From KAT'S KORNER (of THE COMMON ILLS):
Cher
There's only one Cher.
There was not a Cher before Cher. She's not based on anyone. She's not Madonna coming up trying to be Marilyn Monroe.
Everything she did was the 'wrong' thing. In the 60s, gossip columnists like Hedda Hopper couldn't stop trashing her. What she and Sonny wore was considered outrageous. She became a rock star when few women did. And she did it by singing some really tough songs. She wasn't blond, she wasn't Lesley Gore.
The sixties ended and ended the popularity of many big acts from that period. Dusty Springfield didn't have hits, etc, etc. It was over. Cher was no more.
Except, surprise, there she was on TV and she quickly became a TV star -- and she ended up with more hit songs including three number ones.
The 70s ended and so did Cher. That's what people said. She did an act in Vegas. Not much else. The hits were gone on the radio. Then, boom, she was a movie star: SILKWOOD, MASK, THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK, SUSPECT, MOONSTRUCK, MERMAIDS -- and an Oscar for MOONSTRUCK.
And she was back on the music charts -- "We All Sleep Alone," "Just Like Jesse James," "Heart of Stone," "If I Could Turn Back Time" . . .
The 90s. She does the infomercial.
Her career is over.
But we'd heard that before, right?
She ends up with her first solo number one "Believe." She's amazing in TEA WITH MUSSOLINI.
She's never gone. She's never over.
And she's her own template.
Cher is Cher.
Why am I saying this?
A Tweet led to some insisting Dua Lipa is this "generation's Cher" and NME reports:
Another user quote-retweeted the post, writing, “So much truth in one Tweet.” They tagged both artists, to which Cher responded somewhat shadily. “How many [years] are in a generation,” the 76-year-old pop icon wrote alongside an emoji of a thinking face. See that exchange below:
I agree with Cher.
Dua's been around for a few years. Trying doing it for decades before being compared to Cher and try also being an original and not a copy. No woman sang like Cher before Cher.
I feel a little sorry for Dua because it's not a compliment. By that, I mean, a comparison with Cher has always left the other one exposed because they are not Cher. That was Rebecca's point last October when an idiot was insisting Lady Gaga was going to win the Oscar (she didn't, did she) and was the new Cher.
Closing with C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"