Happy J-Day everybody!

"Wait, happy what day?" Well let me explain you.

Every first Friday of November is here a day dedicated to Christmas spirit and more importantly - this being Denmark and all - the launch date of the Tuborg Christmas Brew (or Tuborg Julebryg) of the year. That is basically a Christmas beer that, even though it's available for only ten weeks each year, is actually the fourth best-selling beer in the country, only beaten by three other beers that are available all year round. Quite impressive, innit.

Anyway, the annual launch day marks a nationwide celebration where Carlsberg employees (Tuborg is a part of the Carlsberg company, in case you didn't know) going from bars and cafés to another, singing a traditional Tuborg Christmas Brew song (don't ask) and handing out free beers to the customers to mark the beginning of the festive season. Needless to say, people get massively drunk. I once heard another foreigner describe the way back to home after the night as a 'zombie walk', with people just incontrollably crawling in the gutters, brainless and in slow motion. With that in mind, and with Halloween just behind us, I couldn't think of a more fitting song for the weekend than "Living Dead" by Marina & the Diamonds. Unless, of course, you want to go with the Christmas Beer song. Or both! Anyway, happy J-Day for all ye living dead and have a wonderful weekend!

Second thoughts about Electra Heart

So, this week saw Marina Diamandis bid farewell to her Electra Heart persona. Initially I was relieved - and I still am, as I miss Marina being Marina - but now I've started looking back at the whole Electra Heart era. When she first introduced us to this new stunt she said that she created the character to be able to do things that she'd never normally do, things that are the total opposite of her. "Such as conquering the charts with radio friendly, commercially accessible electropop while sporting a Hollywood blonde hairstyle", I thought. Which is actually exactly what she did. I was cynical.

Quite often story arcs need closure to be understandable. You know, that one little twist that causes all the jigsaw pieces to fall into place. So was it for Marina's Electra Heart thingy as well. After the final part was uploaded in Youtube, I skimmed through all the previous videos back-to-back and lo and behold, things started making sense! I started to see a storyline, one I believe is rather close to what it was meant to be, so here's my interpretation of the video series:

Farewell, Electra Heart

It's been a long two years for Marina Diamandis and her Electra Heart thingy. After a course of ten music videos for her new songs, it appears she's finally killing off the annoyingly vague alter-ego-but-not-an-alter-ego-after-all Electra Heart persona. Don't get me wrong, there have been some amazing songs on her second album but let's face it - Electra Heart did not reach the high standards set by her first one, The Family Jewels. Also the new, radio-friendly Marina makes me miss the good ol' indie popper that she used to be. (Now that I think of it, I might as well write a thing about her in my debut album series.) In the dramatic 11th installment of the Electra Heart videos she looks back at the Electra Heart era and seems to wipe off the trademark heart from her cheek, indicating this is the last we see of the platinum blonde, heart-sporting pseudo-popstar. (How hilarious would it be if she now announced that the whole thing was just a bit of a joke? I'd buy it.)

It's good to see the authentic dark-haired Marina back. Maybe now that she's had her time dealing with the American stereotypes she would no longer be so "obsessed with the mess that's America", as she once put it.