On occasion I’ve felt it necessary to mention in one of these Pick Your Poison intros the challenges that female pop stars and musicians face because of their gender. Being a non-musician male, I can’t fully relate to anything that these women have to deal with, however I feel the need to bring it up in an effort to encourage understanding and potentially create change. If you’re being harassed by people online who feel that the anonymity of the internet gives them the right to say anything they want, including making crude and sexually explicit comments to women, that is absolutely not okay. While I’m sure that Sky Ferreira has to deal with a whole lot of that online via Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and such, one of the stranger moments happened late last week when she appeared on a Brazilian TV show called “The Noite.” Host and comedian Danilo Gentili may not speak English very well, but I doubt that some of his questions to Ferreira through a translator were misinterpreted. He asked about the nudity on her album cover and whether people love her for her music or her body. And while Ferreira was a sport about it, things only got more awkward from there going into her history with Michael Jackson, a discussion about a “festival of crack” (notable because of her drug bust last fall) and her early days of singing opera. If you’d like to see the whole messy few minutes of it, here’s the full video. It’s easy to blame the situation on cultural differences and even Ferreira’s occasional awkwardness, but there’s a certain crudeness that sort of permeates through those excuses. I’ve been told by some Brazilians that this particular talk show she went on is notorious for this sort of disrespect, and that avoiding it would have been wise. It’s just discouraging that something like this exists at all, though considering they also have a festival of crack, maybe there are worse problems out there to deal with. Okay then, let’s get to today’s Pick Your Poison. There’s some great tracks in this set from Conveyor, Dorothy, Feather Beds, Sea Wolf, Sticky Fingers and The Verve Pipe. In the Soundcloud section after the jump, stream new songs from Busdriver (ft. Aesop Rock and Danny Brown), Jessie Ware, Mutual Benefit, The Proper Ornaments, Total Control and Warpaint (covering Duran Duran).
The Broken Needles – Bound to Fade
Cybass – Teasing Girl (ft. Sants)
Kodacrome – Strike the Gold (Luke Neher Remix)
Trippy Turtle – Trippy’s Theme
The Verve Pipe – Overboard
SOUNDCLOUD
Busdriver – Ego Death (ft. Aesop Rock & Danny Brown)
Jessie Ware – Tough Love
Mutual Benefit – Auburn Epitaphs
The Proper Ornaments – Magazine
Total Control – Glass
Warpaint – The Chaffeur (Duran Duran cover)