Ms. Aguilera's Cultural Footprint

My goodness. Christina Aguilera is putting out a new album and I've already been sucked into reading three stories (all good in their own right) about her pop culture standing, significance in the bigger cultural drift, and even whether the CD is any good or not.

Over at Salon.com (watch the ad to enter, Salon is always worth it) Cintra Wilson rightly points to the August attack of the blondes in record release world and how if one squints and pumps up the volume, you can't tell them apart. I've found you can also apply this test to the blond female former prosecutors commenting all over cable and the blond female Republican "political analysts" commenting all over cable.

On the New York Times site, Kelefah Sanneh uses Ms. Aguilera as a reference point for the incredible shrinking pop star who has basically been reduced to fighting for her right to, well, be a pop star.

Beyond implications for women in the music industry and the blonding of said performers, Christina's music is a mess, too. If you want it straight up, you can't beat Rich over at the foufour blog.