I think any attempt by myself to say that I do not like the pop princesses would be a mistake. They are all fascinating to me, and while I do not own many of their records I do own some. I can honestly appreciate the athleticism that goes into the dancing, the artistry of that whole thing. The modern performance on these stages, while having nothing to do with music, is still somehow enthralling to me.
The one that I most love musically is Pink. The fact that she brought in some people I know to play on her records, and some cats from Epitaph were able to eat from that big trough, well that was cool. I like how she presents drums on her productions, and I liked seeing her live the two times I did. Her videos are amazing as well. And she is a vegan, so that seems like a good thing. Or maybe she is just a vegetarian, either way I like and appreciate that she is active in running her mouth, and giving the bird.
The one pop star that I truly appreciate without any reservation is Mandy Moore. She started off as the virginal teen driving around in a VW Bug, and tonight she sang a new country song on Leno, and it was an amazing arc. I am sure that one can talk endlessly about her marriage to musical superhero (and Westerberg wanna be) Ryan Adams, but I think it started earlier.
She used to date Andy Roddick, and they were roughly the two most unfamous famous people I ever saw, and it fascinated me. But, like everything else, I sort of stopped caring.
Then a guy I met once named Justin got a chance to direct her in a feature called ‘Dedication’, so I rented it. Scratch that, I bought it. It was a guy I drank with a few times, and it was his movie. It had an actor I really liked Billy Crudup, so it was an easy choice for me. The performance by Moore was amazing. It was a New York story, and she played an illustrator, and in so many ways she played a cliche, but the cliche was intentional. She was only a cliche, because a lot of people are this, so it becomes said cliche.
That being said, her performance was unvain, and very amazing. I had some friends tell me to watch a previous film called ‘Saved!’ with her in it, so I did. I found that to be so much Hollywood contrivance, and honestly it seemed like prepackaged rebellion. Let us make an anti evangelical movie in an attempt to get some street cred. Where the movie was just a lot of pretty young Hollywood actors doing what young Hollywood actors do, eat the sets and trip on lines in favor of gesture.
And in it Moore was that. She had nothing to work with, and no where to go, so one cannot be blamed for stinking in a stinker. One of my best friends is a principal in the movie ‘Feast’ so I am fond of forgiveness.
But Moore rebounded and made a series of movies that had her with actors like Diane Keaton, and it was great. She played her age, not younger, and she gave good performances. Seeing her in the media was nice, because it felt like she was giving honest answers having moved beyond the unstable ground of teen girl and into the realm of working actor and musician.
So, I found out she is playing at one of my favorite venues in America maybe the world, Joes Pub in NYC, and I hope that you go. She seems to have a good band, and from the download, she has some good songs.
Mandy Moore, thank you.