Ashlee utilizes deliberate cognitive dissonance

[koganbot]

"Little Miss Obsessive" (Track Five on Bittersweet World):

It's like a fairy tale without a happy ending
But then again maybe we are just pretending
Why does it have to be so unfair?
Tell me that you care

"Ragdoll" (Track Six on Bittersweet World):

I've been thrown
Round once or twice
Beneath it all
Was born to fight
I hear your voice in my head
And it's killin' me
I've never been a fan of
Happy endings

Btw, the chorus on "Little Miss Obsessive" has excellent lyrics, the way she keeps working different variations on the meaning of "over" (as Dave points out, it is after all a song about being obsessive), and then "desperate" and "obssessive" and "possessive" all pile up one on another, with "over" reasserting itself at the end.

And I guess we're really over, come over, I'm not over it
And I guess we're really over, so come over, I'm not over it
Late night you make me feel like I'm desperate
I'm not desperate, oh
A little bit possessive, Little Miss Obsessive can't get over it, no

Also, her using consecutive stressed syllables on "Late night you make me feel like I'm desperate" helps it sound desperate.

My favorite Bittersweet one-liner so far:

I gave you my sky before I found my ground
(from "No Time For Tears")

Stanza that gets away with using the phrase "unicorns and fairy wings":

Feels like I'm in Candyland
I'm going down da chute again
With unicorns and fairy wings
I think I've had too much to drink
(from "Hot Stuff")

Ashlee doing her impression of a bird flying with one wing
--That clip of "Little Miss Obsessive" on Leno 4/28/08 is now gone: here's the same performance but a very poor rip:

Watch on YouTube

Comments

[edgeofwhatever.livejournal.com]

Are you sure it's deliberate?

[koganbot]

No, not sure.

But I think "Obsessive" is narrated by Ashlee and "Ragdoll" by Vicky, so the two different attitudes to happy endings highlight the difference (though the lyric writer on one isn't necessarily thinking of the lyrics on the other [I'm guessing it's Ashlee who penned those lines, but as always I don't know which writer contributed what]). In any event, the dissonance might as well be deliberate.

I still think that Ashlee+Kara+John+Shelly gave us a good deal more vividness and psychosocial detail than I'm getting from Ashlee+whomever on this album (and it might be Ashlee all alone on the lyrics at this point). "Never Dream Alone" is charming and skillful in its simplicity, but nonetheless it's pretty much a teen girl's love poem, and my guess is that that one's all Ashlee. But I'm liking this album more the more I hear it. I think Ashlee really knows what she's doing as a singer, her phrasing and the tones she's going for, even if she needs a studio to do it. And as I said on another thread, Jim Beanz as producer of the vocals on this album and a lot of Blackout and Welcome To The Dollhouse is obviously a valuable fellow.

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

Yes, an especially Katy Rose moment on a generally Katy Rose song! ("Hot Stuff," that is.)

The Candyland Drinking Game

[(Anonymous)]

Chutes and ladders make her sick, too. Some of her lyrics seem pretty Stones-y; no wonder you like them. I myself enjoy her Terpsichorean moments, a la SNL. Frank, have you seen my blogspot blogs? They are bgmltr, bugmelter, and bugmelater. They are primarily Youtube swipes. Perhaps I'll start a metric blog (bugmyliter)...

(AKinCLE)

Re: The Candyland Drinking Game

[koganbot]

Yes Andrew, she's Stones reminiscent, Dylan reminiscent, Carole King reminiscent, though I used to draw those parallels more before I figured out that she's actually Ashlee reminiscent.

Have you ever heard of a band called Platinum Weird? Put out a fake old album and recorded but didn't release a genuine new one.

I'll look for the blogs.

Re: The Candyland Drinking Game

[(Anonymous)]

She's Ashlee-reminiscent? As Chico Marx would (did) say, "He thinks I look alike."

AK

Re: The Candyland Drinking Game

[koganbot]

But some would argue that Ashlee no longer looks alike!

[weasel-seeker.livejournal.com]

While we're on cognitive dissonance, I was just randomly listening to Skye's Girl Like Me (bonus track from Sound Soldier) to hear this gem of line:

Baby, what you get is what you see / and this is what you get with a girl like me

Amusing, if only because the first time I heard Skye in like...2005?...when I was brushing her off as one of the post-Avril crowd, was Tangled Up in Me:

I'm the girl you never get just quite what you see

While I definitely don't think this is deliberate in the least (Skye's lyrical choices aren't usually deliberate per se), it was worth a chuckle.