Why do you have to go and make things so complicated?

Beardman — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 10:43:06 -0800

I like to gripe about Top 40 radio, but I don't have much of a technical music vocabulary. Are there names for the vocal styles of Avril Lavigne, Taylor Swift, et al.? Recently I found myself trying to articulate the particular way that these singers deliver lines, and I quickly ended up using unsatisfactory phenomenological language to describe it ("they, um, kind of curl their words in this irritating way...and it's kind of nasal and groany...does anybody know what I'm talking about?").

It got me thinking that I'd like to know more about the technical names for the vocal styles that are commonly used in the music they tend to play at my gym, in the grocery store, and so on. Avril and Taylor were the first to come to mind, but I'm interested in all of it, including, say, that heaving, ogre-ish singing in Nickelback. So: is there any go-to resource for this kind of information, or any informed criticism you can point me to? Or is it really as ineffable as my poor attempts to describe Avril Lavigne would suggest?

(Note: I realize that the most obvious thing to say about vocals in contemporary Top 40 is that they're autotuned to hell and back, but I'm asking about the styles of singing, not vocal production. So the fact that Nickelback typically builds a wall of sound out of vocal overdubs alone isn't what I'm after.)

How can I learn to love my looks?

Anonymous — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 06:56:16 -0800

How can I learn to love my looks? I am 32 years old and single. I’m 5 ft 1”, kind of miniature all over compared to other people, and slim in a rounded way (I’ve never been waiflike and don’t think I could be.) I’m extremely self-conscious about my looks to the point whereby I’m letting them get in the way of living.

I have only had one relationship, which lasted four years, from the age of 18. We lived together, but he wanted an open relationship as he told me he liked my personality, but not my looks. Before I met him, I had always thought of myself as average, and I can’t remember feeling inadequate about my looks beforehand. He was extremely charismatic, and I was hooked on his personality, so I agreed. A bevy of beauties (tall, slim, lovely facial features) paraded through our house at regular intervals.

He said that my breasts weren’t the best or worst he’d seen and my body was below average. When I lost my virginity to him he told me that one day I’d know what true passion felt like, because the experience wasn’t real sex. On the train, he would ask that I sit opposite him and not beside him, so that people didn’t think we were a couple. He wouldn’t hold my hand in public, as he said he felt like a paedophile because of my height. One day he told me he was going out with someone else and from that point on he would not acknowledge me in the street.

Shortly afterwards, I answered a flatmate ad, and moved into a house full of attractive women. I have never been a girly-girl, or hung around them before, so it was eye opening. However because I was different the women put me down about my looks, claiming I didn’t look after myself -- one girl had laser surgery for freckles on her décolletage while another took three hours to dress before going to the supermarket -- and the men who visited the house ignored me. When I went out with the women, men only spoke to me in order to speak to them. I was stunned to observe how much better some men treat good-looking women, as I hadn’t realised this was the case. I moved out as soon as I could afford to.

In the years since, I have tried “faking” that I’m happy with my looks, and most people don’t know how bad I feel about them. I have tried to be stylish to make up for them, which has gone someway to my feeling better about myself (I have also put a great deal of effort into doing interesting things in order to be interesting, and learning as much about humanity and philosophical aesthetics as I can.)

However throughout my twenties I never had sex sober, and I feel incredibly uncomfortable and fearful when a man looks at my face intimately. I push anyone away who wants to get close to me, and if men want to see me again after a one-night stand, I ignore them. Any guy who tries to pick me up is in, and I’m scared of good looking or charismatic men.

Recently, my mother told me I wasn’t pretty, after letting it slip in a conversation. I have never thought of myself as pretty, but she went on to say that I should “flirt with my intellect” as I would look silly flirting with my body. I don’t tend to flirt at all unless I'm drunk, as I feel like I might look vulgar, in a circus-freak kind of way. I stopped drinking completely nearly a year ago, when I also stopped having sex. I have never been asked on a date (I was teased about my looks in high school by the boys) or courted, and a part of me longs to be but fears I'm not special enough. I tried online dating, but the three men I met with weren’t interested in me after the first date, and my profile gathered dust.

Today I got my hair cut, and the woman cut so much off that my face is very visible, which I can’t deal with as I have very visible skin pigmentation marks on one side. I freaked, and after taking numerous digital photos to see what I looked like (I photograph myself most days to check but it only confuses me in different light as I don’t know what the truth is) I covered all the mirrors in my apartment. I feel filled with fear and dread at the thought of going to work with my new haircut, and it’s really brought home the fact that I can’t deal with my looks, and it’s holding me back.

I’ve tried to tell people how I feel about my looks, including therapists whom I saw for depression years ago, but I’ve been told I’m fishing for compliments or it’s a symptom of depression. But I’m not depressed, and it’s still with me, years later.

How can I learn to love my looks?

E:learningtolovemylooks@googlemail.com

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