Tasty vs. PCD vs. Dangerously in Love REVEAL DAY 3

After finishing the hack job that Dangerously in Love started and even broke some kneecaps on the other two albums, Unintentionally RATESist welcomes you to Day 3/the Finale of the Tasty vs. PCD vs. poor little tink tink.

To refill your cups of Earl Grey, here's the Top 10 vying for not only a place on the podium [Top 3] but also the title of WINNER of the rate:

Tasty: Trick Me, Keep It Down, Flashback, Protect My Heart, Stick Up & Glow


PCD: Beep, Stickwitu, Buttons & Wait a Minute


Now the time has come for a bit of a cull of the wild...

10. Kelis - Glow (feat. Raphael Saadiq): 10 Kelis can handle very mature R&B/crossover pop and Saadiq’s production here works very well on the album.

9. Kelis - Stick Up: 10 easily the best non-single cut on the album. Contemporary for the time of release but also very stark and almost lo-fi for something with the “urban pop” label to it. Kelis usually sounds great on tracks where she can exude power in some type of “I got you”/allegiance manner.

8. Kelis - Protect My Heart: 10 the production is pert near immaculate and Kelis’ delivery can make an admittedly tacky sounding chorus sound so heartfelt.

7. Pussycat Dolls - Wait A Minute: 10 when Timbaland ruled the world of production, this was one of his crowning achievements. Years later, it holds up very well while also recalling the magical time of the mid-00s.

6. Pussycat Dolls - Buttons: 10 the solo…the PCD only edit I mean…or the version you’re expecting with Snoop Dogg, this song kicks so much ass and if you don’t have a stripper routine to this, you’re not human.



Breaking the Top 5 is...
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5. Kelis - Keep It Down: 10 easily one of the most unique songs to a pop diva’s name. Guitar and a touch of rock is one of Kelis’ greatest assets as very few black women in major label pop explores rock elements at all despite Tina Turner being the face of Rock and Roll.

Oh look a 2 on 2 match. See what happens when I rate good albums? Now onto to the part that should hurt...

Narrowly missing the podium is...
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4. Pussycat Dolls - Beep: 10 one of the few things will.i.am has done right and in all honesty is the best pop song to The Pussycat Dolls’ name. The beep itself is used really well and is oh so cheeky in the best way.

Say hi to the podium, Stickwitu, Trick Me and Flashback...

Now on to the top results...

Tasty vs. PCD vs. Dangerously in Love REVEAL DAY 2

After butchering Dangerously in Love worse than the producers did, Unintentionally RATESist welcomes you all to Day 2 of the Tasty vs. PCD vs. Dangerously in Love rate reveal. Today we ax #20 - 11 and reveal the Top 10 for Day 3.

Here's what's vying for the Top 10 of the rate:

Dangerously in Love: The Closer I Get To You, Crazy in Love, Baby Boy, Naughty Girl and Me, Myself & I.

PCD: Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go, How Many Times, How Many Lies, Buttons, Don't Cha, Stickwitu, Beep and Wait a Minute


Tasty: Trick Me, Milkshake, Keep it Down, Flashback, Protect My Heart, Glow, Rolling Through the Hood and Stick Up

First thing's first, that last score of 6 before we get into acceptable material scores...

20. Beyonce - The Closer I Get To You (duet with Luther Vandross): 6 generous scoring because at least Luther sounded invested on this.

We break into the 7 scores and above so these cuts are gonna hurt only a little...starting with a meh cover...

19. Pussycat Dolls - Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go: 7 not that covering this song is a sin, but the Dolls try to split the difference between Gloria Gaynor’s original version and the Soft Cell cover and just end up proving “SOS” by Rihanna did this immensely better.

18. Kelis - Rolling Through The Hood: 8 in a way, I can’t stand the Kaleidoscope throwback sound but I can understand why this track exists on Tasty. It shows that despite the direction of Tasty, The Neptunes and Kelis are a natural match.

17. Kelis - Milkshake: 8 Kelis’ biggest hit in the U.S. and lead single for the album. Sure, its mythos of “Awesomely Bad” on VH1, Making the Band routine montage, immortal stripper anthem status is impressive. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; there are better Kelis songs in existence but hey…

Surely this Beyonce song is Top 10, right? Bitch, bye...

16. Crazy In Love (Feat. Jay-Z): 8 hate me later, but especially up against other Beyonce songs, this one does not hold its own. Sure it launched Beyonce but this is nowhere near her greatest or in her Top 40 or Top 50 songs ever made.

Breaking the Top 15 is a song performed better on TV...

15. Pussycat Dolls - How Many Times, How Many Lies: 8 Nicole’s technique is great but her lack of emotive abilities works against her. Plus, Girlicious proved what it could sound like with more than one vocalist on it which brings about Diane Warren’s immense songwriting talent.

Now we get into the 10s that aren't quite up to snuff for the Top 10...starting off with...

14. Beyonce - Baby Boy (Feat. Sean Paul): 10 ages well in its own right even if it has the makings of “2004 as fuck” written all over it. Sean Paul feels essential and Beyonce was on fire vocally.

13. Beyonce - Naughty Girl: 10 this is how you interpolate Donna Summer PROPERLY, PUSSYCAT DOLLS. Of the singles from the album, this is one that doesn’t get enough love.

Bey isn't gonna get tanked at the #12 spot...that's for...

12. Pussycat Dolls - Don’t Cha: 10 while this is a signature track, exemplified stripper anthem realness, there are better Pussycat Dolls tracks but this song still slays.

Losing out on Day 2 at #11...let's see...we have 10 spots...6 for Kelis, 4 for Pussycat Dolls...
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and none for Beyonce...

11. Beyonce - Me, Myself and I: 10 vocally, this is Beyonce’s strongest and most emotive effort on this album. Beautifully sung and showed off her immense control.

Yes, that means in a stunning decision, not one track from Dangerously in Love made the Top 10. I have a very good reason for that: her album is fucking awful.

Dangerously in Love: 4.9

I've always thought of Beyonce's debut being her worst and having listened through it I now know why. The shit presented before her at large is just that; shit. Beyonce did manage to show off her control on tracks worth a damn, but the album’s biggest problem is how much of it reads as “Destiny’s Child first drafts”. Thankfully, the saying from horseshit comes flowers came true for Beyonce as her subsequent albums have managed to be largely listenable [even Lemonade if I can get past the crappy poetry and poorly marketed single choices.]

The TOP 10

Tasty: Trick Me, Keep It Down, Flashback, Protect My Heart, Stick Up & Glow

PCD: Beep, Stickwitu, Buttons and Wait a Minute

See how Day 3 unfolds when it gets posted.

Tasty vs. PCD vs. Dangerously in Love REVEAL DAY 1

Well damn, that was quick. 42 songs ain't shit to get through. Welcome to the first Unintentionally RATESist rate reveal of Tasty vs. PCD vs. Dangerously in Love. Today we reveal #42 to #21 because I have a desire to pert near massacre the worst album in this lot.

The structure is as follows: the dead last loser, the song in last place is revealed followed by every low score until we get to the highest for the day. Using the 0-10 scale and one score of 11 to reign supreme over all, I'm pleased and amazed only two songs garnered a 0. Singles outrank album cuts unless the single blows/album cut is better. If some songs have the same score and look tied, believe me; I can rank them properly even if they have the same score.

Let's get to taking out the trash for most of Day 1. First thing's first, the DEAD LAST LOSER came between a bad cover and a bad song from Dangerously in Love...well at least one of them. Which sucks more?

DEAD LAST LOSER

42. Pussycat Dolls - Feelin’ Good: 0 the cover that won’t fucking die. In PCD world, this Nina Simone song is apparently a torchy/intimate/soft lighting burlesque number. It makes sense, but this cover sucks.

narrowly escaping DLL status is...

41. Beyonce - Daddy: 0 JESUS this is one of the worst ways to close an album.

now for the rest of the trash of Day 1 starting off with a terrible single choice...

40. Kelis - Millionaire (feat. Andre 3000): 1 The 3rd single from the album and all I have to say is…really? It’s not the first collaboration between Kelis and Andre but this one proves that it doesn’t work at all. There’s such a clash between the levels of funk/weirdness between the two of them. It’s actually quite unpleasant mixed in with the twinkly beat.

39. Pussycat Dolls - Flirt: 1 what the fuck is this half-assed Avril level demo “punk” pop? I don’t know but apparently, it’s up to snuff on a Pussycat Dolls album.

38. Pussycat Dolls - Hot Stuff (I Want You Back): 1 a surefire way to piss me off is to fuck up a DONNA SUMMER sample/inadvertent tribute. This isn’t their worst song but JESUS FUCK I hate this song.

37. Beyonce - Signs (Feat. Missy Elliott): 1 get this Eurovision attempt at a Zodiac themed song the fuck out of my presence.

36. Beyonce - Speechless: 1 I’m Speechless how the fuck I can hate a song at six minutes when I’m a fan of “Rocket”…oh wait, “Rocket” is actually good.

35. Beyonce - That's How You Like It (Feat. Jay-Z): 1 this is tripe, weak shit.

Now to break into the scores of 3 or higher but still largely trash section of the rate, starting off with...

34. Beyonce - Be With You: 3 sweet sentiment but this song is mostly made of suck.

33. Pussycat Dolls - We Went As Far As We Felt Like Going: 3 Less Pussycat Dolls for an album and more an audition for the Sex and the City movie soundtrack. It makes sense to close the album…I think.

32. Pussycat Dolls - I Don’t Need A Man: 4 less self-empowerment anthem and more of a glorified Kotex or feminine hygiene product jingle.

31. Kelis - Attention (feat. Raphael Saadiq): 4 on a Raphael Saadiq album, this would make sense. On Tasty, this is kind of a sore thumb especially considering Kelis’ vocals aren’t complimented well on this track.

Unintentionally RATESist: Tasty vs. PCD vs. Dangerously in Love

A series using my rejected ideas for popheads album rates [and rates I've never submitted alike], scoring them and revealing my results in the style of 3 day rate reveals.

First thing's first, the series has a name. Welcome to Unintentionally RATESist and kicking off the series is a rate between Kelis' 3rd album Tasty, The Pussycat Dolls' debut album PCD and Beyonce's debut, Dangerously in Love...better known as...

For this rate I'll be using the standard edition of Kelis and Beyonce's albums with 13 and 14 tracks respectively ["Intro" is omitted as is "Beyonce interlude"] and the revised edition of The Pussycat Dolls' album which clocks in at 15 tracks. 42 tracks total which shouldn't be a complete pain in the ass to pull off.

What has these albums pitted against each other is that each of them contains at least one quintessential piece of urban labeled pop glory that makes people think they can be strippers.

Here's what's being rated:

Tasty
Trick Me
Milkshake
Keep It Down
In Public (feat. Nas)
Flashback
Protect My Heart
Millionaire (feat. Andre 3000)
Glow (feat. Raphael Saadiq)
Sugar Honey Iced Tea
Attention (feat. Raphael Saadiq)
Rolling Through The Hood
Stick Up
Marathon

PCD
Don’t Cha
Beep
Wait A Minute
Stickwitu
Buttons
I Don’t Need A Man
Hot Stuff (I Want You Back)
How Many Times, How Many Lies
Bite The Dust
Right Now
Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go
Feelin’ Good
Sway
Flirt
We Went As Far As We Felt Like Going

Dangerously in Love
Crazy In Love (Feat. Jay-Z)
Naughty Girl
Baby Boy (Feat. Sean Paul)
Hip Hop Star (Feat. Big Boi & Sleepy Brown)
Be With You
Me, Myself and I
Yes
Signs (Feat. Missy Elliott)
Speechless
That's How You Like It (Feat. Jay-Z)
The Closer I Get To You (duet with Luther Vandross)
Dangerously In Love 2
Gift From Virgo
Daddy

Keep your eyes peeled for the rate reveal posts when I'm done scoring the albums.

New Series in the Works

In my latest attempt at stretching content for the blog, I'll be using my rejected ideas for popheads album rates [and rates I've never submitted alike] and revealing my results in the style of 3 day rate reveals.
The structure is using the PopJustice scale of 0-10 with an 11 ruling over everything and winning the song portion of that.

In simpler terms: 11 > single > album cut [unless the single blows/album cut is better]

The working titles for the series are RATESism in America, Institutionalized RATESism, RATES Relations, The Conversation About RATES, That's RATESist, Unintentionally RATESist and something else that I probably won't use because bad puns can only do so much.

As it stands I have about 5 concrete ideas to work with; 3 of which I've not submitted at all, kii:

- The THOT That Counts rate submission of Tasty [Kelis] vs. PCD [Pussycat Dolls] and Dangerously in Love [Beyonce]

- Three of The THOT That Counts series albums but ranking them; Undiscovered [Brooke Hogan] vs. Willa Was Here [Willa Ford] vs. Paris [Paris Hilton]

*These next 3 are part of an intended trilogy mainly between Adore Delano and Sharon Needles and a 3rd guest first in Alaska Thunderfuck and then in RuPaul [I've not submitted these due to some too niche thing]:

- Til Death Do Us Party vs. PG-13 vs. Anus

- After Party vs. Taxidermy vs. Poundcake

- Whatever vs. Battle Axe vs. American


These next ideas weren't submitted because they either went in a route that didn't fit the "neat" 3 album only/4 album max constraint or if I did have one artist, I couldn't find one or two more that made sense against them, I flat out didn't submit [or in the last one mentioned case, literally came to mind just recently]:

- a 2-on-1 Handicap match of Danity Kane vs. Doll Domination [Pussycat Dolls] vs. Welcome to the Dollhouse [Danity Kane]

- a rate involving All-American Boy [Steve Grand] but the only opponents I can think of are EPs of Eli Lieb and Brendan Maclean...well shorter albums than Grand's but that'd be mean putting them against Steve knowing full fucking well he'd win.

- a 2-on-2 match where two artists have 2 albums each because sometimes the 3rd artist and album there doesn't make any goddamn sense. The only one I had ever thought of was Calvin Harris vs. Daft Punk with 18 Months vs. Motion vs. Discovery vs. Random Access Memories.

- Double Dutchess [Fergie] vs. Beautiful Trauma [P!nk] vs. This Is What The Truth Feels Like [Gwen Stefani] {maybe vs. Meaning of Life [Kelly Clarkson] as well.}

- 0304 [Jewel] vs. Liz Phair vs. C'mon, C'mon [Sheryl Crow]


So, there you have it. If I feel ambitious enough to get to at least two of these then the series will be whenever I feel like I can keep a schedule up.

Explaining the Dry Spell of the Blog

[I have to act like my blog is being read by people, so if this seems histrionic...that's on you, precious.]

This is another stretch, but I think one that will actually help me out. I have been in a funk just short of anything mental illness adjacent and in turn, the blog has been in a dry spell for almost two months since that miraculous four post series, The THOT That Counts.

Sure, I've had dry spells before. Anyone that fancies themselves as a writer* has had a length of time where the motivational factor has seemed to cease.

*anyone questioning me being a writer because I don't have a job writing for say, a music publication or a pop culture website...or writing books or having a job, I refute you all by saying this much. I've had a 9 to 5 feeling of no pay, no sex, no life and feeling empty while being in my own feelings. How? It was called college. It was my academic career which spanned pretty much MY ENTIRE FUCKING LIFE.*

What makes this different is that at one point not even like a month or two ago, I wasn't able to get out of bed until 7:36 PM. Even with me staying up until 3 or 4 in the morning (not like I have anywhere to be) I always managed to get out of bed at around 12:30 or 1:00, very rarely earlier than that. The point is, something in me snapped beyond my control and I was completely spent.

Personal muck aside, I haven't been writing because I question "what is there to write on here". Most of what comes to mind is either a needless retread or merely a stretch that I can't commit to carrying out. As for the only drafts I have saved, they're for the only two confirmed songs from Steve Grand for his next album coming out...whenever (by now, he'll barely release another vlog at his discretion. All T, All Shade a Provincetown residency can't possibly take THAT much out of you. OK I know he works/gets gigs/got gigs during the residency too, but I've not even been passive aggressive in the open about his seemingly misplaced priorities.)

All I know is that in that one interview he gave on some radio show I don't want to name check because the host is terrible, he mentioned a possible cover album or more covers in the near future. "Walking", the #SG2 lead single, is still worth listening [even if I've done more to promote the lyric video and let's face it music video than he has which let's be real is fucking pathetic. I've said this on Twitter before and I will say it again; if I'M fighting for your music more than YOU, the person who made it, that's a problem.] That's not even getting into the fact that the video still has under 140,000 views in the over 3 months since its release but I digress to the next bit:
As for what will become of "Don't Let the Light In" and "Good to See You", it's up in the air. Not another snippet from either has appeared since their respective vlog features from when he was still doing those ("umm, he had bear week in Ptown...err a residency to look forward to, plan and execute well. It's like Britney's residency only with live singing. Let him spend his days on social media; it's pretty much the new studio anyway." In the immortal words of Raja: fuck off, Dana.)

I'm not actually bitter and angry to where I've had enough of him let alone anything in...oh this got personal and I was projecting. Well it's either this or bottle up feelings and let things get worse. To close this out, I haven't been writing because I haven't been inspired by anything.

What makes it different is that I'm actually affected by it instead of being nonchalant about it which is a huge deal for me. Yes, I'm pretty much a male version of Daria with way more blatant moments of verbal bite.
For once, I'm unable to mask my true feelings and while it's probably good in regards of long term satisfaction, getting there sucks and I hate it. If I get back to writing based on inspiration (or trying to drive forth good press BASED IN MUSIC COMING FIRST), I'll know it and will get to it when it happens.

Until then, I'm in a dry spell that's probably way deeper than I want to realize.

The THOT That Counts: Willa Ford's "Willa Was Here"

The THOT That Counts takes a look at stripper-pop musical efforts and wonders how they ended up the way the are through a standard review and analysis of the pop culture lens of their time of release.

The year is 2001; the teen pop diva had been reintroduced 2 years prior thanks to Britney Spears playing a classic sex trope of "naughty Catholic schoolgirl" in the "...Baby One More Time" video. Why is Britney mentioned yet again? Oh it adds up, specifically with this installment.

This time, The THOT That Counts is the debut and sole release of sentient edition of Maxim magazine Willa Ford's Willa Was Here. The album in all good 00s pop was a revolving door of producers around a surprisingly game to write her own lyrics teen pop sensation [for a hot minute mind you].

The procedure is the same as before; a standard review of the album with an analysis of the pop culture at the time to see why the album ended up the way it did. Yes, there's an Australian bonus track in "All The Right Moves", but it's only one more to consider in giving a full analysis.

1. "I Wanna Be Bad" (featuring Royce da 5'9") - An occurring pattern of this series is that the album in question is obviously built around the single that managed to find success [Paris notwithstanding because it was something of a cohesive fluke] with this song being a Top 25 hit on the Hot 100. That being said, this is Willa's best song. Her vocals for all of the vocoder/processing are actually pleasant.
Because this was 2001 and this was the beginning of "urban" influenced pop, a nameless rapper just "cool" enough to exist on a track is featured. Royce da 5'9'' is fine on this but still a hit or miss non-descript addition overall. 

2. "Did Ya' Understand That" - The album's 2nd single that failed to chart. This is the beginning of Willa's ambition being a bit unrealized with how fast she delivers the lyrics [especially for a bad girl bubblegum pop act]. The album version and video edit are radically different in that there's a really dumb, half-assed attempt at a rock remix of this song or is some randomly placed nonsense.
The thing is, Ford shows deep vocal potential even if it's not obvious but more on that later.

3. "Ooh Ooh" - A promotional single from the album that failed to gain any momentum. One problem of Willa Was Here is that all the intended singles are at the front of the album. In this case, once the listener gets their kicks with the other songs, they might not get to the other tracks. It's playing the strongest hand right out of the gate.
As for the song itself, it's a great showcase of the registers Ford is able to hit [and the whistle/opera moment that is indeed her doing it. Look up an interview Ford has with VH1 and she does the opera moment.]

4. "Tired" - This track actually has a history that can help explain why the album is why it is. For now, all I'll say is that history does not look kind on Willa's delivery of "Tired of the pop that should flop, that should never be on TV and in your teen magazines." Also, her delivery is so rushed/overwrought. BREATHE. Learn to BREATHE.

5. "Joke's on You" - Keeping in mind, this is 2001; so this is 2 years before blatant skank culture found its "urban" counterpart. So instead, we're treated to pop with an attempt at sexy guitar lick sounding rock treatments. Again, Ford is the strongest vocalist covered in the series thus far so she's a breath of fresh air compared to the others.
To an untrained listener of pop in general, the tail end/money note of this song will have them think she missed the note. In actuality, she hit the note but the vocals used here don't match the beat used for the song.

6. "Tender" - Ugh, another stripper-pop by way of bad girl bubblegum pop ballad. Ford is surprisingly adept especially considering her limited skillset, but this ballad is indeed tender...because it's limp.

7. "Don't You Wish" - Again, this isn't "urban" per se, but this is like if Britney could get more airplay on R&B stations. Yeah, this song is all "leave her for me" but without the misguided charm Taylor Swift had for "You Belong with Me".

8. "Prince Charming" - The most 00s sounding pop beat imaginable...like the four chords of pop but only this beat was used for Britney, Christina, N*SYNC, Dream...pretty much, this beat is like the spirit stick from Bring it On. Thankfully, this doesn't Torrance it, but the lyrics are so syrupy and saccharine.

9. "Somebody Take the Pain Away" - If I told you this clocks in at under 3 minutes, will that take some pain away? Something I hadn't addressed yet is how in the weirdest way, the albums thus far could pass as soundtracks to ABC family movies with the most generic titles imaginable.
This cut while not the title of said ABC family movie, would definitely serve as fodder as its half-baked process of emotional turmoil is sad but theatrical enough for bad acting to thrive.

10. "Haunted Heart" - Ugh, the cadence and pacing issues are beyond insufferable now. That and the title and song lack any cohesive sense. Nothing about this other half-baked Max Martin wannabe beat mixed with a Mad TV impersonation of Christina Aguilera says "haunted heart".

11. "Dare" - For the U.S. market, this is the closing track of the album. Nobody is really going to emerge from this unscathed. Willa's album is at least the most consistent of the bad girl bubblegum pop side of stripper-pop. This song however, is a poor closer track. Stick this in the middle of the album with the other half-baked syrupy productions.

12. "All The Right Moves" - To get the clearest picture of the album as a whole, this iteration ends on the Australian bonus track which from the title alone says this would be the ABC family movie starring Willa Ford.
Ford has this personal vendetta against being labeled "Britney" and that's coming up very soon, but for all that personal umbrage with her...this is like a rough draft of a Britney track from her first album. Down to the production being actually closer to Britney's commercials for Pepsi than even knockoff ...Baby One More Time era Britney.

Now with the album out of the way, it's now time to see how Willa Was Here ended up the way it did through contextual analysis of pop culture at the time of its release.
AfterTHOTS: 2001 was a time when pop music and in turn pop divadom was just about to feel its bad girl self and plant the seeds to the blatant skank culture that ruled from 2003-2009. As slinky drumbeats or anything labeled "rhythmic" was meant to be a moneymaking competitor to anything labeled "melodic", pop or at least teen pop was still bubblegum/innocent...looking. As it was said, Britney reignited interest in a female pop act starting off innocent and then playing into the Madonna effect of being sexual by ways of the liberation aspect of pop culture feminism.

On Willa Ford's end, she ended up playing all her cards too early. If Paris was the result of overexposure by way of reality TV fame during the oversaturation point of blatant skank culture, Willa Was Here is the result of too much, too soon and weirdly being ahead of her time. The album also suffers from the artist having confronted her identity in music on her debut. If you're asking "who?" when you see "Willa Was Here", then you already have an idea as to what I'm talking about. Time for a bit of back story.

Willa Ford started off in the industry all incognito as Mandah [like her real name Amanda Lee Williford, but all...doofy sounding.] Originally signed to who cares MCA Records, she's dropped, ends up on Atlantic records and has something of a break when she gets a song on the soundtrack to Pokémon: The First Movie [track 10, "Lullaby".] Other famed pop acts almost exclusive to the 1999-2001s like N*SYNC, B*Witched, 98 Degrees, Aaron Carter and Vitamin C were on the album as well.

Two names that also appeared on it were Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears. This is the seed planted for Willa's bad taste in her mouth about pop music in general, let alone Spears.
After the soundtrack album, she ends up signing a deal with the Atlantic Records imprint, Lava Records and changes her name from Mandah to Willa Ford. However, the reason for her name change was to avoid confusion with another blonde pop-tart named Mandy Moore. See where the identity crisis comes in?
That brings us to the track "Tired" which on the surface is a thinly veiled diss track against Britney from someone who wishes they could be as big as her in 2001.

See, that's just the face value interpretation. What "Tired" ends up doing is giving an unusually transparent look into a budding talent that's already had enough of the pop music machine and pretty much risked their career telling the listener "hey, here's the skinny". There's two major problems with that: 1. This is coming from someone who despite having experience on one album before this one, is on her debut. How much know how did you really manage to get to where you feel to enlighten us on the fact that the pop machine is a hellhole where individuality mostly goes to die? 2. This is underestimating the public's perception of the music industry as a whole. Even if Ford really did gain so much perspective, it's kind of an open secret; we know Britney lipsyncs and that pop as a whole is really not the best place to get artistic merit on the first try in 2001.

As for the "crap" she took "each day", that mostly comes from the fallout from her failed relationship with Backstreet Boys member Nick Carter. Hmm, a pretty blonde girl with a bad streak having gone out with a blonde boybander who was non-descript and had a messy breakup in the early 00s...sound familiar? In Willa's case, word is she was once an opening act for Backstreet Boys but was booed to hell [this is after the messy breakup between her and Nick or right around it.] For proof of this, I suggest looking up a Willa Ford red carpet moment for her more successful hosting career where she's interviewing the big stars of the 2001 VMAs; at one point the Backstreet Boys pass by her where all but Nick acknowledge her at all.

It isn't to say Ford was the worst thing ever to happen to pop. In a weird way, she was ahead of her time being open about her bad girl image [because VH1 junkie moment, she actually was a bad girl type from the VH1 mini-series, My Coolest Years and the bad girl episode where even the voice behind most of VH1's promo material Rachel Perry was featured as a "bad girl".] She missed the blatant skank culture bandwagon by a small window and Lava Records lost faith in her right as the legendarily tacky "F*ck The Men (A Toast to Men" from her scrapped sophomore effort, SexySexObsessive, was released as a standalone single.

This is also not to say playing sex on the first try is inherently a limiting move; for instance, Lady Gaga played up levels of sex on her debut, but she has the material to back it up and she's a weirdo; meaning there's something to play off of and keep people interested. Willa Was Here showed Willa's true self but neither that nor her intended second album, SexySexObsessive, was really going to build anything off of that. Hell, even the Pussycat Dolls struggled to maintain a true pop identity even though their image was branded in a burlesque troop kind of sex.

The point is that Willa Was Here is ultimately the result of an overambitious pop tart in the 00s trying to make a statement of being a bad girl even though she had no idea how the hell it should sound. Not entirely a Britney but more of a further misguided Stripped by Christina Aguilera.