Rachel Trachtenburg is a musician, model, and animal rights activist. She started playing drums at the age of six and toured the world with her family band the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players. She is now the lead singer of her all-girl band SUPERCUTE!, whom you can follow on Twitter here.
“I Kissed a Girl” is a damn good pop song. What may push it over the edge is that it has the same beat as ”Rock & Roll, Pt. 2.” You can’t help but want to shake a little.
Other than that one song, I would never particularly call myself a Katy Perry fan. I would never think of her as an artist or musician or really anything but someone whose songs get stuck in my head after leaving the grocery store. But after watching the documentary Katy Perry: Part of Me, I do feel differently towards Katy Perry as a musician, performer, and kick-ass lady. Katy Perry: Part of Mefollows her year-long world-wide tour. You get to see all that goes into such a huge production, seven tour buses and 16 trucks, fireworks and masseuses and all. I personally love sweets as much as Perry does, so I was highly impressed by the candytastic costumes and sets.
Throughout the movie you get to see her fans from all over the world, from young girls in Portugal to older Japanese dudes in full Perry drag. You also get to understand that she really did work hard at her music career for many years before she became famous and is actually a songwriter and has a huge part in her whole image…or at least the film does a great job at making you believe that’s the case.
Through all the cotton candy and costume changes you get a pretty good look into what Katy Perry is like as a person and not just a chart-topper, from seeing her so clearly in love with Russell Brand, to seeing her cry over their divorce, and from eating pizza to working out hardcore backstage. Almost every night for a whole year she’s onstage for two hours singing and dancing her tush off, inspiring thousands of people, empowering them to be themselves and no one else.
It can be very cheesy sometimes, but if you take a step back from the one-dimensional lyrics and squeaky-clean perfection, you can see what an enthusiastic and energetic performer Perry is, and how much she gives to her fans, both on and off stage. I do prefer someone more like Alexis Krauss as far as “owning it” on stage and totally letting go, but Miss Katy pushes herself very far for her art.
Sometimes I dis on these female pop tarts as if they’re made in a factory, starting with being over-sexed-up at a very young age or just not even having much to do with music at all. It’s as if the whole image is created in a boardroom, and it’s not clear whether their image comes from a real place in someone’s heart. But after watching Part of Me, I really do feel that Katy Perry is a true artist and a talented, hard-working performer.
Would I ever find myself in a crowd of screaming Katy Perry fans? Hell NO. Did I enter to win a chance to meet the one and only Katy Perry in person? Hell YES. I was not a lucky winner of the golden ticket though; maybe in another life.
Do I think you should watch this movie? Maybe… It’s not at all boring or annoying, which is kinda what I was expecting. But if you absolutely hate her songs, then you know better than to watch an entire movie about Katy Perry. But if you can appreciate her catchy pop hits, this film really demonstrates a lot about her. Perry’s personalty is very big; she’s really found her calling in life, and she proves that it takes guts and a lot of hard work to know what you want to do and make that vision your reality. And it’s just really an entertaining movie.
“It felt so wrong/it felt so right/ Don’t mean I’m in love tonight,” Perry sings on “I Kissed a Girl.” And that’s kind of how I feel about Katy Perry’s music. As a music lover I know that with some artists, you really love only a few of their songs; with others, you’re deeply obsessed with everything they’ve ever written. I don’t love everything Katy Perry has ever done, but wouldn’t call her a guilty pleasure either. After watching Part of Me, I can now safely say, “She’s kinda cool.”
