Hello! This is Jacky from Northwest Is Best, here to share with you my musical heroine as part of Feminist Fashion Bloggers.
Peaches is niche pop star within a niche genre. Her spat-out lyrics may be crude and her electroclash beats simplistic, but I love her. She's fearless, brutal and looks like she'd be a good laugh down the pub. At 44, she's over the hill in conventional pop star terms, but age doesn't define her. Neither does gender. Peaches - born Merrill Nisker in Canada, but now based in Berlin - is definitely a woman. Look at her. She has hips and breasts and hair. Lots of hair.
My main love for Peaches is her gender play in her songs and videos. Consider the above video stills from Downtown, a single from her 2006 album Impeach My Bush. She performs as a seductress stalking the corridors of a spacious hotel, all pillowy cleavage and stockings. Then she's a bellboy, hair slicked back and no make-up. At the end, she fuses the two - dressed as a man, pouting in the mirror from beneath a veiled hat.
And her lyrics? She's not ashamed of her body - how about 'I drink a whisky neat / you lick my crow's feet' from 2009's Trick or Treat. Or, as she tells Iggy Pop in their 2004 glam-shock hook-up Kick It, 'if you play Moses you need burning bush / and that is just what I got'. (I did mention the hair, right?) After four albums, she keeps getting stronger and continues empowering women through her Spandex-covered live shows. As she told The Guardian in 2006 'in my songs, the girl needs to be the antichrist'.
I'm not likely to follow Peaches' example and leap around in a silver jumpsuit, but I'm glad she's out there.
Thanks Aly for having me.
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Check out my guest post at Oranges and Apples and check out Jacky's blog, northwest is best, for Franca's guest post!
Check out a round-up of all today's posts here!
As am I! I'm laughing at 'Impeach My Bush', though - I hadn't heard about that.
ReplyDeleteTeehee! Sometimes crudeness is just so on-spot! Though despite being agnostic I don't know if trying to reclaim the term "antichrist" as something positive is a good idea...
ReplyDeleteI love her though less impressed with the recent stuff. We were briefly considering putting fuck the pain away on our wedding playlist!!
ReplyDeleteI only have the Teaches of Peaches album but I remember being thrilled by her unapologetic androgyny and her use of crass language.
ReplyDeleteoh no, the blogger breakdown ate my comment! I love peaches, especially the early stuff. we saw her live at the 2nd album time, and it was one of the best gigs i've been to, ever!
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