Origami Around
TVSTRANGERTHINGS
blake kathryn
Product Placement
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#extradirty
Game of Thrones Daily
Mike Driver
Claire Keane
One Nice Bug Per Day
ojovivo
YOU ARE THE REASON
Monterey Bay Aquarium
wallacepolsom
Peter Solarz
trying on a metaphor
Love Begins
Misplaced Lens Cap
Sade Olutola
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@winonasmusic
latest cover is up, this one’s dedicated to my girl Lady Gaga who slayed her grammy performance :)
new covers every monday and thursday–always taking requests, so lmk if there’s a ditty you wanna hear from me!
share+like+subscribe if u dig it please!
you can support me on melbryant.bandcamp.com or check out my site,
<3 melbryantmusic.com <3
a song for my grandfather, a WWII vet and a great man who passed away in december.
ICYMI: ‘High Priestess’, the album and release show have been announced! Check out the promo (and me being a dork) here!
Check out this little snippet of my newest original song, Bridges, which is a metaphorical ‘response’ to some facets of the current political climate from the standpoint of someone who just wants to try and help a little bit.
Please consider donating to my Kickstarter to hear the full version of this song, to pre-order my upcoming album, or get yourself some sweet personalized rewards!
Kickstarter link here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1432528102/mel-bryant-debut-album
livestream of my show at Silvana in Harlem, NY…skip to 5:05 to get the singin’ part
Written by Mel Bryant Vocals/Guitar: Mel Bryant Lead Guitar: Conor McCarthy Rhythm Guitar: Aaron Hicks Bass: Sara Keden Drums: Marcus Grant Recorded by Aaron Hicks Additional mixing by Andres Daza
Check out my original song, Cutting Board, fresh off my band Electric Church’s new EP ‘Wesley Sessions’! We recorded and produced the whole thing ourselves! Share it around if you like it and support some hard workin’ independent artists :)
NEW COVER OF MERRY GO ROUND BY KACEY MUSGRAVES :D Like, share, comment and subscribe to my youtube channel if you’re into it! thanks y’all <3
HIT ME A LADY IS OUT IN THE WORLD AND I’M KINDA FREAKING OUT ABOUT IT!
please please do me a solid and listen, like, and share this song with your friends, tell them to go like my page Mel Bryant on Facebook for more! this song is one of my favorites i’ve ever written because it’s about something that really really matters to me—female empowerment, and addressing sexism and rape culture in the music industry (and in life). It would really mean the world to me if you guys could share this thing and get this conversation going so we can start to make real change.
facebook.com/melbryantofficial
Best Wishes y’all
MEL BRYANT ON RAPE CULTURE IN POP MUSIC
The following are excerpts from my final paper for my Women’s Gender Studies class.
Rape culture is an environment in which sexual violence against women is normalized, sometimes even encouraged, through media and popular culture. It leads to a world in which rape is prevalent, where women live in constant fear of rape while the majority of rapists are not incarcerated or punished in any way. Music is a powerful force for social change that can be used to improve the world and bring people’s attention to social injustice. Similarly, music can be used to perpetuate harmful social constructions like rape culture. It’s no secret that many genres, especially mainstream pop and hip-hop, throw around misogynistic language and lyrics that support rape culture. As a musician and feminist, I believe it to be my duty to call attention to popular songs that promote these harmful attitudes towards women.
It is clear that these songs have a very strong and certain effect on the mindsets of our youth—especially young boys—who hear their heroes refer to women as ‘bitches’ and ‘hoes’ and start to think that it’s perfectly okay for them to do the same.
“if she ever tries to leave again I’mma tie her to the bed and set this house on fire”
“Slut you think I won’t choke no whore”
“Every last woman on earth I’ll kill off and I still wouldn’t fuck you, slut”
-Eminem
“Bitches ain’t shit but hoes and tricks/lick on these nuts and suck the dick”
—Dr Dre
“Punch your bitch in her mouth just for talkin’ shit”
—Tyler, the Creator
“I know you want it”
—Robin Thicke
“No matter where I go, I see the same hoes”
—Tupac Shakur
“I beat the pussy up”
—Lil’ Boosie
“You remind me of my Jeep I wanna ride it”
—R Kelly
“When you put it on it’s an invitation/when they play your song get on up and shake it”
—Beyonce Knowles
All these lines present very pressing ways in which music propagates rape culture—-they send messages that promote violent language and behavior towards women, language that is so prevalent in the media that consumers barely bat an eyelash at it. Eminem’s line “if she ever tries to leave again, I’mma tie her to the bed and set the house on fire” was part of a massively popular and successful song, “Love the Way You Lie”, a song that was played hundreds of times a day on countless radio stations. Millions of young people heard this song on a daily basis and were subconsciously affirmed that this kind of treatment towards women is acceptable.
This kind of tacit acceptance of rape culture in music is harmful to men and women—it promotes rigid gender roles for both sexes that are unrealistic and unnatural, and leads to men think they have to prove their masculinity by mistreating women, whereas women are conditioned to accept sexually aggressive treatment from men as a commonplace occurrence. In the sphere of popular music, women are also commonly sexually objectified by male artists, and female artists are objectified in the media by critics and journalists when they attempt to assert their existence as a sexual being rather than a sexual object. Yes, there is a difference.
By no means do I promote censorship in music—quite the contrary, I find it crucial that we as a culture start actually talking about what these lyrics mean, and the possible repercussions of such language. Similarly, I find it rather preposterous that we live in a society that would sooner censor a woman’s nipple than a line asserting that a man will tie down his girlfriend and set her on fire.
These issues are more complex than I’d like them to be. It would be easy to simply blame the artists that are saying this stuff in their music, but thats not going to cut it. We need to talk about the fact that this song went through hundreds of industry professionals before making it onto the radio. We need to talk about the fact that many of these songs became number one hits, and still not a single mention about the potentially harmful content of the songs. I love hip-hop music, but it’s getting harder and harder for me to ignore the way that artists portray almost all the women in their songs as symbols of their success—no names, just “bitches and hoes”, and this attitude has been slowly but surely making it’s way into very mainstream music.
In a nation where only approximately 3% of convicted sexual offenders face any jail time whatsoever, not even including the sexual offenders who get by without being prosecuted because the victim is too scared to testify, this isn’t just a matter of feeling uncomfortable about song lyrics. It’s a matter of life and death. Yet, too many times when women try to bring these issues up, they’re consistently disregarded and accused of being “feminazis”. Take one quick look at the comments section any single youtube video regarding feminist issues, and you’ll find yourself mired in slew of anti-feminist, sexist sentiments ranging from simple expletives to incredibly long winded explanations of why feminism is stupid and wrong. It’s disheartening, to say the least, but I have hopes that this can change.
the Melodrama EP drops late september! So excited to get this going. original art by yours truly :)
My original song, “Hit Me Like A Lady” will be out any minute! Keep a lookout!
sources: eyes // nails
Members of the Venice Beach Girls Dare Club, a group of bathing beauties who do a new stunt every Sunday, playing tightrope basketball.
Venice, California, 1929.
omg this may become my new summer plan: “a new stunt every Sunday” xlaia.
"Space is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is.”
-Douglas Adams
queen miranda
This powerful image is from one of the memorials last night for 16-year-old Maren Sanchez.
Maren was stabbed to death in her high school stairwell on the morning of the prom. She was killed for allegedly turning down a young man’s invitation to be her prom date.
Her classmates paid tribute by dressing up, and bringing out the gown she would have worn to the prom. Even though this memorial was a sorrowful and traumatic event, the students smiled through their tears for the camera because… Maren would have wanted them to be happy on their prom night.
I grew up in Milford, CT, and I live about 15 minutes away from Jonathan Law High School. My partner attended JLHS and I have friends with family members who currently attend.
With the Sandy Hook shooting in December 2012, I can’t believe that here we are again, just a year later, with another tragedy in a Connecticut school.
My heart goes out to all of those affected.
Sharing memorial images for a young woman that never should have died.
She was killed for allegedly turning down a young man’s invitation to be her prom date.
ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? YOUNG GIRLS GETTING FUCKING KILLED BECAUSE MEN A MAN CAN’T HANDLE REJECTION.
FUCK THIS WORLD.
That lone dress on a rack where she would be standing. My God.
thank fucking god people are still talking about this. Maren was killed on Friday and after that first day, posts about her vanished. she was sixteen. she was sixteen and was supposed to spend that day getting ready for junior prom, but instead was dead by the time the first bell rang.
don’t forget maren sanchez. don’t let her become another name you vaguely remember in twenty years. do not fucking forget maren.
