Let's Talk About the Black Eyed Peas

A few weeks ago, BYX threw it's annual Roller Disco function. We drive to a neighboring town and roller skate in those tan Forrest Gump boots. It reminds me of CEO Day, at St. Joe's Elementary. Once a month, if you brought a canned food, you could wear whatever clothes you wanted, instead of the requisite white shirt blue pants uniform. At the end of the school day, St. Joe's would bus all the students to the Skate Place, where we would watch the public school kids get in fights. They tore the Skate Place down many years ago. Now it's a grouping of apartments, named the Skate Place. This is the reason we have to have Roller Disco in a different city.

The point is, whilst skating without my date (it's very difficult to skate with someone when you are as fast as I am), a gorgeous and dramatic song began to play that slowed down time. After three minutes of sweat and tears from dancing powerfully and falling twice, I asked the DJ what that song was. He said, "If you do that again, we're going to kick you out." I reiterated by question, and he said, "Meet Me Halfway, by the Black Eyed Peas."

GASP. Not the Black Eyed Peas! I have a blood feud with this band. I need to look up the definition of blood feud, but I think that's what I have. Their lyrics are offensively simple and the individual beats in the song look like money signs when you open it in GarageBand. Take their latest hit, "I Gotta Feeling," which rhymes the traditional Jewish celebratory exclamation, "motzel tov," with "just take it - off!" That's not offensive. But I'm not Jewish.

I'd like to post some lyrics to this song, in order to prove my point. As you read this, please try to make it melodious. If you are familiar with the song, feel free simply to sing the words.

let's do it

let's do it

let's do it

let's do it

and do it

and do it

- oh no, I'm not finished yet, and neither is Fergie -

let's do it

let's do it

let's do it

let's do it

and do it

and do it

And here I could make a stale joke, pretending to be unfamiliar with her command and asking her to repeat it once more. The issue at hand, however, is what exactly "it" is. It's never stated, and the context of the song is so vague that it could be any number of things. I'll go out on a limb and suggest that it refers to desecrating other ethnic groups' cultural traditions.

However, "Meet Me Halfway" is different.

Okay, that's a lie. "Meet Me Halfway" is the exact same formula. Beats that were bought off the end cap at a grocery store and phrases that are vague and familiar enough that one must find his or her owning meaning in them. But I am in love with this song.

Please, take five minutes and watch the music video. Or, take thirty seconds and hit the highlights, which are as follows: Fergie, who is actually wearing clothes despite what first glance told you, lost in the rainforest from Fern Gully. Taboo in a spacesuit floating way too close to the sun. apl.de.ap dressed as a Bedouin with steam punk stunner shades, floating in circles on the surface of the moon. Elsewhere on the moon, will.i.am in Jay Gatsby's racing goggles, riding a robot elephant. I think he may be using this video as an audition tape for a stage production of Around the World in 80 Days.

Nothing changes in terms of formula. This song sounds like many other songs I've heard. The lyrics were probably written using those word magnets on my mom's fridge. But sometimes a repetition of something as confusing and simletaneously seductive as "meet me halfway" makes me want to climb aboard my trusty robot elephant and ride off into the setting Saturn.