Christgau on Shakira

Again, this is totally unconvincing. I can easily imagine a native speaker coming out with the phrase "my humble breasts." Less sure about the other lines, but it's pretty common for pop lyrics to play fast and loose with standard usage and syntax (which can't possibly be news to Christgau). I don't see the big deal here.

I disagree. When I first heard the humble breast line it totally struck me as something that would come from somebody who's first language was not English. She continually uses syntax that is... not wrong but just not used often by people who have English as a first language. Her lyrics are definitely strikingly different than any other mainstream pop artist. I don't feel pasting them full on right now, but if need be I could.

Both Oral Fixations thank Antonio for "protecting" and "taking care of" her, which doesn't preclude the gloriously catty "Don't Bother," about a tall rival who cooks and speaks French, with its spoken coda: "For you I'd give up all I own and move to a Communist country—if you came with me of course—and file my nails so they don't hurt you and lose those pounds and learn about football—if it made you stay, if it made you stay, but you won't." Whoever it's about, it's great.

Apparently he thinks those lines are really fantastic or he wouldn't be quoting them at such length.

I think they are very fantastic! They're extremely specific and detail oriented (especially the part about cutting her nails) and talk about something very personal to her without making a broad judgement on them. And because of that I can completely relate with her, although I've never, to my knowledge been in a situation even remotely simmilar. For me, that makes good lyrics.

Okay, but that doesn't make her "the pre-Columbian voice of Spain's Christian-Islamic motherlode" (ick).

And that one I'll disagree with on a human level. She is VERY VERY VERY fucking sexy. Way sexier than J Lo, and Beyonce and whoever else you want to throw her up against.

Frankly, with syntax like this, I could make a case for Christgau as a non-native speaker.

Using the term "knee jerk" is getting kind of knee-jerk these days, isn't it?

And Xgau wants it both ways: he wants to plump for her individuality, and he wants to needle people for finding her grating. When of course, it's people with strong idiosyncracies who others tend to find grating or jarring.

And being in love is an excellent reason for Top Tenning a song.

I find Shakira an extremely attractive human being, including her gawkiness in English and her all-over-the-place self-assertion. What I often dislike is her choice in melodies. Her voice is good or bad depending how she uses it; she still goes for broke with it more than is effective. She could well be a better singer at 48 than at 28.

whom

sounds like something lou reed would do.

Are there any female pop singers who don't get a "here's why her voice is neat" review from you, Frank? Somebody who just gets a "oh god fuck this trash"?

The logic might not hold up but the description is perfectly accurate.

Maybe not a bad person. Just a bad critic.

Incidentally, to be clearer, I don't mean in every day conversation, but in lyrics or poetry.

I'm sure Shakira's spanish-language records have moments of charm and grace (i've not heard them), but every english-language song I've heard from her has been complete an utter garbage, and I will not apologize for my opinion or be denigrated by anyone for it. And to give her extra credit for her engrish phrasings is pathetic and patronizing, in my opinion.

"Underneath Your Clothes" is one of the worst songs on it though, I think - "The One" is a lot better and in a similar vein.

Still haven't heard "Oral Fixation", but I think Christgau is broadly correct about the excellence of Shakira's lyrics.

Many critics will happily valorise stuff like cultivated rudimentariness and wackiness and childlikeness etc. in musical arrangements but seem to find it difficult to do the same with lyrics - as if quality lyrics exist on a single line from spare minimalism to poetic sophistication.

I sort of see Shakira as shortcircuiting lyrical unworkability and brilliance in the same way that, say, Wiley or Dizzee Rascal shortcircuit the space between musical unworkability and brilliance.

I guess I'm Latino.

my thing with shakira is that i like her a lot and i want to like her more -- for a lot of the reasons christgau and susan mention -- but she's not quite consistently good enough. i love her best songs -- listened to 'estoy aqui' three times on the way home from work tonight -- but too many of them promise more than they deliver, in either hooks or whatever is spanish for joie de vivre. i want her to be this big, vivacious, continent-straddling colossus, but she's something a little different. which is fine for her, and maybe more interesting in some ways. she just doesn't put the meter in the red often enough for me.

Fwiw I think my 2006 assessment just above still holds for me, but also I still LOVE “Estoy Aqui” and just played it a few times in a row last night.

(Also the Xgau review cited in the OP was problematic to start with and sure hasn’t aged well)

it's absolute nonsense from the master of absolute nonsense

Her father a Lebanese Catholic, Shakira has belly dancer genes and is willing to use them. Maybe her vibrato rubs fools the wrong way because it comes straight outta the cradle of civilization. She's a South American sexpot, but also the pre-Columbian voice of Spain's Christian-Islamic motherlode—a happenstance she inhabits, accepts, and enjoys.

lol wtf is this.

"belly dancer genes" is really something

She inhabits, accepts and enjoys those genes.

it's just crazy how his reputation prevented editors from just stopping and saying dude literally what the fuck are you even talking about?

What a title, to boot:

https://www.robertchristgau.com/xg/rock/shakira-06.php

loool

This article was reprinted in his book Is It Still Good To Ya? as is, so I don't think he's got too many regrets about it.

Reading the book, one of the Xgau tics that gets on my nerves is tossing "right" into the middle of the sentence, like (not an actual quote), "Shakira is, right, a hot little weirdo." Like it's simultaneously flattering the reader's perceptiveness, and assuming everyone agrees with Xgau.

I suspect that Christgau does a lot of tinkering with how his lines scan (in the poetry sense), and inserts random colloquialisms to get the meter he wants.