KungFuMike.net - March 6, 2007

Does the name Tila Nguyen ring a bell? You probably know her as "Tila Tequila," of MySpace fame (or infamy). Tila, Vietnamese by heritage, was born in Singapore back in 1981 and later immigrated with her family to Houston, Texas, where she fostered her disgusting sense of self-entitlement by bullying everyone around her to the point that she was forced to switch middle schools. Upon entering high school, Tila began experimenting with drugs and getting passed around from gang to gang as a sucky/fucky cholo cum dumpster. When Tila discovered that her body could no longer handle the vast quantity of semen that was being pumped into it, she ran away to Queens, New York to drain herself. When she returned home shortly after, she continued begging for her parents' attention. Showing the world how "wild and uninhibited" she was, she kindled a three-way lesbian relationship. A few years later, Tila felt that her life would only get worse if she stayed in the Houston area, so she picked up and moved to wholesome, 7th Heaven-esque Hollywood, California where she found her true self. And Myspace.

As of April 2006, Tila "Tequila" Nguyen is the most popular person on Myspace (golf clap). She has managed to leverage her popularity into such spectacular feats of celebrity as becoming a contestant on VH1's Surviving Nugent, a reoccurring host on Fuse TV's Pants-Off Dance-Off, the cover of Stuff magazine, and she even showed her tits a few times for Playboy.

Unfortunately for us, somewhere between accumulating 1.7 million WoW calloused nerds on her friends list, taking her clothes off for money, and gathering together a bobble-headed entourage of cunt-lapping sycophants, she decided to tackle the music industry.

She became the lead singer/songwriter for a couple of retarded bands that she scraped together, Beyond Betty Jean (RIP) and Jealousy (MIA). Shockingly, Tila ended up landing a track titled "Straight Up" on Myspace Records' first compilation album in November of 2005. In April of 2006, it was announced on TRL that Tila signed a deal with Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas' vanity label, The Will.i.am Music Group, which is a part of A&M Records.

I procured all of that information from her Wikipedia page the other day. When I clicked on the link to her Myspace profile, I came across this recent blog entry:

WILL YOU JOIN THE BATTLE????
The future of the music business is being re-written - NOW. Have you ever had the power to make a massive change? Start a war; stop a war; forge a new path; break down old barriers? Have you, a friend, a neighbor, or even someone you don't like, struggled for years to achieve a dream that a few people control the outcome of, and they tell you that you can't do it? If 99¢ was a step toward changing all that, would you spend it? One artist, who has spent her life trying to break down stereotypes and rules (of what a "model" is, of what it is to be Asian-American, of what kind of artist you have to be to get a record label to sign you), is taking a massive step towards a new idea and fighting back hard against the traditional means to build a music career.

Tila Tequila turned down two record deals, believing that having absolute control over the kind of music she released and how she was portrayed was more important than being part of the system. She's done it all on her own up to this point, so why not continue? Tila has recorded music, picked a single, shot a video, and is set to release everything WITHOUT the help of a label. She is convinced that she knows what her fans want, not some corporate A&R guy at that multibillion dollar company, watching their bottom line. It's about music. And freedom.

Whether you are a fan of Tila's or not, you are someone or know someone who needs this change to happen. For artists to be able to own and control their own rights, and not rely on one of THREE major corporations. To decide that you are good enough! This is the beginning of a new digital revolution...the artist's active participation in Web 2.0. Don't be left behind...

I swear I heard tires screeching to a halt in my head when I read this. I was left staring at my computer screen in silence, hoping to Christ that it was one of those pranks where a scary face pops up and a loud scream booms out of my speakers, shaking me out of my trance. Something was fishy. I mean, why would Tila Tequila, an artist with a record deal, painstakingly go through the labor and expense of pumping a single from an upcoming album on her own? Why would she denounce the evils of the music industry at the same time that she was working in tandem with it?

For the sake of understanding my thought process, let's talk about the most accepted definition of Web 2.0. Taken from Wikipedia:

A social phenomenon embracing an approach to generating and distributing Web content itself, characterized by open communication, decentralization of authority, freedom to share and re-use, and "the market as a conversation"

In a nutshell, the phrase "Web 2.0" refers to what seems to be a second generation of networking offerings on the internet. Shit like Myspace, Flikr and Wikipedia all fall under this new category of communicatory services now available on the web. The relevant implication of Web 2.0 here is that an artist - whether she is a writer, film maker, musician, etc. - can now bypass traditional industry authorities (literary agents, production companies and distribution conglomerates) and publish her work on her own. Web 2.0 allows people with amazing talent to easily share that talent with the world. Conversely, it allows hopelessly talentless people to knife rape your fragile little eyes, ears and brains into paste, making it almost impossible to navigate the sea of suck that Web 2.0 has inevitably become.

Something inside of me screamed conspiracy when I was through reading that blog entry on Tila's profile, so I did a little more digging. I kept thinking to myself, if she had a sure thing with a record deal, why was she taking the monstrous risk of releasing a single independently? Sure, the concept of the "do it yourself" Web 2.0 movement is fascinating and liberating, but if somebody already has success going through conventional channels, why wouldn't they go that route?

A day later, I revisited Tila's Wikipedia page to find that the sentence "In an interview with the TRL VJs, Will.i.am announced that Nguyen was signed to the Will.i.am Music Group, a record label under A&M Records" had been edited to say that Will.i.am falsely announced a record deal with his label. Wait, what? Why would someone like Will.i.am, whose label has a legitimate stable of artists like Macy Gray and Fergie, need to lie about signing a virtual nobody in the music industry like Tila Tequila? The argument could be made that he was misinformed about the deal, but how could the head of the fucking record label make such a ridiculous blunder like that on national television? It's just impossible. Nothing about this was making any sense.

"Me Vietnamese, me play joke - me fuck 12 guys, then snort coke."

Further digging only procured contrary statements about the deal. Countless sources across the internet have reported about Tila Tequila's "revolutionary" decision to independently release her single/album, all while touting a rebellious Web 2.0 DIY anthem. They also report about her deal with A&M/Will.i.am Music Group in the bio section of those same articles. Strangely enough, nobody is talking about why Tila, who had a record deal sitting in her lap, would throw it all away. No news clips about the deal expiring or about any kind of dissension or split with The Will.i.am Music Group. BESIDES WHAT IS ON HER WIKIPEDIA PAGE, NOBODY IS EVEN REPORTING THAT THE DEAL IS OFF.

Color me crazy, but don't you think that a record label that has produced a handful of tracks for an artist with the intention of releasing that artist's album would be pissed about that very same artist just walking away with their work with middle fingers in the air? Don't you think that the Will.i.am Music Group, A&M or even the Universal Music Group would be pumping their side of the story out to the Associated Press so that Tila's pediatric ranting on her blog wasn't the only version of the story? Why isn't this being talked about?

I ended up getting in contact with Hillary Siskand, a PR person that does work for The Will.i.am Music Group. I asked her all of those questions; was Tila ever signed to Will.i.am? If so, what happened to the deal? Tila is listed as an artist on the Universal Group's Myspace profile. Is she on Universal Music Group (the parent company of A&M/Will.i.am Music Group) as an artist? She refused to tell me anything other than the fact that Tila did not currently have a record deal with Will.i.am records. None of my other inquiries to A&M or The Universal Music Group regarding this were answered. Fishy, fishy, fishy.

Another facet of this mystery that needed to be explored was the fact that Tila is selling her single "I Love U" through iTunes. How did she manage to get a track on iTunes all by her lonesome? Regardless of her D-list celebrity status, there are very established artists that have been represented by record labels their whole careers that don't even have their entire catalogue available on iTunes. After some more exploring, I found out that comes courtesy of her deals with both INgrooves (a digital record label/distribution outfit) and Endemol, a global entertainment producer who was behind shows like Big Brother and Deal or no Deal.

This in itself shatters the previous notion that Tila was doing this without any backing from a label. On February 27th, it was reported that she was being managed by Strategic Artist Management and had recently signed on with the industry-giant United Talent Agency for all areas of representation. The more research I did, the more names and companies I realized were attached to Tila's "Web 2.0 independent internet revolution", making the whole thing look more and more like a music industry wolf dressed in a DIY sheep's clothing than anything else.

There are too many questions that have been left unanswered. Neither the Will.i.am Music Group, A&M nor the Universal Music Group have Tila Tequila listed as a signed artist on their respective web pages, but why is she on the front of Universal Music Group's Myspace artist page? Is it because there really never was a deal, or is it because there still is a deal and they are trying to leverage her internet credibility for sales they probably wouldn't get through mainstream channels? Could it be that Tila Tequila and her record label are using her unwitting Myspace fan base as a test market for her music, just to make sure that it is marketable before the release of a full length album? Could it be, when she has successfully scammed her flock of sheep into downloading enough singles and proven that she stuck it to the man, that she will stick her flag on the mountain peak and claim to her naïve fans that they were the reason that the music world was rocked into submission?! WHAT THE FUCK?!?

Any way you slice it, something isn't right about what's going on here, and the questions aren't going to be answered until more people start recognizing the inconsistencies in Tila Tequila's "revolution" and start digging for the truth behind the Web 2.0 propaganda. But who cares? Her music sucks more cock than...well, her. And she looks like a bug.

Posted by KungFu Mike at 4:47 PM