Why does everybody want to kiss Katy Perry?

By
Lady Glance-a-Lot
Published: November 18, 2009Posted in: Lady Glance-A-Lot's ClosetTags: , , , , , , , , ,
Why does everybody want to kiss Katy Perry?
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When I first found out that Katy Perry was coming to town, I excitedly started saving for, hopefully, the best seats in the house. Even though my friend, Corrine and I got VIP tickets, on the night itself, I was nervous that we wouldn’t get a good view of her because we had arrived about 10 minutes before showtime, and the MOA grounds was packed by then.

The VIP area.

Suddenly, a group of kids started running towards some area at the front that I couldn’t see clearly. Instinctively, Corrine said “Follow the kids!” And so we did, as the bouncers screamed, “Go, go, go!”

 

Corrine and I after the show. We wore pink and black that night!

Corrine and I after the show. We wore pink and black that night!

 

 

bouncer

One of the front-row bouncers.

When we ended up in a spacious pit right in front of the stage, Corrine and I started screaming. But at the same time, we figured that we were not supposed to be there. Overhearing the kids (we had followed) ask each other “Are we going backstage,” made us realize that this was probably  the all-access or SVIP area. That meant we couldn’t leave the pit lest the bouncers ask for us tickets and throw us out. 

Mae

Mae kicked off the evening.

Jed Madela

Jed Madela belts it out.

The fact that I had a Blueberry Banana shake followed Brewed Coffee, an hour before the concert made me worry even more–I’m one of those people who have to sit at the aisle of movie theaters or take frequent pit stops on land trips. Even worse, I had been suffering from a week-long bout with Vertigo and was on medication that made me sleepier and dizzier.
journeys **

Journey's Arnel Pineda and Neal Schon was the night's special guest.

Nick Shron

Neal Schon

The show finally began with a set from rock band, Mae. I’m almost 27 and I don’t know who Mae is, although Corrine did. When the kids started bellowing and singing, I felt old and ashamed for my lack of Pop-consciousness.

Mae was followed by local crooner Jed Madela. Honestly, Jed’s set felt out of place. Everybody was markedly quieter when he started belting out power ballads. However, Jed immediately followed this up by saying that he wanted to perform that evening because of the cause it would benefit: Ondoy, the country’s worst flood in 40 years. 

After almost an hour and a half later, I felt ready to burst. But I was determined to hold it in for the sake of Katy Perry! Corrine and I positioned ourselves in the middle front row, a few meters away from the mic stand.
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Perry rocks for a cause. Originally slated for October, her Manila show was postponed due to Ondoy. On November 14, she was joined by Mae, Jed Madela and Journey for a benefit concert to aid survivors of the flood.

Finally, Perry runs onstage, doing pirouettes as she sang “Fingerprints.” Her novelty is clear in the way she presents herself and converses with the audience: a girly character who may appear vulnerable in nothing more than a baby pink studded bra and hot pants. Her stage is covered in pink flamingos and her trademark fruit motifs: cherries, apples, oranges and strawberries. Later, an inflatable cat named Kitty Purrrry is brought onstage.

Perry first bursted into my stereo singing about how “gay” her ex is and how she wanted to “kiss a girl” and I was instantly hooked. But it took almost a year before I finally got her album of infectious pop ditties. On the cover as with her live shows, Perry looks like a blast from the past: a modern pin-up girl with a dark retro haircut,  a 50s hourglass figure that she dresses up in vintage-style swimsuits and costume dresses paired with modern fashion pieces like those famous Giambatista Valli high heels in the “Thinking of You” video.

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She sings about heartbreak and boys but you don’t end up feeling sorry for her. Instead of weighing us down melodramaa, Perry pokes fun at her boy problems. I personally love how she likens an indifferent boyfriend to a “Mannequin.” (You’re just a toy. Could you ever be a real, real boy?).

This girl seems all sugar and spice with her pink concert backdrop, catsuits and penchant for kitties: a potent mix of naughty and nice. Her pin-up image is suggestive of the female sex symbols, whose barely-dressed images were hung on walls for the benefit of men’s one-sided admiration. But, in Perry’s case, the poster girl talks back, asserting her right to exit a failing relationship (”I should know that you’re no good for me”), her determination to stand out (”I gotta make my mark, I gotta make it hard”) and even, expressing the nuances of her sexuality (”I kissed a girl just to try it”). She wields the bastion of girl power, but at the same time she is not afraid to lay bare her vulnerability and complexity.

Maybe that’s why we love Katy Perry: guys want to take her out while girls want to have sleepovers with her. Perry’s music isn’t the Spice Girls’ and Pussycat Dolls’ (not that I don’t like their music) brand of feminism of girls vs. boys and female domination. Perry loves boys! But she won’t take their games lightly, either.

Towards the end of the evening, as she held a giant inflatable lipstick in one hand, she started kissing several people in the audience (earlier she kissed this lucky guy, who she had plucked out from the audience to jam with her during “Hot N’ Cold”). Red lipstick is the icon of the seductive femme fatale. Perry has seduced her fans with her brand of self-aware pop. 

Instead of subjecting us to the ideals of female supremacy, she simply comes to us to sing about the girl experience in the context of her experience, and in the greater context of the relationship between the sexes. Her music validates that girls can be one of the boys sometimes, that girls can have a complex sexuality, that girls can get hurt and deserve to be treated fairly, that girls can break out of the stereotypes they’ve been subjected to.

Dressing up like a pin-up girl provides perfect irony. She resembles a previous era when women were subjected to men’s whims but doesn’t represent it.

Hence, Perry doesn’t make the rest of us gals feel threatened . She can go on-stage and unapologetically show her to-die-for body without us feeling a jealous rage. We end up loving her and oh so wanting to kiss her.