Sarah Byron
Lemonade is an album of emotional discord and marital meltdown, from arguably the world’s most influential celebrity. It’s also a major personal statement from one of the most respected and established artists in the pop game. All over these songs, Beyoncé rolls through heartbreak and betrayal and infidelity, but underneath the rage and devastation, there lies a subtle but important statement – one that attempts to rewrite the narrative of today’s popular music genres. Beyoncé utilizes her influential music to regain ownership of genres like rock and roll, country and pop; genres that have long belonged to the white majority even though these genres were created by black musicians. Lemonade reclaims ownership of rock and roll, country and pop, effectively rewriting the narrative of these popular genres and highlighting the history of love and theft that shaped music’s histography.
The first track on the album, “Pray You Catch Up”, is a melancholy piano-led lamentation on her suspicions about her husband. “Hold Up” follows, taking up a different beat. In this calypso song, which harkens to a Trinidadian style of music, Beyoncé insists that nobody can love her husband the way she does. However, in “Don’t Hurt Yourself”, Beyoncé takes a sharp left turn into rock and roll. In a vicious, rage-filled track, pushed forth by a frantic tempo, Beyoncé threatens to leave, or even get revenge on her husband in this stomping rock anthem (with even a hint of punk).
The album continues, following the rock beat through “6 inch”, but again takes a different direction in “Daddy Lessons”. “Daddy Lessons” is a country song, featuring a New Orleans jazz intro that quickly turns into a fast-paced country riff. Again, we see Beyoncé pull from an unexpected genre, but one that has been hotly contested as having roots in black American musicians.
In the songs that follow, from “Love Drought” through “All Night”, Beyoncé returns to a much more familiar genre to black Americans: gospel. These songs are grounded by solemn piano cords, soulful trumpet notes, and authoritative drum beats, but propelled by Beyoncé’s undeniable vocal range. The whole album depends upon Beyoncé’s raw talent, and she more than delivers. Her vocal talents are undeniably on display, but underlying that talent is a political and cultural awareness that drives the additional purpose of the album.
Beyoncé created this album to regain the ownership of music genres that have historically belonged to the white majority even though the roots of the genre stem from lesser-known black musicians (like rock and roll, country and pop). Beyoncé uses songs like “Daddy Lessons” and “Don’t Hurt Yourself” to take back rock and roll and country. In “The Write to Rock”, Daphne Brooks explains the concept of love and theft: how “white (musical) masters and the (always) black, (most often) men that they admire and desire…continue to hold center stage in the critical imaginaries of performance studies and rock music histories alike” (Brooks, 2008). These musical masters take songs, or elements of songs (and performances) from vulnerable, black musicians, effectively owning the music produced by these black musicians. At the same time, this theft eliminates any evidence of their talent and contribution to the genre. Maureen Mahon adds to this last point in “Rock”, explaining that black musicians “had a continuous presence in genres, making significant contributions while influencing white men [and] white women” (Burnim, 2015). Despite this influence, the contributions of these black musicians hardly ever received proper acknowledgment. This concept of love and theft permeates throughout music history. Beyoncé recognizes this – the music she chose to include in this album supports this notion.
Beyoncé’s incredible position provides the platform on which she makes her statement regarding love and theft. In “Listening for Willie Mae “Big Mama Thornton’s” Voice”, Maureen Mahon describes her frustration with the “marginal position black women occupy in mainstream histories of genres” (Mahon, 2011). Beyoncé recognizes that she holds an incredible amount of power in the music industry, power that seldom, if ever, is held by a woman, let alone a black woman. In light of the cultural and musical thieving that has occurred, and continues to occur even today, she uses her music to rewrite the narrative of rock and roll, country, and pop music. Her album is a statement, one that demands attention and consideration. Rock and roll, country and pop music did not come from the white majority – these genres originated from black musicians.
Lemonade may be a powerful story about marital betrayal and eventual reconciliation but rooted in the heart of this album is a dissection of cycles of violence against black musicians. Lemonade serves to remind us of the loving and thieving that shaped and shapes the music industry and aims to reclaim ownership of the genres that black musicians created and developed.
Citations
Brooks, Daphne A. “The Write to Rock: Racial Mythologies, Feminist Theory, and the Pleasures of Rock Music Criticism.” Women and Music: A Journal of Gender and Culture, vol. 12, no. 1, 2008, p. 55.
Burnim, Mellonee V., and Portia K. Maultsby. African American Music: an Introduction. NY, 2015.
Mahon, Maureen. “Listening for Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton’s Voice: The Sound of Race and Gender Transgressions in Rock and Roll.” Women and Music: A Journal of Gender and Culture, vol. 15, 2011, pp. 1.
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