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Controversy sells
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by Hayley Foster
Eminem, Marilyn Manson, Madonna... If you take a look at the roll-call of bad girls and boys in music, there's no doubt about it - controversy sells. Hayley takes a look at musicians who have made a killing from breaking taboos...
Controversy - fierce argument or debate
Taboo - Prohibition resulting from religious or social conventions
Why is the combination of taboo and controversy in music so attractive to us? Madonna, Eminem and even Elvis Presley have caused controversy and sell records by the truckload. Millions buy the tabloids every day to read tales of scandal. With the exception of certain religions, most people would agree they like to hear about the breaking of some taboo - whether it's neighbourly gossip, a major court trial or a music video that causes such upheaval that campaigns are instigated to get it removed from our screens.
Ah, Elvis Presley, for instance! He might seem plain and boring (No! Say it isn't true! - Mooky Eds) but in the 50s and 60s his pelvis-swinging ways were considered a terrible sexual influence on lusting young girls! And that was just the fifties - as time progresses we're seeing increasing controversy in musical culture as the taboos being broken become more and more extreme.
Take Madonna... At first she was a rising starlet, with some great tunes you could dance to at the local clubs. Then "Like A Prayer" came out and, the video was to be featured in a Pepsi advert. But it featured such heresies as burning crosses and Madonna sleeping with a black Jesus, so Pepsi pulled the ad after the Christian church deemed it blasphemous. The surrounding controversy was probably what caused such a huge number of copies to be sold. Then there was the famous Sex book, where Madonna posed naked with men, women and animals. Or the Erotica album - full of steamy songs, deemed unfit for public release on account of being too sexy for her millions of young fans. Madonna has, during her career, been considered as taboo-breaking and controversial as they bet - but (or maybe 'and so') she's one of the biggest selling female artists of all time.
And let's not forget Frankie Goes to Hollywood, which rose to fame around the same period. The group's debut single "Relax" was famously banned by the BBC while at number six in the charts, and subsequently topped the UK singles chart for five consecutive weeks, going on to enjoy prolonged chart success throughout 1984 and ultimately becoming the seventh best-selling UK single of all time (as of May 2006). The single went to number one precisely because it was banned. And why was the single banned? Because DJ Mike Read was playing the single live on air quite happily, when he suddenly the front cover design (by Yvonne Gilbert), depicting a man and woman pressed against each other, back to back, with clothed upper bodies but bared buttocks, and including a sex-oriented quote from the song's lyrics. This prompted him to listen more intently to the words, and his reaction was such that he apparently removed the disc from the turntable live on air, branding it "disgusting". Hurrah!
One of the latest additions to our controversial music scene is Eminem. The white rapper from Detroit. His first album was declared homophobic and disgraceful. In his songs, he not only sings about making spice girls pregnant and children knowing what a clitoris is but about killing his wife Kim. He was also involved with an argument with his mother, who was distressed when he implied she smoked more weed than he does on his single "My Name Is". Yet this bad boy rapper has sold millions... So perhaps he put it best in his more recent hit "Without Me" when he says "We all need a little controversy".
Oh, and the list goes on... take Tatu, the girl band who kissed while wearing schoolgirl uniforms in their debut single. It was declared that the video would attract paedophiles, even though the two girls were past the age of consent. However, more revelations have recently come to light. Their manager suggested in an interview that he finds underage sex exciting and also openly smokes drugs in front of the girl's young fans. It's still not really known if the girls are in fact lesbians. But the Tatu-Taboo controversy does definitely seem to be a cheap marketing tool brainstormed by their perverted manager.
You want more of a roll-call? Marilyn Manson is a goth but has fanned the flames of Christian extremist anger with his 'satanic' ways. They don't like his lyrics as he often questions the existence of God and, when he does suggest God might exist, paints God as a nasty figure. One lyric is "What about our guns? God? The Government?" His shows have also been blasted as he wears outrageous outfits, either revealing (sexual taboo) or based on priest's attire (religious taboo).
All these musician are popular and sell a lot of records. Yep, controversy sells. Cause churches or other social groups to frown, and you'll get a reaction. The most common reaction is that you'll hugely boost your sales.
I like controversy because it shows attitude and individualism and I'm sure this is what attracts many other people to it. Yes, it may upset some people, but I don't think people have raped God or killed their girlfriends or shared lesbian kisses because of Marilyn Manson, Eminem or Tatu. Don't listen if you don't like it. I'm not saying people shouldn't express their opinions, as we are all entitled to opinions, but they don't need to campaign against it.
Then again - if the controversy stops, maybe we wouldn't enjoy it so much! So express your opinion! Argue your case! We all need a little controversy!
Want to write for our music blog? We're about community effort here at Mookychick and want to hear from you! Email mookychick @ yahoo.co.uk
About the author
Hayley Foster lives in the UK and has her own riot grrl internet radio show, Pigtails and Army Boots. By day she works as a floral assistant in a supermarket, but come Sunday she's a rock chick dj - DJ Moonlight Phoenix! Hayley is also a regular activist for both animal rights and environmental issues.
