Separating the Art from the Artists

I discovered Ethel Cain through a pinterest post that inevitably compared her to Lana del Rey. The similarities are so numerous, it’s hard to believe they could all be entirely coincidental. What are the chances that two artists are mysterious, sad, controversial, stage named, and Jack Donahue acquainted? This is where the beef begins. Ethel has long had a policy of not wanting to be associated with Lana or Jack Antanoff. Along with this, Lana also alleges that Ethel has bullied her online. There isn’t a footprint of this, unlike other things Ethel has said in the past. 

This is why Lana wrote All About Ethel. She posted a snippet singing along to lyrics like “Ethel Cain hated my instagram post, think it’s cute reenacting my Chicago pose, and “By the way, Jack said don't call him and take the other Jack's name out your phone.” Most importantly we get the line, “The most famous girl at the Waffle House.” The first quote is in reference to Ethel recreating the photo Lana took with her then boyfriend Jack Donahue outside of a jail in Chicago. The other Jack is her producer Jack Antanoff who Ethel has publicly said she would never work with. The last is in reference to a New York Times interview Ethel did a few years back with the same title and how Lana went viral for working at a Waffle House a year later. 

Now that you’ve been caught up, let’s discuss. Lana has no problem with talented women taking inspiration from her. From lipsyncing to songs clearly inspired by her in the car, to performing them with said talented women (i.e. diet pepsi). Lanachella is another notable example of collaboration, singing with the likes of Billie Eillish and Camilla Cabello. This makes it clear that the beef started with Ethel’s distaste of the comparisons being made. It is also very in character for Lana to go to the internet with her personal opinions. 

Still, I have a question for the culture: is it morally ok for larger artists to publicly put down smaller artists? The timing is also suspicious. Ethel had recently finished a few podcast interviews and was touring around the same time Lana was touring in England. Now that the dust(bowl) has settled on this event, it’s easy to see a few things. First, that Lana was getting valid flack for using a hologram during some of her concerts. Second, that the album is nowhere to be found. I was in 8th grade history when I found out Lasso was getting pushed back because of Cowboy Carter. Then she renamed it, changed the cover art, released a few singles, and now has a release date set for January with a 3rd title! This exacerbation of a personal conflict between mutuals definitely could be covering something up. At the end of the day one question remains: where's the album Lana?

Recently, this “diss track” reminded me of the Actually Romantic drama following the release of Taylor Swift’s 12th studio album The Life of A Showgirl. On the 7th track she clearly makes references to Charli XCX’s substance abuse and rude things Charli said to their mutuals in the first few lines. The rest of the album is essentially about how Charli is obsessed with Taylor. This comes as a half shock considering Charli described opening for Taylor’s Reputation tour as “waving to a bunch of 5-year olds.” Fans also speculate Sympathy is a Knife to be about Taylor. Both Sympathy is a Knife and Girl, So Confusing are introspective tracks that really boil down to misogyny in the entertainment industry. If you know anything about Taylor Swift, you know this is one of her main talking points. Her Miss Americana documentary focused heavily on themes of body image and advocating for women’s rights, particularly harassment protection. This is why it came as such a shock to me that Taylor chose not to work it out on the remix.

Internalized misogyny, a term most fluent in therapy speak will recognize, is frequently externalized in an under the radar manner that often goes unnoticed. Now, is criticizing a woman inherently misogynistic? Obviously not. I’m also not here to point fingers at “bad feminists.” When so much of the entertainment industry is built to inherently harm women as a result of an inherently patro-centric society we live in, it can seem unfair to immediately point fingers at the women pointing fingers at each other. However, going back to Lana’s infamous question for the culture, it is easy for Lana and Taylor to ask for a narrow intersection of the feminist movement that allows them to gain the platform they have and in the same breath use that platform to punch down on smaller female artists. 

This is when it becomes difficult to separate the art from the artist. Art does not exist in a vacuum. It is first affected by the lens of the artist and the society that the artist created it in, and is then analyzed by the lens of the viewer and the society they were raised in. It’s natural to raise some moral quandaries about the artists you choose to support while they’re alive and whose work you choose to spotlight once they’re not. This is exacerbated by fan culture and the deep personal identity music brings to people. I would console you and say that your streams don’t make a difference in the grand scheme of things. Unfortunately, the grand scheme of things is that ticketmaster is a monopoly and Taylor Swift has 38 variants of The Life of a Showgirl. To sum up, while I hate to blame women for hating other women, it is majorly their responsibility to at the least examine where that hate comes from. Finally, you cannot separate the art from the artist, but you shouldn’t let that stop their art from bringing you joy.