evilentity

While these kinds of distinctions are often fuzzy and uncertain (and I don't usually find them very useful or meaningful), in this case I think it's pretty safe to call them Lizzy Grant and the Phenomena since they're reputedly from Tags, who was part of the Phenomena.

For an artist as talented as Barrie, it must be frustrating to continue to live in the shadow of a more famous ex while simultaneously dealing with the break-up, that much of the interest in your music is based on music made with your ex, and to be inundated with messages more interested in your ex than you. From what we've heard from his album so far, I get the sense that a lot of it was inspired by his relationship with Lana. And from what we've seen on his social media accounts, he doesn't seem to be handling the end of that relationship particularly well. It wouldn't surprise me-- and I wouldn't really blame him-- if he decided he no longer wanted to release "Riverside", or perhaps even the album at all, as it was originally conceived. Maybe "Hate" is more what he's feeling right now.

It sure would be nice if there was some place on here where I check for, you know, actual news about her next album when there is news without having to wade through 75 pages of inane garbage posts like this one. A thread like that might even belong here in the News section.

Nice find! Absent a copy of her diploma or a graduation convocation ceremony program listing her name, this is probably as much confirmation as we're going to get. Edit: I just found this Fordham University Career Placement report for the class of 2008. This could be of interest: "In addition, one graduate chose to pursue a music career part-time..." Yeah, I'd be surprised. Most US colleges are pretty tight about that for legal reasons. If I recall correctly, I don't think the college I went to would give out any information about my academic record, even to prospective employers, without my request. (Granted, I think they also charged a fee for this.)

She's definitely got what sounds to me like a New Yawk accent (whether real or put on) on a number of UV tracks, but I've personally never really thought of her sounding "Southern" on AKA, more vaguely rural American. I'm pretty sure I've seen references to Grant family vacations in Florida. I think she mentioned in an interview that her dad bought a trailer down there and I think Rob has tweeted pics while on vacation in Florida. I've also seen old social media posts of hers about visiting friends in Miami and going to a Heat game. I'm from a northern state in the Midwest and I done known lots of people who talk like that who done never lived in the South.

I rather doubt Lana had any of these or any other meanings in mind when she wrote this. I think it's just gibberish.

My reply to a question in another thread got me thinking about "Aviation" and the whole Alabama mystery again. In "Aviation", she mentions Pensacola and flying "fighter jets all over the nation", clearly a reference to the Naval Air Station there. But what hadn't occurred to me before is how close Pensacola, FL is to the Alabama state line, within commuting distance. If it weren't for the fact that she said she's lived in Birmingham, AL, which is farther away, in an interview and on one of her MySpace accounts (though on another that may or may not be legit she listed Dauphine Island, which is closer), I'd speculate that "Aviation" is possibly written from the perspective of someone a few years ahead of her in her degree program at Fordham who decided to become a military pilot after graduation, perhaps a boyfriend she followed down there. (I see @@PrettyBaby beat me to the punch on this theory.) Her comments in her Fader interview would align with this: Whatever the story may be on this guy, I wonder if he ever said her pussy tastes like Pensacola. Other possibilities, fitting with @@Monicker's non-literal "state of mind" theory, are that it was fantasy based off the True Romance character Alabama Whitman, that clearly influenced her, especially during her Lizzy Grant days (@@TrailerParkDarling beat me to the punch on that one, RIP), or the name of a subway station she used to go to.

@ also drew my attention to this 2012 Channel V Music interview with Lana after her Splendour in the Grass performance that talks about recording at night while going to school, and completing four years of college, but supposedly working something out with her professors to do independent studies to accommodate recording AKA. (She also discussed metaphysics.) (h/t @ellipsis for the transcription) Another afterthought I had: She sings about having "a big degree in philosophy" in "Aviation", which appears on Sirens, believed to have been recorded in 2005 or 2006, and also in the leaked collection of songs reputed to be From the End, which was registed with the US copyright office in 2005. So it may still be a reference to her own field of study, but she couldn't have had her degree yet when she sang this.

Interviews that appear to just parrot her claims, yes, but concrete information? No. Though I'm not sure what could constitute concrete proof other than a copy of her diploma, a graduation convocation ceremony program listing her name, or information from Fordham saying she graduated. I wouldn't say the general consensus is that she didn't graduate. Along with @, I'm probably one of the leading skeptics, and I'd put the odds that she graduated from Fordham well above 50/50. That said, the fact that she habitually misstates her field of study while simultaneously speaking shallowly and unintelligently about it in interviews makes me somewhat skeptical about her academic claims. (She routinely says her degree was in metaphysics, a major Fordham does not offer and did not offer when she attended there. It is certainly plausible that she majored in philosophy, as the song "Aviation" suggests, possibly with an emphasis in metaphysics, but her degree, if she obtained one, would have been in philosophy.) Another possible reason for some skepticism is the timeline of her recording AKA. A Fordham article about a campus gig she played says she was a junior in the spring of 2007 and she started recording AKA in the fall. David Nichtern, head of 5 Points Records, confirms this timeline, implying she recorded it during her senior year of college, and graduated, but the question is did she? Was she able to record AKA while going to school? Maybe. In a German interview she said the album was recorded at night. At any rate, here's an interview quote suggesting she did graduate: The Age, May 10, 2014 And here's another one supporting the timeline above: NYT, June 15, 2014 The link's dead, but another user found a MySpace comment by a Fordham student that said Lizzy came back to campus to play her music in her class, referring to her as an "alum": (Hmm, I wonder if this was a class taught by Mark Naisson.) And here's a Buzzfeed article that suggests she didn't graduate, but provides no sourcing (plus I wonder if it's a feedback loop problem echoing skepticism from this community):

Why would Lana be spinning with the door open? #SafetyFeatures

Yes, you have. Your comment was not only based on what you deem an insufficient display of outrage. Otherwise you'd have expressed fear and outrage over anyone who hasn't made a public show of expressing outrage. But no, it's only Muslims you demand this of. In your worldview, all Muslims are automatically guilty by association of supporting such acts unless they prove they're "one of the good ones" by making a public performance of outrage, regardless of what they actually think about it. We can quibble about whether a person's prejudice against members of an entire religion largely compromised of people of other races is or is not racist, but I'm willing to concede that specific point for the sake of argument because it doesn't change my larger point that it's the same ugly impulse. I'm calling you xenophobic because you're applying a different standard to another group of people than you would to yourself or your own in-groups and it seems motivated primarily by a generalized fear and suspicion of the other group. This is ridiculous. Tons of terrible things have probably happened just today. You can't possibly have condemned them all. I guess I'll have to assume you support most of them until you say otherwise! Now to be clear, no one should support acts like this. And every right-thinking person should condemn them in their own hearts and minds. But the insistence that people should be presumed guilty of supporting them if they haven't expressed that condemnation publicly is grotesque. It reminds me of McCarthyism in the US in the '50s.

I got Agent Cooper.

While I share your outrage at atrocities like this and would condemn them wherever they take place, I find it rather selective. Many innocents have died gruesome deaths, yes, even being burned to death, as a result of Western intervention in Muslim countries. Many Western nations have also tortured or been complicit in torturing sometimes innocent Muslims. But look at those uniquely violent Muslims! Then you're not listening. Tons of Muslim groups have condemned this and other acts committed by extremist groups. "They". Painting with an awfully broad brush here. This sentiment of guilty by association until proven innocent is extremely ugly, xenophobic, and racist. You condemn all Muslims for the actions of all other Muslims. You automatically assume that they support such acts if they do not publicly condemn them. You ignore that many Muslims have publicly condemend them. You do not require any other groups to condemn these acts to escape your suspicion. You do not hold yourself or your in-groups to the same standard. You do not hold yourself or others in your in-groups responsible for the actions of all others in your in-groups or require yourself or others in your in-groups to publicly condemn all bad actions by others in your in-groups. Do you see the size of the problem when they you represent 1.5 billion 1.7 billion of humanity? I believe the high majority of Muslims Westerners are moderate and peaceful, I believe the high majority will never kill or be a human bomb operate flying killer robots, but I also believe that such silence coming from such large community is scary in many ways. I believe they support the idea of Islamism Western interventionism as a way of life far beyond a religion, as a law, as a culture and as how a country rules their society. The majority will never act on it per say, but one thing is not acting on it and the other is reacting against it. That right there is what is scary The silence is just bizarre

You've not only missed my point, but you're kind of making it for me. It had nothing to do with any sort of presumption of American cultural superiority. (I confess it perhaps had a little to do with a presumption of generational superiority. ) It had everything to do with criticizing the arrogance of people presuming that someone must be a "nobody" just because they aren't familiar with them, for whatever reason, whether that ignorance is due to age or culture. It's fine if you have to Google someone-- I do it all the time-- but perhaps people should do that before calling someone a "nobody". I certainly would before asserting that a Latin American artist I'd never heard of is a "nobody". Otherwise you end up looking a little like the Kanye fan that doesn't know who Paul McCartney is or the Superbowl watcher (oops... there I go asserting American cultural dominance for real!) declaring this new rapper Missy Elliott is gonna be huge. At any rate, the person I was responding to is American. More to the point, Lana is American, and even considering the apparent shallowness of her appreciation for her "masters of every genre", she will be familiar with Kim Gordon and/or Sonic Youth from even a cursory reading on Kurt Cobain. Which is why I think this will be somewhat wounding for Lana.

Absolute nobody? Maybe to someone who's only been around 5 minutes. She was only one of biggest influences on one of Lana's biggest idols (Kurt Cobain), not to mention alternative rock generally.

Rob's always been into boating and sailing. He even owned a boat company at one point: http://www.dnjournal.com/cover/2008/april-original.htm

That's the way I interpreted it too. I don't think there's really a comma there either.

Way to once again completely ignore most of the substance of what I wrote and just deflect by labeling it "defensive". Excuse me for the natural desire to want to be properly understood and not have people take offense. But there's no surer sign of a person no longer able or willing to defend their argument than responding to an opponents' point-by-point rebuttal with a cry of "Stop being so defensive!" Now this notion of me not "allowing" anyone to take offense at what I say or have a different view is a very curious rhetorical construction you're using here. If I were truly capable of that, and determined to do that, as you say, we wouldn't be having this back and forth, now would we? I'm no more capable of that than you are of not allowing anyone to question your view or taking of offense. Because, though you hide it in this rhetorical disguise, that is the implication (yes, IMPLICATION! ): that you're somehow entitled to be able to express your different view or offense-taking without it being questioned or challenged. If someone does, they're somehow not "allowing" you to have a different view or take offense. Isn't that what a discussion forum is for? To discuss, debate, and challenge each other's ideas? I'm perfectly fine with someone having a different view or taking offense with something I said. Just don't distort my view, take offense at your distorted view of what I said or knee-jerk react to phrases that in isolation vaguely sound like they might be offensive, but in context of the point being made are not, and then expect me not to take issue with it. Would it completely undermine my point or the original point of this thread to end my post with the bitch fight emote?

If you read what I wrote carefully, the antecedent of the word "that" in the sentence you quote was her history of saying "really questionable shit about gay men". Are you saying people should agree with all the questionable shit she's said about gay men? The interpretation my post offered most clearly... if you ignored half of what I wrote. Just saying bro. Good god, this is getting fucking ridiculous. There's nothing wrong with merely expressing surprise that people seem to be giving a pass to someone saying offensive things about a group and being even more surprised that many people in the group in question seem to be giving them a pass. The latter is simply a recognition of the sad reality that people who are not part of the group often don't care as much. Lately you almost seem determined to read things into my posts that aren't there.

I haven't implied that there's something problematic about gays men supporting her generally. Just that I don't think she should be given pass by anyone on her history of questionable comments about gay men. Though many people, including gays, have made that implication and I wouldn't say that opinion is without any merit. Um, so where did you read that into my post largely about disagreeing with people you generally agree with when they're wrong?

I wasn't really intending to imply any reason why you always seem to "Like" his most terribly argued posts, especially ones that suggest people should be dismissed based entirely on who they are (this time that the facts they present should be dismissed, not only their opinions!), just that you can always be counted on do so. It's an idea that I think is bad enough that people should be called out for agreeing with, end of story.

LOL. You're a parody of yourself yet again: Dismissing out of hand what someone says entirely because of who they are rather than what they're saying, as usual. Immediately deflecting with the phrase "textbook definitions" because you have no argument when someone calls you out for having your facts wrong. Saying you don't agree something is offensive, but that you'll stop doing it if a woman tells you it's offensive in a thread about a woman saying it's offensive. Are a man expressing an opinion contrary to a woman on a subject while saying men's opinions on the subject shouldn't be listened to in response to someone who hadn't even expressed an opinion on the subject yet. And look at @@Atom Heart knee-jerk "Like"-ing every post of yours in disagreement with me no matter how poorly argued. You should really ask the admin for an auto-"Like" button for that shit. It would really save you a lot of time. evilentitties?? jacktitties??? Ha, yeah, it is super ironic that @@comeintomybedroom, not a member of the group most affected, is arguing that a word has always been used more generally than just that group, after complaining about me doing that. The key difference, of course, being that in my case that was actually true. This is far from the only time she's said really questionable shit about gay men. I'm really mystified why so many people, especially gay men, are giving her a pass on that. Is this sort of like how so many of you give Lana a pass on stupid shit she says because you stan her music? Are you so dug in defending Azealia's side in other Twitter spats that you can't do the mental gymnastics required to side against her in this one? I've never understood why it's so hard to say someone's in the wrong when they are just because you generally like them or generally agree with them, or say someone's right when they are just because you generally dislike them or generally disagree with them. I've never had much of a problem with that. Which is why-- to actually express an opinion on the subject now-- I have no problem saying I think perpetual Twitter troll Azealia has a point here about the use of the word "bitch". (Although I think the answer is not to justify the use of the word "fag" or "faggot" as a slur, as she does, but to stop using the word "bitch" offensively.) As @@YUNGATA points out, it's all about context, of course. I could write a book length post on which instances I think are OK and which I think are not, and whether Lana's uses of the word herself are problematic, but one use in particular I've seen on this forum that makes me cringe is when people say about Lana or other women "this bitch needs to do X" or something like that. Intentionally or not, that comes across with a misogynistic undertone.