ABI MARIN
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The Rival @ AU
Social Media Strategist, @TheRivalAU
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PRE-SHOW
When I got asked if I wanted to go to a concert on a Monday night of a Swedish artist I’d never heard of at a venue that took an hour to get to, I jumped at the chance.
In my pre-concert research, I learned that Tove Styrke’s claim to fame is that she has opened for Katy Perry and Lorde, and that was immediately apparent the second she walked on stage. The stage was filled with white roses and glitter, and she walked out in a sparkly tulle two piece (which my notes later were called “glitter pirate chic”), a pair of leather pants, graphic red eyeshadow, and a pair of Yeezy lookalikes. The white roses started pulsating with blue lights like a strobe light, and my exact note was “oh we at Coachella huh”.
On the other hand, opener Au/Ra is the lovechild of Marina and the Diamonds if she took herself more seriously and Halsey if she didn’t take herself as seriously with the album covers of an 8-year-old who loves anime and just learned how to use Microsoft Paint. I don’t want to come down too hard on the girl, because when she walked off the stage and passed me, I realized she was quite literally 4’11” in platform shoes and looked both 15 years old and 35 at the same time (she’s actually 16).
Upon getting there, I got carded by a girl with a mullet who looked younger than I was, and walked into a room decorated like a haunted house’s idea of a vampire’s lair. Black walls, busts of random people in Victorian collars and Beethoven-style wigs above the liquor at the bar, and old english font logos plastered against the walls.
Nonetheless, I walked in at 7:45 for an 8pm show, and there were maybe 20 people in the whole venue, including the staff. One concertgoer was leaned against the wall, quite literally reading a physical copy of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I stood in the corner by the stage, next to a bored parent wearing a scowl whose daughter came up to him approximately 85 times before the opening act started to tell him how excited she was. I saw him watching football clips on his phone the next time I looked over.
AU/RA
I was told to take no flash photography for the first three songs of each set, which struck me as odd, but what was even weirder was that she performed the first song in the dark. When the lights came on, I could see she had hip-length blue hair, pale skin, and was wearing a black jumpsuit set, a floor-length green embroidered robe, and what looked like those Balenciaga dad-shoes that everyone was talking about 3 months ago.
I was also struck by the way she held the microphone--like the way you would hold a piece of moldy bread to smell if it had gone bad or not, and then decided that you most definitely shouldn’t eat it. She enunciated like she was the Welcome to my Kitchen vine, and I had never seen so many hand movements in a stage performance in my life.
All of her songs, while with the cringy titles of “Drake” (a song whose chorus is I tried to find Drake on PlayStation/but he must have been on vacation, which she taught the audience before the song started and promptly regretted it), “Junk Food”, and the aforementioned “Emoji”, are a bit on the nose, yet were all great and had the whole room dancing. And while I may be embarrassed if anyone ever looked at the cover art of the songs I’ve been listening to on Spotify, her songs were incredibly well-written and constructed and have been stuck in my head all week.
I was left wondering why there was no fog machine for her thirty-minute Stevie Nicks impersonation, which was ultimately a missed opportunity. She was lighthearted and extremely excited the whole performance, and didn’t take herself too seriously at all. Maybe she should have though. I mean, she has a song called “Emoji” that, while a bop, is called Emoji. I thought she was saying “emotion” or “in motion” the whole time, which are not even arguably better titles. They just are.
My favorite songs were definitely:
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“Panic Room”, where the exact note I took in my phone is “It’s being sped up @ the end???? Oh we at a RAVE rave???”
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“Outsiders” that went harder than any song I’d heard at any concert ever
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“Kicks” which was the only acoustic song of the set and was catchy enough that I caught myself humming it in the shower this morning
Ultimately, every song was a bop and I felt like I was in a trance. Next.
TOVE STYRKE
After a short break, where I noticed that suddenly that the venue had filled up with a mix of teenagers and single young professionals and gay couples in their early-to-mid-thirties, a glitter-covered boa was added to the microphone and I instantly knew I was in for a ride.
I have never seen a more energetic performance. Tove never stopped jumping or running or kicking around the stage for every song, every break, every note and every breath. She had the audience completely captivated from start to finish in the way only a true artist can - diehard fans in the front, the parents whose excited daughters had brought them there, even the staff was getting into it.
The best songs of the night were undoubtedly:
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“Say My Name” interspersed with roundhouse kicks at each drum hit
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“Borderline”, with an intro that sounded strangely similar to Nelly’s “Just A Dream”
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“Million Pieces”, a funky synth-lead song that sounded like if Madonna was actually foreign
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The highlight of the night was when she covered Lorde’s “Liability”, where the isolated vocals she created left an eerie, unsettling feeling that retained all the emotion of the original while giving her own unique electronic twist
Tove Styrke is as if Dua Lipa, Ariana Grande, and Tove Lo had a musical baby with the backtracks of the 1975’s Self-Titled era, and her high notes sounded like if Billie Eilish was in The Cranberries. She was beyond grateful, tearing up as she thanked the audience for making her dreams a reality, wiping her tears away with a sparkly boa, and handing out red roses into the audience as the backtrack played of her last song, her most recent single “Sway”.
Her performance was high-energy, visually and musically exciting, and emotional. Tove Styrke is definitely one to keep on your radar--she’s got the spunk of a rockstar, and she’s on the edge of something great.
FINAL THOUGHTS
In the words of a concertgoer leaving the venue: “It was a little overwhelming to have so many bops at once.” I have to agree; a rave on a Monday night is never a good idea -- unless it’s a Tove Styrke concert that’s over by 10pm. 10/10 recommend.
Raves for Single Young Professionals 101: Tove Styrke and Au/Ra's Sway Tour 2018
Coursework
Pop Culture
Grade: 99%
"Pop Culture" is a course I took for my major in Communication Studies focusing on analyzing the biggest aspects of today's pop culture phenomena. From movies to music to cultural events, this course seeks to figure out what makes something a touchstone in today's oversaturated media landscape.
Here is a question I answered for my midterm wherein I analyzed the impact of Lil Nas X's 2019 smash hit "Old Town Road" and what it meant in terms of his identity as a Gen Z, a black man, a member of the LGBTQ+ community, and as a southerner.
Lil Nas X’s Old Town Road is one of the most significant cultural touchstones to hit our society in a long time. I’d never heard anything like it, and it seems that the country agrees with me - it’s the longest-running number 1 on the Billboard Top 100, winner of two Grammys, and the top-streamed song of 2019. It has countless iterations featuring Young Thug, BTS, Diplo, the yodeling Walmart kid, and more, but the original remix features Billy Ray Cyrus. The juxtaposition of a country legend with a young newcomer is a once-in-a-lifetime collaboration that shook everyone to their core when they realized how great it was. Not only is it a masterclass in Internet culture, but it teaches us about the racism in the music industry, the cultural shift in long-held beliefs about genre, and what it means to be a hit.
Old Town Road is about finding your roots, what it means to be a part of Generation Z, and being sad. While upon first glance, the song just seems like a fun take on cowboy culture and rap tropes, at its core, it is so much deeper. Lil Nas X, the stage name for Atlanta teenager Montero Hill, was a 19-year-old Gen-Z’er from Atlanta sleeping on his sister’s floor when he wrote the song. Smithsonian Magazine notes that it’s about all of the tropes that we see in rap or trap music today in a completely different way. Hill does a 360 on those ideas by singing about them through the lens of being a gay southern gentleman. By singing these things over a country beat, he’s blending together all of his identities at once. The idea of being black, gay, a “Gen Z”, and southern are all explored through beats, and lyrics such as “ridin’ on a tractor/lean all in my bladder” and “cowboy hat from Gucci/Wrangler on my booty”. Through these lines, he’s showing the foil of being both country and rap, or being both southern and black. He also talks about the commodification of our culture and rap culture specifically by shouting out a Gucci cowboy hat, which Gucci has never made. The song takes on the idea of the “black yeehaw agenda”, in which a lot of black artists are getting interested in the country aesthetic (Vox), and what it means to be black in the American South. Hill’s song brings together all of his identities and notes that while he doesn’t feel like he necessarily fits in, he’ll just make his own lane.
The supergroup of people that came together to create Old Town Road seem like the most unlikely of underdogs. The beat is by Dutch producer Young Kio, who admitted to New York Times’ “Diary of a Song” that he made the beat in his bedroom. The song itself is created by an Atlanta teen with the stage name of Lil Nas X, a nod to his rap idol of Nas (who actually jumped on a remix of the song in early 2020), and prominently features country singer Billy Ray Cyrus. The combination of these unlikely friends made it so that pretty much everyone loved it - from elementary school children singing it in viral videos, to me dancing to it in my room, to videos of parents and grandparents singing along to it in the car. It was pushed through a combination of memes, Tik Toks, and Twitter - Hill himself “meme’d the hell out of it” (NYT) the second it dropped, posting tweets promoting the link to his SoundCloud along with funny videos of the popular video game Red Ded Redemption and the song being used in popular memes. It was then used in videos of comedy influencers on Twitter, who then started using the song on TikTok, which spawned “Yee-Haw Challenge” where participants drink a glass of water, realize it was “yee-haw juice”, and transform into a cowboy while dancing to the song (Vox). The introduction of the song to TikTok gave it its virality, and that’s when it shot onto the charts.
Old Town Road defied genre and brought about a discussion about race, the music “establishment”, and what it means to be an artist in 2019. Due to its popularity, Billboard placed the song on its country charts in March 2019 (Smithsonian). As quickly as it popped up on the charts, it was taken down, due to the argument that it was “not country enough”. Yet the decision provoked controversy, given that white country artists like Florida Georgia Line and Luke Bryan have been introducing more rap and hip-hop elements to their “traditional” country sound recently. However, Lil Nas X admitted that he did not want to be placed in one box. Other artists have recently spoken out about the hypocrisy of the “establishment” and the often racist stance it takes in issues of genre and how it sees the overall shift in the music industry. Artist Tyler, the Creator was quoted during the 2020 Grammys that he hated the use of the word “urban” in place of hip hop/R&B, and that he thinks it’s the “politically correct way for them to say the n-word”. Hill’s blend of country and trap showcase his own identity and the cultural gatekeepers tried to keep it out of the industry’s eye because it didn’t fit into their predetermined way of doing things.
Protecting the Creative Class
Grade: 98%
"Protecting the Creative Class" is a course I took for my minor in Business & Entertainment focusing on the intersections of econmics and creativity - what makes a space creative? Why do people choose to live and work there? What can we do to ensure this creative hub stays creative?
Here is a speech I wrote for an assignment focusing on the importance of creativity in today's society.
My name is Abi Roberts and I grew up in a bedroom community of New York City called Fairfield, Connecticut, where I lived for 18 years. There, in the town of Fairfield, I learned what it was like to be a part of a community. I learned from my neighbors that turned into my best friends and confidants what it meant to be a friend. I learned from my teachers in the public schools I went to what it meant to be an educated civilian, taking classes in civics and history to become a better citizen, in Spanish to become a global citizen, and in math and science to become a more analytical citizen. I learned from my walks down the Post Road what it meant to be an acquaintance, watching people help their fellow citizens in car accidents and emergencies or helping elderly person cross the street. But what I learned most from this sleepy little town was what it meant to be a community, what it meant to come together and support one another, and the place where I learned this was at the aptly named Community Theatre.
At the Community Theatre, I saw a place where people came together to support. I saw film festivals promoting local filmmakers and writers, I saw art exhibits promoting local artists, I saw concerts promoting local bands and local schools, and I saw people, young and old, embracing our hometown pride. Fairfield is a town of 65,000 people, a town with a rich history, strong work ethic and education standard, and a town overabundant with culture. The Theatre is a place that brings joy to each and every person in this town, a place where we have all watched a movie, caught a show, or simply sat on the steps as we watched the busy traffic of Unqua Street. Its parking lot, Gazebo, and venue itself has hosted the annual Christmas Tree Lighting, Hanukkah Festival, Fairfield Pride Day Events, high school Mock Crashes, Fairfield Community Band practices, Fairfield County Children's’ Choir Performances, and Fairfield Day Festivals for years. No matter the season, the town never ceases to create magic in such a little space, a place where memories have been created for generations since its inception in 1921. The Community Theatre is the heart and soul of all of that, and if it were to be knocked down or bought out by a big company, Fairfield would lose its most precious gem.
I can remember being a little sixth grader walking down from the middle school with my grade to be able to watch educational movies and performances from my fellow Fairfield residents--people that truly cared about my cultural and informational education. Without this, I fear future generations of Fairfield Public School students won’t be able to have these crucial learning experiences, ones that shaped my early memories and gave me lessons I will never cease to forget. Without a space to be able to hold such events funded by the town, for the town, I fear we will lose what makes Fairfield so incredibly special - a place that fosters creativity like no other.
The Community Theatre is not only a historical landmark and a hometown staple, it is a place that fosters love, acceptance, and a place for people to come together to support one another. So, I’m pleading you, members of the Fairfield board of trustees and First Selectmen, preserve the community nature of the Community Theatre, preserve what makes Fairfield so special, preserve the breath of life that the theatre breathes into our community. Without this incredibly special place, that has unfortunately been left dormant for the past five years along with the 1,500 jobs it has left open, Fairfield has lost its cultural touch. I read an article the other day from the Fairfield Center for the Arts that summed it up best - without this space, Fairfield will be just another suburban town in America. The Community Theatre is the thread that holds this town together - culturally, spiritually, and educationally. Without this special place, we will not have what makes this town so unique, and what makes me and the 65,000 other members of this community love this town so much. If its iconic nature and community and economic benefits don’t prove to be enough, think of what you are depriving future generations of - love, acceptance, and a rich cultural, creative education that is simply unparalleled. As a native of Fairfield, a proud graduate of Fairfield Ludlowe High School, and as both a performer and spectator of the stage of the Community Theatre from time to time, I speak for everyone when I say this gem is worth polishing. Thank you.
Live Social Media
The 17th Annual Pacific House Gala for the Homeless
I was approached to do social media for the 17th Annual Pacific House Gala for the Homeless, an annual gala for a local men's homeless shelter in Stamford, Connecticut. Before the gala, I created buzz and thanked sponsors and donors, and during the gala, I did a Twitter and Facebook Live video, as well as live-tweeting and posting photos and videos on Facebook, as well as adding to the event's Facebook story. Here are some examples of the tweets, pictures, and videos I produced:
