Unbest

Erin M. Routson on “Super Bass” by Nicki Minaj (from Pink Friday, 2010)
(iTunes, Rdio, Spotify)

emrgency:

I don’t believe in guilty pleasures. When I was in high school, I was what you’d call “cool.” Or, rather, a uniquely specific brand of cool that only led to admiration from people who thought indie rock shows with less than 25 people in attendance or a burgeoning seven inch collection were qualifiers. As I remember it, though it may be faulty, I never tried to be cool. These were just things I liked; this was the music I felt most connected to, the kind that said what I couldn’t yet find a way to say myself. While I filed my Pavement 7”s and saw Jets to Brazil at a tiny club, though, I dabbled elsewhere. Mariah Carey’s “Heartbreaker” (my nascent love for Jay-Z starts somewhere around here), Britney Spears’ “Crazy” (but only the “Stop! Remix”, still an elitist at heart), and Janet Jackson’s “The Velvet Rope” were all in heavy rotation, but in the world of music that I knew, this side wasn’t a part of it. This was pop music. This was throwaway stuff. This music defined “guilty pleasure.”

So there’s a precedent for what happened to me in 2011, what I would consider the high water mark of my pop music appreciation. It started with “Super Bass”: the teeth-rotting pop side of Nicki Minaj hooked me and I found myself listening to it on repeat in the office. While my brother and friends of mine found this kind of ridiculous (growing up I uttered many regrettable thoughts about others’ taste in music), I didn’t. I embraced it. The refrain of “Super Bass” became a part of the persona I dreamed of having: a carefree, sunglasses-wearing girl cruising down a coastal highway getting tan while belting out its lyrics. While I connected with the isolation and confused feelings tied up in a lot of the indie rock I loved as a teenager, in my late 20s I wanted to be happy, to be laissez-faire, to be swept away by feelings that made me nervous in an excited way, rather than nervous in the way that so often made me anxious.

This tendency wore on as I downloaded Ke$ha’s “Animal” and listened to the whole thing, “Your Love Is My Drug” being the standout. After a stint at home listening to Cleveland radio, Mindless Behavior’s “My Girl” became one of my most played songs in iTunes. By the time I made it to my tenure at Willie Mae Rock Camp as a counselor I knew all of Ke$ha’s back catalogue, as well as plenty of Katy Perry. During our breaks, the other counselors and I would hole up in the lounge reading Bop and J-14, finding out all sorts of useless trivia about Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, and anyone else I’d probably never think twice about outside of those walls. I spent all week dancing and singing with girls of all ages to Beyoncé, Rihanna, Ke$ha and Katy, and it was fun, maybe more fun than any of the “cool” things I did in high school. During the songwriting workshop where we dissected the parts to Kelly Clarkson’s “Since U Been Gone”, I sung out just as loud as the 8 and 9 year olds I was charged with. They felt no guilt, neither did I.

It happened again during a few hours at the laundromat watching the Latino music video station. While I thought the ridiculously catchy “la la la la la”s were indicative of some kind of trashy Euro-pop group I’d never heard of, it turned out to be Cobra Starship’s “You Make Me Feel” featuring Sabi. I listened to it for hours. I listened to it today. I’ve accepted the fact that it will be on my running mix for pretty much all of my life, taking its place next to the other not-even-made-with-instruments jams that characterize what gets me to pound out a good workout.

Maybe this is the year I cultivated myself as a musical Benjamin Button: the 13 year old who appreciated Radiohead records is now the 28 year old who can’t get enough of Rihanna’s “We Found Love.” As much as I enjoyed records that were complex and challenging, I also just wanted to zone out and have that mental picture of the girl listening to “Super Bass” over and over again. I wanted to be young and without stress, I wanted to be an adult but also sing along to perfect hooky melodies and love them for that reason alone. There’s no such thing as a “guilty pleasure” from here on out, only joy derived from whatever music makes me feel it.

Erin M. Routson is a Brooklyn-based writer and designer neck-deep in her masters thesis on the policy and design of public housing. Follow her on Twitter.