Rolling Stone-45 best albums of 2016 (so far)

[LetsGetHigh 52,683]

8 minutes ago, Thomas P said:

Views is a shitty ass album.

I'm still bitter at Beyonce with Lemonade. BEYONCÉ was so much better. 

[lifeasgeorge 9,427]

39 minutes ago, kevindjibouti said:

o.o

Imo ANTI is WAY better

AGREED 

[StrawberryBlond 13,754]

5 hours ago, Vague said:

Of course there are honestly. But I was speaking just in terms of who was already a major figure to the public, who was the most concealed and at least seemingly elegant and that would have to be Beyonce. Which is why I can understand why shes the one thats been used as a pawn in media politics. Because in my personal opinion and im sure its a controversial one: a lot of her hype and popularity, imo, is a calculated effort crafted by the music industry and the media. I definitely think shes used as a pawn to save the music industry and be a spokeswoman for black women and thus endlessly positive publicity is bought and thrusted upon the public who are sheep and eat it up with a large spoon.

All of this to say I dont think you're mindless if you like Beyonce, I do, just that theres this disturbingly cult-like popularity surrounding her for a reason. Just like there was with Gaga 7 years ago who was also once being used as a pawn to save deflating profit within the music industry. Once her reign started showing signs of slipping they stopped buying her ass that positivity, let her fall, and moved onto the next. That wont happen with a Beyonce for a myriad of reasons, shes protected and im not even going to get into that aspect because its a whole other conversation entirely (and fyi im not talking conspiracy theories like the illuminati).

I think so too. Having one female saviour (Adele) isn't enough, there needs to be someone else with a different genre aiming at another demographic to even things up. Beyonce works as this person because she isn't controversial, on the surface, at least. She doesn't have an overly threatening or explicit display of sexuality, she doesn't use violence in her work, she didn't do swearing in her songs until very recently. She's appropriate to sing at music awards shows and football games and presidential events. She's hailed as talented and a role model. So, she's ideal to be this pawn used by the industry to sell records.

And indeed, yes, she is protected in the industry, but not necessarily in an illuminati way. She's got such a strong support network around her to retain her popularity and ensure that she never flops. It helps to have a family member in the music industry pushing your career and a multi-millionaire husband doing the same. It's alright for some. Sure gives her an unfair advantage. Can you imagine if Gaga got into a massive music power couple partnership? She'd be unstoppable too. Thing is, Beyonce's so popular now that no one dares to bring up all the flops she's had. Her albums may sell but she sure struggles with singles, especially since she started dropping complete albums with no single preceding them. And her tours were never that big until Sasha Fierce. Out of 6 albums, she's only done a proper tour for 4 of them (Mrs Carter was a mixture of all material, it was in no way a tour for 4 specifically). She's only done a multi-continent world tour (as in 3 continents or more) for 2 of them. She hasn't toured in Asia since the I Am Tour. Her Vevo views and likes are surprisingly low for such a successful superstar (seriously, look how low the views are for all her self-titled album's videos). I think all this shows you how much Beyonce's work is really being soaked into the mainstream. She isn't as memorable or has as many hits as her fans would have you believe. If I wasn't a music reviewer who obsessively researches all artists, I would be hard pushed to name you any of her songs post-B'Day.

[Brian Ryan 1,468]

Love Lemonade, but ANTI is my album of the year!