keflex

barthel:

You might disagree about what the best video of 2010 was, but it seems inarguable to me that the most 2010 video of 2010 was Katy Perry’s “Firework.”  It somehow manages to encapsulate everything that was great and awful about pop culture over the last 12 or so months while also maybe parodying all of those things without it actually being clear if the parody is intended - which is, in and of itself, also very 2010.  It is an absolute masterpiece, so over-the-top that it can’t possibly be serious, but done with an absolutely straight face so you can still access the immature feelings being made fun of.  The song without the video is awful, but the song with the video is transcendent.  You cackle and guffaw but you also can’t help but think that it really does express the target emotion in an absolutely perfect way, and that it does it so perfectly it conjures the feeling itself.  Joy is a ridiculous emotion and for all the artistic attempts to express it through more tasteful means, maybe it is just your chest literally exploding with sparks.  Doesn’t that feel right?  As ridiculous as it would be to express in public, doesn’t it feel good to have that image stored inside of you, accessible during a glum elevator ride or a long shift or any other time in the gloom by yourself, anytime you can close your eyes and replay a song in your head?  It is very possibly the stupidest metaphor a human being has ever come up with, and it’s embarrassing that it’s so accurate.  But fuck it.  It was a ridiculous year, and we are ridiculous creatures.  Fireworks!  Why the hell not?

Pretty much nails every single reason why ‘Firework’ is such a massive tune. The annoying thing is Perry seems to feel differently:

“People are coming back and almost adopting it as their own anthem, and it’s hard, I think, to write an anthem that’s not cheesy, and I hope that this could be something in that category.”

Seriously? Not cheesy? Why the hell are peoples chests exploding then? You’ve gone so far beyond cheese that it actually seems authentic.

Whoa.