The price of fame

Above is a picture of a Swedish artist named Marie Serneholt. She was once part of a pop group called A-teens (left image) but now she has gone solo (right image). Gone are the healthy looking girl I used to like and now all we see is a reality show contestant look alike with more in common with Mrs Beckham than with her old self. So what happened? Could it be the PR department of SMI records where she resides who decided that she was to change her image to that of a blonde bimbo?

A-teens have always been a healthy looking band with a younger target audience. When I survey the bands with similar audiences I find that most of them focus on the having fun, looking healthy aspect instead of the sexy and erotic aspects of their image. Examples like Spice girls, early Britney Spears and Aguilera comes to mind. When the artists then need to focus on a more mature audience out goes the wholesome image and in comes the highly pornographic image bent on selling copies with sex instead of the actual music. This pattern can be seen in both Britney and Aguilera’s case as in many others.

It's sad to see that the record companies no longer have faith in the music they put out but feel the need to wrap it in eroticism to sell. It's a clinical view where the music has become a product much like a perfume or a pair of sneakers. No longer is music a creative way of expressing one self, it’s a product created in the labs of our record companies and spread to us through commercial channels like MTV much like a shopping network try to sell the latest Ab-flex.

Today almost anyone can be a star the question is really how much of your personal integrity you are prepared to sacrifice.