Art is dead.
The postmodern era and the many schools of thought which have sprung up with it have killed any notion once collectively held about value associated with art, terms such as camp and kitsch invading culture to describe a "new" ironic appreciation of the former trash of yesteryear. Since the early 20th century up to its latest years musicians furthered the groundwork made with exploring dissonance, atonality and timbres based around screeching noise frequencies, anti-art movements such as dada, surrealism and art brut were shifting perspectives in esoteric fields of study and even way back in the 60's filmmakers such as Jean-Luc Godard fused both high-art and low-art in a telling expose of the great facade and illusion presented to us by the big screen often referred to as "The Death of Cinema".
Obviously not everybody has bought into these ideas, and still today those who ascribe to such postmodern beliefs are hotly contested as pretentious, pseudo-philosophical babblers by those who belief there is still some serious intellectual and artistic integrity to defend in the human race. The truth of the matter is that anybody can criticise what somebody else holds of value in art, lowering it to the level of disposable thought we reserve for the kleenex we wipe our juicy sperm up with after a saucy wank on a lazy afternoon. After all, one mans Bach is another mans Boyd Rice, and one mans hatred of the greatest achievements of post-rock is another mans contempt for the hits of the soulless pop music industry. In such an environment of discourse regarding such matters who is to keep check here, a middleman who can objectively and logically determine the truth in all of this confusion?
Every man and his ***ing dog, it would seem. That is to say, nobody at all. Believe nothing, everything is permitted. To wallow in an aggressive, disgusting hedonism joyously ignorant of any implications that could stem from it, now that is an unintentional work of art waiting to happen (if it hasn't already, which it almost surely has). This brings us to Millionaires.
According to last.fm "Millionaires started on the beautiful day of August 14th 2007. It was a quite sunny day, just like any other day in Huntington Beach, California; a perfect day to fly a medium-sized vibrant rainbow butterfly kite. But instead, Melissa and Allison Green (yes, they’re sisters) started to become inquisitive about their new Apple desktop and decided to “*** around” on Garageband". Fast forward a year and they have released EP
Bling Bling Bling! based on the strength of an incredibly retarded single entitled
Alcohol, and through the promotional machine of the internet have made a name for themselves as three obnoxious sluts riding the tail of the emo fashion bandwagon sporting a bad attitude who most people would want to punch in the face.
The musical arrangements are unremarkable minimalist electro-pop, but the sheer trashiness of
Bling Bling Bling! does not reveal itself until the lyrics kick in. Ever heard a pack of bitchy girls talking in a group about some girl they hate? You've heard
Bling Bling Bling! before. Ever heard the same pack of bitchy girls talking about how awesome their weekend of getting drunk and snorting coke with older guys was? You've heard
Bling Bling Bling! before. Ever heard that the excess of a decadent and free western society could only ever lead to such eventualities and is completely unavoidable? Never in your life have you questioned it, most likely. What Millionaires represents is a sad, sad state of affairs, but at least I can whack off to these trashy bitches. Who needs beauty when the toothless crackwhore look could be seen as high art? So does the dominatrix choking my neck with her boot.
Bling Bling Bling! is a shining beacon of post-modernism, completely shallow pop music expressed through a considerable lack of artistic talent with no conscious self-awareness to be found. We have truly reached the end of history, and as the soundtrack to our current state of demise music such as what Millionaires has to offer is the only way we could go out, bitching in our callous self vanity all the way.
