Tag Archives: Britney Spears

Nancy Afiouny: My Meow – Lebanon’s Lady Gaga/Britney Spears/Other Pop Trash Wannabe

It seems the concept of beauty queen wannabes, models, actresses, etc… wanting to become singers is still selling to some overly wealthy producer like hotcakes.

How about having a former beauty queen contestent, an actress and a model all together in one package? I’m sure the producer who paid for Nancy Afiouny’s foray into the singing world must have thought he hit a gold mine. And what’s more, this actress/beauty queen/model was willing to take it off in her music video in a region where the word conservative would be considered a gross understatement for its sociological description.

In all honesty, I have no problem in watching a video like this, as long as the music behind the video is actually decent enough. Who would mind something like this actually. Don’t start the whole feminist “women stereotyping, sexual image using, etc…” talk. If the women don’t want it, it doesn’t happen. But with horrible pronunciation, obvious Lady Gaga antiques and an atrocious song to top it all off, Nancy Afiouny is just horrid.

I’m not criticizing the overly suggestive music video. In fact, I think this uptight region needs more liberal arts to let it loose a little. After all, the Salafis and the Ikhwans are scoring major wins in Egypt’s recent elections. The Islamists have already won in Tunisia and Morocco. God knows they need to let loose a bit.

But when it comes to Lady Gaga, her music videos have always had – whether you like the song or not – something to back them up musically. Her music videos and music are definitely over the board but they work for her. Lady Gaga however doesn’t work as a costume for Nancy Afiouny – not even Britney Spears or any other pop star/trash for that matter.

Perhaps miss Afiouny is giving the world a gift for St. Barbra’s day this weekend. That kitty costume would sure get lots of horny Islamist men to go meow before they start shouting: “BLASPHEMY.”

As for my ears, they’re still bleeding. The stray cat outside is still meowing in pain.

Proceed at your own risk:

The Rapture

It’s already May 22nd in some parts of the world, meaning the day the world should have ended has passed with nothing happening.

So let us recap about what some of us did today: got up, missed breakfast, went online for a bit, met up with friends, had lunch, got bored through afternoon, came up with Saturday night plans, executed those plans, got back home and now you’re on the verge of sleeping. Pretty uneventful end of world day, no?

How many end of world days did/will we have in our lifetime? We’ve had Y2K, May 21st 2011, and the Mayan calendar ending on December 21st, 2012. That’s a lot of world-ending dates, don’t you think?

The main problem with this rapture balderdash is that some people take it way too seriously, making it their job to come up with meaningless dates. I do not like to take scripture literally. I do not believe that God will descend someday and literally “save” everyone. Why? simply because the point of Scripture is not to make you believe in the end of days but rather to give you a way of life until that day comes, be it in your lifetime or some other time.  Therefore, this whole talk about analysis of scripture (regardless of what scripture it is) to come up with a failed date of when that’s supposed to happen is, for lack of better word, stupid.

Honestly, if anyone thinks the world ending will happen in our lifetime, they’re seriously delusional. I hate to break it to you people but in the grander scheme of things, we (and I do mean all of us) are irrelevant. How so? In a hundred years from now, even the brightest people among us, will have their legacy either disproved, or lightly used. Some people’s memories do survive into several generations but those are exceptions. Who of us knows anything about their great grandfather? I barely know anything about my grandfather who passed away a couple of years before I was even born.

The world will end someday. It is a scientific certainty. But the world is still young. There’s plenty of room to grow as well as destroy. You might think the current worldwide political situation (weapons race and whatnot) is bad, but if you look at the whole picture, it’s rather silly. No one will use those weapons of mass destruction against another country because, simply, no one has the guts to do so – even the countries that fake almighty strength.

I’m positive as well that each century has had its series of rapture dates. After all, it has been a constant pursuit for man to reach some sort of conclusion and what better conclusion to be reached than to the most puzzling question of our existence: what lies after?

So until the world ends, which is a time when we, our children, their children, their children’s children (I can keep going here) are dead, I don’t think we should be dancing as Britney Spears would say, but rather, maybe we should lessen focus on the development of weapons and maybe on ways to preserve the planet we call home, at least let us enjoy the natural wealth we have, until it all goes away.

Carrie Underwood Going Viral

Who knew that the person that would be taking YouTube by storm these days would not be Justin Bieber or Lady Gaga or Britney Spears… but Carrie Underwood.

Showing everyone that you don’t need legions of teenagers and sexed up music to get the attention of the masses, she has gone in the totally opposite direction: gospel music.

Carrie’s first video to be considered a viral success was her duet with Steven Tyler at the ACMs on the Aerosmith song “Walk This Way”.

Becoming the top video in music on YouTube for a few day and also topping out the most watched videos lists in many countries around the world, “Walk This Way” stands in less than three weeks at more than 4 million hits.

And for those that might say the only reason Walk This Way became viral was the presence of Steven Tyler, Carrie indirectly replied with a breathtaking performance of How Great Thou Art.

Not only did she blow everyone away with her voice but her performance has actually reached the masses with the video currently standing at a little less than 2 million hits, a mere four days after her performance. How Great Thou Art is a gospel song, praising God… and it is sung in a divine way and people want to listen to it. Maybe other artists should take note?

Moreover, Carrie is now the #1 trending topic on Yahoo!, fueled by the growing popularity of her How Great Thou Art performance.

Read the Yahoo! article here.

A singer’s job is to sing, not to show skin in order to get attention. People are beginning to call Carrie Underwood this generation’s best vocalist. And that is not something to take lightly. She has no way to go but up… and as the pop masses would say: Get it, Carrie!

Born This Way – Lady Gaga


Listen to Lady Gaga’s new single here:

Lady Gaga – Born This Way by gagadaily

Get the song on iTunes now.

My thoughts on the song:

After a few listens, it catches on. But that’s how it’s always been with me and Gaga’s songs. The only instantaneous ones were “Poker Face” and “Bad Romance”.

The lyrics are pretty great. I do not agree with those saying that this is a gay anthem. Sure, some parts of the lyrics can be interpreted that way but they can also symbolize any struggling person. The song is an empowering anthem to everyone who has ever felt teased or bullied, regardless of race or sexual orientation.

I understand that Lady Gaga is considered an icon for the gay community. But this doesn’t mean that a song about embracing who you are is directed at that community, exclusively. Many people struggle with their identity in this world where the media paints a certain identity that we should all follow. This song tells us that whoever we are is just enough because that’s the way God made us. The beauty of music in general is that it transcends cultural boundaries. I am Lebanese and find that the part where she references me describes what my country and I go through on almost daily basis.

Now, leaving the philosophical interpretations alone, I have to say that I actually felt that a slower tempo would have given the song more justice. After reading the lyrics, and regardless of what had been said that this would be an uptempo, I thought the best way to represent those lyrics would be on a piano. Lady Gaga does very good renditions of her songs acoustically so maybe she’ll start off her Grammy performance like that on Sunday?

Regardless of what I personally think of the song, it has already hit #1 in the iTunes store of 23 countries. It has broken Britney Spears’ record for first-day radio spins in the United States. The only thing that’s sure is that Lady Gaga is nowhere near done. You might like it, you might hate it… either way, you are living with it.