I'm Wesley Morris and this is

Cannonball today

Put your paws up

It's a dark time in this country right now.

And weirdly also a dark time in pop, maybe even for Taylor Swift.

But that's a different conversation for a different episode.

And don't worry, I might do it.

But seriously, darkness, death, blood, skulls, bones, a sharp knife, sharp teeth.

As far as a certain class of pop singers concerned right now, it's all Carrie in pig's blood

and Gladys from weapons.

Chapel Rhone.

She likes these gothic baby doll killer get-ups.

I mean, I at least have seen live in concert Charlie XX do this thing where she spits

and then licks her spit back up during a set.

Doge Cat just went on S&L and the vibe was real Beetlejuice horror picture show.

Even Sabrina Carpenter, who is not somebody I associate with this moment of dark pop,

I have seen her with the occasional severed lip.

But you know whose children these little monsters are?

Lady Gaga's.

The woman perfected the performance of dark weirdo. She seemed to figure out

how to take the entire life cycle of a pop star from birth to crypt and turn it into something

really interesting and disturbing and special. But she's also been hard to figure out after a certain point, at least for me.

...