An Awkward Look Back On Pitchfork's 'Electra Heart' Review

Let's talk about internalized misogyny haha

A lot of people — journalists, but also readers and music lovers — have agreed that one of the major faults within the music journalism industry is the fast pace. That could apply to a bunch of issues, but for the sake of this article, I’m talking about the fast pace of criticism and reviews. Journalists get advanced copies of music and are meant to publish their review around the time of the release — it’s been like this for a while.

There’s obviously… problems with that. For one, it feels like journalists are in a separate world than the average music listener. What’s the point of reading a review of an album you’re just listening to for the first time?

Secondly, which is my main focus of this article, what is criticism without cultural impact? Records, and just any piece of music, are often judged based off of the effect they have on the world, the influence they bring. That’s why Laura Snapes’ Pitchfork review of Electra Heart is… incredibly strange to read.

But this is something I’ve discussed before. In my article about mid-2010s Tumblr culture, I wrote about the way music journalists were disconnected from what was going on online with music. Critics either ignored or complained about iconic records like The Neighbourhood’s I Love You or The 1975’s self-titled. This was because they weren’t on Tumblr, and they weren’t teenage girls. Therefore… their articles are absolutely out of context. They share stories about music that are completely irrelevant and unaware.

Thank god for retrospectives, am I right?

The best part of Snapes’ Electra Heart review is probably the overwhelming amount of internalized misogyny. Within the first paragraph, she takes quite a few awkward jabs at Marina: calling a brilliant song “babyish,” claiming that Lana Del Rey (who has a “much-discussed mouth”) is a better version of her, and saying that Marina was “over-complicating the whole affair,” whatever that means.

The latter might be the funniest one. Snapes explains that Marina “over-complicat[es]” the album by layering it in “philosophy, mythology, artifice, and blonde wigs,” which, like… yeah. That’s… kind of the whole point. The album is over-the-top, it’s excessive in its glamour and drama, it’s its own world. And that’s why it became a fucking classic.

The first few words of the second paragraph makes me lose trust in Snapes completely. “The Family Jewels was disliked by many…” Was it? Then she makes a bold, hilarious claim that the “personality and “audaciousness” that was on that record is gone from Electra Heart.

OK. Enough of me ranting. Let me get into Electra Heart itself, and the reason I’m vigilantly defending it as if I’m a Marina stan. As a teenage girl, I found myself reckoning with internalized misogyny often. I would find myself resenting and slut-shaming women who were celebrities or musicians if they were dressed provocatively or were open about sexuality or were just pretty. I dismissed it as corny and attention-seeking; I thought it was too much. When I had no choice but too dive into Electra Heart because it was ubiquitous in the realm of Tumblr I was active on, I was forced to think about more. She dips in and out of complying with and fighting against society’s expectations of her — she objectifies herself, and then she tricks men, and then she lets men manipulate her, and then she gathers up the power to have control over a man. She goes from the bottom of the power dynamic to the top so many times; “Sometimes I ignore you, so I feel in control/ ‘Cause really, I adore you and I can’t leave you alone,” she sings on the ever-conflicted “Starring Role.” It’s a fascinating window into what it means to be a woman in a relationship that’s inevitably contaminated by patriarchal norms. “Power & Control” grapples with power dynamics also: “Women and men, we are the same/ But love will always be a game.” It was a sentiment I thought was catchy and true at 14 years old, but boy do I understand it on another level now.

This is all to say that it’s undeniable that there is a smart, intense sense of personality and audaciousness on Electra Heart, and it’s full of depth. She is embodying what it means to be a woman wrestling with how she fits into a patriarchal society. It affects her identity, her interpersonal relationships, her expectations.

So, back to Snapes. The worst part is that she’s not unaware of the Internet influence:

Marina really, really wants you to know that she's into pop culture, though the lazy, meaningless strings of references that comprise a good chunk of the songs here aren't any kind of postmodern comment on the Tumblr-ification of society, but just plain bad songwriting. The bombardment of archetypes and clichés is exhausting: "Beauty queen of a silver screen" persuading someone to buy her "a big diamond ring" on "Primadonna"; the titular "Homewrecker" (where excruciatingly bad spoken word verses clash against a pretty triumphant chorus) whose "life is a mess, but I'm still looking pretty in this dress." "Teen Idle" is just horrible, a glitchy ballad that sounds as though it was recorded in a church, where she wishes to be a "virgin pure/ A 21st century whore," "a prom queen fighting for the title/ instead of being 16 and burning up a bible/ feeling super super super suicidal," a chorus of Marinas echoing "super." She wishes for "blood, guts, and angel cake" because "I'm gonna puke it anyway," a weird preoccupation of hers that also crops up in "Homewrecker" ("girls and their cosmic gourmet vomit"), continued from "Girls" on her debut. But as for ending the ego, Marina does seem obsessed with ideas of finality and death-- knowing "where I will belong/ When they blow me out" on the quavering, celestial "Fear and Loathing"-- seemingly finding solace in the reliability of microcosmic, compact celebrity tragedies, perhaps in the face of the parts of this album that ring desperately true.

I’m sorry I made you read all of that. Maybe you didn’t read all of it; maybe you stopped after she embarrassingly shit talks “Teen Idle,” which I wouldn’t blame you for. The point is: Snapes’ entire view of Electra Heart seems suspiciously misogynistic. The reason the album resonated with teenage girls on the Internet is because her “bombardment of archetypes and clichés” are liberating. They forced me to recognize my own internalized misogyny, and they opened up opportunities to feel more comfortable questioning society’s casually misogynistic standards. Also, she may be aware of the Internet’s obsession with Electra Heart, but she’s completely unaware of why. She says that “Teen Idle” sounds like it was “recorded in a church” as if that’s a bad thing. That’s part of why people loved it! Its gritty, shitty sonic landscape reiterates the dark ideas that she’s singing about. It’s dirty and gross because life sucks and being a woman sucks. She calls Marina’s mention of anorexic habits a “weird preoccupation.” Someone’s unaware of the anorexic (or “Thinspo”?) realm of Tumblr which too often crossed over with pop culture Tumblr.

Finally, in the last paragraph, she gives Marina credit for her vulnerable moments (“It feels like shaky ground to say that these vulnerable moments are Electra Heart's finest, catchiest, and hardest-hitting songs,” Snapes wrote, which I guess is a compliment?). But… uh… isn’t that misogynistic? To only praise Marina for her weaknesses? To find it corny and overdone when she empowers herself? Sometimes it seems like the only time women receive credit is when they’re open about their trauma. Or most of the time. “Whilst there’s no getting past some of the duller and more unbearable material on this record,” Snapes writes, “it’s a real shame that it’s come hamstrung in this unnecessary concept, ready for people to laugh when Marina fails to pull it off.”

Unnecessary is an upsetting word. It’s even more upsetting in the context of how many teenage girls this record empowered. When Marina, on “Primadonna,” sings: “I know I’ve got a big ego/ I really don't know why it’s such a big deal, though,” it’s one of the most important moments on the record. It’s essentially the theme of Electra Heart: Why can’t women be reckless without being questioned? Why do we have to verbalize our trauma to be allowed to have fun? Snapes’ review reads like a joke that just proves the vitality of Electra Heart and more music that plays off of society’s expectations of women. It’s a record that only gets more important with time; time passes, and I only realize further how fucking true and relatable it is. Listening to it helps me understand that my struggles — constantly being underestimated, exploited, manipulated, etc. by men — are universal. That it’s okay to rebel against it, but also to fall victim to it. It’s all fucking complex, and Electra Heart brilliantly captures the flaws, the setbacks, the confusion.

I started this thinking it would be mostly about the weirdness of immediate journalism, of reviewing albums before seeing the effect they had on culture, but I ranted about misogyny instead. I don’t know. There’s a lot wrong here. Even though Snapes claims that she sees the record’s Tumblr impact, her opinions are completely unaffected by it. She complains about the elements that are the reason the record resonates — it feels ignorant and uninformed. So maybe what I’m saying is that there’s a bigger depth to problem of immediate journalism: That it doesn’t encourage journalists to understand the cultural importance of a record. Snapes, I think, should have wondered about it more, questioned her own beliefs.

Next year will be the ten year anniversary of Electra Heart. I, like others, will continue listening, continue wrestling with misogyny and power dynamics and who I am as a woman, and hopefully one day Electra Heart won’t resonate as much as it does. Hopefully one day things won’t be so fucking shitty and complex. But for now, every song fucking hits the nail on the head.