by Ifan Llewelyn
Ahead of her headline set at Brighton Pride this Saturday, we see what today’s young folks can learn from the Princess of Pop.
Crushed up against a barrier standing face-to-face with a stern-looking security member, we stood gazing upward in anticipation of when Kylie Minogue would take to the Pyramid stage at this year’s Glastonbury. Kylie’s “legends slot” was set to be one of the most highly-anticipated sets of the week, with her difficult history with the festival making it a moment of true personal triumph. Slowly revealing herself on a rotating podium, she looks out onto a record-breaking crowd dressed in an open shirt and white tailored suit. She clenches her lips together, nods her brows and gives a slow knowing head-shake that will live on in infamy.
Looking around, despite it being one of the festival’s most coveted sets, there was a distinct lack of teenagers around; they usually stop at nothing to shove their way to the front. Taking prime spots were gay men in their early thirties, parents with young children and very enthusiastic middle-aged women with their camping chairs and boxed wine. Ask anyone under the age of 20 about ‘Kylie’ and you’re sure to endure some confused exchanges before having to clarify “No, Kylie Minogue”. There seems to have been a shift in those years between the chart success of album Aphrodite (2010) and Golden (2018) when the singles from Kiss Me Once (2014) weren’t charting that left space for another Kylie to ascend. From the womb that birthed the most well-known set of sisters in recent history came Kylie Jenner, who really began gaining momentum in this time. During the formative years of a generation, Minogue wasn’t on the radio and Jenner was on iPhone screens across the globe. It was then that a generational divide was formed, embodied in five little letters: Kylie.
The battle to claim the mononym turned from a cultural battle to a legal one back in 2015 when the beauty mogul attempted to register the mark “KYLIE” in the US within “advertising services”. This legal dispute has spread over several copyright cases with the latest being over the right to call a cosmetics range ‘Kylie’, with Minogue coming out on top. Time and again the team behind Jenner try and claim or hinder Minogue’s commercial ventures under the name ‘Kylie’, but have often time failed. Each victory has Minogue’s devout fans giving a pursed-lip and a side-eye to the 21-year-old reality star.
Having said that, Miss Jenner does have a monopoly within social media platforms, with her Instagram account being the 7th most followed with 141 million, each post gaining several million likes. She has an entire generation of young women eating from the palm of her hand, desperately clambering to get their hands on her latest lipsticks. Since Gen Z are increasingly living their lives through social media, the influence of its biggest players becomes far greater. If it’s down to likes, favourites and follows, Jenner is ahead on all fronts. That’s not to say Minogue doesn’t have a very real online presence. One of her big online victories is web domain Kylie.com that she owns, which is sure to be a big thorn in the side of team Jenner. But, having said that, to Google ‘Kylie’ is to be met with gossip article after style round-up about the puffy-lipped young adult.
Fortunately, we don’t live in the anxiety-riddled, eating disorder-inducing cesspit that is social media. There’s a real-world that the incoming young adults will have to live in and outside of their make-up bags, Jenner will have very little influence. The real world is Minogue’s domain, despite not literally being the girl next door, she’s sitting on Graham Norton’s couch, or taking over Wembley Arena, or playing Glastonbury’s legend slot. The honorary Brit is woven into the fabric of the last few decades of popular culture, synonymous with the pop music she championed.
For so many of us, Kylie has been a constant. Since bursting onto our television screens back in the mid-eighties as rag-tag tomboy Charlene Mitchell on Neighbours, she’s been the best friend we think we have who’s always there with an upbeat bop when you’re going through a break-up or getting through that final mile of your run. The doyenne of subtle re-invention, despite going through several distinct phases, she’s always one hundred per cent Kylie. When Madonna robed herself in yet another ridiculous persona, Kylie merely updated her look. She holds such a dear place in the hearts of all of us who are no longer the underside of twenty. Letting her legacy end with those of us that have been avid followers would be a real disservice to young folks who have yet to immerse themselves in Kylie’s glitter-gilded world.
Her Artistry
Long before self-important individuals started referring to themselves as a “brand”, Kylie has been upfront about how she is in fact a product. Speaking to VH1 back in 2004 she said “I think to a degree it’s fair to say that you’re a manufactured product. You’re a product and you’re selling a product.” Influencers might think they’ve invented the wheel with their self-branding, but Kylie has long made an art of it. Whether it’s a pop career, children’s books, endorsements, a Doctor Who cameo, or a range of fetching eyewear, she always serves something distinctly Kylie. Pairing business acumen with a keen eye and a distinct sense of self, she’s her own industry.
Her main mode of expression still lies within her music, with each pop hit tapping into something that defies articulation. All too often pop music is discredited as a lower genre, one for the masses that meanders around the chart top 10 before disappearing into obscurity. This can’t be said of Kylie’s work, with even her earlier hits still dragging folks to the dance floor in the name of something far greater than nostalgia. Well, except for The Loco-Motion that is…
Her Resilience
You don’t spend over three decades in an industry without taking a few hits. She’s survived
critical flops, betrayals both professional and personal, and a doomed R&B phase, and has come out on top. Cultivating a crop of staunch super fans, she always had devout fans fighting her corner, gaining back the support of the public in waves. Who knew that in approaching her 50th birthday she’d see one of her most successful albums yet with Golden? Well, Kylie did. The album debuted at number one here in the UK, the first to do so in eight years. In a world where celebrities are created and disposed of quicker than the stream time of a TikTok video, Kylie remains indispensable. If Gen Z needs a lesson in taking care of something rather than chucking it away like a stained Boohoo t-shirt, Kylie is that lesson.
Her Joy
The world is a scary place for all of us. Political unrest and an unrelenting stream of bad news and natural disasters. Just imagine being a teenager in a time when we’re told the earth might not be here by the time you turn 50. It’s no wonder that yearning melodies set to pulsing dark tech beats are dominating the charts, it’s what the young people are feeling. Kylie is the antithesis of all that. Rufus Wainwright referred to her as the “gay shorthand for joy” and never has there been a truer sentence. When Billie Eilish moodily croons about when the party’s over, Kylie just wants to go out dancing. She wants All the Lovers to come together. She just can’t get you out of her head. On a night like this, she wants you to put your hand on your heart and do the god damn Loco-Motion with her.
Kylie Minogue will be headlining Pride in the Park, Preston Park, Brighton on Saturday, 2nd August.
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