Pop Loser: Cher’s Butt Tattoo

Welcome back to Pop Loser! It’s been a heavy week in Seattle, and with music news also looking bleak, I think it’s a good time to deep dive into a subject that brings me joy: Cher’s ass tattoo. Plus, there are so many great live shows happening this week, and I’ll share a song that sounds like hiking on Mount Rainier. 

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This Week in Music: 

I’m not joking. Over the weekend I watched Robert Altman’s 1994 fashion-filled comedy Prêt-à-Porter, which features a cameo of Cher looking hot as hell with her upper arm tattoo (a charm necklace) peeking out of her shirtsleeve. A Google search to learn more about the ink led me down a rabbit hole of Cher’s many tattoos, including something unexpected: a “garden” on her butt. 

Although the tattoo wasn’t visible to the public until the 1980s, most notably in the 1989 “Turn Back Time” music video (you can see an array of butterflies and flowers through her fishnets), Cher revealed to the Baltimore Sun that she got the tattoo—her first of six—in 1972. “My mother was appalled,” she said. “Everybody was appalled. And that suited me just fine.” That same year, she described her tattoos as “passe” on The Rosie O’Donnell Show, explaining, “I’ve got ’em everywhere I don’t want ’em. I’d like to look at my butt once before I die and just see… it.” 

In 2008, she told USA Today that she recently had one of her tattoos removed, but did not specify which. “It wasn’t a good one,” she said. “I might take some more off. When I got tattooed, only bad girls did it: me and Janis Joplin and biker chicks. Now it doesn’t mean anything. No one’s surprised. I got a tattoo right after I left Sonny [Bono] and I was feeling real independent. That was my badge.” In a 2013 appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman, she reiterated wanting the tattoo removed, “My ass is still in a nice place, but at 87 or 90, I’m gonna have, like, this low ass tattoo hanging there in the wind!” We have not received a tattoo update since then, but I promise that if I ever have the opportunity to interview Cher, it will be the first thing I ask about. 

Now for some current news: Folk singer-songwriter Linda Perhacs is missing. A friend of Perhacs, Dublab founder Mark McNeill, took to Instagram on Monday to ask the public for help finding the 82-year-old. He wrote that the “legendary singer-songwriter was discharged from a residential care facility approximately eight months ago under the supervision of her legal guardian. Since then, friends and longtime collaborators have been unable to reach her and repeated attempts to contact her guardian have reportedly gone unanswered. Please help us locate Linda to ensure her wellbeing.” Perhacs’s former manager, Laurel Stearns, confirmed to Pitchfork that she filed a missing persons report with the Los Angeles Police Department on June 6. It was reportedly investigated, but the status can only be disclosed to family members and legal guardians. 

Modest Mouse guitarist Simon O’Connor sent inappropriate messages to a 16-year-old fan. On Sunday, screenshots of Instagram DMs from O’Connor to a young fan appeared in the Modest Mouse subreddit. After receiving a few confusing messages (including an explicit meme), the fan assumed that he had been hacked. According to the screenshots, O’Connor responded, “Wish I was hacked just had a party night and looking at everything with one eye ya know.”  And later, “You did blindside me with a gaggle of likes and then very little intro besides bikini pics so we are both to blame.” 

O’Connor swiftly posted an apology on the same subreddit, claiming that he mistook the fan for a regular internet troll. “After a few minutes, I realized that I had made a mistake and this was not the person who I had dealt with before. I unsent the messages and immediately ceased communication.” This explanation makes little sense, considering he referenced the minor’s “bikini pics,” after they had identified themselves as a fan. 

Now take a deep breath and enjoy the incomparable Bette Davis sporting a “Bette Davis Eyes” shirt, shared by Kim Carnes:

Music Events Worth Your Hard-Earned Money This Week:

Little Venom, Welcome Strawberry, Found Space, Combing July 29, Baba Yaga, 7 pm, 21+

Downtown Summer Sounds: Folk Bitch Trio July 30, Westlake Park, 4 pm, all ages, free

Marcos Valle July 30, Neptune Theatre, 8 pm, all ages

Widowspeak July 30, Barboza, 7 pm, 21+

Hannah Frances July 31, Fremont Abbey Arts Center, 8 pm, all ages

Ani DiFranco, Valerie June Aug 2, Woodland Park Zoo, 6 pm, all ages

Earth, Wind & Fire, Lionel Richie Aug 3, Climate Pledge Arena, 7:30 pm, all ages

The Songs That Keep Me Up at Night:

“Delicious” by Linda Perhacs

“Delicious” is the closing track of Perhacs’s 1970 psychedelic folk masterpiece Parallelograms. The song is quiet and understated with lyrics about the magic of the natural world. I once listened to this album while driving up Mount Rainier to hike, and this song mirrored what I saw: glittering waterfalls, pillowy moss, and spontaneous summer rain. 

“Favourite” by Maripool 

Maripool is the “one girl band” of Lisbon-born, London-based singer-songwriter Natacha Simões. Her music is new to me, but I’m loving the timelessness of her bedroom pop sound and the quality of her voice, which reminds me of Katrina Mitchell (of the Pastels) or Carrie Brownstein (of Sleater-Kinney). “Favourite” is the second single from her upcoming debut album, Rotten Luck (out Aug 28). 

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