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Winning Entry into Afrocentric Fantasy
Marlon James chats about “Black Leopard, Red Wolf”
BY NICHOLAS BOSTON
New York Live Arts, on
February 3, hosted this
season’s last installment
of its well-received series
“Bill Chats,” featuring an open conversation
between NYLA artistic
director and acclaimed choreographer
Bill T. Jones and award-winning
fi ction writer Marlon James.
James, a Jamaican-born Brooklyn
resident who teaches literature
at Macalester College in St. Paul,
Minnesota, has authored four novels,
including “A Brief History of
Seven Killings,” winner of the 2015
Man Booker Prize, and “Black
Leopard, Red Wolf,” an epic fantasy
novel set in Africa that James has
described, in a now famous quote,
as an “African ‘Game of Thrones.’”
“Reading your work, I’m always
amazed,” Jones said. “My God,
this guy really knows pop culture,
and Americanpop culture! Why is
that?”
“Well, because I am not American,”
replied James, 49, who is
tall, bearded, dreadlocked, and
➤ MARLON JAMES, continued on p.33
➤ KESHA, from p.XX
Kesha, who sang soulful ballads
about her personal experience.
While it was much less popular
than “Animal,” “Rainbow” got
taken far more seriously by music
critics. (The 10th anniversary of
“Animal” at the start of this month
led to some reappraisals.) One reason
was a change of style. Instead
of dance-pop-rap suggesting the
Black Eyed Peas on a reality show
soundtrack, she picked up an
acoustic guitar and came closer to
Dolly Parton.
Even in 2010, the limits of
Ke$ha’s vision of empowerment
were pretty obvious. She fl ipped
the objectifi cation of women in hair
metal (a style she explored on her
second album) and hip-hop on its
head, comparing herself to P. Diddy
and singing “Ain’t got a care in
Bill T. Jones and Marlon James in conversation on February 3.
the world, but got plenty of beer…
And now the dudes are linin’ up
’cause they hear we got swagger/
But we kick ’em to the curb unless
they look like Mick Jagger.”
But her 2012 single “Die Young”
quickly fell down the charts when
the Sandy Hook massacre took
place, and she admitted that she
was uncomfortable with its lyrics,
saying she was forced to sing
them. (She participates in an
orgy with men and women underneath
a pentagram as upsidedown
crosses fl ash onscreen in its
moralist-baiting video.) The phoniness
and darker undercurrents of
her bragging about casual sex and
partying are clearer now that we
know how much they were shaped
by an abusive man.
“Rainbow” could be seen as a
rejection of Kesha’s past. She said
that it was a more personal endeavor
than her fi rst two albums.
But “High Road” makes a partial
return to her early hedonism.
“Hymn” reached out to kids alienated
by organized religion; here,
the gospel-infl uenced “Raising
Hell” deepens it by declaring “can I
get an amen/ this is for the misfi ts
of creation,” with a feature from gay
rapper Big Freedia. In the music
video, she plays a televangelist who
murders her abusive husband.
The album brings together the
two sides of her personality. The
opening moments of the fi rst song,
“Tonight,” suggest “Rainbow Pt. 2,”
as it begins as a piano ballad. But
it then leads into a slowed-down
voice saying “bitch, we going out
tonight.” It returns to the old Kesha
style, as she starts rapping,
over distorted bass, about getting
drunk and dancing. With this
song, the promise of this album
IAN DOUGLAS/ NEW YORK LIVE ARTS
comes through: she’s retconning
her early music with full control.
The album has a few missteps.
“Kinky” sings the praises of
polyamory and casual sex, complete
with a spoken intro where
Kesha calls herself Kinky Spice,
but it reminds me of Madonna’s
early ‘90s attempts to use sex for
shock value. Gay singer/ songwriter
Wrabel duets with her on “BFF,”
an ode to friendship between men
and women that falls into sentimentality
despite the raunchiness
of some of its details.
However, “Resentment,” on which
Wrabel returns alongside Brian
Wilson and Sturgill Simpson, is
the album’s most moving ballad.
The horn-driven “Potato Song (Cuz
I Want To),” is its most musically
adventurous song, bringing out
➤ KESHA, continued on p.33
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