ARTS: MUSIC 23
THE FOUNDER September 2021
4 of Beyoncé’s Most Iconic Moments As She Turns 40
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FINN MURPHY | MUSIC EDITOR
he’s an icon, she’s a legend, and she is the moment, and at the beginning of September, Beyoncé turned 40. To mark the occasion, it is important to remember what makes her so influential in the music industry. The Queen of music has had many iconic moments, but these 4 are just some of the best. 1. Coachella, or should we say Beychella.
In 2018, Beyoncé became the first African American woman to headline Coachella and her performance remains one of the most memorable to come out of the festival. Featuring majorette dancers and a full marching band, her performance was inspired by and paid tribute to the culture of black colleges and universities, whilst also co-starring Destiny’s Child members, Kelly and Michelle, her sister, Solange Knowles and her husband, Jay-Z. Additionally, the production was released as a film on Netflix and a live album titled Homecoming, receiving the Grammy Award for Best Music Film in 2020 and critical acclaim across the globe. 2.
Pregnancy Announcements
If fans weren’t already excited enough for Beyoncé to have children, then her pregnancy announcements only added to the emotions. At the 2011 Video Music Awards, Beyoncé performed one of her greatest hits, Love on Top in a purple sequin pant suit alongside a posse of backup singers and dancers. She ended the performance with a perfect mic-drop moment, unbuttoning her jacket to cradle her baby bump. 6 years later, Beyoncé came back with a bang and announced that she was pregnant with twins on Instagram with a photo of her dressed like a goddess with a green veil living her floral fantasy. The post became the most liked photo on the platform in 2017 and reminds us that even a pregnancy announcement can be iconic.
3. Winning a Grammy with her daughter
At the 63rd Grammy Awards, Beyoncé and her daughter, Blue Ivy, took home the award for Best Music Video with WizKid for Brown Skin Girl, beating artists Drake and Harry Styles. The video for the song was originally produced for Black is King, the Disney+ visual album and film before later being released as a standalone music video. The video features cameos from model Naomi Campbell, actress Lupita Nyong’o, singer Kelly Rowland, models Adut Akech and Aweng Ade-Chuol, as well as Beyoncé’s mother, Tina KnowlesLawson, and daughters, Blue Ivy and Rumi, acting as a celebration of the beauty of darker complexions. This particular Grammy Awards was important for Beyoncé as she became the most-awarded woman in Grammy history, winning one of those awards with one of the youngest Grammy award winners, her own daughter, Blue Ivy Carter. 4.
The Lemonade Era
In April 2016, Beyoncé released her second visual album, “Lemonade”, thus starting the Lemonade era. The album tells the story of a woman who discovers her husband’s infidelity and tracks the emotions and the journey she must go through in order to reach forgiveness. The album was defined by grace and elegance, whilst also perfectly representing heartache and anger. In the video for Hold Up, the singer marches down a busy street in a flowy mustard yellow dress before pulling out a baseball bat to destroy car windows and fire hydrants. This video alone became a major cultural phenomenon, with many fans and other creatives creating parodies of the video, notably in Netflix’s Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Beyoncé constantly reminds us why she is the Queen of Music, and one of the best, if not the best, performer of our time. Her list of iconic moments is endless and will continue to be added to as her career only gets better.
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Goddesses in Gold: Review of Rumors by Lizzo ft. Cardi B FINN MURPHY | MUSIC EDITOR
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eminiscent of Truth Hurts, Lizzo’s new single, Rumors, is the clapback hit that reminds us why Lizzo remains one of the most iconic artists in pop music history. Both Lizzo and Cardi B are constantly attacked in the media and by the public for generally just existing, but they team up in this track to let the haters know that they are still here, and they are thriving. The music video opens with an animated Lizzo painted on ancient Greek pottery and the whole ensemble resembles the Mount Olympus featured in Disney’s 1997 film, Hercules. In each chorus, Lizzo is surrounded by beautiful black women dancing like the Muses of Hercules. Lizzo is also joined by her pregnant labelmate, Cardi B, sat atop a phallic shaped throne rapping about her rise to fame and how tiresome the business can be. In the chorus of the song, Lizzo emphasises that these haters are ‘spending all their time tryna break a woman
down, realer sh*t is going on, baby, take a look around,’ championing the idea that people should focus their energy on better causes. In a world which is so divided, we must push our energy onto valuable causes rather than finding fault in small details of a celebrity’s life. Society is threatened by those that do not conform to a certain stereotype or beauty industry standard but still prevail as beautiful and successful and this is only emphasised by the backlash that Lizzo has received from this single and music video. Some claimed that Lizzo is appealing only to the white gaze, but she hit back on TikTok, claiming that this idea is both ‘fatphobic’ and ‘racist.’ The song acts as a positive affirmation to remind those who do not always fit in or those that are singled out for not conforming to society’s standards that it is okay to be different, that you can still be successful despite the haters. However, it is also important to note that this does bring forward a general argument about visibility and how important representation is. Lizzo has the platform to speak out about these things and feel good in her body as she has made a ‘brand’ out of this, it is now what fans expect of Lizzo, but when it comes to everyday people, the same does not apply. Being able to see yourself in somewhere that you may have not seen yourself before will not solve political issues.
