Books: ‘Tacky’ by Rax King
It’s likely that from the time the first human created a piece of music, there have been critics and pieces that have been labeled, fairly or not, as substandard. Certain musicians gain our collective derision for one reason or another — Nickelback, anyone?
Rax King’s essay collection, Tacky, is dedicated to “the worst culture we have to offer,” from TV like Jersey Shore and America’s Next Top Model to The Cheesecake Factory and the ultimate time killer, The Sims. But King also focuses on music that is often left for guilty-pleasure playlists — if it’s added to playlists at all — like early 2000s Christian rock band Creed and bombastic ’70s rock star Meat Loaf.
King writes about some of pop culture’s most cast-aside musicians with wit and love. In opening essay “Six Feet from the Edge,” King writes about Creed frontman Scott Stapp with understanding and compassion that’s been otherwise lacking in conversations surrounding him, even as we’re collectively reassessing how we’ve treated similar public figures in the past.
When Meat Loaf died earlier this year, it was nearly impossible to find an article that didn’t include dismissive lines calling his music “cheesy” or “over-the-top.” It was the journalistic equivalent of the guilty pleasure, like each writer (or their editor) felt forced to include them lest they give the singer too much credit. I, for one, having been raised by a Meat Loaf-loving father, didn’t know that I wasn’t supposed to like Meat Loaf until I read those articles. Likewise, King embraces the “chaos orchestra” of Meat Loaf, specifically the 1977 album Bat Out of Hell. “I trust people more when they admit they love this album as I love it,” she writes in the closing essay, “It’s Time to Let Meat Loaf into Your Embarrassing Little Heart.” “Surely we all remember when ‘baby, you’re the only thing in this whole world / that’s pure and good and right’ was a way we were willing to feel about someone.”
King’s takes are refreshing, too, with a wonderfully unapologetic tone that weaves personal narratives with larger observations about pop culture. Although the concept of the guilty pleasure and the pressure to like “cool” things and leave the “tacky” behind certainly predates the Internet and social media, they have made them more pervasive. Even when people openly admit to loving something they’re “not supposed to,” it’s often framed as a self-deprecating joke rather than an open acceptance of something that makes them happy.
Tacky is a delight to read not just for King’s style and insights and, yes, a bit of nostalgia, but for the way she handles said tackiness. She looks at her many of her subjects in a new way and tries to get at the heart of why they’ve been so dismissed, offering up something that is part defense and, as the book’s cover says, part “love letter.”
“I think everybody feels this way,” King writes in the beginning of “Six Feet from the Edge,” making the point that although we may not all share her opinions when it comes to Creed (but I do!), we all have something we love that’s a little bit tacky. And not only is that okay, it’s something to celebrate.
