We Got the Music and the Message: Punk Rock Alignment Chart
Posted: January 26, 2012 Filed under: Geek, Music | Tags: alignment chart, Iggy and the Stooges, Jim Carroll, New York Dolls, Patti Smith, punk rock, Richard Hell and the Voidoids, Sex Pistols, The Clash, The Ramones, X-Ray Spex Leave a comment »
Click through for a larger version, if you’re having trouble.
I look back over the charts I’ve made and, oddly enough, all of them have to do with music. I think it’s because a lot of the nerdy shit I have an encyclopedic knowledge of is kind of morally straightforward: do we really need an X-Men chart delineating moral alignment when half the characters already roll with the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants? Anyway, next time I’ll try to mix things up.
ALIGNMENT CHART: Pop
Posted: November 9, 2011 Filed under: Geek, Music, Popcult | Tags: alignment chart, Beyoncé, Bieber, Black Eyed Peas, Chris Brown, Coldplay, Katy Perry, Ke$ha, Pink, Rebecca Black Leave a comment »
A few notes on this one:
1) I tried to stay 2011-ish, but I used earlier lyrics or images if I thought they fit better. It’s more like 2009-11, which is admittedly several geological eras in the lifespan of pop music.
2) Originally had Cee-Lo in the Chaotic Good spot, but I ultimately I decided singing accusations of mental illness and passive-agressive attacks on your ex-girlfriend probably moves you closer to neutral. I did, however, resist recoloring that square pink.
3) Beiber’s position is provisional, depending how the baby-daddy allegations play out. Personally I still think he’s secretly an attractive 20-something lesbian. The Onion has disturbing evidence in support of another theory, however.
4) Mr. West and Ms. Gaga have been omitted, but only because their alignment has already been exhaustively covered.
5) Chris Brown, man. Fuck that guy.
Alignment Chart: Bowie
Posted: September 29, 2011 Filed under: Geek, Internets, Music | Tags: "Heroes", alignment chart, Always Crashing in the Same Car, Bowie, Future Legend, Jean Genie, Magic Dance, Modern Love, Space Oddity, Starman, The Man Who Sold the World, the sexy Leave a comment »
I’d give the Thin White Duke as “chaotic neutral” rating overall: too many identities to consider “lawful”, and his “gotta make way for the homo superior” youth-oriented optimism is counter-balanced by drug-fueled paranoid fantasies. Plus he was the Goblin King. Bowie cannot be constrained by your earthling morality.
Further adventures with this meme can be found here.
Alignment Chart Week: Lady Gaga
Posted: September 9, 2011 Filed under: Geek, Internets, Music, Popcult | Tags: Alejandro, alignment chart, Bad Romance, Born This Way, Edge of Glory, in the biblical sense I am beyond repentence fame hooker prostitute wench, Judas, Just Dance, Lady Gaga, Paparazzi, Telephone, You and I 1 Comment »
Considering the entirety of her body of work I’d put Gaga in the “Chaotic Good” sector. That’s it for this week. I had a lot of fun with this though, so you might (will) see more, with subjects TBD (high school musical YUHSSS).
Alignment Chart Week: Indie Rock
Posted: September 7, 2011 Filed under: Geek, Internets, Music, Popcult | Tags: alignment chart, Drive-By Truckers, Fucked Up, in the garage where I belong no one hears me sing this song, Indie rock, Los Campesinos!, Love is All, the Decemberists, the Hold Steady, the National, Titus Andronicus, TV on the Radio Leave a comment »
Alignment Chart Week: Kanye West
Posted: September 6, 2011 Filed under: Geek, Internets, Music, Popcult | Tags: alignment chart, I'm startin' to feel like a dungeon dragon, Kanye, shameless nerdery, white boy talks about hip hop 1 Comment »I have played Dungeons and Dragons precisely once, in college, with members of my sketch comedy group. It was a pretty silly game, all inside jokes and non sequiturs and swearing: a wizard showed up and we’d be like OH FUCK IT’S A WIZARD. I never played D and D in high school. No one I knew was into it and besides, I had videogames, I had an escape from reality that was more consuming and required even less social contact. I think D and D would have been good for me.
But one of the silly quirks of the game is the “alignment” system, by which a characters moral standing is calculated along two axes: “Good” versus “Evil” and “Chaotic” versus “Lawful.” Good and evil are pretty straightforward, especially in a fantasy setting where literal orcs battle literal hobbits non-copyright infringing halflings. It’s the division between lawful and chaotic that makes things interesting. A guy who plays by the rules isn’t necessarily a hero, he could be a by-the-book hardass, or an honorbound demon lord. Chaos isn’t necessarily evil. It allows additional complexity. Exactly one additional dimension of complexity, but two is better than one, yes?
There’s a memey thing on the internet where you line up particular characters or personalities or entertainments according to this system. (Mighty God King has some really clever ones.) I enjoy thinking about the moral implications of popular culture, and as an obsessive-compulsive I <3 putting things into arbitrary boxes. So I decided to try my hand at making a few myself.
Click through for a giant version. Upon consideration, including careful analysis of the recent Jay-Z collaboration “Watch the Throne,” I’d put Mr. West’s body of work as a whole into the “Lawful Evil” category. But feel free to argue! That’s what makes this foolishness fun!
TOMORROW: Things get a little more… indie rock.
