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Rebecca Black’s “Person of Interest” proves she’s anything but

With her third and weakest YouTube single to date, Rebecca Black doesn't give her fans anything to love or hate.

 

Lauren Rae Orsini

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Posted on Nov 16, 2011   Updated on Jun 3, 2021, 1:15 am CDT

Rebecca’s Black’s third single should cement the YouTube star as a one-hit wonder.

Person Of Interest” came out yesterday, not that many people noticed.

Some haters were still trying to hate. @brobible tweets that the video will “make you want to eat fiberglass insulation.” @dumbasablog adds that it’ll “make you want to bash your ears with a couple of skeeballs.”

But the video, apparently designed to be neutral in every way, leaves adversaries with little fodder. As a result, there’s no trending topic for Rebecca Black in its wake and no widespread media coverage.

Without AutoTune vocals and boasting only a simple guitar and drums backdrop, the song unfortunately follows the blueprint of the 14-year-old’s previous single, “My Moment”: There’s nothing offensive, or even interesting, about it.

In other words, it lacks everything that made Black’s first video —the illustrious “Friday”— popular.

“Person of Interest” may have 11,000 likes on YouTube (and 11,000 dislikes). But what’s that compared to the 6 million hits “Friday” garnered? It’s hard to imagine that Black doesn’t know what her audience wants and what made her popular in the first place.

Is it too much to hope for one astoundingly dumb lyric? One wacky AutoTuned line? Or even, God help us, a bridge that breaks down the days of the week?

Maybe buzz isn’t what Black is after. She’s already been bullied out of school, and another popular video might just feed the trolls. Or perhaps she can just ask her friend Kreayshawn for help when she needs promotion instead of pulling it from YouTube views. Whatever the reason, Black is playing it safe.

If that means fewer ebullient lovers (and vitriolic haters), it’s a risk she’s willing to take.

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*First Published: Nov 16, 2011, 6:00 pm CST