Not a joke, just a sad state of affairs.
http://www.bohemian.com/citysound/?p=7181
Catching up on this thread...
I watched all of those videos. Obviously "Friday" stands out. So yeah, I'm not sure if I have a soul left. I was completely prepared to enjoy them, and if not enjoy them maybe be amused, but instead I find myself depressed... and it takes a lot to make me depressed.
Remember when people were shooting down Avril Lavigne's debut album? Holy crap, that is a masterpiece compared to this. At least Avril was sincere, and honestly I feel much better now about genuinely liking some of her songs. In the same way that Michael Pollan talks about "edible food-like substances," we need to call this a music-like substance. What disturbs me most is the soullessness of it. Not the soullessness in Rebecca Black's face, necessarily, or even the soullessness of the whole arrangement—it's the soullessness of the song/video itself. The whole vacuous fun/party theme has ruled pop music for at least several years now. I thought Lady Gaga and Kesha were the logical extremes of that... but no, it's this. When her ultra-nasal voice sings "fun fun fun fun" through that forced-at-gunpoint smile, I honestly want to start crying. The most fascinating part is that they seemed intent on culturally transplanting her into some sort of synthetic pseudo-ghetto, wherein 13 year old rich white girls say "my friend is by my right, eyyy" and "we so excited, we so excited, we gonna have a ball today." Also see: Kesha. (Seriously though, was cultural appropriation ever so blatant? And why is no one talking about this?)