Spin - Ashlee Simpson
The Trying Game
Working at being cool is never cool
By Chuck Klosterman
It doesn't seem necessary for me to criticize Ashlee Simpson, mostly because there are enough people doing that already. I'm also unsure what the point of such criticism would be, since attacking Ashlee Simpson's artistic legitimacy is like criticizing Michael Jackson for being an unconventional father. However, I've come to realize something about Simpson that explains why so many people don't like her, and it has nothing to do with the music she is (or isn't) lip-synching to. Ashlee Simpson has a larger problem: She tries too hard.
People booed Ashlee Simpson when she performed at the Orange Bowl's halftime show, and if polled, I'm sure the crowd in that stadium would say they booed because her singing was terrible. But this doesn't really make sense. Halftime performances at sporting events are almost always terrible, yet audiences rarely express displeasure. The reason they booed this time was that Ashlee Simpson looked ridiculous. She was dressed like Karen O, almost as if she was trying to front a Yeah Yeah Yeahs tribute band. Now I'm sure that specific comparison did not occur to most of the people in Pro Player Stadium; 90 percent of the 72,000 people who watched USC play Oklahoma wouldn't know Karen O from Terrel Owens. Yet one thing was obvious to them: Whomever Ashlee Simpson was trying to be was not who Ashlee Simpson is. She looked like someone desperately trying t[break=Read More]o give the world what she thought it wanted--an edgier Simpson sister.
A few days after the Orange Bowl, I saw the video for Simpson's "La La". In one segment, she wears a vintage Adam and the Ants t-shirt; later she wear a Motley Crue shirt. I suppose it's theoritically possible that Ashlee Simpson honestly likes those bands. But within the context of this video, her identification with them does not feel remotely organic; it feels like somebody put a lot of thought into whom Ashlee should align herself with. All young artists do this, but some are less subtle than others. I once saw singer/songwriter Leona Naess perform in Cleveland wearing a ZZ-Top t-shirt. "I don't even know who this band is," she said between songs. "I just like this shirt". Naess played Minneapolis on the same tour, but this time she wore an Aerosmith t-shirt. "I don't even know who this band is," she said between songs. "I just like this shirt". Obviously, this was an attempt at cultural positioning: Leona Naess wanted to appear like the kind of girl who (somehow) had never heard of ZZ Top and Aerosmith, just as Ashlee Simpson wants to appear like the kind of girl who's intimately aware of Motley Crue and Adam Ant. Yet both artists failed in their attempts, and that's because even a child could tell they were trying way too hard. And people hate that.
Oddly, this is not true in almost every other aspect of life. People don't love Minnesota Timberwolves forward Kevin Garnett because he makes the game look easy; they like him because he makes the game look hard. Modern athletes who make things look easy (like Garnett's neighbor Randy Moss) are usually seen as cancers. It took James Joyce 17 years to finish Finnegan's Wake, and that's what makes it a classic; filmmakers such as Stanley Kubrick and Orson Welles are likewise lauded for having been obsessive, workaholic perfectionists. Usually, Americans love people who expend ample effort to achieve their goals.
But this is not true for musicians.
Because rock is so tied to the abstract concept of "cool", it seems distasteful when anyone tries too much. Bands that are unpolished and lazy (The Replacements, Pavement, Motorhead) are always more likeable than bands that do "whatever it takes" to achieve a modicum of success (Bon Jovi, Jimmy Eat World, Flickerstick). In fact, not caring can actually make an artist seem smarter: Bob Pollard and Ryan Adams are both regarded as sublimely talented songwriters because they're wildly prolific and never seem too long on any one project; because they never seem to overtly care about anything in particular, it's assumed that their records would be awesome if they did.
And you know what's even crazier? If Ashlee Simpson somehow sees this column, she'll worry that I might be right about all this, and she'll work extremely hard at proving she never works at anything. And this will fail, too. It's hard enough to be good at something; You have to be really great in order to seem good by accident.
Working at being cool is never cool
By Chuck Klosterman
It doesn't seem necessary for me to criticize Ashlee Simpson, mostly because there are enough people doing that already. I'm also unsure what the point of such criticism would be, since attacking Ashlee Simpson's artistic legitimacy is like criticizing Michael Jackson for being an unconventional father. However, I've come to realize something about Simpson that explains why so many people don't like her, and it has nothing to do with the music she is (or isn't) lip-synching to. Ashlee Simpson has a larger problem: She tries too hard.
People booed Ashlee Simpson when she performed at the Orange Bowl's halftime show, and if polled, I'm sure the crowd in that stadium would say they booed because her singing was terrible. But this doesn't really make sense. Halftime performances at sporting events are almost always terrible, yet audiences rarely express displeasure. The reason they booed this time was that Ashlee Simpson looked ridiculous. She was dressed like Karen O, almost as if she was trying to front a Yeah Yeah Yeahs tribute band. Now I'm sure that specific comparison did not occur to most of the people in Pro Player Stadium; 90 percent of the 72,000 people who watched USC play Oklahoma wouldn't know Karen O from Terrel Owens. Yet one thing was obvious to them: Whomever Ashlee Simpson was trying to be was not who Ashlee Simpson is. She looked like someone desperately trying t[break=Read More]o give the world what she thought it wanted--an edgier Simpson sister.
A few days after the Orange Bowl, I saw the video for Simpson's "La La". In one segment, she wears a vintage Adam and the Ants t-shirt; later she wear a Motley Crue shirt. I suppose it's theoritically possible that Ashlee Simpson honestly likes those bands. But within the context of this video, her identification with them does not feel remotely organic; it feels like somebody put a lot of thought into whom Ashlee should align herself with. All young artists do this, but some are less subtle than others. I once saw singer/songwriter Leona Naess perform in Cleveland wearing a ZZ-Top t-shirt. "I don't even know who this band is," she said between songs. "I just like this shirt". Naess played Minneapolis on the same tour, but this time she wore an Aerosmith t-shirt. "I don't even know who this band is," she said between songs. "I just like this shirt". Obviously, this was an attempt at cultural positioning: Leona Naess wanted to appear like the kind of girl who (somehow) had never heard of ZZ Top and Aerosmith, just as Ashlee Simpson wants to appear like the kind of girl who's intimately aware of Motley Crue and Adam Ant. Yet both artists failed in their attempts, and that's because even a child could tell they were trying way too hard. And people hate that.
Oddly, this is not true in almost every other aspect of life. People don't love Minnesota Timberwolves forward Kevin Garnett because he makes the game look easy; they like him because he makes the game look hard. Modern athletes who make things look easy (like Garnett's neighbor Randy Moss) are usually seen as cancers. It took James Joyce 17 years to finish Finnegan's Wake, and that's what makes it a classic; filmmakers such as Stanley Kubrick and Orson Welles are likewise lauded for having been obsessive, workaholic perfectionists. Usually, Americans love people who expend ample effort to achieve their goals.
But this is not true for musicians.
Because rock is so tied to the abstract concept of "cool", it seems distasteful when anyone tries too much. Bands that are unpolished and lazy (The Replacements, Pavement, Motorhead) are always more likeable than bands that do "whatever it takes" to achieve a modicum of success (Bon Jovi, Jimmy Eat World, Flickerstick). In fact, not caring can actually make an artist seem smarter: Bob Pollard and Ryan Adams are both regarded as sublimely talented songwriters because they're wildly prolific and never seem too long on any one project; because they never seem to overtly care about anything in particular, it's assumed that their records would be awesome if they did.
And you know what's even crazier? If Ashlee Simpson somehow sees this column, she'll worry that I might be right about all this, and she'll work extremely hard at proving she never works at anything. And this will fail, too. It's hard enough to be good at something; You have to be really great in order to seem good by accident.