Two things I'd add (and I'm not telling you anything you don't already know; in fact I'm puzzled as to why these aren't in what you wrote, or do you get to number 2 in a later paragraph?):
(1) You *have* to include Pink's "Don't Let Me Get Me" in the birth of the teen-rock confessional (released the same day as Vanessa Carlton's "A Thousand Miles" and three weeks before Avril's "Complicated"); I knew a 10-, an 8-, and a 6-year-old, all girls, who heard Pink's Britney line really loud - "she's so pretty, that's just not me"; don't know exactly how those kids took it (and don't know how "Teachers dated me/Parents hated me" played with them, or if it got censored on the radio), but to me "Don't Let Me Get Me" hits hard as a counter to Britney's allure but from someone who was just as sexual.
(2) SEX SEX SEX! Do you write more about it later? If not, you can't duck it like this, or you end up just repeating or at least implying the Jude Doyle/Jezebel magazine nightmare-for-feminism lies that tried to depict Taylor as the anti-sex girl that she emphatically wasn't; you *can't* just let the terms "family-friendly" and "acceptable to parents" sit there – maybe those terms are true, but that means *also* acceptable to parents, or at least getting a pass, or somehow flying under undeveloped parental radar (but this can't be universally true) is Taylor in her very first single making out or _______ on the flatbed of a Chevy truck with a "tendency" to get stuck at night out on a country backroad, or the act that the cheating boyfriend in "Should've Said No" should've said no to, or Abigail giving everything she has to a boy who then changes his mind (which is gentle on the boy, and maybe realistically so: he's not just out to get one thing, but he's another confused teen). It's not totally obvious why Taylor gets to walk into the Ashlee-Avril teen rock confessional spot while Demi and Miley and Aly & AJ don't, but that sex is in her mix in the way that is less pronounced for them (tho I remember there being confusion as to how Hollywood Records was handling Aly & AJ's "Blush") maybe has something to do with her success; *that's* how Taylor gets to be an older sister (though were Joni, Alanis, Stevie so far back in history as to be unavailable, especially with streaming now underway?)… older sister to actual flesh-and-blood-with-bodies-and-anger human beings.
Gonna keep linking my 2008 Taylor piece for the Las Vegas Weekly, 'cos I think it holds up well, includes her baiting/challenging the country audience by opening her opening set with an Eminem cover.
Pink must have been in there at some point (at some point I think I also had something like 200 words just on Kelly Clarkson, so a lot got taken out in the final edit to get it to their word count), should obvs add it in.
Yes, I reference going into a range of teen emotions/experiences in talking about the album in the chapter outline, and have two proposed chapters basically all about this, called one of them something like the "high school imaginary" -- couldn't talk about "Fifteen" without it and would probably mention "Blush" there.
Opening chapter was really meant as table-setting for how you write a book about Taylor Swift that (1) connects her to the precursors of teen confessional and (2) engages with her as a child and teen phenomenon. Maybe am not pointed enough in this wording that "family friendly" and "acceptable to parents" is a bit of a smoke screen and that the kids are hearing things that are NOT this, having their lives changed in ways that parents may not be clued in to hear.
Mostly posted this to "burn" it, because anything else I wrote would have to re-do what I laid out here. Thinking I'd be better off perrsonally writing about teen confessional more broadly, with Taylor as the conclusion rather than the focus.
the only way around is through -- just keep posting!
that's partially a joke?
I think the A-pop stuff has been a nice way for me to write things that I think would avoid the obviously hopeless folks and bring on a few people who are skeptical of (e.g.) a history of mainstream American pop as an oppressive intruder to their attention. I think that feeling is pretty understandable, it just isn't really connected to a lot of things that the anti-poptimists tend to focus on.
Similarly my thought was that writing a curious but still critical book on the confessional rock boom, and Taylor Swift emerging as a youth phenomenon (including very young children) capitalizing on an under-booked-about era, would be interesting whether or not you actually liked any of this music. Still think this is generally true, but wonder if it would work better as a broader genre survey.
Two things I'd add (and I'm not telling you anything you don't already know; in fact I'm puzzled as to why these aren't in what you wrote, or do you get to number 2 in a later paragraph?):
(1) You *have* to include Pink's "Don't Let Me Get Me" in the birth of the teen-rock confessional (released the same day as Vanessa Carlton's "A Thousand Miles" and three weeks before Avril's "Complicated"); I knew a 10-, an 8-, and a 6-year-old, all girls, who heard Pink's Britney line really loud - "she's so pretty, that's just not me"; don't know exactly how those kids took it (and don't know how "Teachers dated me/Parents hated me" played with them, or if it got censored on the radio), but to me "Don't Let Me Get Me" hits hard as a counter to Britney's allure but from someone who was just as sexual.
(2) SEX SEX SEX! Do you write more about it later? If not, you can't duck it like this, or you end up just repeating or at least implying the Jude Doyle/Jezebel magazine nightmare-for-feminism lies that tried to depict Taylor as the anti-sex girl that she emphatically wasn't; you *can't* just let the terms "family-friendly" and "acceptable to parents" sit there – maybe those terms are true, but that means *also* acceptable to parents, or at least getting a pass, or somehow flying under undeveloped parental radar (but this can't be universally true) is Taylor in her very first single making out or _______ on the flatbed of a Chevy truck with a "tendency" to get stuck at night out on a country backroad, or the act that the cheating boyfriend in "Should've Said No" should've said no to, or Abigail giving everything she has to a boy who then changes his mind (which is gentle on the boy, and maybe realistically so: he's not just out to get one thing, but he's another confused teen). It's not totally obvious why Taylor gets to walk into the Ashlee-Avril teen rock confessional spot while Demi and Miley and Aly & AJ don't, but that sex is in her mix in the way that is less pronounced for them (tho I remember there being confusion as to how Hollywood Records was handling Aly & AJ's "Blush") maybe has something to do with her success; *that's* how Taylor gets to be an older sister (though were Joni, Alanis, Stevie so far back in history as to be unavailable, especially with streaming now underway?)… older sister to actual flesh-and-blood-with-bodies-and-anger human beings.
Gonna keep linking my 2008 Taylor piece for the Las Vegas Weekly, 'cos I think it holds up well, includes her baiting/challenging the country audience by opening her opening set with an Eminem cover.
https://lasvegasweekly.com/news/archive/2008/jan/24/the-rules-of-the-game-no-28-dresses-are-my-weakne1
Pink must have been in there at some point (at some point I think I also had something like 200 words just on Kelly Clarkson, so a lot got taken out in the final edit to get it to their word count), should obvs add it in.
Yes, I reference going into a range of teen emotions/experiences in talking about the album in the chapter outline, and have two proposed chapters basically all about this, called one of them something like the "high school imaginary" -- couldn't talk about "Fifteen" without it and would probably mention "Blush" there.
Opening chapter was really meant as table-setting for how you write a book about Taylor Swift that (1) connects her to the precursors of teen confessional and (2) engages with her as a child and teen phenomenon. Maybe am not pointed enough in this wording that "family friendly" and "acceptable to parents" is a bit of a smoke screen and that the kids are hearing things that are NOT this, having their lives changed in ways that parents may not be clued in to hear.
Mostly posted this to "burn" it, because anything else I wrote would have to re-do what I laid out here. Thinking I'd be better off perrsonally writing about teen confessional more broadly, with Taylor as the conclusion rather than the focus.
I've been over-thinking in my head the question of how do we get around the anti-poptimists? or (in a few cases) how do we win over an anti-poptimist?
the only way around is through -- just keep posting!
that's partially a joke?
I think the A-pop stuff has been a nice way for me to write things that I think would avoid the obviously hopeless folks and bring on a few people who are skeptical of (e.g.) a history of mainstream American pop as an oppressive intruder to their attention. I think that feeling is pretty understandable, it just isn't really connected to a lot of things that the anti-poptimists tend to focus on.
Similarly my thought was that writing a curious but still critical book on the confessional rock boom, and Taylor Swift emerging as a youth phenomenon (including very young children) capitalizing on an under-booked-about era, would be interesting whether or not you actually liked any of this music. Still think this is generally true, but wonder if it would work better as a broader genre survey.