BEYONCÉ PART 3: AMERICAN ICON (with Yale University's Dr. Daphne A. Brooks)
Pop Pantheon
DJ Louie XIV
4.7 • 630 Ratings
🗓️ 28 July 2022
⏱️ 110 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Part 3/4! Beyoncé’s latest solo album, Renaissance, drops on July 29th so to get everyone prepared, Pop Pantheon will be releasing a series of four episodes on the work and legacy of Queen Bey, each with a different guest!
In our third installment, DJ Louie is joined by author of Liner Notes for the Revolution: The Intellectual Life of Black Feminist Sound, Yale University’s Dr. Daphne A. Brooks, to discuss the latest decade of Beyoncé’s solo career. Louie and Dr. Brooks begin with the quagmire that pop stars- and particularly black female pop stars- face as they enter their mid 30s in the fickle, ageist pop cultural landscape and how various icons of the genre like Aretha Franklin, Diana Ross, Tina Turner and Janet Jackson have re-engaged audiences during this period of their lives and careers. They then discuss Beyoncé’s culturally transformative 2013 self-titled 5th studio album, how the surprise release and inclusion of visual components for each song solved the problem of finding a hit single, created a singular shared cultural experience, and forever changed the way pop stars would release music, the rich musical textures which filtered black musical tradition through mordern electro-R&B, and the ways in which this record depended Beyoncé’s artistry and self-revelation, as well as her feminism and activism. They then unpack her 2016 single “Formation”, its confrontational video and performance at the 2016 Super Bowl, and how the song functions as both a call to action and certified rump shaker for the ages, before diving into her masterwork of that same year, her sixth album, the audiovisual magnum opus Lemonade. Louie and Dr. Brooks break down how Lemonade reimagined the feminist ideal of the “personal as political”, using Beyoncé’s own story of domestic disruption to narrate a broader story about American history, how it effectively reclaimed genres like rock ‘n roll and country for Black women, and the innovative ways Beyoncé mined her own pain to radically heal herself, her marriage, her people and the nation through this project. Finally, Louie and Dr. Brooks dive into Beyonce’s latest three side projects, 2018’s collaboration with Jay-Z Everything is Love, 2019’s live concert film Homecoming and 2020’s Lion King companion-piece Black is King, all of which have helped enrich and deepen her artistry and activism and served as a victory lap for her storied career and what, when we look back on it in 50 years or more, Beyoncé’s enduring legacy will be as the greatest and most important pop figure of the 21st century thus far.
Stay tuned for next week’s installment, in which we’ll be giving first reactions to Beyoncé’s new record Renaissance, her seventh studio album and first in over six years!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Pop Pantheon, the podcast where we completely over-analyze all of your favorite |
| 0:15.7 | pop stars and then rank them in the official Pop Pantheon. |
| 0:19.7 | This is your host, DJ Louis XIV. |
| 0:22.2 | And this, of course, is part three of our four-part series on the Queen Bee herself, Beyonce. |
| 0:29.0 | But before we get to that, a few housekeeping tasks that I will keep very short. |
| 0:33.5 | The first is the next gorgeous, gorgeous, my queer pop party that I DJ in downtown Los Angeles |
| 0:39.3 | is happening on August 12th. |
| 0:42.3 | That's a Friday at Resident. |
| 0:44.3 | This is an indoor outdoor venue, so if you like to hang out outside instead of coming inside, you can still do that. |
| 0:49.3 | It's so much fun. |
| 0:50.3 | It's me playing pop hits all night. |
| 0:52.3 | You guys have heard me talk about this a billion times. |
| 0:59.2 | So I'd love to see you there. Please come introduce yourself to me if you do come. Tickets are cheap. |
| 1:04.9 | The link to buy them is in the show notes of this episode. And I will also post them conveniently for this transition on our social media channels, which are Pop Pantheon Pod on Instagram and |
| 1:09.5 | and DJ L-O-U-I-E-X-I-V on both Instagram and |
| 1:14.1 | Twitter. |
| 1:14.9 | So follow at those locations for info on Gorgeous Gorgeous, which is happening again on Friday, |
| 1:20.2 | August 12th, and of course, just for other fun Pop Pantheon-related stuff, including games and |
| 1:26.7 | clues and gossip and fun interactive things. So look forward to |
| 1:34.2 | seeing you guys at Gorgeous, gorgeous, and also on social media. Please continue to rate and review |
| 1:39.1 | Pop Pantheon on Apple Podcasts and wherever else you guys listen to podcast really helps the show. |
| 1:45.1 | I will get back to reading some of my favorite reviews of which there are some |
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