Planningtorock`s message about gender equality and sexual freedom on All Love`s Legal seems simple and outdated at first. But in 2014, the simplest messages are often the most urgent. Western media coverage of the Oympics in Sochi drew attention to Russian violence and anti-gay legislation. But we also share a planet with at least five countries where even vaguely defined homosexual behavior deserves the death penalty. Jam Rostron, the multimedia artist behind Planningtorock, sings “You can`t illegalize love” on the title track of All Love`s Legal. This slogan may fit on a t-shirt, but it`s not necessarily a bad thing. Nuance does not translate so well today. Some critics, such as Suarez and Chad Parkhill of The Quietus, have deemed it necessary in an era of global erosion of LGBTQ rights. [7] [4] Loud and Quiet explained, “Rostron knows that the best way to get your message across is to embrace the language of capitalism, that is, an instant, hook-heavy soundtrack filled with messages that quickly stay in your head; Gender is just a lie and falling in love with whoever you want are the coats of arms of [their] campaign. [44] 405 reporter Robert Whitfield called the repetition of slogans in the record “very effective, creating memorable lyrics that could easily serve as a battle cry.
The intention, as with an event, is not to offer solutions, but to make the question inevitable and to open the debate. In addition, “the exhilarating mix of rhythms and slogans creates something recognizable, but completely unique in the way it addresses themes that have been largely ignored – something Planningtorock finds strange given the roots of dance music in black and queer styles.” [45] Rostron`s musical work, a kind of arthouse, has always been an intelligent platform for direct intentions. Her debut album Have It All set up the little tools – violin, keyboards, drum machine, heavily edited vocals – that she would also use for her successor W. Aside from Rostron`s collaboration with the Knife, Tomorrow, in a year, she only improved in balance. On All Love`s Legal, she continues to refine by adding or subtracting rhythms and strings until she finds the right tension between her unambiguous genre politics and her unknown voice. Even artists who oppose the classification of genre and genre will adopt gender conventions when creating their music. Aside from the creator, the lyrics or even the voice, there is something that does not seem identifiable in All Love`s Legal. The instrumentation is neither pretty nor ugly, human or non-human, male or female. Instead of acting with identification (“I`m like you, you`re like me!”), Rostron opts for alienation. This is a bold strategy – the impersonality of music forbids anyone to reject the message and accept the messenger. There is no difference between the two. However, All Love`s Legal isn`t as dark as all that.
Behind their music hides an organic and humanistic ethic: we are all human beings, and we are all driven by the same passions and original charms. Planningtorock as a multimedia project strives to push this idea as far as possible. It is an unthinkable dance music sung by a dry and semi-digitized voice. It asks you to abandon the kind of categorical thinking that separates the man from the woman and the homosexual from the straight. It sounds like the kind of message that pop music has embraced. But instead of conveying that message in an instantly metabolized Treacle pop ballad or an arena-ready club anthem, Rostron`s music demands that you engage in what deeply rooted ways of thinking about gender and desire would actually feel – it doesn`t sound too comfortable, and it shouldn`t. (By the way, it`s the ocean that separates “Same Love” from Planningtorock`s “Public Love.”) Gender can be a “lie,” as Rostron sings on “Human Drama,” but it`s a lie that, for most people, is at the heart of our sense of self. So if we really want to come together, Rostron seems to be saying that we have to undo first.
All Love`s Legal was Planningtorock`s first album to be released after Rostron was released as a genderqueer and changed his name to Jam Rostron. [3] In order to promote and release All Love`s Legal, Rostron founded the Human Level label, which aimed to promote queer and female producers in the music industry. [2] In addition to the album`s production team and advertising photographers, composed exclusively of women, the production team for the music videos for the album`s songs was composed exclusively of women. [13] As Rostron explained, “I said for this [album] that I only wanted to work with women. The magazines come back and say we don`t know [photographers]. I think, well, can you go back and think about it for a minute? [13] As Jam Rostron`s W (2011) tour drew to a close in the summer of 2012, they noted that there were “some things I didn`t accomplish with,” as well as themes about social issues and their personal lives that, strangely, didn`t fit into the lyrics they had written. [13] [13] While Jam Rostron`s W (2011) tour touched on his social issues and their personal lives. [2] They intended their next album to consist of tracks that dealt with sensitive topics but were still accessible in some way; They first thought of writing a deep series of songs about social issues without worrying listeners, but this plan “didn`t translate” and they “came to the conclusion that if it`s a problem for people to talk about these topics, then that`s the problem.” [2] They went from the “subtle and poetic” presentation of political themes on W to more “direct” statements when writing the lyrics of their next album.
[3]. Sexy and sensual, LSDXOXO nails this EP in the best way.