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on Culture Study Podcast, is currently one of the top 50 most listened to artists in the world on Spotify, has not one but two songs in the Spotify Billion Streams Club. debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, sold out a headlining tour off of her debut EP, and has had 21 songs chart. On the Billboard Hot 100. 21. 21. So we're not talking about Olivia Rodrigo. We're not talking about Billie Eilish. We're not talking about Taylor Swift. No.
Who are we talking about? We are talking about Canada's own Tate McRae. This is the Culture Study Podcast, and I'm Anne Helen Peterson. And I'm Rihanna Cruz, producer of Switched On Pop and freelance music and culture journalist. OK, so this is a little bit of a false like open because I'm trying to take the position of Melody, who when I came up with this idea, she's like.
who is tate mccray you kind of had that position a little bit before like you knew who she was but not you weren't like oh she's that interesting I have to say that I have been listening to Tate McRae since 2020 and not because I was like a so you think you can dance person yeah it's because As longtime listeners of the pod know, I live on the Canadian border. So my top 40 radio station that I listen to all the time. Virgin 94.5 out of Vancouver plays so much Tate McRae. Wow.
Not just because Canada's own, but also because of the rules in Canada that stipulate that you have to play a certain percentage of Canadian artists. Oh, wow. So there's a ton of Tate McRae, so much Drake, like a preponderance. Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. I didn't know that about the radio rules.
Yeah, I didn't know that either. And then our previous guest, Elamin, told me this because he's Canadian and also a huge music fan. So now I have to reorient my understanding of who's popular all the time because I'm like, is this just Canadian popular?
or is this like actually all over top 40 but so I knew who like the you what is it you hurt me first the one with like the huge bass drop no what is the word asking for it back could you tell me where'd you get the nerve yeah you could say you miss all that we had but i don't really care how bad it hurts when you You broke me first. You broke me first. Just all over the place when I would be like, just drive. The only thing I do when I go into town was drive to the grocery store and get like.
grocery pickup during the pandemic like soundtrack um Melody and I are huge fans of Switched On Pop, and one of our most popular Culture Study episodes is about the reboot of early 2000s music with Switched On Pop host Nate Sloan. And then when I heard your episode, you guys sometimes switch lead hosting duties where one person is educating the others about something. And you recently...
We're the lead host on an episode about Tate McRae. And I immediately texted Melody and was like, Melody, listen to this episode right now because I want to do. an episode of Tate McRae that isn't just reproducing the episode that you did. But I would love if you can tell our listeners a little bit about how you got interested in Tate McRae and also... the evolution of your thinking, because it's pretty interesting. Yeah, so I...
started hearing about Tate McRae. I wasn't even like listening to Tate McRae until, you know, a couple of years after you, frankly, like I feel like 2023 is when I. began to be culturally aware of Tate McRae. I don't think I had listened to her at that point. I just started hearing her name popping up everywhere, and I follow the Billboard charts kind of religiously. So all of a sudden, it seemed out of nowhere, one of her songs, the song Greedy, shot up the charts.
and was in the top 10 for a very long time. You know, I believe it peaked at number three. It was a moment where I was like, kind of feeling like slightly out of touch, you know, like I'm only 25. And that was a moment, I think maybe one of the first moments where I was like, man, like, am I?
aging out of young people culture you know because I was like who is this woman she kind of came out of nowhere the name Tate McRae is kind of like to me so generic that i'm like you know is this made in a factory for like young gen zers yeah you know and i'm like i i had really like no I just didn't know who she was. I had no prior knowledge of this person until her song was in the top 10 on Billboard. And so that kind of evoked a fascination.
within me where I was like okay like now this woman is on my radar I kind of need to know everything about her because right why am I so out of touch and so so I watched a lot of Tate McRae live performances from that moment forward. I watched a bunch of her music videos and I kind of became fascinated with her in this sort of like reverse.
way where i was like oh like i really don't like her music but i want to know why totally totally and this is like in some ways the ethos of our podcast and i think switched on pop too is like yeah Every song is actually really interesting. Every pop phenomenon is really interesting. It doesn't mean that you have to love the music. Right. Exactly. And I have like a sensibility about myself where I'm like, I don't think there's really any.
bad quote-unquote music because I think like all music has its audience and if I don't understand it somebody does and that's like the kind of motivation for me to figure out with artists like Tate McRae, what am I not getting, you know? So that's how she came into my, into my radar and into my focus. And then it was greedy and then it was exes.
second single from that record oh it's so like rhymey and cute i'm sorry sorry that you love me you surveyed your friends to say like what's interesting to you or like why do you like her and your friends were like she can dance yeah exactly literally very much that because you know like in my circles I have a lot of friends that are very invested in pop music you know like these queer circles where like pop music is our lives. And so
I asked a bunch of my friends who would come over for like music video nights and we'd like sit and watch like Tate McCray live performances. And I'd be like, okay, like what am I not getting about this woman? And my friends resoundingly were like, she can dance.
and she's pretty in various forms you know I remember one friend that was like okay like why do you like her and he was like oh she's serving and I was like right but what is she serving and he was like she's just serving like I can't explain it you know like it's it's very like it's shallow and I hesitate when I say that because there are pop stars who can exist on this sort of like she's serving plane but it really comes down to like she could dance she's pretty her music is catchy
So I had Melody watch the video for race car before this. Sports car. Sports car. Yeah. And she was like, is this trying to be camp? But it's not camp, right? It's low camp, right? We're thinking about, like... She's trying too hard to be camp. Right. So it's not camp. Right. And she's not doing Gaga levels of postmodernism. No, not at all. I think like where it lands for Tate is this. idea of nostalgic pastiche. Ooh, yeah. You know, where it's like, what she's doing.
is not reinventing the wheel by any means, you know? And when you watch a video like Sports Car, it's like trying to, I guess like... Like she puts on, you know, really cool and ornate outfits and like the editing is very like whiplash, like lots of cuts, lots of different scenes. And you could see that like she's trying to like make a cultural moment. And where it really lands is like her kind of being what I would call like a blank slate. Right. Where it's like.
You can kind of look at her and be like, oh, she's beautiful. And then, you know, project whatever you want onto her where you're like, oh, she's the moment. She's giving camp. She's serving. She's doing all of these things. And then. You take her image out of it. And what are you left with? Question mark. You know? Yes.
Yes. So Melody, I can hear like she's not saying anything to me, but I can hear her in my brain telling me to go backwards and establish who Tate McRae is. So she did an informal poll on her Instagram and. So she's a middle millennial and I'm an elder millennial. And she had a lot of responses to her poll of like, who is Dave McRae? Like people being like, who? Like they don't know.
I think she is just not completely on the radar the way that, like, Billie Eilish is, right? Yeah. Of older people, I will say that. And then Tate McRae herself, she's 21. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And she's from Calgary, Alberta. And she started as a dancer and she came in third place on So You Think You Can Dance, but like the teen version of So You Think You Can Dance, right? Is that true?
Next generation? I don't know. I was watching all these YouTube clips and it's all like next generation. She's so young. She's like salsa-ing. She's nine years old. It's so weird. She's been about this life. She's been about the choreo life since. she was a wee child well she's a dance kid her mom owns a dance studio yeah
And we'll get to this later. And her dad is a lawyer for oil and gas companies. And so she grew up that rich kid life in Calgary. And then she started posting some of her... songs to YouTube very Justin Bieber-esque in a lot of ways Billie Eilish I think did the same thing Gracie Abrams like very new school of pop artists getting their start on YouTube
Yeah, like they find their audience and grow organically from there. And then she got a record deal in 2019. And then she is considered kind of a COVID artist and that her popularity really took off 2020. And then in February of this year, and this is what preceded the episode of Switched on Pop, she released her third album called... So Close to What?
You had so much fun with saying this album title in the episode. Because it's a funny album title. What? And it debuted at number one. Okay, did I leave anything out that is important here? No, I think that's pretty much it. I mean, she has had, I think, a pretty steady audience growth, which I think is notable because I think in America, at least, I know she reached her cultural tipping point.
Like with this record so close to what, you know, like it debuted at number one on the 200. Like that's not an easy feat. You know, a lot of people. can't do that and it's it's just a testament to i guess how much tate is connecting with specifically these younger audiences because i agree with you where i'm like Older people don't really know who she is. Even people my age, you know, like the elder Gen Z kind of cusp generation. Like, it's kind of a blind spot, I feel like. Yeah.
Totally. And we'll talk about this, too, in that she is at once incredibly evocative of formative stars for millennials. Yeah. Specifically Britney and Christina Aguilera. Yeah. Also not like she that you would think that that would make her more popular amongst older fans, but she's not. Yeah. Today's episode is sponsored by Article.
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The episode today, we're going to try to unpack her star image, including parts of her sound and what she symbolizes in music and pop culture. So to kick us off, we're going to play two questions back to back, and I think it'll be apparent why we're pairing these together. The first question comes from Hannah. I have a question, but it's so hard to pinpoint. Tate McRae's dance, music, aesthetic style is reminiscent of early aughts Britney and Christina.
But in today's music landscape, I'm having a hard time not hearing her music as tired sounds or tired style. I'm a millennial. Tate McCray confuses me. I'm not sure what she's offering. Her music sounds contemporary. as in it fits into the popular soundscape, but what is it offering that's different and why is she so popular? I guess my question is,
Am I confused by Tate McRae because her brand doesn't include access to her as a character or personality, like, say, Sabrina Carpenter or Chapel Roan, who are so distinctive? And then the second question comes from Catherine. So... I'm less puzzled by Tate McRae than by the puzzlement over Tate McRae. To me, she seems like a nice kid working out an early career who's got some bangers.
This is probably partly because I'm from Alberta and enough older than Tate that her sort of early aunt's persona in terms of vibe and aesthetic reminds me of my best friend from high school, whom I've just always thought was the most beautiful and charismatic person. Tate seems totally intelligible to me. So my question is not why the hype, but why the puzzled discourse? Why do people seem to think Tate owes them something? And what do they think she might owe them?
think people think that tate owes them anything i think that they're trying to think about why is she so popular and you know the the description of like this is like my beautiful friend from high school yeah absolutely like she is like the coolest girl in high school right exactly like I think when she started to become famous me and my friends were like likening her to yeah like that girl in high school
that is so popular but like is also nice to everybody you know yeah she has a nice face yeah the popular girl that will always say hi to you in the hallway because you had a class together a year ago you know what I mean like that's the energy that she's putting out and Brittany always had that energy too Christina was like no that bitch is mean right right
There was like a real viciousness that at least oscillated around her. I'm not talking about who she is in real life. That was the image that was around her. And I think that that similarity to Britney is instructive. I do think that like... millennials love billy eilish they love olivia rodrigo like those were the weirdos when we were like that was like liking fiona apple when i was
in high school which I did right and so like it's very easy for me to glom on to the the more musically complicated I would say and like sad just like a nerd who makes good kind of image is easier, whereas... And we'll get to this later, but I think that like there is some mistaken nostalgia around Britney. Like Britney was basic. Like think about what Gen Xers and boomers were probably thinking about Britney when she came out. It was like.
this is the most popular girl in the school. And like, what is going on with these videos? She can't really sing necessarily, you know? Right. Like she's just an image. Yes. Yeah. She just represents this like virgin whore dichotomy. She is ripping off Madonna in all of these different ways. And now millennials, because of everything that happened to Britney over the course of the 2000s, I think have them.
a much more layered understanding of who Brittany was and who she represents. Right. So like a kind of like retconning Brittany into being something that like was universally loved. Yes. Okay. i mean like i didn't love britney when i was in like i didn't own any of her albums right she was just the most popular thing yeah
Right. And why would you love the most popular thing? You know, we love to hate on what's popular. And maybe that's why people are so puzzled by Tate McRae, you know, to go back to these questions. Like, I think. She projects this energy that is off putting to a lot of people per chance. You know, like I think like something Tate does that is.
really great to some people and not so great to other people is that she's kind of like nostalgia farming a little bit and is kind of pulling from all of these different artists that we already know, you know, and her music, which is something I talk about in the switched on pop episode, like sounds like.
other songs that are demonstrated hits that people love and so I think like she is kind of I said this already like kind of a blank slate but in the way where you could project your already formed thoughts and opinions on other artists and other time periods onto her because she puts that in her music, if that makes sense.
Yeah, so Melody always hears cursive singing when she listens to it, which is a term that I first heard on Swish on Pop. Can you describe what cursive singing is? Oh, yeah. So you will know cursive singing. When you hear it, it is a style of singing that was... I don't want to say like originated in the 2010s, but definitely like found its audience in the 2010s with artists like Halsey and Camila Cabello. This.
style of singing that elongates certain vowels and kind of pushes your vocals to like create. unnatural syllables in words you know I think often of this vine you know that was that that went around that was somebody making fun of cursive singing particularly I think Halsey because Halsey was really big at the time and they're singing welcome to my kitchen you know but it's like welcome to my kitchen which sounds a little bit like bjork if i'm doing it personally
Welcome to my kitchen. We have bananas and all the calories. But it's like the way that they sing, they elongate certain vowels. They kind of stretch their vocals. Tate does it by kind of being very... in her in her nose i think like she has like a nasally voice and when she sings the way that you hear it it sounds kind of kind of garbled
a little bit, you know, and it sounds sort of untrained you know like you listen to somebody like Adele who is like belting right and enunciating and you could hear every syllable that she's singing versus somebody like Tate McRae somebody like Camila Cabello who is kind of floating through words, floating through melodies. And the reason why it's called cursive singing is because it sounds like you're writing in cursive. And everything goes into the next word.
Like everything is flowing. Everything is like kind of connecting with one another in a way that's indistinct. And there's a little bit of sexy baby in there, too. Oh, for sure. I think that's, like, a fundamental part of Curse of Singing is, like, sexy baby. We had a former... fundamentalist housewife on the show several months ago and she told us about fundy baby voice like what is that what is that melody can you do fundy baby voice
I've just been asking God to really show me the plan that he has for us. Some people call it keeping sweet. But you don't talk like a big girl. And, you know, Britney had a baby voice, which was, you know, like makes sense in terms of like all of the discourse around purity that was circulating around her. Right. And this is like. fundy baby voice evacuated of a religion entirely right yeah um and then there's also like
Melody also mentioned to me this morning that every time she listens to a Tate McRae song, a different song not by Tate McRae gets in her head. Exactly. Like Buttons is the one that always gets in my head by Pussycat Dolls after listening to... Sports car? Yes. Not race car, sports car. I think that's a fundamental part of why, again, why people like Tate McRae is because she kind of serves as this conduit for other thoughts, other feelings, other emotions.
I listened to a Tate McCray song, like two hands. I think the beginning of Two Hands is directly ripped from Slide by Frank Ocean, Calvin Harris, Amigos. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think that connection and that like sound alike opening makes me think of slide. a song that I really enjoy, a song that defined my summer when it came out.
that makes me like two hands more. You know, I think it's intentional. I think it's intentional nostalgia farming. I think by putting these kind of... vague, placeless musical sensibilities in her music, it gets people to connect with her songs in a way that perhaps they wouldn't do organically if that wasn't there. You know, that's an interesting way to think about it, because I think when I see songs that interpolate songs from my teenage years.
To me, I think my first reaction is, like, how uncreative. Yes. Like, get a new song. Like, you don't need to do that, like, the blues song. Like... boring you know like yeah that song sucked when it came out like you don't need to do it again uh but i but then that's an interesting way of thinking about the nostalgia farming as like also offering these different access points for people well right because it's like whether
or not you actually like the interpolation and you actually like what the placement is doing it's the feelings that it evokes that's why people keep interpolating that's why there's like whole song camps devoted to interpolating old songs for new purposes like it has a
demonstrated psychological effect whether or not like you're privy to it or you like it even yeah um which i i think is part of why tate mccray is successful i think especially for gen z who like weren't around or culturally aware like gen alpha as well who who weren't present for say
buttons by pussycat dolls being the cultural moment you know like this kind of like what a moment it was yeah let's say you know and i and i think that like older listeners to this show need to remember like That nostalgia... I think our first impulse is to be like, oh, my God, I wish that you knew what it was actually like in 1999. Right. Right. But like there were parts of it that ruled and that I would be nostalgic for. And in 1997, 98.
Like I was in love with Dazed and Confused and the soundtrack to Dazed and Confused. And my parents were like, what is wrong with you? The 70s sucked. Right? Right. But like nostalgia is like cyclical, you know, like we're in these moments where like. Like, yeah, of course, Tate McRae, an artist in 2025, is calling back to sounds that were popular 20 years ago. You know, like you could place her music sonically in 2005. And it's like, right, of course.
the way the people in the 90s were calling on 1970 and so on and so forth. I think you take that, the nostalgia farming, and put it with Tate McRae's use of... chorus and hooks and like the way that she's able to sing these earworms that kind of like bore itself into your head and I mean that not derogatorily you know it's like you know when you listen to like a song and
there's like six different choruses in it and they all kind of are worming their way into your psyche and then you're singing like different parts of the song throughout the day. Well, and what's the name of the producer who's responsible for that thinking of like, do a hook and then... do another hook yeah do an even better hook so that your song has like six hooks in it yeah ryan tutter ryan tutter who is a
really famous songwriter and producer. People might know him as the dude behind One Republic. And he is basically one of the greatest songwriters of the new... century essentially you know like he he is able to write these songs whether you like him or not because I have thoughts on him but whether you like him or not he's able to craft a hit and Tate McRae is kind of his
pet project you know he's worked on all of her music and the ryan tedder method something we talk about on switched on pop the host charlie talks about is ryan tedder's method to writing songs which is all hooks like you don't write a verse you're writing a hook you're writing another hook you're writing another hook and then for the bridge it's another hook and you kind of like jenga these hooks together until you have a song that
is the catchiest part over and over and over and over again. Right, right. And it's kind of confusing sonically when you don't have, like, the rest from the hook. Right. Does that make sense? Yeah, well, I mean, that's like... My issue with Tate McRae songs, or it was my issue with Tate McRae songs before I really listened to her and I was hearing songs like X's on the radio, like X's confused me deeply because.
I didn't know where the hook was and in my head I kind of saw it as like this is the death of the chorus you know like to be really grandiose about it because that song has so many hooks that the idea of a hook is kind of removed, you know, like what happens when you have no buildup and you have no come down and you have no breaking up of everything. Like everything is kind of just.
all catchy all the time and it's a proven method that clearly works because brian tedder is very prolific but at the same time for some listeners it can be very boring you know to put it bluntly or like kind of grating in a way you know like you like you know how like a jingle is like just a melody and it's supposed to be catching in your head but it's like
10 jingles you know yeah exactly yeah so we're going to read these next two together because i think that they will complement each other and they also offer some theory on the question of confusing popularity This first one comes from Shazwina, and Melody's going to read it. It seems like Tate McRae is stuck in an interesting spot. A lot of name recognition, like people have heard of her, but not brand or personality recognition. Is it an issue of our fragment? media like
there not being a monoculture? Or is she just not distinctive enough in personality to have a following, to have fans who find something to relate and look up to? I think of her as Britney adjacent in terms of music and performance, but I can't place her as a character. Okay and then the second one is from Carrie. I heard Tate in a podcast interview talking about the frequent comparison between her and Britney Spears like it was obvious.
I don't understand the comparison besides Tate dances sexy. She wears low rise bottoms. Can you explain? Would love to hear your thoughts. Dancing sexy is like such a... You know, a popular girl thing. Yeah. I do wonder if how the lack of image in our brains is maybe a factor of both you and I being slightly out of her demo. Yeah.
Yeah, I think so as well, because I'm sure there's like tons of Gen Alpha kids, frankly, that are looking at Tate McRae and knowing so much about her the way that like... I don't know, when I was younger, I was really into, like, One Direction and, like, Fall Out Boy, you know? And, like, I, like, imagine that somebody not in those...
fan bases or those demos would look at those artists and be like, what the hell are you gleaning from Pete Wentz? You know, but, you know, I'm like, I could imagine maybe some, something similar is happening with young people and Tate McRae. I don't know. Yeah, no, and I think especially in Canada, she has, I think, a much more solid image as, like, hockey family girl. Yes, yes, totally. In America, I think, like, that's my main takeaway.
from Tate McRae, however reductive that it might be. I think the two things that I knew about Tate McRae prior to researching her music is that... she was Canadian and she was a dancer, you know? And I mean, it could be argued like, what else do you need? You know, especially in America. But I think the specifics are important here because it's not like she's from Toronto, right? She is from... It'd be like being from...
I don't know, like maybe a little more being from Dallas. Right. Distinct. Right. Like unique personality. Yeah. Or like Minneapolis. And someone posited in one of the questions they were like, she is.
basically she's like every hockey family there's a dancer there's a girl in a hockey family who didn't want to play hockey or like there were gender politics going on that made it difficult to play hockey and so she becomes a dancer instead like there's this real pairing of hockey and dancing and this was true in my minnesota family's world as well like it was
Two older brothers who are really good hockey players, a younger sister who is a really good hockey player, and then a really good dancer. And it's like the families, all they know is the commitment to 24-hour sports. Ice-T. Ooh, I like that. You are just like the whole family rotating. around the activities of the kids.
And even if that includes like for rink time, sometimes you can only get rink time at like 11 p.m. So that just becomes the new norm. It's just I mean, that's an extra layer for us to think about here is that like the elevation of of the kid above the parents needs. This is enlightening also. I'm learning a lot about the family dynamics. I don't know this for sure. I did find an Instagram account that's just devoted to Tate McCray's family. Word. Okay.
Period. And it says like Tate and her brother who has a name like, I don't know, Tater Tatum. It's not. But. And then it's like, and then to Mr. and Mrs. McRae, like it's very deferential and clearly a teen did it. Yeah. It's very cute. Yeah. So there's that specificity that we're missing. But I also think she is, and you talk about this a little bit.
in the episode she is sort of like b-level and i mean that as in like she's um britney was virgin whore groundbreaking a new kind of pop star when she went wide with Hit Me Baby one more time. Totally. And then there were all of these other pop stars whose images were evocative in similar ways. So Christina, of course, but also Mandy Moore and Jessica Simpson, right? Like doing the same thing, sounding the same.
in a lot of ways. Yeah. And so who's the first order to integrate? Like, that's the thing. I can't be like, she's not a knockoff of... of britney but yeah who is her first order well in the switched on pop episode i kind of draw this conclusion after you know discussing her music for a while and i feel like a lot of people put emphasis on tate's dancing above all else i like in tate mccray to somebody like paul abdul right like somebody who started as a dancer then made music and it's like
this idea of like the pop music B team where it's like, we're not looking to somebody like Paul Abdul. I mean, I wasn't alive when she was making hits, so I can't, it's neither here nor there, but you know, I can imagine people weren't looking. to Paula Abdul to like radically change the way that we were consuming pop music. That was Madonna's job, you know, that was Janet Jackson's job. And Paula kind of served as like this.
character who's giving us bops and she's going to be cool to look at and she's going to put a cartoon cat in the video we're all going to go crazy over it I wish you could understand how cool I thought that was at age nine when it came out. You know what I mean? It's something that appeals, I think, to young people in a way that I think is perhaps a little foreign.
people to to understand you know I I can't really explain why like when I was a kid I was super obsessed with like random like hardcore like bands and like random acts that were like so irrelevant you know what I mean and but I like I don't know something when you're a kid you like gravitate towards those things and you make them your own. And I think part of why Tate McRae is so successful without a defined character is because like her demo.
I can imagine is younger people who look at her and they go, oh my God, like I want to be her, you know, and her character is somebody to aspire to be for young people, if that makes sense. Yeah, no, for sure. It's like reading Seventeen magazine when I was 13. Yeah, right. No, exactly. You're like, oh, my God, this person is so cool. And maybe that's her character. She kind of radiates this like effervescent popular girl coolness, you know? Yeah.
And maybe it's unreadable to a lot of people. You know, it's not as distinct as we had a question earlier comparing her to Sabrina Carpenter or Chapel Rhone. It's like. Tate's character is not as distinct, but like we can argue that like the popular girl, cool girl, hockey adjacent dancer is still a personality, I feel like. Well, and I think part of this, too, is that she comes up through dance instead of through acting.
Right. So like Sabrina Carpenter, Selena Gomez, like they're coming up through like saying words on stage and developing characters that we relate to. Whereas dancers, like it is a wordless relation. It's like. oh, I like watching them dance. Like it's very unidirectional. Yeah, that's really interesting. I've never thought about that before. And even like the male gaze, like we had another question about Sabrina Carpenter feeling more resistant to the male gaze than.
tate does and i think that that has to do with the fact that like she is foremost positioned herself as a dancer and not as an actor wow that is really interesting because yeah you look at this crop of of pop stars right people that Have... Had experience in acting, you know, like Miley Cyrus and, you know, Sabrina Carpenter next to people like, I don't know if you're familiar with Addison Rae, who is gaining popularity, but she came from TikTok in a medium where.
she wasn't speaking. She was doing dancing videos in her living room. And that's a really interesting point about this generation of pop stars. Like it's, it's not so much from, or they're not so much coming from like, the disney or nickelodeon pipeline they're coming from like self-made talent quotes around talent you know because you could argue like tiktok dances but there's like a charm and a personality there that's carried off
in just aura you know it's like yeah you don't need words and like even the way the way that you're taught to perform when you're trained as a dancer like the way that your face looks like you're you're performing sexy face yeah right yeah and I think when you're acting When you have to transition between like speaking lines and then going into singing, like the variety show style that was the Mickey Mouse Club or Nickelodeon.
You have to negotiate this charisma, this transitional charisma that I don't think Tate has ever had. She hasn't had to flex or grow that muscle. Yeah, but does she need it? Right. She doesn't. That's the thing. She can just be a dancer. She can just be Jessica Alba. That's an interesting comparison. Right. Right. Totally. Totally. Okay. Next question comes from... Okay, we're talking about the dancing part. This comes from Farrah.
About Tate McRae, I keep seeing that she's a really good dancer, but to my untrained eye, her moves look similar to a lot of pop stars. Is she that much better of a dancer than her contemporaries? Is it really the dancing that's propelling her to this level of stardom? I wish I was a dancer. I wish I could give you like a really thought out like choreographer's answer about why Tate McRae is so known for her dancing.
You know, she has all of these like class, like modern dance things that you see more in the solo. components like lots of like laying on your back and putting a foot up in the air like like that sort of thing right right and then her group dancing I juxtaposed watching a lot of videos of her with early Britney. They are pretty similar. Just in terms of lots of cuts to make the dancing seem...
More dynamic than it might actually be, I would say. And then I also think that she is a descendant of like the step up style of dancing. Right. That's like staccato almost. Yeah. Yeah, like kind of this like street era of dancing. Totally. Yeah. Totally. Whereas like Britney is much more like, let's get in a V. You know what I mean? Yeah. I think something also about. that...
I noticed, and this term I learned from an episode of Glee when I was younger, hairography. Oh, so much hairography. Tate is really great at hairography. I think maybe that like distracts from maybe, you know, in, uh, an imperfect quality to her dancing again. Like I'm not a dancer, so I can't like say whether or not whipping her hair.
Right. You know, she has this long, beautiful hair that, you know, you watch videos of her live. I think there's a break and maybe exes where she like has a breakdown when she performs the song live. She always has these breaks. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And. which is good because it highlights what she's good at, which is dancing. But the haerography is a big part of it where she's kind of like whipping her long hair around and like moving in such a way that.
It flows, you know, like I think like the movement of the body that Tate implements is something that's fascinating to me. I don't know. I don't follow much dance, but what I do follow. is like movement videos from like, you know, the mid-1900s. 1900s is a lot I'm talking about like like one of my favorite artists is Merce Cunningham who was this choreographer and worked a lot with like
John Cage and all of these other people. And he has these movement videos where like, you know, he does these like jerky movements and he's filming dancers and the dancers choreo and they're doing these like jerky movements that call attention to like how. the body moves like modern as shit yeah you know what i mean like how like weird and funky the human body can move and
To bring it back to Tate McRae. I think like when she does this hierography, it evokes a similar thing where you're like, wow, the human body can do such amazing movements. Does she strike you as tall? Interesting. She's 5'8". I looked this up. Yeah, she's tall. I don't think 5'8 is very tall. Well, Sabrina Carpenter's like 4'11". Gaga's 5'2", famously. So, you know.
Maybe we need like an average height pop. I'm just thinking of in terms of her height. And then you add like another three feet onto her. extension with her hair right like it makes like a fluid line it's like um Rhythmic gymnasts, you know, have those little ribbons. Yes, I think we're on to something here. I have an addition to this, too, which is like you guys reminding me of.
the other stars that came through the Disney pipeline and the ongoing joke about the Disney knees. Oh, you know, where it's like the one move that they all have is just sort of like knocking their knees together in time. So speaking about like Olivia Rodrigo's SNL. She doesn't really dance other than just like knocking her knees together. And I can't think of any of other Tate's contemporaries who are dancing.
in the complicated way that she is so like i'm also not a dancer also don't know if she's like technically good or not although i assume she is if she's like lifelong train but the level is way different than what her contemporaries are doing yeah that's and I think that contributes to this success we really need to give her credit for being a dancer because I think
in this TikTok era of music where we have a lot of artists coming from TikTok and YouTube where they're sitting behind their pianos, like Tate is giving performance in a way that, you know, I don't think a lot of... gen z pop stars are doing presently you know like you watch like someone like billy eilish who is one of the biggest pop stars in the world like she doesn't dance you know
Like even like Charlie XCX doesn't dance like these pop stars. They kind of just like stand there and move and moving is a lot different than dancing. And I think like Tate is able. to distinguish herself from other people because she is a dancer and She did place third on her season of So You Think You Can Dance. And they didn't even allow Canadian votes. Right, exactly. Like, if they allowed Canadian votes, she may have won her season, is the thing. So, like, you know, I mean...
She is, by all accounts, a pretty good dancer, you know, generally speaking. No, for sure, for sure. And, like, millennials will talk about how they felt when they saw Britney perform. with the snake for I'm a slave to you, like that cemented our understanding of what good dancing looks like. The same way that I'm sure Madonna cemented or Janet Jackson also was incredibly influential in terms of what I thought good dancing looked like.
Or J-Lo. I mean, we haven't even talked about J-Lo yet, right? Yeah. There's a tradition of very good dancers, middling vocals. Yeah. Memorable... images that like stay with you even if in this case it's one that when you map yourself onto right no real there there paula abdul and the paula paula abdul what i mean she was a judge on american idol like that yeah People understood her as a...
having discernment when it came to talent people for many years right like she has charisma you know where she could parlay that into a judging gig where you arguably sustain yourself on just charisma Yes. Today's episode is brought to you by Z-Biotics. Maybe you've heard people rave about Z-Biotics pre-alcohol probiotic. Charlie got me to try it and I'm still kind of amazed that it worked so well, but great news.
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ZBiotics Probiotics. ZBiotics has a 100% money-back guarantee, so if you're unsatisfied for any reason, they will refund your money, no questions asked. Thanks to ZBiotics for sponsoring this episode. Our last two questions are going to go back to back and we will be able to revisit some of our Canada feelings. This is about Tate, Canada and hockey. The first question comes from Lauren and Melody is going to read it.
This is just a semi-troll comment and not a serious question, sorry, from a British Columbian, but it makes all the sense that a girl from Calgary with an oil dad is the Canadian star to get widespread American attention. Classic Canada. Alternative Q, what's with the male gaze in Tate and that goalie outfit subverting the male gaze like pissing off hockey fans by wearing the pads wrong? And then the second question comes from Allison and Melody is going to read it.
Explain Tate's connection to hockey culture and sports in general. I took my 14-year-old daughter and her friends to her concert last summer. We also saw Olivia Rodrigo, Sabrina Carpenter, and she saw Taylor too. And the vibe is so different. The clothing, the... fans wear, the hockey jerseys and pennies. And we play hockey, but I've not seen the kind of outfits on fans like I did for Tate. How and why hockey? I know she's from Calgary.
OK, so the hockey pads thing in the cover image of her second album, Think Later, she's standing in a black tank top and underwear. And then there are like goalie pads leaning against her legs and the words Think Later on them. Yeah. But the pads are on the wrong.
links and then in one of the posters promoting a tour she's wearing a bedazzled jersey uh she has also performed at many hockey halftimes the hockey i think she performed at the nhl all-star game fitting yeah so what are your thoughts on this well I've been talking a lot about this kind of cultural awareness that I gained of Tate McRae through hearing her music. Before...
I was aware of Tate McRae and her like pop music and her impact. I think I learned about her. This is like reminding me. I think I learned about her from a tweet that was calling her a puck bunny. yes because I think she famously dated a hockey player yes and that motivated most of her songwriting I think on think later which was the album that blew up got very big um i think that was how Or at least was one of the first things I gained knowledge about Tate McRae. The term Puck Bunny kind of.
ping pongs around my head which is implied that it's somebody who is fascinated by and continues to date hockey player like a like a hockey player groupie basically yes i think that the the point that the first question asker makes that like Oh, of course, this would be the Canadian star who translates to American audiences. Well, right. Yeah. Yeah.
defines like personality i think or like you know like it's like oh right canadian in my head oh maple leaves hockey right like syrup like all these like stereotypical canadian images that That she's pinning onto her presentation. And also like pretty Americanized understanding, right? Right, totally. This upper middle class rich kid.
whose dad is a lawyer like that is relatable across lines yeah yeah i mean yeah and i think like also a lot of people dance You know, I think like a lot of people, we have either when they're kids or they're now like I, I can't dance, but I took a dance class when I was like six, you know, because my mom made me like, it's like, these are things that make her make her relatable, I think.
You know, Melody has this theory that I'm wondering if we can like intersect here. And she was trying to figure out why all of these other Gen Z... stars have entered into her algorithm in various ways like she's become deeply familiar with all of them but not tate mccray like nowhere in her tiktok algo and her theory is that It's because she's conservative coded. What did your sister say, Melody?
My sister unlocked it all for me this morning because I was telling her about this recording and she was like, I can't explain it. But like she has Hawk to a girl energy. Okay. And I was like, yes, that's it. Like, that's why she's not in my algorithm.
Yeah, I think that's interesting. Something that I wanted to talk about in the Switched on Pop episode about Tate McRae that didn't really fit into our larger analysis was like, there is a quote unquote bimbo-ian presentation to Tate that I think A connects with the male gaze and B connects largely to like cultural trends of the 2020s and I think in America
you know, we're in Trump presidency too. And I think America writ large is being moved into this more conservative direction. Like young people are being pushed in a more sexless direction. you know, a more kind of an era that is, I would say like devoid of culture, frankly, and like what makes and defines popular culture. And I think somebody like Tate, who clearly has admiration in her head for stars like Janet Jackson and Madonna, these deeply sexy, like radiating sex appeal.
pop stars but existing in this era of culture is kind of watering that down you know and and i think going back to like the bimbo-ness of it it's like Tate McRae's character to a lot of people is like, I'm sexy, I can dance and I sing about being sexy. Like that's it. Like that's the start and the end of the conversation. And I do think there's like a real point to the fact that like in America, at least speaking for myself, like.
Country music is bigger than ever. We see all of these artists pivot to more conservative aesthetics and a more conservative audience, frankly. I think of Post Malone, who... did rap music transition to rock and now did his Coachella headlining set full country, you know, with like a whole country band kind of retconning his old hip hop songs into country songs. I think there's. something notable to say there about like the conservative tide of, of culture.
And the fame of somebody like Tate McRae, who is a blank slate other than being like, I am sexy and I have cool girl, popular girl energy.
and she collaborated with morgan wallen a lot of listeners pointed that out right yeah whose politics are um i would just say not progressive uh right exactly and I also it reminds me to, you know, like if we're looking at the echo of Britney, Christina, like late 90s, early 2000s, like that was an incredible moment of backlash against feminism and just like backlash culture generally.
And we're in another one of those moments right now. Right. Right. Like that's the echo to me. I like that. I like that. I feel like like, yeah, we're in this like I think there was a moment perhaps like in the late.
2000s and early 2010s where our pop artists that were gaining a lot of popularity like Lady Gaga like Lorde you know these artists that were very like defined and defiant in the sense that they like pushed back on what was normal at the time and they both changed pop music as a result you know they were very internal in that like they were kind of the shepherd of their own image totally and i think tate coming from this new era is not really pushing against anything and yet is
having still massive popularity with this album so close to what being number one on the billboard 200 like there is the same type of celebrity just without i think the like pushing against norms you know which perhaps factors into this larger conservative era yeah well and even just think of the word conservative like i think sometimes we we miss It's primary evocation, which is...
it's not pushing boundaries right it's not radical by any means no yeah it's just it's the like second tier iteration very safe in a lot of different ways right And a throwback, like that nostalgia, you know, like MAGA is nostalgia, right? Like they are all related. Yeah. So I think Tate McRae.
is part of this culture cycle that we're in for better or for worse you know what i mean yeah and we don't know what her personal politics are necessarily but that doesn't mean that like it's sort of like how
Taylor Swift was utilized by white nationalism. That doesn't mean that Taylor Swift is a white nationalist. It just means that her popularity was... exploited by a group that was gaining prominence at that time right like the imagery that she projects is in line i think with what is coming back in vogue
unfortunately. And I would be very interested to see where Tate McRae is in it. 10 years oh yeah i mean me as well because i think like this album is it has good songs on it you know like i really like revolving door for example like i think that's a great pop song but I'm curious to see what she does that's not tied to nostalgia cycles. You know, like I think she started putting out music and it was very in like the pop punk vein of what was trendy.
in the beginning of the 2020s you know and now we're in this moment where everybody's trying to be Britney and she's making music that is Britney Spears coded like I am also curious to see where she goes in her career and hopefully does something that's not tied to nostalgia, you know? Yeah. Yeah. When I think about like watching Miley Cyrus, I remember just being so annoyed by her. I mean, like, what are you doing? Like.
this is so like you're just you're trying to push like it's it was such a clear and obvious rebellion in so many different ways right and like bangers era right like yeah yeah bangers era even though i really liked a lot of the song on bang like that that album perfect pop album tops the bottom It's so long. Yeah. Anyway, and then watching where she is now 10 years later, I'm like, this is a woman who is going to have a long and varied career.
Like, I cannot wait to see where her artistry leads her. And I think that there is that potential. Like, if you watch those early, like, 2017 videos of Tate, like, singing on her keyboard. Yeah. There's something there. And so it depends on where she is.
wants to take it yeah i and i think the miley comparison is apt because i think a lot of as we've been saying a lot of young listeners gravitate towards tate mccray and i was thinking recently like i've been a fan of miley cyrus since i was like six years old and I had the Hannah Montana CD you know yeah um I I have been following her ever since and I can imagine maybe there's some young listeners who are really gonna
come of age listening to tate mccray yeah which you know i i think is is kind of beautiful really yeah you know like yeah no and like i learned a lot coming of age listening to britney spears in the background like you learn what you believe and don't believe in terms of how you accept or reject that image or negotiate that image. Right.
I remember seeing a guy, Britney, with her legs out behind her. It's a very classic image that came with the first album, I believe. A guy had that poster on his wall when I was in high school. I was like... I don't want to date that guy. Totally. It's instructive. Well, this has been a total pleasure. We will put like 17 different links to the episode that we evoke so many times in this episode. If people want to find more of you on the internet, where can they find you?
I am still producing Switched on Pop, so you can totally listen to that. And I'm on Twitter at BitBurger, B-I-P-P, Burger. amazing yeah it's a song it's a really good song um by you can't change your handle now well exactly it's my it's my defined um my defined persona is bit burger so that's where we're at amazing amazing thank you so much for being here thank you for having me
Welcome to the Ask An Anything segment. This part of the show is usually for paid subscribers, but today we're letting everyone experience what a full episode of the Culture Study Podcast is like. This part of the show is pretty self-explanatory. Someone asks something and I answer it. Sometimes it has something to do with the rest of the episode and sometimes it stands alone.
Sometimes it's with the co-host and sometimes it's with Melody. Today's question is about something I love writing and talking about. This one comes from Laura and Melody is going to read it. Okay, it's a little long, but it's good. Yes. What is that one friend's secret to having so many cool hobbies and being good at so many different things? A former colleague popped up in a shared Slack selling her art and it sent me into a spiral.
How is she so cool? She always has the perfect alternative style. Oh, this hand-painted silk kimono, I made it. As an omnivorous hobbyist, knits, sews, farms, bakes. forages for natural remedies, paints, volunteers at the library's high-tech makerspace. Just anything she puts her mind to. To boot, she's a loving mother, social advocate, and very thoughtful and talented at her highly technical day job. Where do people like her find the time?
Or is it not about time and just a natural talent to acquire new skills and knowledge? Is it more confidence? I've always looked at that list of hobbies, interests, and activities and long to be so omnivorous. Why do some people seem to have more time or more ability to do cool things in the same time? Why am I just so damn tired after putting my kid to bed? Why do I have to relearn the absolute basics every time I pick up knitting needles?
Okay, so I read this question and I immediately thought... I bet that Laura has so many amazing things and that someone could write the same post about her in some way, right? Probably. Maybe she doesn't like hand paint her kimono, but there's probably this feeling that she is doing a lot of really cool stuff. that she's really great at her job and like does other things. Whatever Laura's life is, like...
When you see someone's life from the outside, it is very easy to understand it only as an accumulation of all of those awesome things. Like this coworker who was very cool. He was like, like is. really bad at a lot of stuff you just don't see it yeah yeah No, if they weren't, if they were good at truly everything, like, they're a robot, right? Like, there are things that they are very bad at and that, like, there are probably things that they feel, like, very self-conscious about or ashamed of.
or that they aspire to be more like someone else, right? Like everyone has these things. And when you only consume someone's life through, I'm not even gonna say social media, just like through glimpses of their life. If you only see someone at like school pickup, right? If you only hear someone on podcasts, like it's just so easy to understand all of them as these awesome things.
She could have foraged like one time, but she posted about it. And so it seems like part of her personality. Right. Like it seems like she forages every week, but really she forages like twice a year. Yeah. And then I just think like the second part of the question, which is about like, I'm just so tired.
There is nothing wrong with feeling that tiredness. Laura alludes to the fact that she has to put her kid to bed, which to me suggests that her kid is pretty young, right? And that is like a life draining segment of life. Yeah. Where it feels like there's not a lot extra to give. And we put this incredible pressure on ourselves to do all of the things. And like also.
like be stylish and like have creative verb it also sounds like her co-worker is just a creative person i'm not a creative person like are you i feel like you're a more creative person than me uh I don't know. Like my creativity is like organizing flowers where they're going to go in like on graph paper. Like that's my creativity. It's not.
It's not arts and crafts. No, it's not. And I have friends like this, too, who I'm like, oh, my God, they're so effortlessly cool. And they're probably like, how does she run a marathon and also work full? time you know what i mean like there's things that about everyone else's life that seem like i don't know how she does it that line totally
The other thing that occurred to me was not just the like, is this person naturally good at learning things? Maybe. But then you also start to kind of do the... time math of where are the hours coming from she could be one of those freaks that only needs like four hours of sleep totally i thought about that yeah i i need
At least nine every night. And I've just accepted that I just don't have as many hours in the waking day. Yeah, there was some like... i don't know some article that looked at a lot of super high achieving like ceo type people who are also parents and we're also doing all this other stuff and they were those like Those people who can get four hours of sleep and still be incredibly high functioning. Yeah. Last night, I got six hours and 47 minutes and I feel like a shell of myself. Yeah.
It's horrible. The other day I got eight and a half and I wanted to cry. all these people with kids are gonna like just i was gonna say this is like this is the top three reasons of why like i don't think i should have children is because i need too much sleep
Also, no mention of this co-worker's partner. Like, maybe the partner takes on a lot of child care. Like, maybe they have an actually equitable relationship. That would be sick. Maybe they have a nanny or they have really involved grandparents. Yeah. You know? Totally.
I also thought like maybe this cool coworker is like very good at turning down things she doesn't want to do. So she's not saddled by like obligations. Maybe she has really good boundaries and maybe she also doesn't feel bad saying no. Yeah, this has been my secret. So last year, I like worked myself into burnout. This year, we're recovering from that. And so I've said no to a lot of things. And I am experiencing this huge like surge of creative.
energy that I am putting into learning how to quilt as you'll hear me continue to talk about as the hyper fixation continues. But it just feels really good because I didn't think I could feel that feeling again. When all I could do last year was my only hobbies last year were like laying down. Karking. Yes, karking. You should define what karking is. Karking is short for carcass time, which comes...
It's a long story. It comes from a TikTok, but it's related to bed rotting, but need to kark. Yeah, and I think that... that actually is a skill if you think about it rest is an incredible skill and one that we do not celebrate right like what we celebrate is this like cornucopia of creativity that's this easy like looks amazing on social media whereas karking is harder to display yeah and also like i would encourage laura to think about what
You probably have hobbies that you're just not thinking about as hobbies. Like a couple of years ago, a friend of mine who is a mom of two, she works full time, you know, volunteers, like she is this kind of person where she's just so cool. And she reads like 150 books a year. Yeah. And I was like, how do you do that? And she said, it's my primary hobby. Yeah. I was like.
Oh, I never, this sounds so dumb, but I never thought about reading as a hobby. Like reading is just something that I do. Right. But when you think about it in terms of a hobby. that it's like oh i'm reading i'm dedicating time to my hobby or like i i firmly believe in like elevating the things that involve your hobby. So like, I have a really nice Kindle. I have a really cool little lap bean bag to set it on. I have a remote page turner. I have a special pillow to hold my arm.
so they don't fall asleep while I'm reading. It's elite. It's so good. Yeah. So like whatever you're already doing, think about that and then think about how you can make it a little more luxurious. Right. And I think that... This is something that gets discussed a lot anytime I write about hobbies. People are like, I only recently came to understand reading as my hobby. Yeah.
It sometimes gets complicated because I think sometimes we think of things that we are compelled to do by outside standards. We're like, oh, well, organizing is my hobby, right? Like that one gives me a little bit of like, oh.
or like cleaning is my hobby and you can take pleasure from cleaning but I don't think that like something that has this dual tasking as like something that you are compelled to do by outside standards it's just it's complicated I feel that way about exercise sometimes right Like when is running a hobby and when is running like body maintenance? Yeah. Kind of thing. That's probably why I could not.
continuously exercise that I just go in phases because it just feels too much like a to-do. Totally, totally. I think our advice to Laura is to feel like... great about yourself and think about how someone might look at your life if they could really see your life right like if parts every part of your life was like beautifully represented they'd be like wow that's awesome
Like everyone's life is cool. And it's just that some of them are more aesthetically pleasing than others. And that doesn't make them better or worse. And also just that maybe take solace in the fact that the co-worker. Doesn't have it all figured out. No one does. Is there anything else you'd add? Actually, I have one more idea for Laura.
Coming off of, again, personal experience is to see if there's some kind of class of something that you want to take that's like multiple weeks. So then you have like scheduled carved out time to try something new or to. improve on something you already like to do like if you need to relearn the basics for knitting like find a knitting circle or a knitting class where you know okay these three tuesday nights or whatever it just for me
Because I always loved school. That kind of structure is just so helpful. I did a seven-week class on Mansfield Park with Fred of the Pod, Margaret H. Willison, where I just never would have... done anything like that on my own or like just took a two-week quilting class and it was delightful and so yeah. I also think that in situations where it's hard to ask for time for yourself, and I think oftentimes this is true of younger mothers or mothers of younger children.
It gives you a structure to ask someone else to cover the labor of the home during that time. And if it's a class that somebody else is facilitating, it somehow like doesn't feel optional, especially if you're paying for it, but you don't have to pay for it. but yeah all right that's our advice yeah we're always you're doing great yeah laura we really like this question it was beautifully written that's what you're that's one of your hobbies is writing good questions
Hey, your hobby is listening to the Culture Study Podcast and contributing to it. We love it. Thanks for listening to the Culture Study Podcast. Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. We have so many great episodes in the works. I know I always say that, but it's actually true. And I promise you don't want to miss any of them. Some of the episodes in the pipeline include ones about America.
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And if you're a paid subscriber to the podcast, head over to the discussion thread and keep the conversation going. I want to know. This is always my question, but it's like, what did you find out about Tate that you didn't know? I think a lot of people are going to be surprised by just how popular she is. Or what do you still want to know? What are you still stymied by?
I think we can have a good conversation about that. The Culture Study Podcast is produced by me, Anne Helen Peterson, and Melody Raul. Our music is by Poddington Bear. You can find me on Instagram at Anne Helen Peterson, Melody at Melodious47, and the show at Culture Study Pod. you Why do I have to relearn the absolute basics every time I pick up Needy Niddles? Needy Niddles. Needy Niddles. Needy Niddles. Why do I have to? Sorry, really tickled. Okay.