[SPEAKER_03]: Taylor and Travis got married, alert alert.
[SPEAKER_03]: This is old news now, but I think you guys still want to hear us talk about it because one patron asked about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so obviously that means all of you may represent you all.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, street sweeper.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's thunderstorm in here.
[SPEAKER_00]: I miss thunderstorm so much.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't get that in there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, and now someone is the fuck is that?
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I'm going to just close the window outside.
[SPEAKER_00]: I probably should close the window anyways because it's raining and it's a fan on it and while the fan is wet.
[SPEAKER_03]: See, that's thunderstorms.
[SPEAKER_03]: My air conditioner has a big gap in it, so it actually like soaks my entire room and all the wires when it thunderstorms.
[SPEAKER_03]: in London we ran, but I think maybe it's because it's more north there's not as much thunder and like like yeah I think usually guys again not women in STEM I think get us to get to a certain temperature outside like I think it has to get extremely hot for a thunder storm like there's some sort of chemical thing that happens in the atmosphere.
[SPEAKER_00]: During the heat wave we had a couple thunderstorms and it was like so loud that it woke people up.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everyone was like, did you catch that thunderstorm and everyone was like, yeah, it woke me up at 4 a.m.
[SPEAKER_00]: The window next to me was like the sky was white and I first heard it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought there was an explosion.
[SPEAKER_03]: My scientific theory has been proven correct.
[SPEAKER_00]: I guess so.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't Google it.
[SPEAKER_03]: Just had to explain to me yesterday, moving the decimal because I forgot about that.
[SPEAKER_03]: I was trying to calculate the tip and he was like, oh, you just moved the decimal over and I was like, start talking.
[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, it was like, it's really easy and I was like, stop, stop, stop it, start talking.
[SPEAKER_03]: Don't try and teach me this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't, don't mansplain.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't mansplain math to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't mansplain math.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, my brother's girlfriend was trying to explain how people get blue eyes and the traits and like dominant.
[SPEAKER_00]: jeans and stuff and she had to pull up like five different diagrams to like illustrate how it works to me and I still don't think I fully get it.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's a marvel anyone listens to what we have to say because we are really stupid.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hate so much.
[SPEAKER_03]: My math trauma is as such that like if you talk to me about it I will immediately blackout to don't even try.
[SPEAKER_03]: Don't even try.
[SPEAKER_03]: Basic math doesn't know me.
[SPEAKER_00]: but she's so pretty and smart in other ways.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Wild Red.
[SPEAKER_00]: And yes, so Taylor Swift got married.
[SPEAKER_00]: To be honest, I've kind of fallen off as Taylor Swift correspondent of this show because I find, if we wanna talk about Slop, like I don't know, I feel like she's become,
[SPEAKER_00]: Slop.
[SPEAKER_00]: I when someone mentioned the Madison Square Garden like the rumors that they were getting married there was like that's obviously a decoy That's obviously fake.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's insane.
[SPEAKER_00]: What lunatic would do that?
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, do I think the highest of her?
[SPEAKER_00]: Not necessarily, but think higher of her than that?
[SPEAKER_00]: And no, it was real.
[SPEAKER_00]: They like did that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, she's talking
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like not even that it's tacky, it's just it's like the public spec, I like she's someone who is like throughout her career like commented on her own kind of role as like a celebrity I had this like kind of self-awareness about what it means to be on public display, but I feel like has like spoken a lot about whatever like the the damage that that's done to her and like
[SPEAKER_00]: colonisize it to an extent, but then like what is this?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like what is getting married, you know, she's like, well, she's also very attention.
[SPEAKER_03]: She loves it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's, but there's like something so meta about it.
[SPEAKER_03]: She fuels the parasociality of her fans in such an insane way.
[SPEAKER_03]: Like she likes it.
[SPEAKER_03]: I just, I don't know.
[SPEAKER_03]: And speaking of taste, as Taylor Swift has taste or no taste, I would argue you know taste because what is that comb over being hairstyle?
[SPEAKER_03]: She has been rocking for a few
[SPEAKER_03]: strange like bull coat side being she's been doing.
[SPEAKER_03]: What is that?
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean famously notice.
[SPEAKER_00]: Famously one of the worst stress celebrities on the planet consistently.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if it's like she's just so rich that she's so out of touch and like so powerful that she doesn't have to like try and stage hip.
[SPEAKER_00]: or if she just is so beloved by like the type of people that would respond to that lack of taste that it and so well and then I would dain I would venture on my end that I I'm not venturing and I'm just saying it but I I-
[SPEAKER_03]: have kind of reclaimed Taylor Swift as bad taste because I have started to like her more as she has come out as the basic aspect that she has always been and I have always said she is but that people tried to deny for so long in calling her some sort of musical genius in saying that she is like artful I was like no she has never been and when she got together with Travis Kelsey I was like this is her in her at her roots I prefer her like this and I actually so I'm
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, what are your highlights of the tailors?
[SPEAKER_00]: RAT and T-Logal?
[SPEAKER_03]: Look, it was that way.
[SPEAKER_03]: I need to confirm that I did not just dream this upper.
[SPEAKER_03]: This wasn't AI.
[SPEAKER_00]: But look, they're T and T, try out Taylor and Travis.
[SPEAKER_03]: No, I know, but they worked with AT&T for the wedding.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm pretty sure.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me look.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why do they need sponsors for this wedding?
[SPEAKER_00]: They're the, she's the richest lady in the world.
[SPEAKER_03]: Okay, wait, wait.
[SPEAKER_03]: I might be wrong.
[SPEAKER_03]: I can't find anything supporting this wedding.
[SPEAKER_00]: That might be like a joke.
[SPEAKER_03]: That's a bad joke, and it's ugly.
[SPEAKER_03]: Ha ha ha.
[SPEAKER_03]: They're your Jackie and I hate you.
[SPEAKER_00]: People like one prizes.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like there's like a circus thing with like games and prizes, like luxury prizes for wedding guests, who are all rich.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why do rich people need to win prizes?
[SPEAKER_00]: They don't need to win things.
[SPEAKER_03]: Oh, they put it on a jumbo troll and that said, just TNT, like, just and T-married.
[SPEAKER_03]: It is just like the tackiest affair I've ever beheld.
[SPEAKER_03]: I, okay, yeah, someone made a TikTok being like a genuinely thought AT&T sponsored this, me too, girl, because that's how ugly ugly it was.
[SPEAKER_03]: I just can't even believe it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think there is something to be said, like in the era of celebrities getting married at like hackney city hall, like Charlie Xiex, or like the really low key celebrity wedding, that someone would then do something so unbelievably awesentacious, there's something charming about that.
[SPEAKER_03]: Like I'm kind of fucked with it.
[SPEAKER_03]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think Taylor's in her basic era and it's what she was always meant to evolve towards and I'm happy about it Because I'm like ha ha finally the world sees her for what I have always seen and I think it's funny I don't know and Travis Kelsey makes me laugh
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, no, I am a Travis Kelsey, it makes me laugh.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm like, this isn't her.
[SPEAKER_03]: I can't see this, this is like, you're like, this isn't her, I'm like, this is her all along, and we will never get to the crux of what Taylor Swift really is.
[SPEAKER_00]: These last few albums she put out were so bad, and I know she can do better, she's done better.
[SPEAKER_00]: And see, I don't think she can.
[SPEAKER_03]: All of her music sounds like the last album, whatever, like what are these lyrics?
[SPEAKER_03]: I was like, to me, that is what her music has always sounded like.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm like, it has always sounded this like infantile and nursery rhyme.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's so clear and evermore, oh, it's really good album.
[SPEAKER_03]: I simply have to agree to disagree here, but I completely love it, respect.
[SPEAKER_03]: your feelings and I'm really sad for you that it has taken this turn.
[SPEAKER_03]: Like I don't want this for my girl.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am actually fine with it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am so embarrassed that there is like a recorded proof of me on the internet.
[SPEAKER_00]: Be like, oh my god, I didn't get Taylor Swift tickets.
[SPEAKER_00]: I actually feel horrible.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I'm like, I can't believe that exists.
[SPEAKER_00]: And see.
[SPEAKER_03]: In this episode, I say the controversial take that I think animation end up for middle school in terms of like being outwardly an anime fan if you live in the West But but I which obviously don't fully even necessarily agree with I was being a contrarian, but here I will also say I think Taylor Swift should end up to the age of 16 and I think millennial webit of taking it too far into adulthood And she has taken it she's in like arrested adolescents like this this wedding is so like baby baby
[SPEAKER_03]: Like, she's like, I'm a baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is like her living out her like prom queen fantasy.
[SPEAKER_00]: So something.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I think that's exactly what it is.
[SPEAKER_03]: And again, baby mode.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think she has always been baby mode to me.
[SPEAKER_03]: She's been one big baby and I'm happy for this.
[SPEAKER_03]: Also guys, you can like anime as an adult.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm totally kidding.
[SPEAKER_03]: But, um...
[SPEAKER_00]: But can you like Taylor Swift doesn't adult?
[SPEAKER_03]: No, I'm not kidding with that.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm just kidding.
[SPEAKER_03]: And the thing is it's safe to say now, because everyone just so much so hates her, do you think she is a little bit getting womaned?
[SPEAKER_03]: I agree that the private judge should is crazy, but I am like they're actually her so many male CEOs out there, like really terrible people, who we just don't know about, but we're too lazy to seek out and get mad at, that are doing the same thing, but I think like, and I think they should all be arrested.
[SPEAKER_03]: She's clearly Taylor Swift.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you know, I don't think that she's a bad person.
[SPEAKER_00]: that is the behavior of a good person, but like in other ways I don't think that she's necessarily a bad person.
[SPEAKER_03]: She's a victim of lifestyle crew.
[SPEAKER_00]: She's like a crazy famous person.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just am like, oh, you're so...
[SPEAKER_00]: Pringe and yet so powerful like Katy Perry entertains me because I'm like, what is this her her and Justin Trudeau.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm like, what is that but like also she has zero cultural capital anymore like she's sort of a joke.
[SPEAKER_03]: She's a cringe lord for sure
[SPEAKER_00]: but Taylor Swift has still so much cultural capital and I guess I just think that like she's become too powerful to try or be challenged.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think she needs to do some self in a reflection.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm actually totally fine with people stepping away from the line line and I'm totally fine with her career not really moving forward because I don't need her to keep.
[SPEAKER_03]: I just- that's okay like you can- I think she should go focus on something else.
[SPEAKER_03]: I don't need her to keep making music and I never thought I was good in the first place.
[SPEAKER_03]: I haven't thought she made a good song since I won songs she made in the Hannah Montana movie, where she performs it in the movie.
[SPEAKER_03]: I thought that was a beautiful song.
[SPEAKER_03]: Ever since I've been like what?
[SPEAKER_03]: It's like Duh-Hell.
[SPEAKER_00]: If I wanted it in from there.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think, yeah, I'm back it up, girl.
[SPEAKER_03]: I heard her, she is one, she and Selena Gomez are these baffling people, her a little less than Selena, who like, their presence in the public eye and like, but why?
[SPEAKER_03]: Like, I don't think that's should have persisted.
[SPEAKER_03]: Selena even works and like, girl, what have you done?
[SPEAKER_03]: But she made the blush I wear every day.
[SPEAKER_03]: She made that with her own two hands.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think it's crazy to have your wedding at Madison's fucking square garden in the middle of one of the densest cities in North America, and then to be like, and have the most intense like NDA type, you cannot take photos of those wedding thing where it's like, oh, now you're being secretive, you literally just shut down the fucking city for your wedding.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to know, like, we did anyone do anything crazy what were people doing?
[SPEAKER_00]: Was the part was at a good party?
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what I want to know.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm like, you owe it to the public.
[SPEAKER_03]: If you're going to be like, so, I mean, the financial diet called us, it was like, this is a sign that we're all medieval peasants.
[SPEAKER_03]: Like, we're living in medieval peasant area that we're like cheering on these people for having their like billionaire wedding.
[SPEAKER_03]: But it's like, if you're going to do that and you're going to shut down the city, at least step out onto the balcony and wave at your fucking peasants.
[SPEAKER_03]: Like, shouldn't even do that.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's like, you don't let the peasants even see
[SPEAKER_00]: See you, but you're gonna like ruin my whole day because you decided to get married to this film Give us your privacy as we get married on the most famous stage of the world literally.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, you don't marry it in a stadium I know it's also like it's just so Sure, it's so on the nose.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just hate it get married at a palace like do that like it'd be be like But this the stadium to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm like is a tacky as part of
[SPEAKER_03]: No taste mama.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, her husband is a football player.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, Sadia is why exactly it's so tacky, I'm here for it.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's, it's no taste, but to me it's bad taste and you will all understand what I'm saying when you listen to this episode.
[SPEAKER_00]: Listen to this episode, which we recorded with the help of our lovely friends I own a gamble and Gina Tonic who are the editors of Polyester magazine and who have
[SPEAKER_00]: called the polyester book of Bad Taste, and so we're going to be joined by them in just a minute.
[SPEAKER_00]: But in the meantime, and this is rehashed, a podcast about the internet phenomenon that strike in northern our culture only to be quickly forgotten, but we think are due for a revisiting.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is a special Patreon bonus episode for our lovely patrons with great taste.
[SPEAKER_00]: So this month's bonus episode is all about taste, where it comes from what it symbolizes and whether or not it can be replicated by the algorithm.
[SPEAKER_00]: And to help us discuss this topic, we have some very special guests.
[SPEAKER_00]: I only gamble and genetonic are the hosts of the polyester podcast and their new book, the polyester book of bad taste is out now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hi guys!
[SPEAKER_00]: Hi!
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're so excited to have you guys on and as I mentioned today we're going to be talking about tastes but in particular we're going to be dissecting this new concept of tasteslop which was coined by the writer and trend forecaster Emily Seagull who by the way is also the person who came up with normcore and just to jump right in Seagull defines tasteslop as
[SPEAKER_00]: the appropriation of the tasteful by the tech world in order to create slop, and she gives a few different examples for how this can like manifest, which include like a corporate mood board full of high-end design, fetish items, dinner parties held for AI companies, the sudden explosion in popularity of like a particular item due to the algorithm,
[SPEAKER_00]: such as Tabby Shoes or those Trader Joe's tote bags, you see everywhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would also personally add the personalized AI Spotify playlist to that, as well as like short-form videos where celebrities showcase their tastes like top jaw or those like letterbox top fours.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you go right that TASLOP emerges when the visible signs of TASLAR extracted from those relations and redeployed generically.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I just was wondering if there were like any other examples of TASLOP that like you guys have observed lately or like any particular items or aesthetics that you've like noticed have been sloppified.
[SPEAKER_00]: Really?
[SPEAKER_02]: I think anything chrome.
[SPEAKER_02]: But anything quite so much like pitched and is writing an article for us, so I'm just stealing their idea They were talking about how like the new it-girl thing isn't have cool clothes We're talking about a really cool apartment and like a huge part of that that she's writing about is like Crow mitem, so like having a chrome So for this got a chrome frame or like a really cool chrome Coffee table or really cool chrome Can you offer so far that has a chrome frame for free?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, okay, I know that I just bought Chrome, it's shelves, Chrome, Chrome, Chrome, Chrome, it's like, people are like, it's so like futuristic as well to be like guys, you know what the future of taste is?
[SPEAKER_02]: Chrome, that's fun, it's fun, yeah, it's like that's fun, it's fun, it's fun, but yeah, I thought that was an interesting one where it's like this really like polished metal.
[SPEAKER_03]: Not me with my chrome nails too.
[SPEAKER_03]: Holy shit.
[SPEAKER_02]: I got it to gold chrome, but I don't have gold chrome to color.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't think gold chrome comes because it's like gold's quite tacky isn't it?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, this is yellow actually, but are yellow.
[SPEAKER_03]: But hey yellow, it's like white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white, white
[SPEAKER_03]: And they basically call themselves cafes now like they don't want to admit that they're diners And then they've also it's kind of that's excuse to create like hostile or like anti-homeless architecture The seats are all separated and they're like these little stools But then they're kind of designed with the idea of looking like sophisticated and it's been an excuse to kind of like McDonald's is an expensive place now I had the prices crazy And it's just funny because it's like McDonald's is fast food, but then they're kind of using these
[SPEAKER_03]: taste signifiers.
[SPEAKER_03]: I also find just like a lot of new restaurants use the same kind of mid-century modern interior design to the point that it's like it's so easily replicated that like you're literally seeing it pop up in the AI models that Emily Seagull references.
[SPEAKER_03]: I just think anything that's not easily replicable and can be so replicated that it could be shadowed by AI would be qualified.
[SPEAKER_01]: Have you seen the
[SPEAKER_01]: Coca-Cola just did like a rebrand as well, and it looks exactly the same, but the only difference.
[SPEAKER_01]: So like the actual logo is exactly the same.
[SPEAKER_01]: They've like redesigned the can at tiny bits, so now like Coke Zero can's on in a black font, they're in the white font, and then just say zero underneath.
[SPEAKER_02]: But then I'm like, boy, I know, that sounds like a trickery, that sounds like a devilish trickery.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I also thought it was interesting, it was like they've introduced a styrofoam to it.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like a retro mid-century font.
[SPEAKER_01]: that it's kind of like old coat, like when everyone loved coat, the coat alone, it was like new and stuff.
[SPEAKER_01]: But then also that really aligns with taste-lop, I think, because I feel like fonds really go through the taste-cycle.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like it used to be sad and sad, and then all of the fashion houses changed.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I can minimalist fond and now it's swinging back the other way.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and there's the whole hand written font, trend, like the jolene font everywhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's something where the chalkboard, like written menu thing that to me, kind of feels like weirdly tweet and like weirdly like 20 tens and yet like has come back in like, I guess the tweet revival kind of way, but that's sort of, I think a bit of an epidemic.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it works out since like the linen tablecloth, the like, silver, old, cutlery,
[SPEAKER_01]: chalkboard, the like minimalist restaurant aesthetic, the light looks like Italy, that's taste slow.
[SPEAKER_03]: Italy, Italy is it's love.
[SPEAKER_01]: Italy is just love.
[SPEAKER_03]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_03]: We have a son or a Italian.
[SPEAKER_03]: I take it all back.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's being a tourist in Italy is taste slow.
[SPEAKER_03]: I just remember because I think this is happening a lot in film.
[SPEAKER_03]: There's a lot of like shorthand for prestige going on where you'll have certain types of shots, like really cinematic shots and a lot of it's I wrote an article about a lot of it's derived from like the Tree of Life by Turins Mallock with these like really like soft, focused visuals that a lot of commercials now use and I think that also qualifies to me as taste law.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think anything that can be shorthanded for taste is
[SPEAKER_00]: Slopped to me, commercial directors like using kind of like cinematic language instead of just, you know, a guy in front of a screen That's like bring back like a guy in a white void talking at you Those schools that are yeah, um
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so so you go fleshed out the idea of Tase-Lop in an article on Sub-Zack which grapples in part with like whether or not AI can develop taste or if it can simply just mimic it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she says this has depended on how you define taste and provides like two different frameworks for doing so.
[SPEAKER_00]: The first comes from the French sociologist Pierre Bordeaux which argues that taste is essentially constructed set of codes used to signify a class in cultural
[SPEAKER_00]: And Bordeaux believes that taste is not natural, but talk to us either in the home or the classroom.
[SPEAKER_00]: and seagulls articles suggest that that type of taste or like if you define it that way, it could be adopted by AI technically.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the second comes from Susan's on tags, notes on camp, which fuse tastes as like a sensibility, which is which is less systemic and more like esoteric, which seagulls says like acquiring this type of taste requires like more sentience, it's more human.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I'm curious, like, how do you guys define taste?
[SPEAKER_00]: Is it something innate or is it imposed on to us?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you know you look like you have something you want to say?
[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's both, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So somewhere in the middle, I think we are, I get obesity to be like, oh, classes and have a point of view within tastes.
[SPEAKER_02]: All like has like some saying over how we form our tastes.
[SPEAKER_02]: I feel like as capitalism has got more prevalent in my life as I've got an older, I think, and also online, you can see it a lot more vividly.
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, but I also do think there is like an innate feeling inside of you and that's kind of like where the book learns really well for me Um, with the essays that I own his commission didn't explore like that new ones between those two ideas of it like being something that's within ourselves and like so hard for and the part of it being like a society I don't think it's like nature of his nurture where it's kind of like what actually is both nothings ever versus I think
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think what's interesting about the idea of like, can AI develop taste or can it just mimic it is that like I think one of the arguments that I make in the book is that like a lot of people who have good taste are just mimicking it and mimicking it the hoods of the way that we like process good taste and like liking the right things and things being intellectual in society as like some sort of hierarchy that establishes worth about whether you're like,
[SPEAKER_01]: why do you feel like the right things?
[SPEAKER_01]: Obviously, this is more prevalent in creative industries, which we're all in, but I think in general, through social media, that's also exploded.
[SPEAKER_01]: And there's this whole cottage in the street now of influencers that tell you, oh, something, well, do you know that you are like, upper class, something or do you know that you have money?
[SPEAKER_01]: Something is like, quiet luxury, everyone should want to be quiet luxury, because everyone wants
[SPEAKER_01]: to be thought of as having money, but not to be ostentatious about it, because then that's poor taste.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think these are all basically behavioral rules that are learned, that draw people away from that actual taste of that makes sense.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that becomes more and more obvious.
[SPEAKER_01]: The more we kind of zoom into trends, whether it's like tabbies or anything, basically, is like, oh, do I actually like that, or have I just seen it so many times,
[SPEAKER_01]: that kind of, well, I'm trying to power.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think what I really got from your book, Gene and I only, and then also from the Seagull article, even though I don't think it was articulated.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think they were articulated almost as the inverse of each other, but I think I came out of this realizing there's taste and there's no taste, and I think bad taste for me still qualifies as some sort of taste, and I think going down through like Seagull's points to me like discernment came out as like the major,
[SPEAKER_03]: qualifier of taste and I think when it comes to bad taste, you're still making a choice to embrace that.
[SPEAKER_03]: To me, like when I was reading the essays in this book and reading the article, no taste came across.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think both of your pieces were arguing against the idea of no taste and the idea of like a top down.
[SPEAKER_03]: enforcing of taste from corporate authorities, essentially, like I think, with the example of a eye, for example, or the micro-trends that you talk about, those are very much instilled.
[SPEAKER_03]: Again, through influencers who are partnering with brands, you know, getting a kickback by telling everyone to buy this one random, traditional object, right?
[SPEAKER_03]: And in a single article, it's like these fucking tech people being like,
[SPEAKER_03]: I think AI could do, they have a vested interest in telling people to do this versus to me someone having, someone loving an object that is considered bad taste is still them being able to discern something about it that makes them love it.
[SPEAKER_03]: And I think, yeah, to me that was what taste meant.
[SPEAKER_03]: And I think, I totally agree, I think it's a mixture of something innate because you have to kind of have this innate desire for.
[SPEAKER_03]: a thing to have the taste for it, but I also do think it could be like environmentally learned.
[SPEAKER_03]: You know, you can be taught how to like discern an essence, the essence of something, I guess.
[SPEAKER_00]: And like I only both you and Encego sort of at points like describe that experience of the the lived experiences that inform why like you might like something that
[SPEAKER_00]: might be generally popular, even, but because of your own sort of specific context for it, draw you to it, which I thought was really interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I think like her focus on the esoteric quality.
[SPEAKER_00]: She uses an example of like, proper clothing and like, two people who come out at very differently because one person had this own personal connection to it and like one person
[SPEAKER_00]: But I also, I loved this sort of emphasis on the work that goes into discovering things.
[SPEAKER_00]: You compare it, you talk to it tastes as a Russian doll of artifacts.
[SPEAKER_00]: I really loved that metaphor because it brought me back to literally being on my computer and being why am I drawn to this image and then finding the source material for it and then going further and further down that rabbit hole.
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, and do you guys like have, I guess like any early moments, for you, recognize the seeds of your personal taste being planted?
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh my god, like, I felt like you know what, it's really good ones for this as well.
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, I think welcome to mine.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right now is I remember coming to uni and, um, Eden, my best friend who I made best friends with in like my first year uni would just spend every like night, we'd just smoke weed and watch a new film and it would always be like a film she'd seen, but she'd been like,
[SPEAKER_02]: You've not seen this and it would be something like so crazy that I hadn't seen now looking back She'd be like you haven't seen lost in translation You haven't seen ghost world you haven't seen Donnie darker like just loads of like films that was just like everywhere I think I'd seen like before me and I don't know how they'd pass me by but I think for me
[SPEAKER_02]: A huge part of my taste was informed by like my friends taste, I guess.
[SPEAKER_02]: But like what my friends wanted to show me, and I think that's kind of like what's also missing in the conversation of taste is the way you introduce each other's to taste.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think that's like such like a fun thing that we lose a bit through like social media algorithms that tell you what to like, because you're not really listening to like your peers recommendations anymore.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're all taking the same recommendations from our algorithms, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: I think for me it was similar but like so I've written about like a few different things in places before mostly both of my books but I felt like one of them was going to charity shops when I was 15 and buying VHS's of staff and just buying ones that like I thought was interesting or I'd seen online or whatever and that's how I discovered like Ghost Wild and Heavens and like
[SPEAKER_01]: breakfast club and like all of these other firms that are obviously not like niche films, but like felt new to me, but maybe I'd already seen like a screenshot on Tumblr or something which I felt like why is why the internet then when we were teenagers was like so good for that and like why it was this kind of like Russian dollar element, not just Tumblr, which was like obviously a lot of screenshots but I felt like even criticism was so much more generous in that it like fashion criticism in particular which is what I was mostly reading was like pointing to
[SPEAKER_01]: who made the soundtrack for the show, for example, so then you could look them up or like, who if a look was inspired by, or even just the writer thought it reminded them of like a character in a film, that was cross reference.
[SPEAKER_01]: So like even reading something like that, then kind of just like opened up your world.
[SPEAKER_01]: that inch by inch bit more, whereas now I saw like a tweet the other day that was like, how do people find out who does the soundtrack for fashion shows?
[SPEAKER_01]: I always very love them, but I never know where to look and it's just like, I felt like we, the internet has been like, inch certified to that degree so much that like there's no way of people being able to find the things that interests them, because it's all our growth and that.
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, you've a sort of exclusive to like influencers or magazines of the stuff I think.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I agree.
[SPEAKER_03]: I learned a lot of my taste for my mom.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think I don't know if it was like being her only kid, but I just thought she was such a goddess when I was growing up.
[SPEAKER_03]: She, I would watch her get ready for work, and I thought she was so glamorous.
[SPEAKER_03]: I mean, she is glamorous, but she is glamorous.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, she is.
[SPEAKER_03]: She's very fast.
[SPEAKER_03]: So I just thought, I just only wanted to go up and be her, and like, we're that kind of clothing, and I think my parents really,
[SPEAKER_00]: my parents are kind of snob.
[SPEAKER_03]: They really care about like aesthetic sensibilities in a way that very much informed like the way I've moved through the world since and I completely agree that taste is something that's social.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think Tumblr was a really, I haven't been for me for discovering taste as well, like you think.
[SPEAKER_03]: The way that you could kind of customize your own page, you're like you have to learn how to code your own playlist into it.
[SPEAKER_03]: There was a lot of work being done.
[SPEAKER_03]: to cultivate that sensibility.
[SPEAKER_03]: And I go through my old Tumblr now and I'm like, wow, I was like 16 and I really, like, I still really like that kind of stuff.
[SPEAKER_03]: And so it was true to who I was, even though I've changed so much.
[SPEAKER_03]: Since, I think that to mean no taste, as opposed to bad taste, is like equivalent to like, it's like abstraction, basically, where it's like taste is knowledge and learning.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, curiosity, I think is important.
[UNKNOWN]: Thank you for watching.