#1 Crush

In grade school, I was the girl who ran around the playground in pigtails trying to kiss the boys (and even planted one on a few of them). In high school, I had my first love that broke my heart multiple times. College came and went by in a non-dating blur, and here I am now, at thirty-years-old with those same stupid feelings; the fascination that comes with getting to know someone, your pulse quickening when they enter a room, and all the angsty stupidity that makes you feel like you have the self-esteem of a sixteen-year-old.

Having a crush sucks. Truly.

But having a crush when you're a girl especially sucks because there's nothing you can do. You have to sit around and wait, hoping that the guy down the hall will glance your way and see something special, something out of the ordinary. You aren't supposed to make the first move. The men are the ones who are supposed to do the chasing. Which leaves the girls to their own devices...

So all you can do as a girl, is think. Which complicates things. Which is stupid.

At my angst-iest, I was in high school. It was the late 1990's and my world revolved around boys and music (has much changed? yeah, that would be a big NO). When I was angry and needed to feel like a total badass chick, I rocked out to Garbage. Shirley Manson was my idol with her fiery red hair, heavy blue eye makeup, and black fingernail polish. There was something so primal about her attitude and her sexuality was able to break through the ugly grunge-pop mold of bands at the time.



What I love most about Stupid Girl, is the worn, used feel of the visual textures against the lyrics of the song. The scratched in text blocking the views of the band adds even more grit to the words being sung.

"You stupid girl
All you had you wasted"

"Don't believe in love
Don't believe in hate
Don't believe in anything
That you can't waste"

The video itself is a performance piece, inspired by the title sequence from David Fincher's 1995 movie Se7en. The clip was shot in just four hours entirely within a warehouse. Samuel Bayer, the video's director, cut the film into pieces, and soaked it in his bath, applying deliberate fingerprints and abrasions to the footage before putting it back together by hand.

Shirley Manson is quoted as saying the song is an "anthem for a girl who won't settle for less than what she wants."

Now, that's my type of song.