me happy and proud . There are so many things that Nicki got right in representing Trinidad with this video and I'd like to highlight them. Firstly, our national instrument, the steelpan . Regardless of what the world at large thinks, the steelpan was invented in Trinidad and Tobago, and has nothing to do with stereotype of the Rastafarian playing pan on the beaches of Jamaica whatsoever. Next we have a coconut vendor selling his wares on the Queen's Park Savannah with Queen's Royal College framed beautifully in the background. Then, a beautiful montage of different aspects of life ...

THIS IS MY NEW FAVOURITE SONG. Listen to it. Then, when you're finished you should listen to the rest of Azealia's amazing  Fantasea mixtape . She's amazing. That is all.

via BU Mass COM It's the summertime! Regardless of how awesome or lame your days might be, the one thing that make everyday more awesome is the amazing music. I LIVE for music, and I definitely have some songs that will be on constant replay in the coming months. The awesome thing is that you can listen to music almost anywhere, and it always makes you feel  something. Music really has the power to transform a mood, and there's something uniquely amazing about that. These are the songs that I'll be playing on repeat while I'm driving or running, or doing anything really... Liquorice- Azealia Banks 212-  Azealia Banks Where Have You Been- Rihanna Rumor Has It- Adele Girl Gone Wild- Madonna Pound the Alarm- Nicki Minaj And a throwback just for the sake of it: California Gurls- Katy Perry What about you? Do you hate my taste in music? What will you be listening during your lazy summer days? Recommend some new music to me in the comments below!

So here's my issue: I think I quite like this song, but I'm not sure if I should. I hadn't heard of Chester French before I found this video, so I don't know if this is within the expected range of where her music and imagery usually falls, but it feels a little uncomfortable to me. Chester French's Black Girls  video is beautifully shot (and NSFW so watch out!) but the premise makes me bit uneasy. The song is about loving (and sleeping with) black women, because they're so uniquely beautiful. Awesome right? Maybe not. My problem with the video is that it seems to exoticize and fetishize black women, even though the lyrics say that's exactly what it's trying not to do. In the video, French is seen flirting with and kissing (among other NSFW things) a gorgeous black woman. There's nothing wrong with this in and of itself. People have sex. However, I'm not sure how the nakedness of black woman adds to the narrative of her beauty. The portrayal of t...

For everything horrible thing that you can (justifiably) say about Kanye West, you have to admit that he knows how to put together a visual. One of the things that I love about his music is that he never leaves you hanging. He uses every means he can get his hands on to demonstrate for you what he's trying to say. From his videos for Runaway and Power to Love Lockdown and Paranoid , you can always tell that a lot of thought goes into the visuals for his music. As repulsive as he behaves sometimes, you have to respect his artistry. This video really shows you how in tune to his themes he really is. This video doesn't even feature him (or Jay-Z or Frank Ocean) but he still manages to get his point across. Presumably drawing from the London riots and the Occupy Wall Street protests, Kanye managed to bring to life the growing state of civil unrest, and political turmoil. It's very poignant. I don't really have much more to say, because I honestly think the v...

Hello again! As I mentioned the other day , I'm going to be posting more of the things that I like that may not necessarily intersect with fashion photography. The first of those things will be music. I love music and music videos, and I love to dance, so there's no reason why I shouldn't be talking about those things here.  So, I present to you, Misc. Music. This will just be a place where I talk about the things that are going on in music, whether they be new songs, the lyrics of said songs, the artists themselves. It will just be a section where I get to tell you how awesome Neo-Soul is, and why you should be listening to it! In any case, for this first installment, I'm tackling JLo's newest video. I hadn't seen it because I don't watch Idol and I don't generally keep up with her goings on, and I'm still mad that she duped us ALL into thinking she was finally settling down with Mark Anthony, but that's a story for another day. This video.... i...