I haven’t had regular access to cable television since July of 2004. I haven’t had regular access to a television since March of 2005. Overall this has been a good thing, I’ve read more, I’ve thought more, and oh yes, I’ve blogged more, than I would have. Nevertheless over the past few months I have started to notice that my “pop culture lexicon” is getting out of date…I am simply cut off from the cultural touchstones of my peers. This isn’t all a bad thing, the animal mutterings which pass for speech from most humans are inputs I only marginally process (just enough to respond as if I am actually listening to the vapid stream). Nevertheless, the rise of YOUTUBE and internet video enabled by broadband allows me to “sample” the Zeitgeist of popular culture now and then. So that was how I stumbled upon this Nelly Furtado video, Maneater. I have three immediate responses
1) Jesus fucking Christ!!! (and I don’t even believe in that stuff)
2) Watching a video like that makes it clear just how un-sexy most internet porn is. Internet porn, with its anatomical focus is like a super-value meal, a lot of calories for the buck, but fundamentally unsatisfying once the aftertaste kicks in.
3) Southern European women sure do clean up after a good shaving, huh? The contrast of dark hair and light skin is their bane when it comes to the mustache tendency, but it can be quite striking when the lack of hair means they no longer look like a small men….
Addendum: I believe that for best data gathering you should simply start viewing about 60% of the way through.
TangoMan Adds:To add another data point to the analysis see Georgian beauty Katie Melua. Her style tends to emphasis the range of her voice rather than relying on studio gimmickry. This video has a nifty Hannibal Lechter theme and some great video compositing.
I particularly liked the intellectual controversy that surrounded Katie’s song Nine Million Bicycles where her lyrics “We are 12 billion light-years from the edge. That’s a guess – no-one can ever say it’s true” came under public fire from cosmologist Simon Singh for their inaccuracy. In a one time performance Katie reworked her lyrics – “We are 13.7 billion light-years from the edge of the observable universe; that’s a good estimate with well-defined error bars/and with the available information, I predict that I will always be with you”. Most agreed that they had lost a little zip in translation.
See also this video for a closer examination of what Georgia has to offer the world.