Fiona Apple is my real guilty pleasure

I have a lot of guilty pleasures. My Chemical Romance and Gilmore Girls are two that I've talked about before to a lot of people. One I don't think I've discussed at length to anyone is Fiona Apple. The thing about Fiona Apple that makes her, probably, my most guilty pleasure is her legitimacy. A lot of other guilty pleasures, like campy movies (by far the most acceptable form of "guilty pleasure," to the extent that it shouldn't even really be considered one), ABBA, or Food Network can be justified in various ways. MCR hearkens back to my emo or Smashing Pumpkins days. ABBA is a derivative of my Stephin Merritt fetish and is ridiculous/outlandish enough to be acceptable. Food Network is utilitarian.

I should have no real connection with Fiona Apple's music. It's undeniably effeminate in more profound and robust ways than MCR or ABBA. She has little to no indie cred; her first album was probably her most popular and came out when she was 19 or something. There's really no reason why I should like her. That's why it makes no sense - there is no justification. For all my other guilty pleasures, there's some sort of 'out' - a reason why I like it. That doesn't exist for Fiona Apple.

Yeah, I mean there's the basic truth that the music is incredible. Tidal, beyond its 1996-esque cred, has about eight really, really good songs. The other albums get a bit more experimental, and that's even better. Her lyrics, also, are some of the very few outside of hip-hop that I actually listen to and care about. But beyond that, as far as image is concerned, there's no justification.

Wait a sec, here's a classic fall-back criterion to vindicate me - she's hot. I'd be all circa-1999-P.T. Anderson with her. I just wish she would come out with more than one fucking album a decade.

Fiona Apple |MTV Music

"Sleep to Dream" is probably the hottest Fiona track ever. You should listen to the drums from the first few seconds on at least mp3; this video fucks them up.

Fiona Apple |MTV Music

"Fast As You Can" is a latter-day Fiona banger that you might not have checked out.

Fiona Apple |MTV Music

A Fiona ballad; I wasn't able to get the video for any of the songs I really like from Extraordinary Machine. This song is pretty good too, though.

Gay marriage amendments

First of all, don't get me wrong, I don't think that state constitutions should be amended as to restrict marriage between a man and a woman. But I just have to say that the protests that are going on right now probably would have been much more useful before election day. Intuitively, it seems that picketers are much less likely to influence the adjudicative process than the democratic process.

I am also uncomfortable with protesting outside of churches also from a strategic and moral standpoint. Scapegoating the LDS while ignoring the larger causes for the amendments' passage is shortsighted and leads to hatred. LDS make up less than 2% of the population in California and even less in Florida (though more in Arizona). Not only do the protests directed at LDS not help change public opinion, but they could easily degenerate into another form of the same bigotry that amendment opponents justly decry.

One Beat is the perfect combination of fury, melody, nostalgia, charm, and coolness

There are definitely "better" Sleater-Kinney albums.  However, as much as I love the earlier S-K ones (and I love them a lot), One Beat puts it all together. 

Purists decry the pristine production.  (reluctant to make a terrible pun here)  One Beat lacks the rough edges of earlier work, but these girls aren't street punks and they really never were, regardless of the posturing on Dig Me Out.  After all, it took just six months for Carrie to retreat from Berkeley. 

As ever, the original bass-less band, the backbone of (you better wise up) Janet Weiss, the many-headed-hyrda singing technique and mad hooks form the structure, but an unabashed tunefulness pervades the album, where that other tracks merely alluded to it.  Before they went completely into The Woods, they embraced their stealth-metal edge, tempered by a very Puget Sound dash of indie.  

It doesn't hurt that:

• I'm utterly enamored of Carrie Brownstein.
• The album was released at a fun time of my life and is closely associated with good memories.
• S-K was never prone to embarrassment, so even this one, which definitely reaches further than any before it, resonates without being goofy.
• Nobody lingers like your hands on my heart and...
• Sympathy is a killer final track.