At least there's only five more to go.

December 7, 2013 5:27 PM

Following the high profile of her first major song, "Friday", Rebecca Black has released the video to her new song, "Saturday".

Friday, released in March 2011 [previously], achieved widespread publicity through social media. Saturday and the accompanying video references this song, as well as other contemporary culture including Miley Cyrus and twerking.

posted by Wordshore (48 comments total)

Fun fun fun fun
posted by hellojed at 5:31 PM on December 7, 2013

What a lot of people haven't mentioned yet is that the song was written by none other than Dave Mustaine, who is a "huge fan" of Black.
posted by Wolfdog at 5:33 PM on December 7, 2013 [3 favorites]

Fun fun fun fun

No, it's not.
posted by alex_skazat at 5:34 PM on December 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

This is awesome, I hope she keeps doing these every few years and they become more sophisticated and self-referential all the way through the rest of the days of the week until she's contemplating turning 40 in "Next Thursday".
posted by scrowdid at 5:36 PM on December 7, 2013 [20 favorites]

I love it.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 5:42 PM on December 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

I wonder what's next for Rebecca Black. What comes afterward?
posted by bondcliff at 5:43 PM on December 7, 2013 [12 favorites]

i think it's really interesting to watch her watch friday a week before this came out - like, she knew this was just about to happen (and no doubt the friday watching video was part of the pr leading up to it) - and she watches and makes embarrassed faces and says "i still have that clock" and just over a week later that clock opens a video that was surely already shot.

good on her and her team.
posted by nadawi at 5:46 PM on December 7, 2013 [2 favorites]

also, note in that watching friday video just how little she seems to like patrice wilson. i really hope in a decade all the ark music gals get together and write a book...
posted by nadawi at 5:49 PM on December 7, 2013

That video has the "fun" factor the "We Can't Stop" video should have. That said, Rebecca Black is only 16, so the party content is giving me some side-eye.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 5:52 PM on December 7, 2013

Rebecca Black is the Sue Grafton of pop!
posted by R. Mutt at 6:15 PM on December 7, 2013 [6 favorites]

Who says there are no second acts in American lives?
posted by Horace Rumpole at 6:27 PM on December 7, 2013 [3 favorites]

The 934,000 views this video has received within its first day means about $2000 in ad revenue. #BecauseInternet
posted by andreaazure at 6:38 PM on December 7, 2013 [2 favorites]

I hope she'll consider covering Johnny Cash's "Sunday Morning Coming Down" next and then maybe New Order's "Blue Monday."
posted by octobersurprise at 6:40 PM on December 7, 2013 [3 favorites]

Another Saturday Night and I'd rather have nobody.
posted by oneswellfoop at 6:44 PM on December 7, 2013 [2 favorites]

Without over-analyzing this too much, there's several things that baffle me as a middle-aged English male sometimes struggling with American pop culture.

1) Rebecca Black is only 16, so the party content is giving me some side-eye. Quite. I thought things such as alcohol, gambling (poker?!) and the like were serious no-no's in teen or early college portrayals? Yes? No? But here, not only is there implicit / explicit evidence, but also consequences e.g. writing in marker on the face of someone passed out.

2) Miley Cyrus twerking. Same clothes, same hair, slightly different person. Homage, recognition, or critique?

3) Right at the end and completely out of context, a black man who has been arrested bursts in, says something, and is bundled back out by the same white policeman restraining him. wtf? Someone seriously explain - is this referencing anything specific?

Side-point: is it me or is Rebecca made up to appear as a young-ish Britney Spears in this video?
posted by Wordshore at 6:53 PM on December 7, 2013

Is that the "girl in pink" at 2:27?

'Cause she seems pretty cool, and I like the idea that Black would give her a cameo.
posted by CaseyB at 7:17 PM on December 7, 2013

Doesn't look like her, and there's no mention of it on her Twitter, so I'm guessing not.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 7:24 PM on December 7, 2013

I thought things such as alcohol, gambling (poker?!) and the like were serious no-no's in teen or early college portrayals? Yes? No?

Speaking from the white / suburban / middle-class background that Rebecca and I share: 16 is a pretty typical age for experimenting with alcohol. Not necessarily in the glamorous, over-the-top way portrayed in the video—but, hey, it's a music video. It's a pose. Yeah, if your parents catch you (in real life), you're gonna get a serious talking-to and a grounding. But this isn't real life—it's a fantasy.

Think of the video as aspirational marketing: it doesn't reflect what Rebecca's peers do, so much as it reflects what their cool older siblings are doing, and what they hope to do themselves one day.

(Although, yeah, "early college" ["university" in the UK] is commonly stereotyped, and not without reason, as being a general orgy of irresponsible drinking and partying. You have a bunch of dumb kids living on their own, away from home, for the first time, with unprecedented access to intoxicants. 16-year-olds aren't necessarily painting slurs on their passed-out friends and waking up pantsless, but many of them will be in a few years.)

Probably also relevant: unchecked extroversion is seen as a virtue in mainstream American culture (contrary to the conventional wisdom about UK culture).
posted by escape from the potato planet at 7:29 PM on December 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

Wolfdog: "What a lot of people haven't mentioned yet is that the song was written by none other than Dave Mustaine, who is a "huge fan" of Black."

Wait wait, this isn't true, right? I Want To Believe!
posted by Philby at 7:33 PM on December 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

Well, at least her friends are old enough to drive that car legally now? And she has matured to have considerably less decision fatigue about which seat to take.
posted by Skwirl at 7:51 PM on December 7, 2013 [7 favorites]

Which day will she sing about the mold in the coffee pot, the jerk who stole your parking spot, and the diabetes-inducing punch from the retirement party for Janice in Accounting?
posted by Dr. Zira at 8:08 PM on December 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

I thought things such as alcohol, gambling (poker?!) and the like were serious no-no's in teen or early college portrayals? Yes? No? But here, not only is there implicit / explicit evidence, but also consequences e.g. writing in marker on the face of someone passed out.

This is a huge point of cultural conflict/ambiguity.

On the one hand, it's illegal for teenagers to drink. However, what that actually means in practice is that teenagers (especially middle and upper class teenagers) do drink, they just do it in under-the-radar fashion. Usually this means getting someone older to get a keg for a house party while someone's parents are away. This sort of off the grid drinking goes hand in hand with extremely irresponsible behavior (passing out, for example). Meanwhile it would be absolutely forbidden for someone the same age to have a beer or two in a pub-like setting.

Re gambling? No taboo against that for younger kids, though casino gambling is 18+ in most cases (I think mainly because money/legal/consent reasons, not for the reasons alcohol is forbidden). In my own experience, gambling outside casinos, especially when you're young, takes the form of poker for small change. That said I'm fairly sheltered in that regard. Maybe there are kids running underground casinos and I'm just not aware.

My understanding is that Black is from a wealthy family in Southern California. I'm not sure if it's true, but the stereotype is that kids in that exact situation are likely to be a little less sheltered than average. Certainly, to me, the video hearkens to movies like Clueless, Can't Hardly Wait, and Fast Times At Ridgemont High, which depict about the same level of teenage debauchery. (Was Can't Hardly Wait set in SoCal? I forget.)

Another angle on this is that, since Rebecca Black isn't repped by a big family-friendly media empire like Disney, she's much more free to depict the real experiences of people her age, as opposed to the sanitized version.
posted by Sara C. at 8:52 PM on December 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

I was assuming the guy who runs in ranting at the end is supposed to be the Ark Music dude that was rapping in Friday.
posted by ckape at 8:54 PM on December 7, 2013

Yeah, I was just about to say that. It's definitely a commentary on the previous video. He leaves ranting something about "sitting in the front or the back".

Two things I hope for Rebecca Black's future:

1. She releases a song called "Monday" just in time for college. Hopefully with footage of kids moving into dorms and a rapping professor.

2. She eventually fades into obscurity with a totally normal job, life, etc. and this is her secret thing from her past that delights her friends. A la How I Met Your Mother's ongoing "Robin Sparkles" gag.
posted by Sara C. at 9:01 PM on December 7, 2013 [7 favorites]

(Was Can't Hardly Wait set in SoCal? I forget.)

Apparently it's Pennsylvania, which makes sense to me intuitively. It's way more East Coast/vaguely Midwest than Clueless and the like.
posted by Copronymus at 10:04 PM on December 7, 2013

50+ yo white male here who is willing to admit that I liked Friday for all its corniness and Saturday for its closer to reality depiction of privileged suburban kid life. The song is ok too.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 10:32 PM on December 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

Can we make "failure to go away" a criminal offense?
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:55 PM on December 7, 2013

We can make the Dave Mustaine thing true.
If we just believe.
posted by Mezentian at 2:01 AM on December 8, 2013 [2 favorites]

You have to respect her for owning her past.

But where did the sex doll come from?
posted by Mezentian at 2:05 AM on December 8, 2013

It's fun to see kids having fun.

Not as fun to see prematurely crotchety old grumpies grump about harmless fun/cute songs here, but we persevere:-)
posted by discopolo at 3:47 AM on December 8, 2013 [2 favorites]

So I was listening to this dude who got a big contract for a YA novel, and he was telling us the stupid rules of YA

1. Sex is okay, mostly
2. Alcohol is okay, mostly
3. Death of things OTHER THAN ANIMALS okay
4. DON'T EVER KILL AN ANIMAL IN YOUR YA BOOK

So, by those standards, I guess the video is perfection, or something
posted by angrycat at 5:42 AM on December 8, 2013 [1 favorite]

As a huge fan of ARK Music, it is weird and delightful to see one of its graduates going about doing normal ordinary music. Though I still prefer Patrice himself to any of his clients.

To the people snarking about how awful it is that Black is still around: she became famous as a 13-year-old girl, had no major media machine helping her manage her fame a la Disney, and her fame specifically centered around the "fact" that she was the "worst singer of all time". I think she totally gets to pursue a singing/being a teen on the Internet career after that, especially considering she is actually a pretty good singer.
posted by Rory Marinich at 5:51 AM on December 8, 2013 [7 favorites]

I hope she'll consider covering Johnny Cash's "Sunday Morning Coming Down"

Actually, it's Kris Kristofferson's "Sunday Morning Coming Down".
posted by dobbs at 7:10 AM on December 8, 2013 [4 favorites]

she became famous as a 13-year-old girl

Wait, really? People were being that horrible about a 13 year old's music video? Jeez.
posted by yoink at 7:25 AM on December 8, 2013 [1 favorite]

OP, the 45 yo male who defaults to a Statler and Waldorf view of culture, people and the world, here.

And what a difference 24 hours and several views of the video makes. I now love the sheer exuberance contained within, and the fact that she is hanging out with other happy people, and smiling in a joyous way and not through the harming of others. I also want to adopt Rebecca Black; she would be such a cool daughter.
posted by Wordshore at 12:05 PM on December 8, 2013

Right at the end and completely out of context, a black man who has been arrested bursts in, says something, and is bundled back out by the same white policeman restraining him. wtf? Someone seriously explain - is this referencing anything specific?

Yes. As others have noted, it represents Patrice Wilson, co-writer and co-producer of "Friday," who is also the guy who does the rap in the middle of that song. (He's trying to horn in with that rap when he bursts in.) He had also been involved in some legal wrangling over the rights to "Friday," which may or may not be incidental.

In addition to "Friday" and Miley Cyrus, I'm pretty sure Katy Perry's "Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)" is part of the pastiche. Black was in Perry's video too, if this weren't meta enough.

While "Saturday" is cute, Rebecca Black's cover of Rihanna's "Stay" (also with Dave Days) is my favorite so far.
posted by Shmuel510 at 12:43 PM on December 8, 2013

Actually, it's Kris Kristofferson's "Sunday Morning Coming Down".

Look, they've got all Sunday morning. I'm sure there's enough time for them both to come down.
posted by octobersurprise at 8:14 PM on December 8, 2013 [1 favorite]

wheres the drop
posted by klangklangston at 11:28 PM on December 8, 2013 [1 favorite]

My understanding is that Black is from a wealthy family in Southern California.

It's odd that if she's from SoCal, why are all the friends she rides with like totally WHITE.

Oh, wait, she's from Orange County.
posted by FJT at 11:57 PM on December 8, 2013 [1 favorite]

It's odd that if she's from SoCal, why are all the friends she rides with like totally WHITE.

Oh, wait, she's from Orange County.

Irvine, the city she's from, is 45% white.
posted by yoink at 8:58 AM on December 9, 2013 [2 favorites]

Another question from clueless OP. About 1:45 in, Rebecca et al enter a party. Some of the people there are not pleased / shocked to see her enter.

Why?
posted by Wordshore at 12:00 PM on December 9, 2013

Weird, I had exactly the opposite reaction to that -- in my take, the people are WAY TOO EXCITED to see her at the party. I figured she was trying to make some kind of commentary on herself as a teen celebrity, or probably just some kind of "swagger" thing where she and her posse are the guests of honor wherever they go.
posted by Sara C. at 12:09 PM on December 9, 2013

Some of them do. But the exact frame, at 1:48, with the girl in the centre moving her cup with a "What the hell are you doing here?" look, and the boy on the right, near camera, with this horrified look on his face. I didn't get that part.

Thinking about it, I could probably need a frame-by-frame analysis by some pop culture experts, for the whole video (starts Google searching).
posted by Wordshore at 12:32 PM on December 9, 2013

The Huffington Post has some screen caps in sequential order, but the captions don't really add much.
posted by Wordshore at 12:39 PM on December 9, 2013

Another question from clueless OP. About 1:45 in, Rebecca et al enter a party. Some of the people there are not pleased / shocked to see her enter.

Why?

Imagine if Rebecca Black showed up to a party you were at. Wouldn't you at least do a double take? I think we're watching her grapple with what it means to have become famous for singing a widely-hated novelty song when she was 13. On the one hand, she clearly appreciates some aspects of the notoriety, but on the other hand, you have to ignore the looks.
posted by Copronymus at 1:16 PM on December 9, 2013 [3 favorites]

This is all just set up work for her inevitable return as an overweight Christian country star with "Sunday" [feat. Jessica Simpson].
posted by Locobot at 11:56 AM on December 10, 2013 [1 favorite]

The Huffington Post has some screen caps in sequential order, but the captions don't really add much.

They totally miss the Risky Business nod for a start.
posted by Mezentian at 6:21 AM on December 12, 2013

Rebecca Black singing with no post-processing whatsoever.
posted by Shmuel510 at 6:37 PM on December 21, 2013 [1 favorite]