I'm probably two or thee years behind the times, but I just "discovered" Mika while eating breakfast in Riga two weeks ago. His song/video "Grace Kelly" was playing on German MTV on the video screen in the hotel dining room.
Listening to the song, and viewing the video, what can you say about this performance in terms of not only music and the body, but in terms of gender and sexuality as well? How are the latter related to the former, specifically in Western popular culture/popular music? How do various types of bodies get presented for consumption, and what do these presentations (presume to) tell us about gender/sexual identity? To whom are these images addressed - or, to use Michael Warner's terminology, what sorts of "publics" do they create? What does a moving, singing body "do" that a photograph doesn't, and on what registers?
Of course, you needn't answer these questions; I only offer them as a way of starting things off. Add your responses as comments to this post, instead of starting a new post for each response.
(By the way - the formatting of this clip seems to be too wide for the column width on this blog, so if you want to watch it without the major cropping, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEhutIEUq8k.)
There is something very androgynous about Mika, and his style of music. His "look" is attractive in a somewhat feminine way, i.e. he's more "pretty" than he is "handsome." As for his music, he frequently makes use of falsetto, which adds to his feminine quality, as well as various aspects of his video (e.g. the glittery shoes, the interesting wardrobe).
ReplyDeleteFor us, or rather, for society this is somewhat strange because we tend to try to give everything a black and white definition, and when we find gray areas in between we get really confused. This happens in music all the time when a certain band or singer or song doesn't fit into a specific genre. Perhaps the reason so many "anomalies" pop up when we try to categorize things is because they're not meant to be boxed in in such a way... When someone asks me what kind of music I like, I always hesitate to answer because I don't like a song based on their genres. I like music on a song-to-song basis, so I always answer "anything," which doesn't make sense either, because there are plenty of songs I don't like...
As demonstrated from this song, music video and Mika's own personal statements (e.g. "If I was worried about sexual taboos I certainly wouldn't have made the record I made. It has nothing to do with that. It has more to do with self-respect.") we see here a statement of self-exploration and unique personality. I refuse to label this music/video as anything "pro-____", however I think it is clear that when viewing an androgynous man half-naked, singing falsetto music and dancing eccentrically, all signs point to sexual liberation - casting aside all norms of Western homogeneity.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, the most telling sign of this liberation is a brief period in the music video (I believe around 0:51) where we view Mika in front of a mirror flexing his muscles. This short period of 'masculinity' - demonstrating one's strength and muscle tone (and btw, I have nothing against muscle-y girls or female body builders - they are, unequivocally demonstrating the beauty of the female body) is quickly contrasted with a shot of Mika dancing rather liberally in a bedroom. Here we have a dichotomy between the 'norm' and open-mindedness. Clearly, without this video shot and its corporeal nature we would never fully understand the point of the music.
Lastly, in regards to purely the music, the quotation "we are not what you think we are, we are golden" definitively demonstrates this notion of liberation: a bold statement of not fitting into a black/white portrayal of personality, but rather "gold" - a lovely color representation of social/sexual emancipation.
When I think about (partial) nakedness of singers in their music videos, what comes to mind most immediately and prominently is the hyper-sexualized image that some female singers seem to desire to put forth. (Without doing any sort of broad research, I would suppose this is mainly in the "pop" genre.) Example (Britney Spears): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMqayQ-U74s. The aim of such self-presentations of these singers is, ostensibly, to utilize the body to induce desire in viewers. The male counterpart of this, which comes to mind from pop culture generally, is the "hunk" character: think the perfectly toned-and-tanned Abercrombie model (http://www.businessoffashion.net/fashionbusiness/images/2007/03/20/abercrombie_2pv___2.jpg). Again, the producers of this imagery are aiming to exploit sexual attractiveness by emphasizing the hyper-masculinity of these male models.
ReplyDeleteIt's a fact that Mika is openly wearing nothing but boxers for the majority of this music video, but I never get the sense that the goal is to capitalize on sexual desire. As the above comments have already indicated, and as I have pointed out with my examples, his body is not an example of stereotypical masculine sexual attractiveness. Nor is he moving or posing himself in ways that would emphasize his sexuality - the way Britney is doing, so painfully obviously.
Instead, the overall vibe that I get from his performance and dancing is freedom and playfulness. He's dancing around the way you would when no one's watching you in your room - just letting go, having fun, enjoying the music. The boxers make it look like he was just in the middle of getting dressed when he stopped for a spontaneous dance party. It's almost like we're getting a glimpse of a side that a famous person wouldn't normally show the outside/public world - a world which so strongly expects the sexuality-emphasizing presentation of pop culture figures today. I love the way he puts the tape back into the player at the end and goes back to push-ups, as if he noticed we were watching, became shy about his free-form dancing, and quickly went back to his planned workout.
All of this having been said, his shirtless state does remind me of another display of males in popular culture: rock bands. (Well, some of them.) Here's an example: Slither, by Velvet Revolver - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKz2U4fvA4U. The lead singer is shirtless in this video, as is one of the guitar players. In my interpretation, the aim here is not (mainly) to draw attention to his sexuality. (For a moment though, it does seem to take that angle - see 1:57.) Instead, I think it's a display of freedom - "we're gonna take our shirts off because we can" - and kind of a flouting of mainstream culture (which is "pop culture" here, in my mind) in favor of the alternative culture of rock. This alternative flavoring is accentuated by his piercings and tattoos.
So I think both Mika and Velvet Revolver are trying to display the freedom of their bodies in a different light than sexual freedom. Thus they are putting forth alternative concepts of the masculine gender.
When I look at this video, my first response is similar to some of the others posted here already: sure, Mika presents us an image of a male body, but it’s not the usual male body that we’d think of in a sexualized way – of course, a man in underwear we would imagine should necessarily give us such a sexualized image.
ReplyDeleteBut I think what this also calls into question is the idea of youth and sexuality. When we think about the Britney Spears-es that Tory mentioned, we think of a scantily-clad, YOUNG girl who is flaunting her body on stage. In most cases, youth for a woman translates to sexuality. In music, the “innocent schoolgirl” look has essentially become a cliché, and a teenage girl in her underwear dancing in her room – we would imagine that to be very sexual, indeed.
But a “young boy” dancing around his room, almost naked, we just don’t see as such a sexual display. Youth for males in music – in my opinion – translates to “cuteness,” not “hotness.” High school garage bands we think of with a twinge of boyish sweetness, not the “rip-my-clothes-off-and-do-me-here” style of a Britney.
The last thing that occurs to me, from a sexual orientation standpoint, is how campy the movie is. All the colors, the excessive number of objects in the background, the falsetto-alternating-with-normal-voice vocal style, the thumping beat – makes for an over-the-top experience, and one that I would associate with a lot of LGBT media. This is reminiscent to me of an Of Montreal or similar band.
To be honest, this video does not scream sexuality to me. As Tori and others have mentioned, what I notice first is the youthfulness and playfulness of the whole scene. Sure he has his shirt off, and often dresses androgynously, but I do not associate this portrayal immediately with some sort of sexual statement. Based on the words of the song, I am not surprised to find that, as Kenny quoted, this video was about "self respect" instead of a statement about gender.
ReplyDeleteI feel as if Mika is trying to express something about creativity, liberation, and self-acceptance. His "public," if you will, are those who have had issues coming to terms with themselves because they do not conform to society's norms. This would lend itself to those with gender identity issues, whether it be any part of the LGBT community, but I do not believe that it is exclusively directed towards them.
Lastly, I find that seeing him perform on video, instead of simply viewing a picture, allows us to see many different sides of him. This is exemplified by his switch from normal voice to falsetto, his many costumes etc. It seems he's not concerned with choosing a specific gender identity, whether it be mainstream or counterculture, but is asking his public to embrace the many ways in which one's imagination and creativity lends itself to one's image of their own body and self.
Has anyone ever gotten this error code while trying to post?
ReplyDeletebX-w89vit
I think that visualizations of gender representations in music videos and crafted performances tend to correspond to those representations in the music itself. Last year, I wrote a paper about gender representation in a video of a performance of "Throw Away Your Television" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Here is the video:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pgBjnbxCBs
It's interesting to compare this video and the Mika one. Both the singers are performing shirtless (they actually even look pretty similar). But one comes across as a display of raw masculine energy, while the other seems a statement of androgyny. How do we make these judgements? Some more overt factors are the colors of the outfits and Anthony Keidis's muscles and tattoos. As was already mentioned, the falsetto that Mika employs also recalls feminine stereotypes of higher voices. More subtle details are also at play. For example, I think the specific hand motions that the singers choose to emphasize are carefully constructed within a framework of stereotypical gender roles. On numerous occasions in the Mika video, Mika puts his hands on both sides of his head as if to ruffle his hair; I think we view this as a feminine gesture because we associate longer hair with women (though Anthony Keidis's hair is actually quite long), and we view the ruffling of long hair as a symbol of female sexuality. So even though Mika doesn't have particularly long hair, I do think that this is an association that we make subconsciously (or consciously). Mika also tends to extend his arms upward and his hands outward, while Keidis clenches the microphone toward his body. I think that Keidis's gesture is more masculine because as it contracts the biceps and causes them to flex, it displays control and power, which we associate with the masculine. What does a moving, singing body do that a photograph doesn't? I think these subtle gestures play a larger role in our assessment of gender representation than we might realize, and they cannot be captured as easily in photographs.
Does anyone know how to embed a youtube video? It wasn't letting me post with the video embedded
ReplyDeleteMyles, I'm not sure you're able to embed a video in a comment; I *think* you can only do so on the main page, in a post (but someone correct me if I'm wrong).
ReplyDeleteOne thing I want to add that I forgot to say before is that Mika's upward and outward hand motions signify liberation. Think of Rose extending her arms outward on the bow of the Titanic, a mountaineer doing the same at the top of a mountain where he seems the master of nature, or students running out of the school building on the last day of classes with their arms extended. in this case, the liberation is from traditional gender roles. Anthony Keidis clenches both fists tightly around the microphone, adhering strictly to the established power role of the male.
ReplyDeleteEven though Mika is mostly in his underwear throughout the video and the video is full of sexualized symbolism, I think the major expression I get from the video is a demonstration of the inexhaustible energy that the teenage boys acquire, instead of trying to be erotic.
ReplyDeleteHe wears this white boxer which generates the feeling of purity; His body is frankly exhibited and his movements unmistakenly demonstrate his naiveness. Symbolism of sexuality shown in this video, in my perception, is more of a teenage boy’s mischievous challenge to the social norms. Like the article we read before on falsetto in rock music, the high voice of a male transgresses the normal expectation of a masculine voice, and therefore male falsetto generates a confusion of gender norms, as well as the musical symbol of the youth(the nostalgia towards the naiveness). The shoes and hats, being the classic symbol of female sexuality, were most effectively abused in the video by Mika. We see that the shoes he wears are mostly sneakers in bright colors, and those hats are as cute as those shoes. Therefore from these observations, I don’t perceive an overt sexuality.
I like the plot of the video a lot. At the beginning part of the video, the tape wound up and the song stopped. Then Mika ran out of bed to change the side of the tape, and the song started again. Towards the end of the video, Mika changed the side of the tape again when the second playing is over, and he played it the third time and danced as how he was during the second playing. This gives the audience a feeling that the process of “running around” and the youth fantasy never stop.
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ReplyDeleteThough it strays from the stereotype, I definitely got a sense of sexuality from the video. I think it inspires a sense of liberation in sexual identity. The colorful childishness that provides a context for a good portion of the video made me think of the juncture between youthful innocence and sexual self-discovery. This idea along with the fact that the way he moves is atypical of masculine display (and commonly seen bodily movements in general) encourages the viewer to consider their own bodies unconstrained by convention. This is highlighted by the fact that he presents his body in so many different forms, colors, views, etc. (I thought the part where lasers are coming from his crown, fingertips, and groin is perhaps the most poignantly odd and different from the other scenes. Not sure what the artist/director was trying to get at here.) In any case, the lyrics seem to imply a struggle against society or background in pursuit of something that the singer finds attractive, fun and, in a way, innocent. If this is the case, I think the video and artist do a good job of capturing and relaying the protagonist’s view of the world.
ReplyDeleteI found two different things while viewing this. While the video appears to be sexual in nature, this seems in direct contrast with the lyrics. The lyrics are definitely meant to portray a sort of liberation; not just in sexual identity, but moreso for cultural identity in general. I see why the theme fr the video was used; the sexuality of his almost-naked body creates a sort of tension that makes one really understand what is going on. The body with boxers, to me, represented the sort of baseline. His ridiculous outfits donned at various points throughout the video represented all the variations. I got the message that these sorts of deviations were not supposed to be seen as relief to the body; rather, they were supposed to be seen as interchangeable—meaning, our deviations from the baseline of the body are not supposed to make us in any way different from our body.
ReplyDeleteI see “We Are Golden” as expressing a return to that youthful period in life before we become ‘sexualized’ by puberty; that ‘golden period’ where we have not yet constructed the dichotomous categories of ‘male’ and ‘female’, and so don’t yet conceive of ourselves in that way. In this ‘golden period’ there is a natural fluidity between typical ‘male’ and ‘female’ aspects of behavior, which Mika displays in, for instance, his frequent use of falsetto and his wearing of colorful and sparkly shoes. Mika also displays the playfulness and openness that characterizes this early period: for instance, Mika sings, “teenage dreams in a teenage circus, running around like a cloud on purpose, who gives a damn about the family you come from, you’ll give it up when you’re young and you want some.” Mika’s youthful indifference to the seriousness of ‘adulthood’ is also expressed by his jumping on the bed, wearing untied shoes, and incorporating cartoonish or superhero-like themes into the video (e.g. lightning bolts from the sky). Furthermore, Mika sings, “I was a boy, at an open door, why are you staring, do you think you still know?” which I think suggests the point that as boyish children, we are still ‘open’ and not yet restricted to the dichotomous options that come with the sexualization of post-pubescent ‘adulthood’ (e.g. infant boys can still cry, play with dolls, and wear pink). Importantly, Mika also seems to be critiquing the very dichotomous sexualization of ‘adulthood’ when he says, “why are you staring, do you still think that you know?” That is, he’s critiquing the assumptions held by a person that might be staring at him, and suggesting that it’s the listener’s dichotomous assumptions – what ‘they think they know’ – that are questionable. The playful nature of the song and the song’s lyrics are all suggestive that Mika is glorifying in this ‘golden state’, and that this song is Mika’s tribute to that ‘golden’ state or attitude.
ReplyDeleteWhen I saw this video the first thing that came to mind was how much this guy has taken from Freddie Mercury. Mika has a more modern and youthful approach, but in a lot of ways his character in the video really reminds of the feminized male that Freddie Mercury embodied. From the over the top and sexualized body motions that represent the playful lyrics to vocal parts in a higher register, it just makes me think of the band Queen. Interestingly enough, in his song “Grace Kelly” he actually references Freddie Mercury and does a brief vocal impression. Upon hearing that I was able to accept the comparison because he shows that he himself is aware of how much he is taking from the “Freddie Mercury character”
ReplyDeleteI do applaud Mika because he seems very comfortable and happy in his own skin. This is who he is and you can take it or leave it. Jumping into that high falsetto from a lower and smoother more “male voice” during the verses really exemplifies the dual male/female undertones that he exerts in his performance. Were I to just hear the music and not have seen what the singer looked like, this would have been relatively close to my mental image of Mika. Realizing that makes me wonder about why exactly I would picture someone like him? Couldn’t it have been a really muscle-bound man with a beard? Would that have made as much sense with the persona I assume the voice will be attached to?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDckgX3oU_w
Here is Queen. Go to the second song (Radio Ga-Ga)
This was an interesting concept for a music video. Normally, artists choose to tell some type of story with a simple plot, but Mika just dances around the entire time. In addition, the action seems to take place in a relatively small area. Even when the setting is no longer the bedroom, you get the sense that it's still part of the same space. Despite the static scenery, I think the video was effective due to the amount of motion the main character incorporates. He is pretty much "rocking out," which is a testament to the effect music can have on the body. The type of music may vary, but everyone can agree that, given the right genre, they have no choice but to get down. Everyone at some point has danced around when no one was looking, although probably not as Mick Jagger as Mika.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I think a key theme of the video is intimacy. We are somewhat voyeuristically looking into the bedroom of a guy dancing in his underwear. The fact that we get to see a moving, singing body instead of a photograph also makes the scenario more intimate. From a marketing point of view, this intimacy between artist and consumer gives rise to a sense of connectedness that would make someone want to support a stranger as if they were a close friend.
Another element that adds to the intimate feel is playfulness. There are legit children's toys all over the room, which is extremely colorful, and Mika is jumping around like a child in fantasy land. He is also oddly sexualized, which coupled with the little kid's theme and occasional falsetto is reminiscent of Michael Jackson.
In closing, I don't really understand the Statue of Liberty lasers or the portal in the ceiling.