Monday, January 25, 2010

adrogynous youth

transgendered media, as a kid, doesn't always come at you in the form of drag queens shouting "let's do the time warp again". Something struck me today I never thought about. A lot of the music I listened to as a kid had androgynousness to it. Probably the earliest example I can think of is danke schoen by wayne newton.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyCQ6vKqgnU

Now granted it was recorded when he was a kid (which, a lot of boys have high voices like a girl, just look at the girl that does voicework for bart simpson:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FU9w0G5yUk

Then I remember listening to the pointer sisters song - automatic.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDU6K02igoU

I loved this song as a kid, I could remember eating pizza at the local joint, and tossing quarters into the jukebox to hear it. The thing about this song, as a kid, I thought they had brought in a guy to do the main voice. Clearly this couldn't be a woman, the voice was just too deep. If you look at the wiki page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_%28Pointer_Sisters_song%29

They say "The song, which features Ruth Pointer's deep lead vocals".

Then there's the movie Caddyshack. I remember loving all the songs in this soundtrack, many by Kenny Loggins. Again, as a kid, there is no internet, no way of knowing who's actually in a band. One song in particular from the movie (which is played particularly in one scene when Danny is making love to his girlfriend) is the song "make the move".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wy7uVOUqbIk

Now if you listen to it, you might think "I hear kenny, but surely there's a female doing some of that background vocal. It's so heavenly, like an angel singing. Nope, one of his male backup singers just has a nice high voice.

What is the point of all this? Gender bending comes in all shapes and sizes, and none of it is to blame for how we turn out. Ignorance is not bliss, having a plethora of media to let you know "hey, your normal" gives us bliss.

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