I'm everywhere, I'm so Julia
Sill and Bill reunited, Charlie's Angels soundtrack, CT It Girls, 2007 Fashion Trends 🔥
Did my Hire Me website thumbnail inspire Paris and Nicole’s reunion for a new reality show? Most likely, yes!!!!!! Also on my to do list this week is apply for Pop Culture Jeopardy!
In this issue:
🔗 LINKS LINKS LINKS!!!! New Nicstalgia episode coming next week. ICYMI, last week’s issue included my Y2K vs. McBling aesthetic mini essay and more.
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Huge thank you to Nicstalgia supporters who I will love forever: Janine, Marie, Liv, Mitra, CY, and Aleena! 💐💐💐
📲 I’m just a simple girl in a high-tech digital world
My fav things from the internet rn:
🔥 I had a blast talking to Nicole and Ryan from Soundtrack Your Life about one of my favorite movie soundtracks – Charlie’s Angels (2000). It’s super emblematic of the 20-year trend cycle, with lots of callbacks to the original Charlie’s Angels decade – the 1970s. Gender politics was the theme that really kept coming up for me. Charlie’s Angels is very reflective of the turn-of-the-century climate, post third-wave feminism, where it seems empowering but it’s really not lol. No, you really don’t need to rewatch the movie. Yes, the song “Barracuda” still rocks.
“Unfortunately, I feel like we’re gonna talk about McG a lot”, “I can’t believe you worked at the Abercrombie disco underwear store”, and “There’s a gratuitous amount of ass shots” are some of my favorite exclamations from the show.
Also mentioned:
• My middle school dance to “Independent Women Part I”
• My high school fashion show where I came out in an Andy Warhol-themed outfit to “Groove Is In The Heart” (which btw did you know where the ah ah ah ah ah ah sample came from?)
• The fact that grocery store songs could actually be AI bc they sonically feel familiar
• People being resentful of capitalism, not nostalgia marketing; our stated preference is novelty and our unstated need is familiarity
• The fact that “Baby Got Back” replaced on the streaming version (vs. the physical media version) of the soundtrack
• Stuff filmed at the Los Angeles River (“Wherever You Will Go” by The Calling, “Don't Cha” by Pussycat Dolls, “Down” by Blink-182, the Grease car chase scene)
• What would a Charlie’s Angels movie reboot look like today? Oh wait there already was one LOL
📼 Connecticut native and NYC’s Forever ‘It’ Girl Chloë Sevigny visits Kim’s Video. Fun series! I really wanna go check out their physical location in downtown Manhattan. Super excited about the documentary too, where their physical media archive ends up in Sicily, but I find it extremely rude that when you pay for an Apple+ subscription, you still have to pay extra to rent some movies. This is why I buy DVDs…
🍷 Speaking of Chloë Sevigny, she is joined by Connecticut native Rachel Sennott in Charli XCX’s 360 music video. I’ve played this song so many times since it came out the other day that it’s actually concerning. I physically can’t stop!!!!!! “I’m everywhere, I’m so Julia” meme depicting Julia Stiles is so esoteric that it could have only come from two places: 1. My brain, or 2. The SSENSE Instagram account. Also extremely important adjacent news, A.G. Cook’s new album Britpop’s title song interpolates “Lipgloss” by Charli XCX, a NSFW hyperpop masterpiece that’s on my top Spotify songs of the year list every year.
🍟 Really loved
’s For the love of CHAINs interview with the founders of Chain, which tap into identity and the hardcore fandom behind fast food chains. “From instantly sold out limited merch drops, to pop-ups featuring an ode to classic menu items, to the first fast food festival, Chain operates at the intersection of creative and culinary.”📺 I’m absolutely enthralled by Alexander Avila’s video essays, Hannah Montana's Guide to Life Under Capitalism and This Video Isn't Just About Taylor Swift. It's About You. I do have to watch the videos in parts because they are feature film-length, but they dive into the sociopolitical nuance behind these pop culture phenomena in impressive detail.
“Miley Stewart lives the American Dream…she’s just like you. “Normal” American life is an impossible ideological fantasy. It is a construct that allows us to believe that there is a peaceful and authentic alternative to…life under capitalism…Authenticity is fetishized by the rich and poor alike to sustain the illusion that something better is possible within the current system.”
“Taylor Swift embodies the neoliberal ideal while giving it an emotional texture and a personal but idealistic persona in tandem with the material privilege that accompanies her name boost her to international stardom… She’s not like other girls, but she’s just like you.”
From the archive:
⏰ There’s No Beginning and There Is No End: Mariah Carey and the Refusal of Time. Now THIS is what I call journalism!!!!!! Speaking of Mariah Carey-themed literary excellence, I’m also extremely excited to read the upcoming THE 97 ZINE’s first issue, “Me. I Am Mariah… The Elusive Chanteuse”!
👗 I have no idea how I came across this blog of the 20 Best and Worst Fashion Trends of 2007, but this blogger Budget Babe is legit! She’s built out a massive audience, and it’s cool to see how fashion content creation has evolved. It’s also so funny to look back and remember how we perceived trends at the time. Very differently than now.
🎶 An Obsessive Guide to Music Played at the Gap in the Nineties and Early Aughts. This is so fun. No one writes pop culture rabbit holes like this anymore (except me hehe). As you know, I have deep core memories of music I almost exclusively listened to as a retail employee for 6 years. My most popular Spotify playlist is 2008 Gilly Hicks actual playlist, which is the exact soundtrack of songs that played in the store when I worked there.
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