DAY THREE OF OUR POP DIVAS THEME WEEK! First order of business, go fill out our final four bracket! Click that cute button below, fill out the form, and then keep reading.
I’ve always loved when artists come out of left field with an acoustic or slowed-down album, song, EP, that completely contradicts the other party music they’d been putting out before. For the most part, my Discover Weekly are acoustic covers of pop songs. It’s just my jam. Miley Cyrus and Kesha, both traditional pop queens—Miley made it all the way to the Elite Eight!—tend towards Homecoming Dance vibes, mixed with underage shenanigans, and a wild attitude. Their first songs were “Hey! It’s super fun to do drugs and party!” and/or “Hey! You can’t control me anymore! I’m a muthafuckin woman.” Songs such as these, while totally fun and a riot, can perpetuate the patriarchal agenda I was force-fed as a child: That women can’t really be successful but instead will always be a mess and benefit from their privilege.
Successful women were not to be trusted! Surely, some form of manipulation was at hand in order for them to be on top. Success is a man’s game so when a woman finds herself up there, it must be wrong. Or they must not deserve it. Or they’re going to squander it (or in the case of Kesha and Miley, party it away). This was the image we were presented of both pop icons. The unruly, misbehaved, and probably drug-addled women, singing poorly written party songs and wearing less than underwear on stage. What they put out wasn’t substantial. It was just a money grab.
Of course, all of this is false. This mindset I was raised in (that women can’t be successful and, in turn, can’t own their successes) was trained and, thankfully, untrained. The anti-successful woman fog I was forced to carry finally lifted and I learned about celebration and there totally being enough room for all of us. It seemed, around the same time, these pop women were finding themselves too.
In 2017, Kesha released Rainbow, her first album since exposing the turmoil she faced at Dr. Luke’s hands (although all alleged still, Dr. Luke can go fuck himself). And at the end of 2020, Miley Cyrus releases Plastic Hearts, the album post-divorcing Liam Hemsworth and becoming (California) sober. At a time of great vulnerability for both, Rainbow and Plastic Hearts take these feelings of inadequacy, hurt and anger, physical and emotional pain, confusion towards society, confusion towards self, and spun a different tale, one with soul-crushing lyrics and heart-bursting melodies. Both albums are fantastic (with its few exceptions, as is normal for any album), but I’ve always been drawn to the raw similarities between Kesha’s “Rainbow” and Miley’s “Golden G String.”
With both of these songs, you see into the artists’ soul. Both songs are retrospective: an honest and, at times, brutal, look back at their career yes, but also a reflection on their mistakes and celebrations along the way. Both songs are about coming to terms and, ultimately, forgiveness. They hug themselves with these songs. They mourn the youth they never got to have and the questionable decisions they made, yet encourage the noise and brilliance of the future, one where they’re stronger because of what they’ve been through. And I see what I’ve been through reflected in them.
“Rainbow” on Rainbow
“Now I see the magic inside of me.”
Every single day I want to quit. My therapist and I were talking about being a housewife, a topic I’m sure I’ll write about more later on, but yeah, Faith, it would be so easy to just marry rich and give up my daydream. Hey, at least then I’ll get to play Sims all day. But there is something here, inside me like a kernel of light and it terrifies me because somehow it’s always pouring inside, the rain constantly pelting down and threatening the life of that flame. I’m trying to shelter it and some days it’s only overcast and I’m thinking “This is it, somethings happening.” And then it rains again. But it’s fucking there and I have to keep fucking trying, right?
“What’s left of my heart’s still made of gold.”
I’m definitely broken—but what’s left of me is made of gold. I might be scarred both emotionally and physically, my mental state leaves much to be desired at times, and though my spirituality has grown immensely, I’m not sure what to do with it, but I am, without a doubt, the best version of myself. Regardless of the unending existential crises, I’m a better human now than ever before and I strive to lead with compassion. I’m done wasting my energy getting frustrated with others or constantly arguing. I’m ready to see other people’s sides, hear their stories and their reasons, and tell them that, even if I disagree, they are heard. Compassion is the strongest power. Cultivate it.
“Golden G String” on Plastic Hearts
“I did it all to make you love me.”
While Kesha’s song is about remembering your inner spirit, the colors that carry you through life, and knowing that yes, you can do this, Miley’s is a lamentation of the past but an encouraging look at the future. She admits everything we already knew: that she did it all for/because of the media. Being told to be something only made her be the opposite all the more, made her want to wear the many infamous outfits, made her want to do drugs and party, and anything else that clashed against the Disney princess coating. I was told to be a teacher—it’s the safest route to a job, they said—but the pressure of becoming a teacher plus the pressure of actually being a teacher and being told to be a good teacher meant I never wanted to be teacher. So I rebelled too.
“I should walk away, but I think I’ll stay.”
I don’t think Miley regrets her past, I think she’s tired of regretting her past, and “Golden G String” is her forgiving herself. It’s also a sincere “Fuck You” to all of her haters—and those she hates—because she is not going anywhere. “Golden G String” isn’t Miley giving up, it’s her giving into her own power, the power she might have finally worked out and mastered. The song is her saying that regardless of the world she created for herself (and the world that was created around her) she is here. It’s been hard and it will be hard, but she’s staying.
I’m not musically gifted like Aimée or musically inclined like Zack, I just… enjoy music like an average person likes music, but also appreciates silence. But I do feel and fuck, sometimes I think I feel too much. Some days I’m carrying the weight of the world on my neck, forcing me to hang my head in a myriad of negative emotions—shame, guilt, anger, confusion. Sometimes it’s really heavy. But through Rainbow by Kesha and Plastic Hearts by Miley Cyrus, I’ve got some additional support.
I see them. The pop veneer—their shiny, envy-inducing lifestyles—is totally faded with both of these albums. And they did it. They sat and scrubbed until the image they were supposed to be was gone. It’s my turn next.
Shit We’re Loving: LISTEN
Shelby’s Pick: POP DIVAS PLAYLIST!!
This playlist is a fucking banger. It also almost tore OTF apart—trying to find the perfect list of pop divas was a struggle. Truly, there are so so many, spanning decades of music, and each is important in their own right and we recognize, in order to get 64, some awesome women did not make the list. Our criteria for selecting who makes the cut versus who doesn’t was simple:
We prioritized solo artists over groups/bands, though there are a few (like Spice Girls) that naturally had to be present on the list.
We considered the artist’s following and the impact she/they either had or still have today. Influence is a major factor when choosing who’s the most popular. One-hit wonders, while certainly pop masterpieces, did not make the cut.
We only list women (as is OTF’s MO) because women are the foundational pillars of the pop world. Women are also more categorically lumped into “Pop” rather than a more specific genre. Continuing with this notion, we tried to select songs that were willingly and lovingly created by the artist. Using Kesha as an example, though her “TiKToK” is her most played song on Spotify, since it was made under and for Dr. Luke, we do not include it.
At the end of the day, “Pop Music” is complicated. It may seem simple enough to find the number of Grammy’s plus who ranks on the Top 40 and then do some math, but pop as a genre has exponentially evolved since some of the older artists on this list. The 90s and early aughts saw this explosion of pop thanks to the internet and social media, both skyrocketing factors that didn’t exist for some of the older artists on our list.
There’s a chance you won’t agree with every artist we selected or every song we picked and that’s okay! Music is fluid. It’s both objective and subjective and we all have different, varying tastes. This list was created in celebration of women’s music, art, and life. So celebrate with us.
Show Your Support: Native Land Digital
We are on stolen land. You and I, right here, right now, are on land that was never ours to take. Yet, many don’t know this. Even less care. But learning—and acknowledging—is half the battle and Native Land Digital aims to have everyone take that first step. Native Land Digital is a free, online tool to learn of the original Indigenous territories in a specific area. The project, which started in 2015 as Native-Land.ca, strives to “create and foster conversations about the history of colonialism, Indigenous ways of knowing, and settler-Indigenous relations, through educational resources” like their comprehensive and interactive map and the Territory Acknowledgement Guide.
Land is sacred and, as Native Land Digital stresses, it is not easy to draw lines that divide land into chunks that delineate who “owns” a different part of it. In reality, land is “not something to be exploited and ‘owned,’ but something to be honored and treasured.” To honor the sacredness of the spaces we’ve built our lives on, the spaces we often take for granted, we acknowledge and extend our hearts to the land’s original owners and to Mother Earth herself, for bearing the weight of humanity.
Shelby and Lizzy acknowledge the Kaskaskia, Myaamia, and Hopewell land they live on. Shelby also acknowledges the Shawandasse Tula people and their land.
Sydney acknowledges the Munseen Lenape and Wappinger land she lives on.
Aimée acknowledges the Merrick land she lives on.
Kayla acknowledges the Kiikaapoi, Jumanos, Wichita, and Tawakoni land she lives on.
Blaze acknowledges the Ramaytush, Ohlone, and Muwekma land she lives on.
Daily Intention:
Today I will…
Hug myself while jamming to our playlist.
Here’s some nifty buttons for you to press, enjoy: