"In Defense of Ultragrrrl"

The Voice's Tricia Romano does the best job of trying to explain the Ultragrrrl phenomenon I've seen so far: In Defense of Ultragrrrl

I don't think Sarah is definable or explainable, and that's what makes people who don't know her uncomfortable with her. They don't know what to do with her or how to label her or how to become like her, because it's impossible: Sarah was born Sarah. And that drives some people nuts.

(This is long so I'm putting it after the jump.)

I'm not going to say that her "haters" are wrong 100% of the time (it will be many years before we'll know if MCR is as important as Nirvana, for example. Gulp.), but ALL of them, 100% of them, don't understand that what they're criticizing isn't the point, isn't her point, at all. It fills me with glee to see these frustrated wannabe serious music writers complaining about her writing or the fact that the girl can neither spell nor locate a spellcheck button to save her life, because I know that SHE DOES NOT CARE, she's just trying to share the music she loves. I've never met a person who was so authentically herself as Sarah, and even her detractors (and I know of very few who have actually met her), if pressed, will admit that the girl has got a gift for something, even if they can't say what it is (and it's not, as the lone on-the-record detractor, Jason Gross said "self-promotion". Sarah is more open to offers of publicity than others but it's because she's promoting her bands, not herself. I have never known her to go out and seek publicity -- publicity comes to her.)

What Sarah is (and the article touches on this, sort of) is fearless in a way that makes people acutely aware of their own insecurities (myself included, though, since I know her, I find it inspiring rather than discomfiting). And she should be inspiring! Here is a girl who has used her gifts and talents (and she does clearly have talent, despite what she says in the article) in exactly the right way, in a surprising industry.

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about generosity and how everything I admire in people comes down to a form of it, and everything I don't like in people (smugness, bragginess, etc) is a form of being un-generous. Curiosity is a form of generosity, for example.  And Sarah is, inarguably (ask anyone), one of the most generous people in the world and I'm NOT BEING FACETIOUS. It comes completely naturally to her. And I think her success comes directly from that quality -- when she likes something, she wants to share it with everyone. She wants to help people. Imagine that: someone in the music industry who isn't trying to make and hoard money, who is trying to share and help people. It's totally understandable that that would be misunderstood or mistrusted. But, like I said, she doesn't care. She's living her dream (and despite what you would think, that dream is not fame). My favorite part of the article was this:

"I find comfort in the fact that people who actually do know me like me a lot."

I'm glad Sarah knows that's true, and isn't afraid to say it.

Comments

[martha]

You know her much better than I do, but I just wanted to say that you've hit the cliched nail on the head. She's fearless and amazing and that's pretty great. And everything is not what it is about.

[epg]

I wrote a profile (that I should have had published by jumping on the Blum Columbia j-school student train) on her last year and she was great. For years in reading her blog I couldn't come to a conclusion about her, but after listening to how she got from A to B I grew to like and respect her. Plus I love anyone who hugs people without remembering who they are.

[Alec Schweikert]

"Sarah is more open to offers of publicity than others but it's because she's promoting her bands, not herself."

Really? Because people sure as hell aren't talking about her bands, based on this article. If I was a band on her label, I'd ask myself, "Why is the person who runs our label on the cover of the Village Voice, and the most we can get is a sidebar review? Is there something wrong with this picture?"

[rpg]

"Plus I love anyone who hugs people without remembering who they are."

Hysterical.

[lindsay]

Alec: you do make a good point. When I wrote and posted this I was unaware that this would be the cover story and such a huge deal. One could argue that anything she does publicity-wise helps her bands on some level, though (look at hip hop label-runners). I mean this in the least underminer way possible: anyone missing the fear of being called a self-promoter (or who has the ability to swallow or dismiss that fear) is going to do very well no matter what. It's not going out on a limb to say the self-promotion 'gene' is the biggest single predictor of success in America at this moment in history. And if I were in a band, I would want the founder of my label to have that gene, no question.