Her Minaj-esty

Earlier this week I was fortunate enough to work on the Nicki Minaj tour.

In my time, have seen countless celebrities walk around backstage before a show in nothing but a pair of tracksuit pants, flip flops and prior to their visit to the beauty department. The one thing that I have discovered however, is that they really are just like us. They have their good days, they have their bad days, and ultimately, with the help of a small army, they can be transformed into something quite spectacular in the blink of an eye.

Seeing this side of fame- the glamorous 'having everything done for you by a professional' side, it's no wonder that the likes of the Kardashians, Lady Gaga and Miss Minaj herself are able to sustain their paparazzi perfect image, regardless of the place or time of day. Seriously, if I had a personal trainer, private chef, stylist, makeup artist and hair dresser at my beck and call, I'd look fabulous everyday too!

But watching Minaj arrive at the venue, hiding behind a pilots hat and over sized shades, a part of me felt a little sad for her. I stood there, wondering what it must be like to walk in her shoes for just one day? Put the fame, the fortune and the fans aside, and the pressure to look a certain way each time you step out in public would surely be enough to make me want to call it quits.

Now, I'm not and will hopefully never be the type of person who substitutes gym gear for everyday wear, but I do like the days when I can put on a simple pair of jeans and plain white tshirt and run to the grocery store or out for a quick coffee. People like Lady Gaga and in earlier years, Madonna, have set such a high precedent for themselves in terms of their style, that now, anything less than outrageous or over the top is deemed unacceptable and makes headlines.

I suppose the more important question to ask is "when is the right time for am celebrity persona to end?" Does Gaga have enough international love and support that she could turn all 'Betty Crocker' tomorrow and set a new precedent for herself (as previously done by the likes of Christina Aguilera or Xtina as she was formally known)? Or, can an over the top image only die at the same time as a career?

P!nk- The Artist...

Yesterday I read an article by CNN journalist LZ Granderson about the direction the international music scene is heading and how true artists are a hot and rare commodity these days.

Granderson's opinions on the matter are not too dissimilar to my own, so I've inserted the article below...
* Disclaimer: I will point out however that I am a tragic Kardashian follower and I think Taylor Swift is stupidly talented.

Pink, a true pop artist
By LZ Granderson, CNN Contributor
Tuesday November 20, 2012

One day, many years from now, future generations will look back at this time in our country's history and wonder what in the hell were we thinking.

The Kardashians are famous for no reason, same-sex marriage is controversial for stupid reasons, and somehow the "Twilight" franchise is a cash cow.

But our culture's biggest sin may well be the auto-tuned syrup we've allowed to dominate the pop charts. All-time chart records are handed to vacuous acts such as the Black Eyed Peas and singing awards are given to vocal lightweights such as Taylor Swift.

LZ Granderson History will show a dark time in our culture in which a million followers on Twitter became a key component to winning a Grammy.

But thank God for Pink.

That's what I was thinking as I was watching her performance during Sunday's American Music Awards. She recreated the video for her current single, "Try," a mid tempo ballad about the ups and downs of an imperfect relationship.

Where there is desire
There is gonna be a flame
Where there is a flame
Someone's bound to get burned
But just because it burns
Doesn't mean you're gonna die
You've gotta get up and try try try

Singing words like that live with the right level of emotion that Pink is known for is hard enough. Doing so while in engaged in an athletic pas de deux, complete with lifts, is breathtaking. She received a standing ovation afterward, much in the same way she commanded one at the 2010 Grammys as she swung over the audience's heads on a trapeze, asking:

Have you ever thrown a fist full of glitter in the air?
Have you ever looked fear in the face and said, "I just don't care"?

It would all seem like a meat-dress wearing gimmick if she didn't have the voice and lyrics to back it up. But she does, and thus we can all breathe a sigh of relief knowing her voice will be there for future generations to discover when looking back at us.

Pink won't be able to scrub our record clean singlehandedly -- there's just too much manufacturing for one person to overcome. But at least there will be evidence for my great-great grandkids to see that we weren't all "American Idol's" sheep. While Christina Aguilera has a tendency to oversing, Britney Spears can't sing, and Lauryn Hill sorta stopped singing, Pink has managed to carve a brilliant 13-year-career by being something that is incredibly rare these days -- an artist.

A complete artist.

Maybe the most underrated artist we've had on the radio in the past 20 years.

That's not to suggest she's been ignored -- Pink has sold more than 40 million albums worldwide. It's just when you look at the amount of publicity given to her in comparison to say, Lady Gaga or Adele, well there is no comparison. We know she is phenomenal, but the others are considered phenomenons. Gaga and Adele are worthy of the accolades, but whenever I listen to Pink's "Dear Mr. President," "Family Portrait" or "Sober," I feel the need to atone for us not making more room for her in the pop culture paradigm.

Billboard magazine -- one of the most respected names in the music industry -- ranked the top five performances from the American Music Awards. For them, Pink's brave rendition of "Try" was second. Tops was Psy doing "Gangnam Style" with MC Hammer.

MC Hammer!?!

Yes ... we're going to have a lot to answer for someday.

As soon as I read this article, I jumped straight onto YouTube to see Pink's AMA performance. I was truly flawed. Not only did she sing the song live, but she did so while engaged in a beautiful contemporary dance, which told the story of the song in perfect harmony with the lyrics. It was a masterpiece that received and deserved a standing ovation.

I work at a music entertainment venue and week in, week out, I deal with some of the industry''s biggest and 'best' artists. I've seen more concerts than I can remember and I've witnessed the best and worst backstage antics, sound checks and dressing room demands. It is an incredibly insightful and fortunate job to have but I am constantly amazed at how an artists public persona can be so completely different to their 'when nobody is watching' attitude. Sweet little Justin Beiber was not so sweet and Christina Aguilera's ego was bigger than the venue itself.

When I first met Pink on her 2006 I'm not dead tour, I was both shocked and pleasantly surprised at how genuine and 'normal' Alicia, as they call her, really was. If I'm being honest, I'm not entirely sure what I was expecting, but from that moment on and still to this day, Pink has remained my favourite artist to work with and her shows are securely within my top 5 of all time. 

Due to the nature of my job, I rarely buy tickets to see an artist perform and I have seen so many arena shows, that my standards are impossibly high. It's a rare few such as the likes of Sade and Michael Buble, that have impressed me enough to warrant my box office support. But, for as long as Pink is still touring and performing, I will be buying a seat to her show. She is that good!

Firstly, she sings every single song ...live! I am constantly amazed at how many "diva's" and artists lip sync or rely so heavily on backing vocalists to carry their out of breath or just average voices through a live show. It's actually a little disappointing to think that we, the public, pay thousands of dollars to hear a song taken straight off a record and paired with a little booty shaking on stage.

Secondly, there is no questioning the fact that Pink is the most daring and risque performer of my generation. Her shows are a constant melting pot of stage domination, aerial displays, dancing and sheer athleticism. In my opinion, a Pink show is the epitome of a live concert performance.

With all that being said, I believe that the accolades LZ Granderson gives Pink are not only justified but are well deserved. So, my advice- if you like Pink's songs, even just a little bit, then buy a ticket to her show the next time she's in your city and experience one of the best all round concerts I've ever seen. By the end of it, I promise the respect you have for her will double by the time you walk out the door.

She's that good.


Just in case you missed it, here is her American Music Awards performance...

And her Grammy's performance...

Over Weight or Over Critical...?

The other day I read an article about a British doctor who commented on this recent Marks and Spencer ad campaign by stating that 2 of the women are overweight and one is obese.

After conducting a quick survey amongst the women in my office, all of them agreed that they would be happy, most even thrilled to look like any of these girls in the photo, and thought that their figures accentuated the shape ware products beautifully. Furthermore, as we stared at the image, we all genuinely struggled to identify the three 'over weight' women as mentioned by the doctor.

Marks and Spencer is a large UK department store and like many fashion brands today, have decided to ditch the wafer thin models in favour for a more true reflection of the women in society- bodies ranging from sizes 8 to 16.

Dr Ellie Cannon believes that some of these women set an unhealthy example that no one should aspire to.

"The fact is it is absolutely outrageous that, in an effort to illustrate the diversity of women, obesity has taken its place alongside ageing and differing skin colours.

I am really concerned by this trend of supposedly empowering women by what has become known as the 'body acceptance movement' which embraces the notion that fat is fine," she wrote.

Hearing comments like this from an educated health care professional makes me angry. I am not condoning unhealthy lifestyles or body weights, be them at one end of the spectrum or the other, but I do think that ads like this are a positive step forward for the fashion industry and they should be supported.

In my opinion, the more images of 'normal' sized women seen in magazines, on television and plastered on billboards, the better society's perception of body image will be.

Advertising With A Cause...

Step aside Brad Pitt and your crappy Chanel ad campaign. Here's a piece of advertising I'd like to see plastered everywhere!!

A colleague of mine brought this campaign to my attention today and I felt compelled to share it. It's spearheaded by the Dutch charity organization Cordaid and is titled Mensen in Nood (people in need).

These ads highlight the contrast between the luxury items we seem to so freely purchase, versus the basic necessities in life that we often take for granted.
A purse versus food.
A pint of beer versus water.

It definitely made me stop and think and if I'm being honest, it shocked me a little.

This is the truth of consumerism in its most basic form.
A point of reference we should always keep in the back of our minds whenever we ask ourselves "do I really need that...?"

Powerful.

The Race That Stops A Nation...

It is undoubtedly one of Australia's favourite public holidays. It's The Melbourne Cup, affectionately dubbed "the race that stops a nation", and it's the major event in the Spring racing season.

I'm the first to admit, I'm not a huge fan of the Melbourne Cup, or horse racing in general for that matter. It really has nothing to do with the horses or the sport itself, but rather the culture that goes along with it.

I am, for lack of a better word, an anti-gambler. I have no problem buying a few raffle tickets at a fundraising event and my sister bought me my first Lotto ticket last week when the jackpot hit $1million, but I am constantly amazed at the amount of money people willingly (and excitedly it seems), hand over to bookies to not just bet on horses, but on practically anything.

I completely understand and respect the concept that "you have to be in it to win it" but the truth is, the gambling industry is so successful because people consistently lose more than they win. On my recent trip to Las Vegas, I had some interesting conversations with various casino employees who were complaining about the hard hit The Strip had faced during the GFC and that only now, were gamblers and tourists coming back to the desert. As the waitresses, barman and hotel staff complained, I couldn't help but look around me and see hundreds of people sitting at tables, at slot machines or big wheels and wonder "if this is what tough times looked like, than the good times must be really good".

Australian's do love to gamble and I think a lot of it stems from our deep culture in sport- the two just seem to go hand in hand with one another. However, my main problem with gambling today is that it's become so mainstream, so accepted and so "normal" that its advertising has practically infiltrated our televisions, radio stations and print media virtually unnoticed.

In my personal opinion, if someone wants to gamble, they have every right to go to their local TAB outlet or jump on the Internet, but I have a serious problem with the positive message that betting companies are presenting, particularly when airing their ads during prime time " family" television.

If I'm being honest, I believe that gambling should be placed in the same category as alcohol, smoking or even pornographic advertising. It shouldn't be allowed on mainstream TV and at the very least, glamorised in the way that it is. No one sees images of the families left devastated by a gambling addiction, or those forced to live on the streets because they have nothing left. Gambling is an addiction and I'd hate to see the number of those affected by this disease rise with the coming generations, simply because they were exposed to advertising and pro-gambling images at such a young age.

I think seeking gambling information should be a conscious choice, rather than something we see in the media and over time, become desensitised to it.

* * *

Back to the original theme of this post though, and let's talk about the Melbourne Cup fashion.
This year, Australia celebrated 50 years of Fashions on the Field at Flemington.

The racecourse was definitely a sea of colour at this years event and flower power seemed to be a trending theme. But as always, there were some hits and some misses...

[ Jacinta Campbell | Stunning dress. Still unsure about the head piece ]

[ Kyly Clarke | Perfect colour for her complexion. Simple and chic ]



[ Jennifer Hawkins | This dress caused a lot of controversy around my office, but it's actually my favourite celebrity look of the day. I love how different the jewels on her head are and the blue colour is absolutely gorgeous ]



[ Delta Goodrem | I didn't like this ensemble at all. She looked like she should have been frolicking in a field rather than track side ]

[ Kate Waterhouse  | This is very simply but very pretty. Lavender is a beautiful shade for Spring and the detailed neckline is gorgeous ]

[ Rebecca Judd | I don't know why, but I don't love this dress as much as all my friends seemed to? I think the hat is fab, but I'd prefer this printed dress in softer colours. A little too harsh for me ]

[ Sophie Monk | Sophie just seems really up-tight in this dress. It's stiff, boring and bland. Nothing fun about it at all ]

[ Misha Barton | I'm still confused as to why Misha was at the Melbourne Cup, but regardless, her and her dress looked terrible. She's at the top of my worst dressed list. ]

[ Lauren Andrews | Winner of the 2012 Fashion on the Field ]

[ Mary Vitinaros | Winner of the 2012 Designer Award ]

[ ..and back to the 1960's ]

OBAMA For The Win!!!

Yesterday was another great day in history.

In the past 24 hours my social media outlets have been flooded with excitement, well wishes and hope for a better future following Obama's win over Mitt Romney. The majority of my friends, family and acquaintances may not be American, but they are global citizens and this is a decision that indirectly affects us all.

Another 4 years for Obama, another campaign for the Democratic Party, another win for humanity.

And just in case you were busy last night, here's Obama's acceptance speech.

It was so good, so inspirational and so well spoken that it almost made me want to become an American myself....almost, but not quite :)

Cavalli for Target...

Fancy a champagne lifestyle on a soda water budget?

Target Australia and Italian fashion designer Roberto Cavalli have collaborated on a ‘Designers for Target' collection, which hit selected stores yesterday.

“I’m excited to bring the joyful and positive spirit of my work to a new audience … When I set out to design this collection I had a wonderful party in mind with all women dressed glamorously and sensually,” said Cavalli.

It's a running joke amongst my friends and family, that Target is my favourite store. Honestly, they're probably not far from the truth, because some of my most loved and coveted wardrobe items have come from the women's section with what seems to be a standard 20% off. My main advice to anyone who first compliments me on what I'm wearing, and then a few seconds later screws up their nose when they find out it's from Target, is that you have to sift through the crap to find the diamonds. I'm not saying that everything Target stock is fashion-forward, but simply that there are fabulous items and in particular, good quality basics that are a fraction of the price you'd pay in a boutique. There is and probably always will be a part of me that outright refuses to pay over $50 for a plain tank top or pair of black leggings.

With my love of Target aside, there are only a few designer brands that have made it onto my "one day when I win the lotto, I'll splurge on..." list, and Cavalli is certainly one of them! As a mutual lover of all things animal print- particularly the leopard variety, I was excited and intrigued to see what the designer could come up with for a) a mass audience, b) the 'everyday woman' and c) prices that your average housewife or uni student could afford?

Having gone to Target and seen the designs first hand, in my opinion Cavalli has crafted a beautifully cohesive capsule collection, which is not just appropriate for the Australian Summer, but maintains the chic style you'd see on a socialite vacationing in Monaco.

The collection includes casual and formal women's ware, swim suits and shoes, with prices ranging from $49 – $129. Click the link to see the entire Look Book.

And of course, no Cavalli collection would be complete without one of the world's most beautiful women to showcase it. Enter Checz supermodel and Victoria's Secret Angel, Karolina Kurkova.

One of the things I loved most about the advertising of this campaign however, was that in addition to Kurkova's photo shoot, Target put the same clothes on a size 14-16 model to showcase the items on a different (and some may say 'average') body type. I give Target cudos for this initiative and I truly believe that it will be received positively by the women of Australia, just as it was for me.

And finally, having had my eye on a couple of the items, I ended up purchasing the black tuxedo blazer. I was in desperate need of a new one, so all my hopes were pinned on the Cavalli design being an immediate winner. And...I am happy to report that it was a success! I am obsessed with this piece. The quality is excellent, the material feels expensive and the clincher...it's lined with leopard print! Topped off with a detailed collar and gold signature waist button, this is my new go to jacket and one of my favourite wardrobe additions.

If you like the look of any pieces in the Cavalli for Target collection, I'd recommend you make your way down to your nearest store and grab a signature item or two. I have always regretted not getting my hands on any of the Stella McCartney for Target pieces, but I won't make that mistake again.

Now, all Target need to do is collaborate with Chanel and Christian Louboutin and I'll be one content girl!
Happy shopping!

[ Below is a behind the scenes clip from the Cavalli for Target campaign, featuring Karolina Kurkova ]