‘Old Town Road
(ft. Billy Ray
Cyrus)’
Lil Nas X
Columbia Records
SINGLE REVIEW: ‘OLD TOWN ROAD’
“Ridin’ on a tractor, lean
all in my bladder.”
These stupid lit lyrics
drip, soaked in the spirit of
the hip-haw genre.
There comes a time in
a
writer’s
career
when
they
are
launched
into
uncharted territory. Never
would
I
imagine
this
territory to be the depths
of
the
largely
pastoral,
cowboy
agenda
that
is
Tik Tok (Musical.ly’s son,
Vine’s distant cousin).
Lil
Nas
X’s
smash
single “Old Town Road”
has risen as a cultural
phoenix that ignited the
weirdest
parts
of
the
internet, personifying the
cowboy emoji and igniting
an inescapable “yee-haw
boi” energy that has lead
the meme empire to its
climax. In March of 2019,
“Old Town Road” rose to
the top of both Billboard’s
Hot Country Chart and
Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Chart,
only to be removed from
the country chart due to
its
supposed
deviation
from traditional country
roots (ahem, some would
argue, a deviation from
whiteness).
Since
being
thrown from the horse that
is Billboard’s Hot Country
Chart, Lil Nas X dropped a
remix of “Old Town Road”
featuring Billy Ray Cyrus,
and is now at the top spot
on the Billboard Hot 100.
“Old
Town
Road”
is
the blissful apex of the
cowboy energy that has
flooded popular culture.
The pause between “I’m
gonna”
and
“rideeeee”
quite possibly hits harder
than
all
four
seasons
of
Hannah
Montana
combined. Genius’s lyric
interpretation
video
of
“Old Town Road” dropped
just
yesterday,
and
it
soared to over 2 million
views in just eight hours.
The most shocking piece of
this phenomenon, however,
is Lil Nas X’s fair and
square,
joyous
attitude:
This man seems to take no
notice of the questions his
single raises about race,
genre, media, memes and
success.
In
interviews,
he simply basks in joy
without
acknowledging
his role in single-handedly
challenging
present-day
cultural associations. He’s
just a hip-haw cowboy,
humbly praising pioneers
like Young Thug and Lil Uzi
Vert. That bliss — that’s the
root of yee-haw energy.
—
Samantha
Cantie,
Daily Arts Writer
COLUMBIA RECORDS
One of my favorite things
to witness in the American
suburban expanse is ridiculous
buildings trying their best
to
incorporate
motifs
of
classical
architecture.
On
Eisenhower, in the south of
Ann Arbor, there’s a strip
mall that’s trying it’s best to
look like a fun-size imitation
of the Colosseum, except it’s
only a semicircle, and I don’t
think there are any Tropical
Smoothies in Rome. At this
faux façade, with its vehicular
arena of a parking lot, there is
a Tex-Mex fast-casual chain
called Moe’s Southwest Grill.
It’s objectively worse than
Panchero’s or Qdoba, but I like
it the best. I like it because it
reminds me of Clemson, South
Carolina, a then-small town
with a college a lot of my family
attended, home to a Moe’s
location I ate at when I was
eight or so. I was stupid then,
so I probably made my mom
order me a cheese quesadilla.
The multicolored plastic kid’s
cup with the big bendy straw
lodged in the lid similarly
lodged itself in my mind.
Why am I talking about
a
pretty
okay
fast
casual
southwestern
chain
for
a
Books piece in a B-Side themed
around the number three?
Truth be told, I don’t know. I
do know this is how my mind
jumps: Weird Roman rip-off
architecture to Moe’s to South
Carolina
to
the
Anderson
public library. There’s a Moe’s
in my Southern hometown
as there is a daunting library
that looks like a downsized
Parthenon (or at least it was
daunting to me when I was
eight and two stories equated
to about seven kid Cassies
stacked on top of each other).
I always left the library with
a book when my mom took me,
but I never read them there; my
time was happily spent logging
hours on the computers playing
Magic School bus point-and-
click games.
I do know that tenuous little
connections like this make up
my lifetime career and hobby
of reading and writing, from
its humble beginnings in South
Carolina to its radical new
changes in Germany to its
uncertain endings in Michigan.
I’ve lived in a trilogy of fixed
places in the never-ending
and incessantly moving series
of novels that is my life. I’ve
lived in a few more houses, but
three places. Two continents.
One girl who bided a lot of
her time alone, in the pages of
constructed worlds that were
always easier to follow than
real life.
In first grade I was put in
an accelerated reader program
because I smoked all the
measly excuses for chapter
books out of the water. Some
called me a gifted student, but
I know now that translates to
“gay and depressed by their
teenage years.” I remember
being
presented
with
the
challenge of tackling some
more advanced literature — in
this case, “The Chronicles of
Narnia” — and the next day
I came in proclaiming I was
already finished with “The
Horse and His Boy.” Never
mind the fact “The Horse and
His Boy” was the fifth book in
the series. I, with my advanced
tyke eyesight, had conquered
it.
I didn’t actually read the
book. I just sat in my bed and
stared really hard at a page for
30 seconds before flipping to
the next.
Cut to few years later and a
bunch of miles farther, and my
fifth-grade class was tasked
with writing a story for a
big assignment for the class.
Inspired by the worlds of Percy
Jackson and Charlie Bone,
my opus was about a group of
ragtag friends who get thrust
into a fantastical situation and
solve it with some ingenuity
and the power of staying true
to your heart, or something.
The gimmick with this story
was time travel, and the name?
“Back in Time.” A classic. I still
have it printed on now decade-
old paper if you want a signed
copy.
In fifth grade I was living
in Germany, and the school
library was up a set of stairs
from the fifth and fourth
grade hallway. It was the
highest point in the school,
its
atmosphere
airy
from
all the natural lighting the
surrounding windows allowed.
Almost every week I would
parse through its tight shelves,
looking for a title of “Horrible
Histories”
I
hadn’t
read
before. A lot of the historical
references were lost on me, but
I loved the pictures.
Walking up the stairs of the
North Hatcher Stacks doesn’t
fill me with that same brand
of childlike glee. I hardly walk
up them to check out a book, —
only to suffer. Writing is a lot
more involved now, and the
reading so tough that even if I
try to read a page it feels like
I’m back in first grade staring
at argle-bargle. Yet at least in
my sophomore year of college I
find myself trying to read and
write — more so than when I
first moved to Michigan.
Reading and writing was
always mindless fun in the
first two places I lived. In the
third, it used to be a taxing
chore. Fun was no longer to be
found. My energy spent trying
to make new friends or make
sense of this crazy new state
did often not see any reward,
so I forewent my traditional
pastimes for … nothing, really.
When I became aware that my
family was to leave Germany
soon, that we would have to
leave behind the life to which I
had practically just adjusted, a
spark died in me. Germany had
become a waste; things would
be better in Michigan, a fresh
start.
When things weren’t better
in eighth grade at a Michigan
Catholic
middle
school,
I
assured myself things would
be better in high school. A
fresher start.
They weren’t much better at
all.
Being
designated
an
accelerated reader back in first
grade meant I spent reading
time in a group separate from
the class. However, this group
consisted of me and me alone.
Perhaps this was the first time
I realized I was forever doomed
to the outside, never able to
pinpoint why I could never
quite fit in. Did I just need to
make more friends? Did I just
need to have a girlfriend? How
could I be normal?
Perhaps the answers to those
questions were found in the
childhood books I read, with
their
outsider
protagonists,
and they secretly lodged their
way into my mind. Only now
do I know I’m far from normal,
but I’m pretty cool with that.
At the end of the day I really
do love being a (beautiful)
transgender woman. I regret
a lot of things about my
childhood, primarily the fact
I’ll never have the girlhood I
always wanted, but there were
nuggets of good. Tiny, silly
memories that form the person
I am today. Scenes from the
trilogy of places that is my life.
I can’t rewrite my past, rip
it out like a page of a notebook
or chuck its Word document
in a digital trash bin. I sure as
hell can write my future, and
until I figure out exactly what
I want it to be, I’ll keep reading
to find out.
On the threefold literary
litany of my very own life
CASSANDRA MANSUETTI
Senior Arts Editor
RICK RIORDAN
PAULINE BYNES
B-SIDE: BOOKS
Movies are no stranger to
love triangles — “Twilight,”
“The
Princess
Bride”
and
“Pretty in Pink” all heavily
showcased the metaphorical
polygon. “Three to Tango,”
1999’s
spicy
Australian-
American romcom, joins the
ranks of movies that rely on
the problems of having three
people in a relationship.
The
triangle
can
be
a
gorgeously balanced shape —
three equal angles and three
equal sides all connected at
clean points. But rarely does
a love triangle ever emulate
the stability of an equilateral
triangle.
More
often
than
not, it resembles an isosceles
triangle with two longer sides
gripping for dear life on the
shorter, conflicted member
of
the
group,
sometimes
even
morphing
into
that
dreaded scalene triangle that
seemingly follows zero rules
of logic.
But there is some semblance
of thought behind a love
triangle or, at the very least,
an element of predictability.
“Three
to
Tango”
is
no
different. Characters end up
heartbroken and, in true rom-
com fashion, pouring their
heart out to the other in front
of a giant crowd at some fancy
gala in a big city.
Matthew
Perry
(“Fools
Rush In”) plays Oscar Novak,
essentially a Chandler Bing
who lives in Chicago whose
biggest worry is the fact that
he’s in love with his boss’s
mistress who also happens to
think he’s gay. Like I said, love
triangles are messy.
Amy
(Neve
Campbell,
“Skyscraper”)
and
Oscar
have the kind of meet-cute
we all want — Oscar, always
the hero, dramatically saves
Amy’s artwork and their first
encounter is a tense moment in
which everyone around them
falls away. It was magical. The
only cloud over the situation
and the real sticking point
of the movie is that Oscar’s
boss also happens to be Amy’s
protective
(Domineering?
Possessive?)
boyfriend,
Charles (Dylan McDermott,
“Perks of Being a Wallflower”).
Eventually, the relationships
evolve into the classic love
triangle tropes: Oscar is seen
as a “close” friend and Charles
is the enticing rich-boy. Amy
is stuck in the middle.
Part of the reason love
triangles work so well is
that drama is inherent —
the
minute
someone
feels
even a smidge of jealousy
or a character realizes their
feelings,
all
hell
breaks
loose. As Charles becomes
suspicious of Amy and Oscar’s
relationship, the only saving
grace is the fact that Charles
is convinced Oscar is gay. As
Oscar pines away for Amy, the
movie’s audience wishes for
more of Oscar’s work partner,
the man who is actually gay
and with better jokes to boot.
And, honestly, for how much I
wanted to hate Charles, Dylan
McDermott
is
a
gorgeous
human being with a smirk to
die for. Forget Matthew Perry
and a bumbling Oscar — give
me a Dylan McDermott who
doesn’t know he looks like an
actual Greek god.
Though “Three to Tango”
has an interesting premise, the
actual plot fails to age well.
The notion that Oscar and his
work partner are dating hangs
in the air with no one daring
to touch them. Characters
broach the subject unable to
even say the word — through
several
uncomfortable
moments in which secretaries
and
competing
coworkers
meet eyes and say the pair are
— you know — demonstrate
the uneasy attitude towards
the LGBTQ+ community that
was the norm in the 1990s.
Eventually, the movie wraps
up in the expected fashion:
Oscar and Amy get together
after a teary reunion in a
diner and it eventually comes
out that for all his confident
posturing with Amy, Charles
is, surprisingly, a sub in the
bedroom. It was the kind of
funny irony that the movie
lacked throughout.
“Three to Tango” didn’t add
anything new to the concept
of love triangles or romantic
comedies.
There
were
no
insights, no vampires and
an air of homophobia that’s
present in too many late ’90s/
early ’00s movies. And yet,
it’s still a charming romantic
comedy that, even if you
don’t love it, is easily enjoyed
ironically.
A plot as old as a triangle:
‘Three to Tango’ charms
EMMA CHANG
Senior Arts Editor
B-SIDE: FILM
Part of the reason love triangles work so well is that
drama is inherent — the minute someone feels even a
smidge of jealousy or a character realizes their feelings,
all hell breaks loose
b-side
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4B — Thursday, April 11, 2019