Icon #39 - Selena: The Queen Of Tejano

0:02 Hello the internet and welcome to this spin-off episode of instead of looking at the zeitgeist through current events on monday mornings we look at the zeitgeist through the powerful pop cultural deities that are our icons uh especially a deity today. I'm Jack O'Brien, one of the founders of Cracked, and this week we're talking about an icon who is the embodiment of you smoke too tough, your swag too different, your bitch is too bad, they'll kill you in many ways.

0:38 It was just like too awesome. For reality, when she was alive, they were considered they were calling her the next Janet Jackson, even though at the time of her death, at the age of 23, she was drawing crowds bigger than the largest crowd that Janet Jackson ever drew. We sometimes talk about what might have been today's episode is about what would have been. she would have headlined the Super Bowl. She would have kicked off the Latin music era like decades earlier. Today's episode is about Selena, but it's also about the absence of Selena, the phosphorescent Selena-shaped hole that was left in popular culture when she died.

1:18 I'm thrilled to be joined, as always, by my co-host. When I first started wearing bustiers on the show, he said... It's a bra with little sprinkly things on it. Boosty caca de la menta.

1:29 Boosty caca de la menta.

1:30 It's Miles Graham! Thank you so much.

1:35 I was just watching the Selena movie a little bit. Just reminding myself. And God, I just remembered how much I was fucking in love with Selena. Like, not the J-Lo version. Like, actual Selena.

1:49 Actual Selena.

1:50 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because it's been one of those things that just growing up in L.A., Selena is just ambiently part of like culture here in Los Angeles. But like you, if you're, I, I like, I'm always like, yeah, Selena, I'm up on the songs and things like that. But I dove back in right in preparation for this. And I just like, everything just started hitting me of like how much this dominated my mind from like that 19, like third to fifth grade era for me. Oh yeah.

2:15 Yeah.

2:15 Not me, by the way. I'm saying, oh, yeah. And I definitely was not hitting in Dayton, Ohio the same way it was in Los Angeles. But we are thrilled to be joined in our third seat by a talented writer, host, actress, improviser. You know her from Dropouts, Dimension 20, DC Comics, HBO, Disney, all the places. Her charisma is such that when J-Lo played her in a movie, she decided to change the entire trajectory of her career. It's Danny Fernandez!

2:45 Oh, my gosh. Yeah, it's kind of crazy.

2:47 Miles, I grew up here and I grew up in Texas.

2:50 My family is from both.

2:52 So it was she is our baby. I just always refer to her as our baby.

2:58 Oh, because she, yeah, she didn't.

3:00 Yeah.

3:00 Queen.

3:00 But she, you know, she didn't fully get to grow up, but I just feel like she's, Oh, literally I put.

3:05 On the documentary.

3:06 I waited to watch the documentary that they have on Netflix. I knew I was going to cry one minute. It literally like 46 seconds. And I started weeping. And then I, I cried repeatedly throughout the documentary and that's okay.

3:19 You know, it's crazy. She has such a visceral reaction still. Yeah.

3:25 I felt the exact same way like i when i i also watched the selena los dinos uh yeah and i like there were so many times i was like selena also the effect on her family and how much like i really began to appreciate like how much like this was all like there was this family effort to like support and you know all do this thing together like how important that was to her and yeah, it just adds like another, it's just like, sort of feels like a bygone sort of sentiment that we see with like pop stars in any way where it's like, yeah, they.

3:58 Were trying to create the, you know, Latin Jackson five, I think they say in the documentary and with, with all the problematic parts of that, like the dad was not Joe Jackson, but like there are parts where there are interviews where she's like, Uh, yeah, my dad heard me singing and, uh, I saw dollar signs in his eyes.

4:21 She's like laughing, but then, you know, um, I mean, she was supporting the family from like age 11, I think.

4:28 Yeah.

4:29 Anyways, that JLo fact blew my mind that JLo didn't have plans to be a recording artist. Until she played Selena and like did, so they got, they put together these massive crowds for the Selena biopic. Um, and JLo in like just inhabiting Selena was like, I need to do that. Like that's, that's my shit. And like kind of stepped into that because I was like, I hadn't really realized, but this pop cultural thing by that, by the white media was called the Latin invasion in the late 90s.

5:06 They're still saying that.

5:08 Donald Trump is saying that.

5:10 The musical caravan.

5:13 But that was like her album on the six was like one of the big parts of that. I think that it went to number one.

5:23 Without Selena, we would not have J-Lo.

5:26 I'll just say that because J-Lo gets a lot of hate for a lot of different reasons. Her acting, if that movie came out today, would win an Academy Award. I really think if Selena came out today, it still holds up.

5:41 She's great.

5:42 It's insane that it's like her first film and one of her best ever.

5:46 That's crazy to me that her performance in that and her performance in out of sight are like two of her best performance. And they're very early on. She's just like naturally so fucking good. Um, but yeah, she did. She did. She did.

6:02 Selena Anaconda out of sight, I think was 97.

6:05 I mean, God damn. What a run. Yeah.

6:09 I do think them, because the Selena movie came out in what, 95?

6:12 97.

6:13 I do know it was, was it 97? Yeah.

6:17 Okay.

6:17 I did think it was a little, I know that they were rushing to do the film. So someone else didn't do it. So they had, you know, say her family had say, but it was like crazy how quickly they did the film. Like there's so much trauma there to then be like, I got to rush. Like this icon and also my, my daughter and the love of my life just died. And now I have to rush and make sure I do this movie before anyone else does, because they're going to do it with, they were going to make the film with or without them. And so that's why they were like, we need to rush and make sure that we're a part of it. And that the story is how, how we, you know, what we want to say, but it was very soon after her death.

6:57 Yeah.

6:58 They, I mean like the film came out within two years of her passing away.

7:02 That's, that's wild. And yeah, they discovered like that. I think they cast, they, they cast a super wide net to see like who would play her. Salma Hayek was considered, and they discovered J-Lo. She was a fly girl at the time.

7:18 She was in that movie Jack, though, with Robin Williams.

7:22 I'm going to keep this speech short, like my life. That is a laugh line from the movie Jack.

7:31 I don't know.

7:31 Jack, speaking of the wide net that they cast, I don't know if you've ever seen the girl that was the runner-up.

7:37 No, does she look exactly like her?

7:39 Literally, literally exactly like her.

7:42 Those are the two directions you can go. You can either get someone who looks exactly like the person or you can get someone who kind of looks like the person and is a good actor. And I think they went with the latter and very wisely so. But I do think, like, reading this article in 1999 about the Latin invasion, they're like, Ricky Martin, Santana. Jennifer Lopez, Enrique Iglesias, and the Buena Vista Social Club. It's in a Iowa State student newspaper. They also have a paragraph that says, the hip motion is very particular of any Latin dance, Castillo.

8:24 So they're like describing how people dance to Latin music. It has an element of sensuality to it and communication. When people that really know each other dance, you can see there is a lot of give and take between the dancers and a lot of nonverbal communication. It's like they're describing dancing for the first time. Yeah.

8:43 Well, I love like the scientific white gay song dancing. Like it's communicating something with its sensuality.

8:51 But that was going to be, Selena was going to free the footloose town of America from its, you know, lock-legged, sexually repressed.

9:00 Yeah.

9:02 Um, there are these parts of her story where like it's, you know, she's rising and like, you're starting to see the power of her draw and like people's obsession with her. Um, like it's like the moment where you like see the T-Rex making the water ripple before you see the T-Rex, you're just like seeing the evidence of like how much people are obsessed with her. Um, there's this one part where Coke puts out a series of like Selena branded uh, eight ounce Coke bottles. And like, it's like they put the case down on the floor, turn around and they're back.

9:38 And like, they've all been bought. Like it's like immediately, everything just sells out immediately. And there's like multiple examples of that. And instead of being like, guys, these Selena Coke bottles are selling faster than any product since cocaine. She might be like a generational pop diva. They're like, I guess we should do another hundred coke bottles like really you know they're just like not aware of what they have quite yet although they're like starting to get it uh by the end but yeah it's wild like she really was going to be fucking massive.

10:14 Well, and it's insane that she was that popular with, especially here in America, that her albums up to that point had only been in Spanish.

10:21 Spanish. Yeah.

10:22 Yeah.

10:23 I didn't know she was an English, like native English speaker. Like I didn't know. Yeah. She has some parts where she's like, uh, as she's recording her English language, like crossover album, she's like, they're going to wonder how I learned English so fast.

10:38 She's the original no Savo. She's the original no Savo kid.

10:43 Um, And I love that.

10:44 I mean, like in the film, obviously, there's a famous, very memed line about like how she they're not Mexican enough for the Mexicans, not American enough for Americans. And being Chicana, like that's just our she is our patron saint.

10:59 Yeah.

11:00 Yeah.

11:01 She that's like our life is living.

11:03 But she used that as her superpower. That's like the thing is that like she everyone kept saying she wasn't enough. And then she was like, oh, actually, I can be the bridge between these two cultures and everyone in America is going to love me. Everyone in Latin America is going.

11:16 To love me.

11:17 And then she just, you know, catapulted herself.

11:20 But I think any other star, I mean, when you see her, she has such a big light. Any other star would maybe have crumbled from that level at her age, from that level of critique. And she kind of just, she was giggling every time that she didn't know her Spanish words. Like she just leaned into it and it made people love her instead of.

11:38 She would enter a press conference. It was like crowded with like photographers and like journalists and like hug every single person. She was just, everyone was like, man, she, she knew my name. I met her like three years ago and she like knew my name and like walked up to me directly and like asked me how I was and like remembered everything that I had told her.

11:58 She just had that like crazy charisma that, yeah, I, I put her in the category of like, you know, people whose star was too powerful for, mortal people to deal with, you know, like the, I think that is one of the weirdest effects that comes from the, you know, what we cover in this show, which is just like the iconography and like people being like, it's like a religious light that like melts the barrier between like human and immortal and causes mortal people to just like snap sometimes. Like, uh, you know, I, I, JFK and a lot of John Lennon, I think, is probably the most famous example other than her um but like i'd also put jesus did jesus couldn't deal with jesus swag jesus sweat smoke was too

12:56 tough on our altar.

12:57 Right but didn't look as good in a bustier.

12:59 Not quite as good by the way we do have to shout out you you are wearing selena you are uh wearing selena bustier i'm trying.

13:08 To realize you're the bustier oh.

13:10 100 i have multiple cap.

13:12 Okay, listen, before the pandemic, like the year before the pandemic, that Halloween, because you know how people have Halloween parties like on a Saturday and a Sunday and like you're going to like three different, four different. I was a different Selena look every day.

13:25 Wow.

13:26 I got to repost it on my Instagram, but I was like her Houston Astrodome look.

13:31 I was her Komala floor look. I was this look like.

13:34 Is Astrodome the purple one?

13:35 Yes. Oh, shit.

13:38 Yeah, I remember all of them.

13:40 Oh yeah.

13:41 That's so miles. You're a fan.

13:42 I was like, I'm going to be Selena every day.

13:45 I was just thinking though, Selena, man, like I, that was like one of the first like women I fell in love with because of their smile.

13:52 You know what I mean?

13:54 Like somehow like a person's smile can communicate just so much. Uh, like there's just something, something so genuine about it that I remember being awestruck as a kid from seeing her like big smile, uh, And, like, there's just, like, there's so many of these interesting, like, intangible qualities about her that, like, you know, add up to create somebody who's essentially, you know, a fucking god among mortals. And, yeah, it's funny. As I was watching that documentary and, like, you first, like, there's, like, the first time you see her, like, her face kind of light up. that was one of those moments where I just kind of flashed back and I was like, Oh my God, that's the smile. This is like, this

14:30 is one of the first times I could like, just be like, man, a smile. It can be like so beautiful to me.

14:35 That was your like Ratatouille food critic moment where you're just like going back to your childhood. Like I remember that this stirred something inside me. Yeah. Yeah.

14:45 Yeah.

14:45 I was trying to think if there were other, you know, we were talking about people that we lost early, but like if there were other celebrities who were unproblematic and be loved by everyone the way that she was. And I guess the one that came into my head was Dolly Parton, which I know y'all did another episode of.

15:02 It's very hard to.

15:04 I mean, granted she only lived to be in her twenties, but like she was beloved. There was no, no one has anything bad to say about her. And so I was thinking if there were other celebrities that were like that, that were as beloved.

15:18 I'm sure they're hard to think of on the spot, but everyone I think of, I go, well, um, no, um, but there's right.

15:23 Right, right.

15:23 Oh no.

15:24 They tweeted that one thing.

15:25 Oh no.

15:26 Actually they dated that abuser. Nevermind.

15:29 Biggie maybe like has a little bit of that where he's just like beloved and like all the details you find out, like even like what he had on him when he was killed was, uh, like cool and made him just seem great. I don't know.

15:42 Um, Yeah.

15:43 But it's, it's interesting because like his muse, like it's hard to get to draw that kind of audience, like with just straight up like golden era, New York hip hop that he was, you know what I mean? Cause like Selena also, because I think every group in America, they'll have their star that like goes, Oh.

16:00 Shit, that's us right there.

16:02 Yeah. You know what I mean? And black people had that with Michael Jackson or rap, like it just, and Whitney Houston, many examples of, But then like with Selena, that was one for especially everyone who's living in America to suddenly go. That's why I really felt it in L.A. because also being biracial and other kids who are like Chicano and stuff like you kind of get like you're like, you know, they're getting teased for the way they spoke Spanish or whatever. You get teased for the way I'm you know, I'm not black enough or my Japanese isn't good enough. So I saw a lot of overlapping themes.

16:31 But when that moment happened, it just energized every kid who was like Latino to be like, like going like, look, it's us.

16:38 Yeah.

16:38 This is the fuck. And she is the most fucking spectacular artist and nobody can deny it. It's a huge thing.

16:44 I will just say she, so she, uh, we lost Selena in 95, Tupac 96, Biggie in 97. That's three straight years of just losing generational talents who were about to like define the next decade of popular culture. So like, When people are like, what the fuck? Like, what was Woodstock 99? Or like, why did pop culture suck shit in the early 2000s? You can't ignore the fact that we lost like three of our strongest soldiers of all time in their prime who were about to just fucking dominate. Like, they were going to be.

17:24 Well, and also change, like, you know, like, I don't know how much of the bling bling era we get if Tupac's still alive.

17:30 No, I don't think, yeah, exactly. Like, I think a lot of the stuff that sucks would not have, you know.

17:36 Right, his messaging was getting more radical, like, or just more thinking of, like, is rap bigger than me just, like, making songs? But yeah, and I see that, too, with, like, Selena knowing, like, I can't, it's even hard for me to think of where that thing stopped, like, that whole empire thing.

17:51 I completely agree with what you said early on, Jack, that when I was watching Bad Bunny, I was like, oh, my God, the way that we would we would have had a Selena.

17:58 Super Bowl like decades ago.

18:01 Oh, my God. She would have.

18:03 She would have crushed it.

18:05 Looking even like I'll just randomly be on my Peloton and I'll just put on her Houston Astrodome concert. And that like just gets me going through the whole thing. But like the way and she did that at what, 22, 23. So thinking like a decade or so after that, her being asked to be at the Super Bowl.

18:23 She would have crushed it.

18:26 She would have crushed it.

18:27 Yeah.

18:28 That shit was so Texas. I didn't realize how Texas that shit was. The Astrodome concert. Like I knew that it was this iconic show. And then you watch the biopic or the documentaries and like she's riding like behind a carriage.

18:43 Yeah.

18:43 She's riding a carriage of horses out to like the concert is being performed like in the middle of a rodeo, like dirt. you know, the stage. I don't know what the fuck you call it. Rodeo. The bottom part of a rodeo. Yeah. The dirt pit.

18:58 I do.

18:59 I was trying to think of, and then we can get into more like bio stuff from our researcher, but I was trying to think of like a bigger celebrity, what would have been. And the only example that came to mind is Bruce Lee. Like it's right at the precipice, like right as shit was taking off. And like, you know, the very beginning of the breakthrough and then they're lost.

19:26 And like with both of them, you have like Bruce Lee, I didn't realize was the same age as Chuck Norris. And so like Chuck Norris just pops in and like has the exact career that Bruce Lee would have, except like way shittier, you know? And like, I feel like that's so true of just, you know, a lot of pop artists that came after Selena, you know?

19:47 I mean, so many, like a lot of that, 27 club, group too there's like a few people like you wonder about like I certainly think about like Amy Winehouse a.

19:56 Lot I was about to say Amy Winehouse.

19:59 Or you know Hendrix or whatever but like there's definitely yeah there's a few that what's interesting though is like you they were taken away by their own sort of vices.

20:09 Exactly that might are gonna go on like Selena and Bruce Lee were both like he's like very focused.

20:16 Right and it was like external factors that ended up being the thing that They took them out, but yeah. You know what?

20:22 Actually, someone we've forgotten is Aaliyah.

20:24 Aaliyah is also a great example. We also lost like right 2001.

20:29 2001, right before 9-11.

20:31 Yeah. Yeah.

20:33 I mean, banger, banger after banger like that to know the music that she would also be performing at the Super Bowl.

20:40 We would have had an Aaliyah Super Bowl 100%.

20:41 Yeah, for sure.

20:44 Um, all right, let's take a quick break. We'll come back. We'll get into the, the bio and, the story of Selena. And we're back.

21:04 Hmm.

21:04 I kept here in my head. I kept hearing Selena, Selena, instead of Shakira, Shakira in my head the whole time. I was like thinking about what might've been. I was like, I feel like it would have been her hips. Don't lying to us.

21:18 I'm curious the people she would have brought out at her Superbowl.

21:21 For sure. Yeah.

21:23 Yeah.

21:23 All right. Uh, so she is born to Abraham Quintanilla, Jr. Um, born and raised in, uh, South Texas, uh, they thought they were having a boy and, uh, planned to name him Mark Anthony, which is some weird JLo kismet. Um, and they got the name Selena from the woman in the next bed over who like had the same exact reverse thing. I guess like back then they would just be like, yeah, it looks, I don't know. It looks like a boy or something. They were just like guests. And, and that's what they would tell you.

21:56 During the twins. Sometimes he'd be like, here comes the next one.

21:59 And they're like, do what? Um, But yeah, she thought she was going to have a boy. And so, or thought she was going to have a girl and had the name Selene on lock. So they stole that because she told them that it meant moon goddess. Do you think they traded?

22:16 Like she was like, shit, I had a name for a girl. And they're like, shit, they had a name for a boy.

22:20 I don't know. I don't know if there's a Mark Anthony walking around out there.

22:23 Maybe it was the Mark Anthony.

22:27 It was him.

22:28 Yeah.

22:28 There's stories from a childhood friend named Meredith Lynn Capple. remembered, we used to love to ask her to sing songs. It gave you chill bumps how powerful her voice was. And this was in third and fourth grade. She'd do it during recess. And when we walked home from school, any top 40 song she could sing, she didn't just sing it. She really got into it. This is something we saw with Bjork and our Bjork iconograph where She would her classmates would be like, Bjork, could you hum for us on the school bus? And like, instead of being like a loud, like, yeah, instead of being like a loud, you know, everybody throwing spitballs and shit, everyone would just go silent as Bjork hummed for them. Um, it's,

23:16 it's just so funny. Like at third and fourth grade, people just using you as a human jukebox is wild. I feel like that's a good indication that you might have it. People are generally kind of bad at judging whether they're good singers or not judging from a American idol. Uh, this would be a good symptom that you might be, you might be a good singer.

23:37 You're 10 years old and giving your classmates goosebumps.

23:40 Yeah.

23:42 It's like kids having an experience you probably don't have until you're older, like being touched by art or something like that.

23:49 Hey, dude, shut the fuck up.

23:50 Selena's singing Wilson Phillips.

23:53 It's wild because she was, like, naturally good at singing, too. So it's almost like a parrot listening. Because, like, how do you without singing? I mean, she eventually did. Like, her dad obviously was pushing them to, like, have lessons and stuff.

24:04 But just off the rip?

24:05 Yes. Off the rip, they said she was a perfect mimic. Like, she could do anything. She could do, like, Edith Piaf or, you know, like, make herself sound like an old recording. She had an uncanny talent that, like, people didn't really... realize so uh they started out they wanted to sing american songs they they liked like the eagles and she was really into donna summer air supply taste of honey um and her dad.

24:33 I will survive right i feel like i've seen.

24:35 Her sing yeah she actually opened the astrodome yeah with like covers of a couple uh donna summer songs um but Yeah. And then he was like, no, we are going to be, we're going to play Tejano music. And at the time she was like, get fucked. But she, in retrospect, was like that, that was smart. That was smart.

24:57 But I totally, yeah, this threw me off as a kid. I did. I, uh, you know, you listened to her interviewed and she has a Texas twang.

25:05 Like, yeah, she does.

25:06 Yeah. There's one interview where she says DAC Quattro instead of Couture say for 14, which is like saying two teen instead of 12, you know?

25:15 Oh yeah.

25:15 Yeah.

25:16 But I just feel like if that were today, cause, um, you know, it reminds me of the, uh, me gente Latino, you know, like the JLo, uh, meme. Like I, that's what I mean is like her Spanish was at time. She obviously, like when you watch the documentary, it got way better.

25:32 So fast. Yeah.

25:34 So fast.

25:34 Yeah. And I want to see her singing was immaculate. Her Spanish singing was immaculate. Like, so, um, but that's what I mean.

25:42 Like, I just feel people still loved her.

25:44 Like they thought it was endearing as opposed to like, I'm going to make a meme and like, uh, punch down at you, you know?

25:51 Yeah. No one has ever made me realize how much better the word Corazon is than heart. Then her, her singing, she, she fucking feasts on the word, uh, Corazon. This is, I will just say, so Tejano Music has like a polka bass, you know, and this is the second time we have a polka infused artist breaking through with also Weird Al. I'm like... mainstream secretly yearning for polka and it was like no it's too corny too corny we can't do it but it like everybody secretly fucking loves it.

26:25 Yeah it's just it's got a universal appeal to it you know what i mean like that rhythm just it's yeah i'm i'm not surprised by it but.

26:33 Like i understand like as a preteen or teenager that like none of your classmates are listening to this. Like, I understand why she was like, why are we doing this music? I, meanwhile, she's like buying Michael Jackson tapes, you know?

26:46 Yeah.

26:47 Yeah.

26:48 And in retrospect, everyone's like, well, and look like. she eventually broke through, but she was also like generationally talented. Like if he had been just been like, I don't know, maybe sing some pop songs out there. Like maybe they would, she would have been discovered sooner. Hard to say. I do also that there's a scene in the biopic, uh, the, the scene where they, uh, they're at a concert and the crowd is like surging forward and like, uh, the stage is buckling and he comes out. her dad comes out and is like, get back there and starts like yelling at them and then comes back and is like, can you go out there and quiet them? Like to Selena, um, that scene, like in Chris, in her husband's, uh, memoir, he,

27:35 his version of it is that her dad was like, stay back there. Don't come out. And she like shook him off and like bravely went out and like calm to the crowd. Um, because she just like knew that otherwise it was going to be a disaster. So like, there are weird ways that I feel like the version that we got in the biopic is the dad's version of things more than anything. Like why would you in a movie called Selena about, about this like living Saint, why would you change the story to be that you had to convince her to go out and like calm the crowd instead of the truth, which is that she was like, you know, the only thing they're going to, yeah, your daughter's magical. Why not just like, let that be

28:18 the story.

28:19 I mean, I got that feeling just with the band being a continuation of his own band.

28:24 That is one thing he's like weirdly not kind of, he is completely open. He's like, and then I saw the ability for my children to carry forward my own musical aspirations. He's like, yeah, that's weird. And he's like, yeah, well, worked. It worked. We're here now, aren't we?

28:42 Jack, I think every version that you've seen of her has been her dad's.

28:46 Yeah, I think that's right.

28:48 Because the series was also.

28:50 The Netflix. Yeah, they did a Netflix series that was basically like the monkeys. Like it was like a. Yeah, it was.

28:57 It's, it's, it's, yeah, it's very much her, you know, there is a level of machismo and she clearly pushed against it too, I want to say, but she butt heads with her dad.

29:08 But yes, it's there.

29:10 It seemed like just what he wanted, which our community has talked about quite a bit.

29:16 Yeah.

29:17 Yeah.

29:17 So I think that's, yeah, that, that is the sense that you get. So he, to that point at age six, He's like, you have a gift. We're sharing it with the world. They start performing at clubs, weddings, birthdays, any party they can get in front of. Selena, again, six years old, is so worn out that she... slept behind the speakers between sets, which is wild. And she was naturally very shy. That's one thing that she didn't have naturally.

29:51 We cover some icons. We covered Oprah last week. And Oprah, as a child... was like her, her family would just go drive her to churches to speak in front of people. Like she just, she needed an audience in some way. Whereas Selena was like, yeah, I don't, I don't like it. I don't like, I don't want to be out here. Beyonce, apparently the same way, like it was unnatural to them and they had to, um, you know, uh, Selena would say like, I, what, what you see, this is a direct quote, what I do on stage, you won't catch me doing off stage deep down. I'm still kind of timid, timid and modest on stage. I let go. It's like just the music allows her to let go.

30:37 Yeah.

30:37 Her husband also said that, that like, obviously she comes across as this huge powerhouse and yet she's like very vulnerable. And that's the side obviously that he got to know. But I think it's just like, yeah, she, you know, when we think of her and again, she's been elevated to like sainthood and, So it's almost like she's seen as a supernatural is, is what I mean. And what you're saying is like, no, she also had, you know, her vulnerabilities, her shyness, which.

31:04 Is kind of even like all the more amazing. Like I went and I think it's interesting to like figure out why these people are, um, why certain people become these, like, you know, not just famous, but like fucking iconic and like kind of blur the line. Like people are, unable to differentiate between them and gods kind of in a in a real sense and like one of the things she did have is she only needed like three to four hours of sleep a night which is something we see a lot of the time with icons is like they just uh a lot of them have that benefit of like needing less sleep but i think it's relatively rare for people on that level to not naturally like being in front of crowds so like that that's almost

31:47 more impressive you know like i went and you know, did some half-assed internet research of like famous iconic people who were like, had stage fright. And, you know, it's uncommon enough that the list includes Eleanor Roosevelt and Moses. Moses? Yeah, Moses. Moses actually didn't like being on stage.

32:09 Well, I think, I mean, isn't that the worst kind of person is the person that wants to be famous? I feel like that's probably what makes her endearing. Like she was very humbling. Like she didn't have a chip on her shoulder. She wasn't egotistical. And so that's probably why everyone has a good story about her as opposed to like other artists that are seen as like divas, but in.

32:28 A bad way.

32:28 Yeah. And like, I don't necessarily think it's a bad, like always a bad thing. Like some people are just more comfortable in front of a crowd than like others. I meant the, the, the.

32:38 The artists that are seen as out of touch or.

32:41 Yeah, totally. They move around Texas a bunch of times because her dad like has a steady job at Dow chemical. And like, once the band starts, he's like, I'm quitting that. We're opening a restaurant where the kids will sing to people. And like, it just, fucking eats shit immediately. Uh, the, the oil market, like it was when oil, uh, took a shit and yeah. So that closed down, they ended up in Corpus Christi, uh, body of Christ, a wild name for your town. Um, but, uh, but they pointed out that like, this was after kind of a bumpy start to their career. Corpus Christi was the perfect place because it had a much larger, uh, kind of Latino audience to pull from. This is a detail that's just like,

33:33 they were like the junkyard gang coming up. They traveled around in a 1964 bus with no AC or heat. So when it was cold, the kids slept near the motor to stay warm. They saved money by making lights out of regular bulbs, plastic film, and peach or coffee cans. Wow. That's funny. That's ingenuity. This is something that, uh, came up in the Madonna episode, but you know, this, this has had, they're coming up in the eighties and everyone is like, uh, sorry, men are singers, not women. Like the, in the Madonna episode, I was blown away that she was the first woman to headline an arena tour. It's just like in the eighties. Like, I just never thought of music, especially because, you know, pop music is so

34:25 dominated by women singers now. Like, I never thought of, like, music as being, like, as sexist as doctors, you know, where people are just like, a girl can't sing a pretty song. That's a man's job. Right. Yeah.

34:39 Toxic masculinity.

34:41 Also, singing feels like innately... feminine i know but they were tejano music especially but like well not just tejano music like everyone like in that people were just like this is a boy thing our boys sing.

34:56 I feel like yeah that was like always like the crooner era and stuff like hey i'm a fucking drunk with a microphone yeah oh i love music and it's like wait what about this Young lady with a beautiful voice. I don't know about this. It should be a drunk ass.

35:13 Makes me intimidated.

35:14 Yeah, tell me how he won't let me go home in the snow after a Christmas party.

35:18 I want to feel violated.

35:22 I want my personal safety. yeah jesus not inspired.

35:27 So but this is how they come up you know they're touring like very small venues and then like just slowly slowly build up um they're dropping albums like crazy um they're but like their first big album was released when selena was 13 um that was not big like it was an independent studio still but it's like the one that um You know, it was called Selena y Los Dinos and later reissued as Mis Primeras Grabaciones, which is like my first recordings. But that's like kind of the start of their recording career. But like they really put out albums quickly. And so you kind of get a similar optical illusion with Tupac where it's like, oh, this person died when? How do they have so many songs, so many good songs, so many recordings?

36:14 I mean, that's kind of like the benefit, I feel like, from starting out so young. I mean, not really. Not great for you as a person to be working so young. Your mastery of an art form, the amount of reps they got in. It's like, you know, they always say about the Beatles playing in Germany and stuff.

36:30 Yeah, she got her reps.

36:32 She already had the reps in to fucking command the stage.

36:35 The Beatles don't have shit on Selena, you lostinos. No, no, no.

36:40 The one thing I want to add, though, is In that band, the earliest, the Dinos band, the rap producer, Mike Dean. Do you know who Mike, you heard of Mike Dean? He does like all, like did a lot of the Kanye West albums. He's done Beyonce albums, Travis Scott, like Sicko Mode. Frank Ocean.

36:58 Really?

36:58 He was one of the keyboard players for Selena when he was super young. Yes, dude. I was going in on the Dinos band and I saw Mike Dean's name on the list. I go, what the fuck? Because he was from Texas and he first got his keyboard from the same music shop where AB got a PA system for Selena to use for a tour. And the guy who owned the store was like, yo, dude, you should go play for this guy, AB. Him and his sister, they do gigs and you could probably fit in. And then he, then Mike Davis, Selena's brother who, yeah.

37:29 Yeah. Um, who produced all the music.

37:33 Yeah, and so him and A.B. got along, but her dad apparently didn't like him because he was getting too trippy on the fucking keyboards.

37:40 And he was also like, what is this?

37:42 Yeah, he was like, Selena could be playing some pop shit. And he's like, no, we're only doing this other stuff. He's like, I'm off this shit and just left. But yeah, it's really interesting to see that those two careers even intersected in the 80s.

37:53 I was just thinking about Frank Ocean because Future of Free is the last song on Blonde and it's one that I didn't listen to him. The album first came out that much because it's like, I don't know. There's too many good songs to get through to get to that one. But now I think it is like my favorite song on the album. And it ends with him saying like, people are accusing him of like changing. They want to murder me, murder me like Selena. And it's like kind of, he also talks about Tupac in it.

38:22 And I think it's, interesting that he was like having those thoughts about fame, like, and you know, how dangerous and powerful fame can be at that point and has like kind of become our like JD Salinger, you know, like somebody who just stepped away from doing the thing everybody wanted from him because I'm sure at least partially he was uncomfortable with it. And I do think that's also like the JD, the catcher in the rye thing and like how that ties into, uh, John Lennon and the assassin. Anyway, I have tons of thoughts on, on that and like how they're trying, trying to like freeze these celebrities at this peak moment of like wanting how they want to remember them.

39:09 Um, but yeah, I thought you might actually freeze them. And I'm like, okay, we're on some Walt Disney shit.

39:15 I was just like, kill them so that they don't, continue to change or do things that like, you know, don't fit with their.

39:23 Yeah. Revolutionary.

39:25 Yeah. And and don't like evolve because this is like their God, you know, and they don't, they don't, can't deal with that shit.

39:32 I just love that Frank Ocean's disappeared. And like the only time you see him like random TikToks and someone's like, I saw a guy, there's this dude walking around Tokyo and he goes, Frank Ocean. And like, he just turned around and was just did like a very subtle nod. And I was just like, he's, he lives.

39:48 He's out there. The Frank Ocean subreddit is like, He's alive because he posted on Instagram like three days ago. Fuck that. Yeah. Anyways, let's take a quick break. We'll come back. We'll talk about once the big deals start coming in. We'll be right back. And we're back. So yeah, touring works. They're playing bigger and bigger venues. At age 17, she gets signed to an ad deal with Coca-Cola. And you can watch these ads and it's, it's wild. First of all, they wrote the jingles for their own ads.

40:36 Coke was just like, Yeah, I don't know. Take a crack. It's like very Detroiters coded. Yeah, you can try writing the jingles, but they're very catchy. It's a world that no longer exists. But yeah, Coke executives are kind of the first ones who are like, oh, she's the next Janet Jackson. And this is like the first kind of big money that she starts to see. In 1992, Coke marketing is heading in a different direction. So they drop celebrities from ad campaigns only retaining their most successful spokespeople, uh, which are Elton John for diet Coke and Selena. Those are the only ones they kept. Everybody else got fucked. Um, and the, and then for a Sprite, this is a word about one of our sources. There's this book by Joe,

41:26 Nick Petoskey, who was like a local reporter who I think just like happened to have, good access to a lot of the sources to tell this story, but he might not be the best reporter in the world because he also is like And they also decided to keep Christopher Cross for Sprite because he read that they kept Chris Cross for Sprite and got it wrong.

41:55 Oh, my God. And Buster Rhythms. Christopher Cross. God damn.

42:01 But it is interesting. Like, on the one hand, you're like, it's weird that Coke was one of the first people to understand her amazing appeal. But like they, in America, in our world of like, you know, at that stage, early hyper capitalism, like they are the ones who have access to tracking metrics that are like, God damn, these cases of Coke just keep disappearing the second we put them out.

42:26 Also, Mexican Coke is like infamous, notorious.

42:29 Yeah, the best.

42:30 So like we are a Coke drinking community.

42:33 Yeah.

42:34 So smart of them to capitalize on that, I will say.

42:37 Yeah.

42:37 And this is like the Koch executives and the advertising executives are the ones who are like, this kid has this guy, Lionel Sosa said, this kid has this innate ability to remember everybody's name, be totally gracious, know who everybody was. I've spent all my life trying to figure out politics and who's who and who has the power.

42:56 And she instinctively knew it. Maybe she didn't know it, but she was just wonderful to everybody and whether it was the assistant at a shoot or the president of Coca-Cola. So again, like, you know, we talked about like people who were cut down in their prime because of like self-sabotage and shit like that. Like that was not going to happen with her. Like not a question of what might've been. It was a question of what was about to be.

43:19 It's also funny when like, there's someone who'd be like, man, like she's had an unbelievable skill for this thing. and parenthetical she was a decent human being who acknowledged other.

43:30 People in the room she was just nice she was just nice to everyone and didn't treat people like shit yeah.

43:35 I can't figure it out trying to fucking get in people's heads and I just I've.

43:39 Been trying to figure this shit out my whole life.

43:43 It is funny that she's like the Tom Cruise, I guess, of remembering people's names.

43:47 Because isn't that like a skill that he has?

43:49 Yeah. He shakes everyone's hand.

43:51 He shakes everyone's hand. Hand shaker.

43:53 I contact her. Hey, how are you? Great to see you. Thanks so much.

43:56 His is a product of like a weird alien space cult. And hers is just like because she's a good person. Yeah.

44:04 Like my dad, he's taken a lot of celebrity pictures like over his career. And he he's always said like Tom Cruise was like the one person that he like it. It was odd. Like, not in, like, a bad way, but he was, like, he has a– like, there was a magnetism about just merely, like, shaking his hand and him being so engaged with, like, a photo shoot that he was, like, yeah, I don't know what's going on with this dude.

44:26 Trying to convert him.

44:27 Yeah, yeah.

44:28 Trying to convert him.

44:29 Yeah, like, nah, nah.

44:30 I walked past him one time, and I– You think you would notice like, cause I just wanted to, I wanted to be like, oh shit. Like how tall is he actually? No idea how tall he is. You don't notice that at all because he just like has this like magnetism about it, about him that you're like, oh, tall. Does he really have a height? Can you say he has a height? I don't know.

44:50 He levitates when he, when he needs.

44:52 So she, uh, what, one of her big purchases after she becomes successful, she gets a red Porsche Carrera, um, and bought a go-kart. and had a headboard that was an aquarium. Um, and then just a bunch of pets, but I, I will, the aquarium headboard and like tons of pets is a bit like Michael Jackson coded, like, uh, you know, stunted child. Yeah. Stunted child, which makes perfect sense.

45:20 You know, she was part of like.

45:22 She was sleeping behind the speakers between sets at six years old.

45:27 Her dad was like, we will be the Latin Jackson five.

45:30 She was like paying her family's mortgage. She was responsible for their Christmas presents.

45:36 So that's wild.

45:38 I'm so blown away that like substance abuse isn't like a part of this story. Like in a major, like, you know what I mean? Like knowing kids who get, who end up with that kind of pressure being like, actors or whatever. And then suddenly the entire family's like, well, you know, we're all counting on you now. Right. And you're 12. Right. That breaks 99.999% of people to have to have that kind of like weight on their shoulders on some level. I mean, like not everyone, but like most people would crumble under that kind of, and it's a terrible situation to be in. but like the fact that she could do it and still maintain like this joy throughout it is like, really, I think that must be a credit to the fact that the whole operation

46:22 was like structured as her family already.

46:25 It's like all family through and through. I also think that it helps that she is like, she's got an engine, you know, she only needs three to four hours of sleep a night. Like she just has like kind of this limitless energy that is like, comes from a place of kindness. There are all these stories. Like she would like hire kids from the neighborhood to do yard work and would like make them lunch. And you know, like shit that like you don't have time to do when.

46:52 You, as a 22 year old, you know what I mean? Like what the, how much do you have your shit together?

46:58 Dropped everything to like meet fans who were like in a tough situation. Um, there's a story of her going to her first press conference and hugging everyone in the room and, And at one point, a young fan was like, oh, my God, I love your boots when she was signing a thing for her. And she just, like, took them off and gave them to her. Like, that's just where it's insane. Like, it is, like, very....

47:22 It's like, it's really one of like the most, I feel like such an underrated quality. Like when even you're, you're thinking of just our interactions, like these are the kinds of things like you're like, wow, what a touching thing. But you're just a genuinely caring, generous person.

47:36 So I don't know if we, I also don't know if we have anyone else that's like, that's her. in our community specifically. Like, I just can't think of anyone else that, you know, it's like that. It's kind of what you were saying about like having these revolutionary. She, she like in the documentary, they talked about how many kids then were embracing being Mexican American specifically. Like I was saying, like being Chicana and not seeing it as a negative anymore, like seeing it as like, a bridge between these two worlds. And so her being taken from us, it's like, we just don't quite have someone. It was like a blow, you know, that we would be even more powerful if we were allowed to keep our icons alive.

48:14 Yeah.

48:14 And grow with them, you know, and grow with them and how, how influential she would be using her platform.

48:21 Like, yeah, it's never got to see that.

48:23 Yeah. It's a, it's a huge bummer. This is also the point. So she starts opening like boutiques where, cause she was like, she designed all her, like those iconic outfits that, you know, Danny is cosplaying in. Yeah.

48:37 I also have, I have so much of her.

48:39 I have the Selena, uh, Look, I had her makeup. Yeah.

48:43 I had her eye stuff. I have so much Selena stuff. Y'all don't even know.

48:48 The makeup was like another thing where I forget which makeup company it was, but like they needed like a letter writing campaign to get them to like put this makeup line out. And then it like sold out again. Like the second it like it touched shelves, it was gone. And they're like, huh? There's also people magazine when she passed.

49:09 put out like a commemorative issue, like a Selena, full Selena issue. That they they didn't make it the only issue that month. They also had, they like did it for a small chunk of Texas people magazines and the other was like the cast of friends, I think was on the cover and it, but the Selena one sold out so quickly that they like went back for another printing, went back for another printing. And finally they were like, we're going to do a Spanish language people like that.

49:43 But like, that was the reason they ended up doing it was because of like the power of her draw. This is when Yolanda Saldivar comes into her life. Um, she's the president of her fan club. She like goes to a concert and is like blown away and reaches out and is like, can I be the president of the fan club? And then, you know, Selena is so busy.

50:09 And this is like, it's the one time that I've been like, man, I wish... I don't usually root for like asshole agents and managers, but I'm like, man, like that's what we needed here. We needed like... We needed UTA to sign her like three years before she died. Like some hard-ass manager who like came through her life and was like, you know, like she was probably like too nice for her own good. Like the Yolanda people were like, we were nice to Yolanda because Selena was so nice to Yolanda. Like if you said a bad word about anyone, Selena would compliment them. And so like, Selena had this like incredible, you know, kindness and energy about her towards everybody. And like, you need like, that's

50:58 something you see in Hollywood is like the people who are, who are actually nice. Like their managers have to be like complete monsters.

51:08 But she was exactly, but she was also so young that like, she wasn't in Hollywood long enough to be jaded to know that people would fuck you over. Like she just, she hadn't experienced that yet. If she had lived several decades after that, she would have. Not with someone murdering her, but with people trying to fuck her over, people trying to do stuff with her money.

51:30 She just was so young at that time. She was naively believing in the best in everyone.

51:36 Right. Also, it sort of aligned with her aspirations to be selling clothing, too, because I was reading that was something that Selena felt that Yolanda specifically helped with.

51:47 Yeah. So she gave her the boutique. She oversaw the boutique.

51:51 This was also someone that started as a fan.

51:52 Yeah, she started as a fan.

51:54 She loves her fans. She always says, I would not be anywhere without them. And so if this fan is, you know, devoting her life, devoting her work to her, you know, a very loyal fan that... it just makes sense. I understand why, why in.

52:11 Some way it makes sense.

52:12 Yeah.

52:12 It was, you, you need like some, someone who is cynical in your orbit to be like, I don't know about this one. And like, she, she had, uh, actually like been in 1983, her former employer, uh, a doctor had like sued her for $ 9, 200 for theft, but like that didn't come up on their background check. Um, But, uh, so that ends up being what happens is that like, she is stealing money from the clothing stores. She's, you know, passing weird checks. She's supposed to be in charge of the fan club. And then like people who sign up for the fan club are not getting the stuff that they're supposed to be getting. Like, she's just, you know, a pathological liar. Like there's this weird part where like Selena is like, and you know, it's great. Like she's

52:59 doing a great job in the fan club. And that's really, you know, important to me because what can happen if you don't have a good fan club is like, people don't get the stuff that they're supposed to get. It's almost like Yolanda was like going out of her way to lie to her preemptively about the shit that she was actually fucking up behind the scenes is like very, I don't know, pathological.

53:21 And 100%.

53:22 Anyways. So there's a bunch of back and forth because she's like hiding documents and selena for whatever reason is the person who keeps having to like go and like deal with her that shouldn't have been the case but uh and then one one time when she like goes to her hotel to fire her uh yolanda shoots her and she's trying to run away and she's trying to run away yeah yeah.

53:47 Yeah i liked that in the documentary they didn't show her They did not show her. Um, and then, yeah, that's the, I mean, when you think, I mean, obviously we can't change history, but it's like, if she were in a different place, if she were like somebody else should have gone, not her, not the literal artist confronting someone about money.

54:07 But she had like too big a heart, you know, she was too like the, the day that she went, like got shot. I think it was that day or the day before Yolanda was like, I was actually assaulted and Selena like took her to the hospital to like look into it. And then the doctor was like, none of this shit is lining up. And that's when like Selena was like, all right, well, we need to part ways.

54:34 And that's when it, uh, it ended. But the morning was why like fans just immediately turned up to her house, um, made it into a shrine, which by the way, that that's one of the things that people said about Yolanda is like her roommate moved out because she had turned the entire house into a Selena shrine before, uh, like any of this happened, like once she started working for her.

55:00 So like, again, like she, had that religious kind of devotion to Selena. Um, and then, you know, it went haywire somewhere. I mean, she was like definitely a broken person. I don't think there is anybody I can think of in the world who is like, people are as uniformly like, no, fuck this person as Yolanda.

55:21 Like, I mean, she still makes headlines when she tried to go and get parole recently.

55:25 She's still trying to get parole. Keep her in there.

55:28 I mean, no, everyone has said you are safer in there. Trust me.

55:32 Yeah.

55:32 You should stay in there the second you get out.

55:36 Our next hearing is in 2030.

55:37 But like her dad said that like we had to move after her death. We could hardly leave the house for the first few weeks because of the crowds outside. Months afterward, there were still people standing outside the house, even in the middle of the night. I'm not talking about one or two people. I'm talking about 15 or 20 there in the streets at three o'clock in the morning.

55:57 And again, this is like when I call them deities, I'm not joking. Like that is some religious devotion. Yeah. Like if that was a cult doing that at a leader's house, it would, everybody would be like, this is, what is this? A fucking horror movie.

56:11 They're off.

56:12 It also just feels like a trauma response that she was taken. So suddenly you don't even have time to process. Like clearly, I know Chris said that her husband, it's like, you just, you, you, you know, you're processing it later. So in that moment, it's, Several people that they interviewed said, I'm here just to like, see if this is real.

56:29 I can't imagine that she's gone.

56:30 It's like not even registering because she was such a big, bright light to have that like out suddenly.

56:38 It's just especially for her family.

56:40 Yeah. One of the things we've talked about that is like a consequence of people's inability to like deal with. you know, these larger than life figures. And the fact that these larger than life figures die is like, that they will create conspiracy theories that these people are not dead. You know, we've seen it with Tupac, we've seen it with Elvis and they actually, so at her funeral, like the one where there was like thousands of people publicly able to like pay their respects, they initially had it as a closed casket memorial service. And, um, like they actively heard the rumor starting that she wasn't actually in the casket. And so they opened the casket for people to see, because like in, in real time, they were like, Oh,

57:25 we need to stop this because otherwise this is just going to be a rumor that she's like somewhere.

57:32 Yeah.

57:33 Chilling with tupac you know and that funeral is i was i'd never seen it before so in researching for this i watched it um it is on youtube it is like you can see her open casket and she's just all the comments are like she's an eight like she looks immaculate she looks like an angel she looks she does yeah.

57:50 She looks it's wild that they weren't planning an open casket because she was yeah She, she looked great.

57:56 Like almost in a way where like, I'm, I don't even think this person is actually dead.

58:00 Right.

58:01 It was so just, she looks just like in a moment of pause or something.

58:05 Yeah.

58:06 Yeah.

58:06 She looks like she's sleeping.

58:07 But yeah, I mean, people were like outside of the crime scene, like trying to find like grass that had like, blood spatter on it, like trying to get like the lawn clipping version of the Shroud of Turin, like is really like next level religious feelings that people had and have for her.

58:26 They destroyed the murder weapon and they were a lot of fans were upset about that. Cause like, they were like, no, like this should, this, this is a historical item. Right. But like at the time they're like, no, this, this is, this is getting destroyed and tossed into the Bay of Corpus Christi.

58:41 Yeah. And people were like, they were immediately like, we need to not let Yolanda in the general population. People were immediately waiting outside of the police station to kill her. She made bail. And also, uh, there, there was a Howard Stern made a bunch of, Comments that like, I don't know. You can't really call them jokes. It's just like racism. He's just being racist about Selena. death and shit.

59:12 It was like the land speed record for death threats that came to somebody after a broadcast. And he had to issue an apology.

59:21 I don't know if you remember, at the time, he was playing her music and the soundboard guy was putting gunshots in the back. Oh my god. And like, I think it's just one of those moments where like white America completely has no idea the country that they live in. And they're like, just because you have, you're fucking ignorant.

59:40 You have no fucking clue the impact that this artist has left on a segment of the population. You couldn't even get a fraction of. So you think like, ah, ha ha. He's like, you know, he's like this movie, this music isn't for me. Like, I don't even know who this is for. Yeah. And you're doing this kind of flipping shit. And then, yeah, you, you found out.

59:57 Yeah, there were like letters to the editor in the local paper being like, guys, are we overdoing it a little bit with all the Selena stuff? And then like white last name, you know.

1:00:08 Y'all are lucky I was seven.

1:00:10 Right. Fuck you up.

1:00:12 Y'all are lucky I was in elementary school. I would have shown up, Howard Stern. I didn't know that.

1:00:16 Yeah.

1:00:17 I didn't know that.

1:00:18 Yeah. Yeah.

1:00:19 But an incredible brief, but like, I mean, just an amazing what would have been like, and just so random. And so like strange that this person was taken from us by, by such a troll, weird sociopath. Yeah.

1:00:38 Motherfucker I just it's crazy too that her name now is synonymous like I would hate to actually my my um Tia's name is Yolanda but I would hate to like you know that name is so it is it's Karen but worse you know and that's like what we it's a slur it's a slur.

1:00:57 Yeah there's a girl I went to high school with who like hated being called Yolanda because of that. And she was like, she was always Yoli, but like, she was like, people were calling her and she responded, but then it was like, nah, like the, the, the brand is, the brand is fucked up right now.

1:01:12 Generationally.

1:01:14 Yeah. But I think again, like to me, I, again, as someone who's not Mexican, not Latino at all, but growing up around many like Latinos and just as a kid in the city, it's, this like Selena was really one of these figures that it really dawned on me how important this culture was to like, and how prevalent it was around me, like it really opened my eyes because again, seeing every like Latino kid get activated by Selena at that time, I, I just didn't, I was like, what the fuck? This is crazy, bro. Like everyone is turning up for Selena. And I was even thinking like how I knew the words to them without knowing what they meant, because you were around people all the time.

1:02:00 And you're just saying like, Just anything. So many lyrics that I'm like, wait, I don't even know what I'm... singing right now. I just know that this is, I'm like, I... Como me duele. And I'm like, everybody's singing. I have, again, I don't know to this day what that means, but I can say, I can sing Como La Flor, like, at least the first two verses, because it just was something that, like, even was so new and exciting, and I was able to tap into how exciting this was, and how... also just dope. The music was, it exposed me to so many other things, but yeah, I, I, I think there's like just a really, there's another power to it. That's beyond her music that I always resonated with me as just like a biracial person that I

1:02:47 could just see what this meant again for like, like you're saying, Danny Chicanos who are straddling multiple cultures and, And what that experience is like. And yeah, I think it's, she resonates with so many people like, and I think that's, that's a mark of a true fucking icon like that. You don't, bro, I don't even speak Spanish really like that, but I, I can, I'll sing the fuck out of Selena.

1:03:08 No, she got you to level four on Duolingo. She did.

1:03:11 Oh, yeah.

1:03:13 No, and, like, she... What you were talking about culturally, too, is, like, she... This is why anyone.

1:03:18 That follows me on threads, because I'm not on Twitter anymore, but, like, I rep Texas so hard because it's, like, we.

1:03:23 Have, like, when people.

1:03:25 I guess when people think of Texas, they think of, like, white guys in F-150s or whatever. I'm like, no, this is our culture. We are so cultured. Like, when you watch her, you're like, this is Tejano culture.

1:03:35 And so.

1:03:36 It is frustrating to me to relinquish that, I guess, to white people or that being what represents Texas when we have our own entire culture in.

1:03:46 That state of history. Literally. And yeah. And so I will always fight people about it.

1:03:53 Amazing. Well, thank you for suggesting Selena. It was a great... Yay! A great dive.

1:04:00 The icon.

1:04:01 Yeah, the icon.

1:04:02 I do want to tell y'all my family is so Catholic that I could not be more Catholic.

1:04:07 And I had this.

1:04:09 this frame it was of the virgin mary but if you looked it was actually selena like my mom did not even know like the whole the whole.

1:04:19 Time it was up there you had that oh no.

1:04:22 This was like a couple years ago like i just like would have it up and it was like and it was clearly you know um the virgin mary but when you looked closer like it was selena in her astrodome outfit So.

1:04:35 I also have this like I have so much. I don't know if you can see that.

1:04:39 Yeah.

1:04:39 Like artwork.

1:04:41 Yeah.

1:04:41 Artwork of her. I love her. I love her. I love her baby.

1:04:47 I'm like, shit, bro. She got a Walk of Fame star. Doesn't sound like I got to go to.

1:04:50 She did.

1:04:51 I was there. I was there. I cried.

1:04:53 Yeah, I think Eva Longoria was there. I mean, they probably pulled in a lot of the Tejana's. But me and Vanessa Guerrero went out there at night when they were doing the star for her.

1:05:06 Yeah.

1:05:07 Who came from her family? I think her whole.

1:05:10 Family, her whole family, you know, they are currently in a lawsuit, which we didn't talk about, but.

1:05:16 They talk about off mic. I think when, Oh, did you?

1:05:19 Yeah.

1:05:19 No, you were telling me about how I think it's messy.

1:05:23 Yeah.

1:05:23 Her brother is suing her sister.

1:05:25 Her dad passed away this past last year, I think. And there's a lot of turmoil. There's there's always been kind of drama.

1:05:35 So, yeah.

1:05:35 Yeah.

1:05:37 For like the rights to her recordings and stuff.

1:05:39 I think like it has to do, it definitely has to do with money. Um, so yeah.

1:05:45 Well, that's a bummer, but you know, it's, it's also a got her, her sister was who introduced Yolanda to her. That's gotta be a tough one to sit with, you know?

1:05:54 Oh, I didn't know that.

1:05:56 Yeah. Uh, Yolanda approached the sister to be like, I think Selena should have a fan club.

1:06:02 You know, what's crazy is I was looking at like, I was listening to her music this morning. It's insane how many downloads, like it's still constantly, I would get into like an Uber and they're playing the radio, not even like Spotify or something. And she's playing on the radio. That's crazy.

1:06:20 Yeah.

1:06:21 Being played on like kiss FM. And you know, for someone, I didn't mention this.

1:06:26 I forgot.

1:06:26 I have to say this canonically. Goku and her have the same birthday.

1:06:31 Yeah.

1:06:32 Or I guess non-canonically. No, listen, this is the most Mexican thing to ever happen to me. So it's accepted by fans. It's not official, but Goku's birthday and her birthday are actually the same day, which I believe is April 16th. So that is the most Mexican thing that I've ever heard.

1:06:49 Yeah. April 16th.

1:06:52 Yes.

1:06:53 Her and Goku. Love it. We love that for us.

1:06:57 God bless. Where can people find you, follow you, all that good stuff, Tanya?

1:07:00 Yeah, find me on Instagram because who knows about all the other things. I don't even know how long I'll have that, but at least find me on there.

1:07:06 I'm at Ms. Dani Fernandez. It's M-S-D-A-N-I-F-E-R-N-A-N-D-E-Z.

1:07:10 You feel free to tag me in any Selena stuff and any Goku, any Dragon Ball Z.

1:07:15 That is my Venn diagram.

1:07:17 Yeah.

1:07:17 As everyone knows, Selena, Dragon Ball Z.

1:07:20 I know.

1:07:20 Finding out my two.

1:07:22 I searched Selena, Goku, and your post comes up.

1:07:25 Yeah, my post, yeah.

1:07:27 Listen, when I found this out, everything unlocked for me. Those are two gods. Those are, you know, Goku is like an Olympic mascot.

1:07:37 And, you know, these are my, those are my two gods.

1:07:40 Someone commented, Kame La Floor.

1:07:45 I'm obsessed.

1:07:48 Yeah.

1:07:49 No, the actual dweebs will be like, that's not as official. It's never been confirmed. It's confirmed here.

1:07:54 I'm confirming it now. Don't worry about it.

1:07:57 It started as a rumor, not connected to her. It started as a rumor and then it just took off. And then when I found out like, oh, y'all are saying it's April 16th. Well, that's Selena's birthday. So we love our Mexican, our Mexican icons. Two beloved Mexican icons.

1:08:13 Miles, where can people find you?

1:08:15 Uh, at miles of gray and the other shows for 20 day fiance and ain't a footy.

1:08:20 There you go. All right. We'll be right back with the notebook dump. All right. That was Selena. This is the no, no, no, no book dump. Um, in keeping with, The tendency we've seen for our icons to grow up poor to middle class, like somewhere in that range. Selena was, as mentioned, literally singing for her supper, which I think probably the standard definition is like they grew up hungry and that's what got them to be good at whatever they're good at. I don't necessarily think it's... the desperation because a lot of trauma comes with that. I do think that there's also something to it about being plugged in to the same things as your audience. You know, the vast majority of Americans are poor to middle class.

1:09:17 And by growing up like that, you have access to the actual communal experience that the vast majority of people are drawing on. And I think that's true of Selina. There's a People magazine profile of her about how her taste stayed, quote, down to earth. She shopped for shoes at Payless and dresses at Walmart. Her favorite restaurant was Olive Garden. Shout out, Selina. She loved pepperoni pizzas from Pizza Hut. And I feel like being born poor to middle class allows you to plug into the shared unconscious of your audience in a way that I don't think people who are born wealthy and have like wealthy parents necessarily have access to. Oprah talks about her relationship to her audience and how her main insight that she had

1:10:11 that allowed her career to take off is, that she's exactly like her audience. If she has a question, they probably would have that same question. You know, she's drawing from her own lived experience and her own curiosity and her own experiences of the stuff she's talking about. She's not just making content for an audience that she's cynically trying to manipulate, which is often how you see the mainstream media talk about the creation of art, is that it's like all these... kind of complicated decisions. And when you talk to artists, a lot of the times it's just like, they're making it for people like themselves. They're making the thing that they would want to consume. And I don't think starting poor, you know, gives you that necessarily,

1:11:00 but I do think being rich gets in the way of it. Like the wealthy people, generally live in a world of trying to justify their unfair advantage to themselves. And I don't think there's a way to exist in that sort of kind of warped feeling of superiority and not get your kind of sense, your gut for reality and what's interesting fucked up in some way. And, you know, one of the key insights that being wealthy might fuck up for you is that the Olive Garden rips. You know, especially 90s Olive Garden, that pre-private equity Olive Garden, brother.

1:11:42 That pre-private equity salad and breadsticks.

1:11:46 Breadsticks.

1:11:47 Breadsticks. I would suggest that, uh, she was onto the wrong pizza and that Domino's is our superior, uh, fast food pizza and that, uh, you know, but she, she was living in a pre-apology tour world, you know, a world before Domino's said, Hey, we've been making our pizza bad the past couple of decades and we're going to do it good now. So I can't, I can't fault her, you know? She never saw 9-11, never saw Domino's get good again. So can't be too mad at her for riding for Pizza Hut. I think at some point in the 90s, I was also riding for Pizza Hut. They gave me free pizza for reading books. I liked the details where the Coca-Cola Corporation knew how great she was before most people, like while the corporate world, uh, does

1:12:46 ruin you as a human, uh, it does give you access to these metrics, you know, Q ratings, sales data, the, these, the packs of Coke with Selena's face on them keep disappearing, like at a, at a rate that doesn't make sense that violates our previous sales and economics rules and violates the laws of physics how are they going this fast um you know they're they're out there with their charisma measuring device a bunch of hollywood and advertising executives walking around uh small music venues like talent ghostbusters being like hey look i don't know what this spanish lady's singing about but these readings are off the chart, you know?

1:13:37 Koch knew she was on the level of Elton John probably before her own family knew that. And you kind of see this in Hollywood too. The agencies have crazy access to tracking metrics and they know, they just know about people way ahead of time. They're like, oh, we need a young Casey Affleck for the latest Nolan. Let's go with that Tim Shamalette or whatever his name is, you know, uh, before, before everybody else knows about it. Um, and then I do just want to go back to, I think the, the main thing is that this is our icon episode about what might have been slash what would have been that when people are looking at the years of bad pop and rap music in the late nineties, not all bad, but just generally like maybe not where

1:14:29 we should have been, uh, Um, we might have just been missing Selena and Tupac and Biggie and not kind of realizing it. And with Biggie, I think it's kind of easy to imagine what would have been just more great albums. Um, Tupac really kind of feels like the sky's the limit. I think he might, I said in the Tupac episode, he might've won an Oscar. Um, I, I think he could have had a political career, not like run for president, but just like his, the content of his message was more political than I think I realized at the time. But with Tupac, there's like a lot of variability of the different directions it could have gone. Selena, I think we can say her getting removed from the firmament of time in our timeline, our weird, bad timeline,

1:15:22 is just an undeniable fulcrum moment. This is going to sound like I'm overstating this, but I don't know if we have another Assassin's Bullet that did more guaranteed damage, I guess. Like even JFK, a lot of people like to talk about how he was about to change everything and end the Cold War. which, you know, I like to believe that sometimes and maybe it was true. But he was also the person who helped get America into Vietnam. McNamara, the guy in the amazing documentary, The Fog of War, talking about how badly they fucked up all of their decisions about Vietnam. That was JFK's guy. JFK, you know, just might have been increasingly unpopular as he was forced to hold that decision, you know, more and more. So again,

1:16:16 huge variability there. Selina, I just, look, I don't think she ends any wars, but I don't think there's a world where she survives and doesn't change the way the world looks and feels pretty drastically. Bad for J-Lo, but I think in ways that would be undeniably good for the probably the most hateable and hated character, uh, we've covered in this series. I do just have to, the, the one thing I can say, I do have to tip my hat to her, uh, the stupidity of her alibi.

1:16:50 How has no other assassin tried? I was trying to shoot myself and I missed, you know? So, so I was actually trying to shoot myself with a long range sniper rifle. Uh, and that's on me probably in retrospect, why it didn't work. because I'm setting up to do myself in and here comes around the corner out the window, the president's motorcade, you know, um, I'm, I'm surprised nobody else has tried it, but, uh, true, truly just a profound ability to come up with a lie that, uh, she, she's able to convince herself of that. Just absolutely nobody else is going to believe. And lastly, uh, just another word about, uh, Frank Ocean name checking her on the last song on the last full album that we have from him, Blonde, the song is Future Afree. And it's like,

1:17:41 you know, he proceeded to go full J.D. Salinger on us. I don't know. Do people know that anymore?

1:17:48 That J.D.

1:17:49 Salinger was kind of the main thing he was famous for was writing Catcher in the Rye and a couple other, you know, well-respected and very popular works and then just kind of becoming a recluse and never publishing again. And everybody was always like, what's he doing? You know, and there are rumors of like these great novels that he'd written and then just like burned up in his cabin.

1:18:12 And I think that that instinct to remove yourself from the public eye in the face of extreme fame is in a weird way, kind of loosely related to his book's relation to assassins. I actually wrote a paper in college on the connection between Salinger and John Lennon's assassin who, you know, who shot John Lennon and sat down and started reading Catcher in the Rye until the police came.

1:18:45 And when they confiscated his copy of Catcher in the Rye, he had written, this is my statement. inside the book. The Catcher in the Rye was his statement about why he shot John Lennon. So the goal of my paper in college was to try to understand at least what was going through his head. And there have been other assassins who were discovered to at least be fans of Catcher in the Rye. And I don't know if I was ultimately successful, but it came up again, that question, the relation of the content, the relation to J.D. Salinger going, removing himself from public in the face of fame and the relationship of like, you know, fame to these people who assassinate extremely famous people. So the title, The Catcher

1:19:31 in the Rye, comes from a section of the book where the narrator says, Holden Caulfield is like talking about a dream where he's in a rye field trying to catch these kids before they go over a cliff of, you know, becoming teenagers and adults and, you know, all the messiness and nastiness that is entailed there. And he's also kind of going over that cliff. And it's a metaphor for him trying to catch these kids before they're ruined by the you know, inevitable perversity of the adult world and the inevitable like onward march of time. And my theory was that Lennon's assassin like felt like he was saving Lennon from going over that cliff. Like the connections that these fans have with icons is so powerful

1:20:19 that when something threatens to change it, uh, including the icons themselves, like, because like John Lennon is, going solo. And, you know, uh, in the case of his assassin, like not respecting Jesus, he had some wild theory where, you know, John Lennon was, uh, actually singing about Christian values before.

1:20:43 And now he was, you know, violating those values in the case of Selena. Uh, you know, your idol is actually firing you from being the president of their fan club. It's, it's, too much to take there's too much at stake for these fans and you know these fans in america have access to a handgun and i think it's so interesting that as i'm having all these thoughts about selena i hear frank ocean saying a song to his fans you say i'm changing on you i feel like selena they want to murder me like selena like connecting those thoughts of you know the fans not wanting him to change and him feeling like they're going to try and kill him. Um, he also opens the song saying, I'm just a guy, I'm not a God. So, uh, I feel like sometimes

1:21:35 the only rational thing for someone to do when they're given this crazy level of power and fame and, you know, a gift that they will kill you merely for possessing, uh, sometimes, uh, the smartest thing to do is to just, like, give it back or disappear. Or at least I understand that instinct. Anyways, would still love to see a new album from Frank Ocean, but I feel like.

1:21:59 I get it.

1:22:01 It is powerful, scary stuff. All right, that's going to do it for this Lena Notebook dump. Thanks to Miles, of course. Danny Fernandez, of course. for suggesting the subject of Selina for the guest spot. The outfit, we might need to start doing these icon episodes as video episodes. This was the second great outfit. Jamie Loftus also had some amazing Minion stuff happening in our episode. I think both not realizing it was not a full video episode. Uh, thanks to Meredith Danko for the research on this one and to Brian, the editor for pulling it all together.

1:22:39 And that's going to do it for, uh, September icon episodes. Uh, and we are entering spooky season, which means we are entering a season of spooky icon episodes, uh, Fright con, uh, fright conography. Uh, so next week we're kicking it off with a big one. The monster I would consider the main icon of Halloween. Uh, we're going to not just do like, you know, universal movie monsters. We've got some, uh, fun, uh, like a fun variety, some weird, like hyper-specific archetypes. And, uh, yeah, I think it's going to be fun, but Halloween is the season that kind of gave us, uh, one, one of, uh, The main things when we were thinking about, like, what qualifies for an icon, the first thing we thought is, like, well,

1:23:26 do they make sense as a Halloween costume? Like, are they that iconic?

1:23:31 So.

1:23:31 this is really iconograph season and we're going to do something special for all four iconographs that drop in the month of October. We've already recorded one of them and it's a lot of fun. But yeah, I'm not going to say exactly what the first one's about. I'll let you guys stew on that for a week. Like what is, what is the big spooky icon, the monster that is like Kind of the Santa of Halloween. I don't know that that's actually confusing. That's misleading. But, you know, just the one that I think is the first kind of icon that at least I think of when it comes to Halloween season. It is with I'll tell you who it's with. It's with Blake Wexler. And we just recorded it.

1:24:15 And it's so stupid and fun. back this afternoon to tell you what was trending over the weekend, but hope you enjoyed this and we will talk to you soon. Thanks.

1:24:26 The Daily Zeitgeist is executive produced by Catherine Law.

1:24:29 Co-produced by Victor Wright.

1:24:31 Co-written by J.M.

1:24:33 McNabb. And edited and engineered by Brian Jeffries.