Grimes sees the future once again and shocker: it’s bleak. Nü metal’s back and artificial intelligence reigns supreme. Propaganda songs are our best hope of making a good impression on the robots now. But the loaded nature of “We Appreciate Power,” the first single off Grimes’ currently untitled fifth album, isn’t necessarily its initial impression. The self-produced song, which features Grimes’ ongoing collaborator HANA, is an immediate onslaught of mutilated noise—distorted metal guitar chug, bloody screams, a guitar loop that conjures fear and demands worship. Flashes of Nine Inch Nails’ Pretty Hate Machine reverberate through the drum programming and synths. Though Grimes’ late-1990s shock-rock sound is less skeletal than what Trent Reznor offered with his 1989 debut, there’s still a parallel: Like Reznor, Claire Boucher knows exactly how to manipulate the machines to conjure the sounds she hears in her nightmares and fantasies. She also has a keen ear for pop hooks and for transgressing what can and should be said near the mainstream. She closes “We Appreciate Power” by calling for the end of the human race and, in a disturbing coo, asking listeners to “submit” to the simulation.
In a statement, the song’s inspiration was attributed to North Korea’s Moranbong, an all-female military band that plays state-sanctioned performances. Moranbong’s more innocuous songs (“Let’s study”) may take on a harmless Eurovision quality out of context, but the Kim Jong-un dictatorship’s embrace of joyful modern music serves a political purpose: to use certain sanitized aspects of Western pop culture as promises of progress to its people, while not acting that way otherwise. “‘We Appreciate Power’ is written from the perspective of a pro-AI girl group propaganda machine who use song, dance, sex, and fashion to spread goodwill towards artificial intelligence (it’s coming whether you want it or not),” Grimes’ statement added. “Simply by listening to this song, the future General AI overlords will see that you’ve supported their message and be less likely to delete your offspring.” To some, the choice to cite as inspiration the real forms of propaganda being used to manipulate millions of oppressed North Koreans will be beyond the pale, particularly if you start parsing the song for a tongue-in-cheekness.
I don’t think Grimes is necessarily joking: The song is meant to provoke, unsettle, and turn the conversation towards an outsized but not entirely unrealistic view of future dystopias, a running theme throughout her work. On that level, “We Appreciate Power” is effective as a piece of concept art—the most “all in” Grimes has gone to date. It invites strong feelings, even if the reaction is as beside the point as, “Wow, Grimes is susceptible to the 20-year nostalgia cycle of trends, too.” If “Freak on a Leash” isn’t a dealbreaker, then the supervillain allure of “We Appreciate Power” might pull you in (it legitimately slaps), but it just as well may leave you weighed down by Grimes’ commitment to the absolute darkest timeline. I have to hand it to her, though: Grimes made me grind to fake robot propaganda.
, Download New Movie Hip-hop in South Korea has made it over to the mainstream, partly due to the massively popular music competition show “ Show Me the Money ,” which is like is like “X-Factor” with more hypebeasts in bucket hats. As the reality TV program has gained popularity, major Korean record labels have become more willing to invest in burgeoning rap stars instead of the typical idol or group. XXX’s Kim Ximya, who raps on top of production by the duo’s other half FRNK, has suggested that the commercialism of Korean rap has killed the authenticity of the genre, as it increasingly mirrors the formulaic nature of K-pop. “For most of the Korean rapper population, I feel they did not write about what they actually felt or what they were actually doing,” Kim said in an interview with Billboard . “They were making music they thought people would like to hear.” On their debut album Language , XXX present themselves as the alternative to the sanitized, hyper-glossy rap music typically p...
, Download New Movie We are sending away 2018 and we look back and see what were the most popular phones over the past year. While there are 20 phones in the yearly selection, the list of manufacturers is scarce. To be more precise, two out of every three devices come from either Xiaomi or Samsung. Samsung brought us 7 of the most popular phones in 2018 - hardly a surprise that the world's largest manufacturer dominates the popularity chart. Somewhat less expected is that Xiaomi got 6. Last year , the number for the Korean manufacturer was the same, but the Chinese maker is up by one, showcasing that the global trend of Xiaomi catching up to the big guys is on every level. The most popular phone of 2018 was the Redmi Note 5 Pro and it completely smashed any competition. It was so popular, that the other two Xiaomis following couldn’t gather the same number of hits even if they combined their powers. Samsung eventually caught up with the Galaxy A8 (2018). The love for midrangers is...
, Download New Movie Joy to the world, the new year is finally here. We say goodbye to 12 entertaining months and welcome the opportunities 2019 has prepared for us with wide-open arms. We would love you, our readers, to stay beside us as we renew our pursuit for a better tomorrow. Our YouTube channel is doing an impressive job - we passed the half a million subscribers mark in 2018 and we are already nearing 600,000. We put a lot of work and thought to provide interesting and entertaining videos and is so amazing to see how well it is received. Our website team has been busy too - nearly 6,000 articles were posted, while we managed to create over 160 long-form reviews. Happy New Year to everyone! We are wishing you lots of love, happiness, success, and health. Brace yourselves - the future is bright! The GSMArena team! 3D song download download
Comments
Post a Comment