Lip Gloss
- What is the song basically saying about how to live a good life?
The song is basically saying that physical possessions, such as Lip Gloss, make you popular and happy. Therefore, it implies that having expensive or nice possessions will make you happy, more popular, and that it will make your life “good”.
- What lyrics particularly speak to that perspective?
To support the message that possessions make you more popular, the song says “My lip gloss is cool, All the boys keep jockin’, And chase me after school”. This basically says that she is suddenly desirable because of her lip gloss. There are also multiple lyrics throughout the song that talk about how she is suddenly popular and all the girls now want to be her, implying that she now has a “good” life. She then says (in regards to her lip gloss): “I be lovin’ it, I be, I be lovin it”.
- How do the video images support, re-orient, or challenge the dominant theme of the lyrics?
In the beginning of the video, when Lil’ Mama is doubting herself and talking about how she wants to be popular, she is wearing a plain black jacket with a plain black hat. Then, after applying her lip gloss, she is wearing hip clothes, with no signs of anything bland or plain. This is interesting because she is now happy and cool, just because of her wardrobe change and lip gloss.
- What else do you notice that’s interesting? Look for internal contradictions, aspects of the message that resonate with other messages from pop culture, points that connect to your own perspective, etc.
What I find interesting is that the lyrics essentially say that nobody knows anything about this girl, other than that she has nice lip gloss. The lyrics “What you know ‘bout me? What you, what you know, Is that my lip gloss is cool, my lip be poppin’”. That explicitly states the superficiality of the relationships she has with her classmates. The video also starts with her in a car, saying that she “just wants to be part of the cool crowd” and feels she “doesn’t have what it takes”. This adds to the message the song gives out, in that the lip gloss makes her suddenly cool and popular. An interesting note though, is that very quietly, at the end of the video, her mother says “It wasn’t the lip gloss, it was you all along.” Lil’ Mama however quickly covers this up by saying “I know, but wow”, which defeats the purpose of that line even being there. That one lline by her mom contradicts Lil’ Mama’s entire song, so obviously Lil’ Mama is going to cover it up and imply that it was the lip gloss.
7 comments:
Henry- I would have never have thought/ caught how she says how no body even knows her but like her regardless just because she has nice clothes. I had not caught the line where she says no one knows anything about her but they still like her. When you listen to the song you just pass over that and only hear how her lip gloss is cool. Though the message was obvious how possessions make you have a good life.
henry,
i like ur analysis of the video, because i wouldn't think that that is what the video is portraying. but after reading your analysis, i realize that what you are saying is correct. you dont know anything about Lil' Mama, accept the fact that she has pretty lipgloss and that makes everyone like her. good point =)
-Rachel
Henry- I thought it was interesting what you said about the end, how no body really knows anything about her besides her lip gloss. The analysis that you have is very clear what the message was that possessions are important to having a good life.
-Yu Xi
your answer to number 4 was very good. i never even noticed that on the last part Lil mama was trying to cover up the message that would otherwise contradict her song completely. However I felt you could have said way more in question 1. you could have stated some of the things you said in the other questions, for example your answer to number 2 kind of hints at the main idea of the video so i thought you could have put it in question 1.
I think you had some good insight when you said that she started the video wearing all black clothes and really wouldn't stand out among a crowd, and with her lip gloss on, her outfit suddenly changed to the eye catching purple and white outfit with her jewelry sparkling. It really casts a new light on the subtleties of the video's superficiality.
I liked your analysis, I think it important that when we analyze these songs we get passed our bias of "this song is really annoying an pointless" and get to what the artists try to say. I'd like to take your analysis a bit further and ask when she says "what you know bout me ..." that does imply that in the popular crowd they don't care about "her" as a person, my question is "Does she mind? does she care that people don't really know her? does this outweigh the joy of popularity?"
I agree with yo how before she had the lip gloss everything was dark and sad and then she got lip gloss and everything got better and more colorful.
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