P!nk Screams, 'I'm Not Dead'

Subtlety has never been a word associated with Pink. And the image of her screaming mouth on the cover of I'm Not Dead immediately informs us that nothing has changed. Pink's fourth release oozes the same in-your-face attitude that attracted a legion of fans with her first two albums.

One thing that has changed, however, is Pink's determination to scale the charts once again. The singer's second album, M!ssundaztood, moved 5 million copies. In contrast, her third album managed just 700,000 units. She said of the poor performance of 2003's Try This, "My heart wasn't in it as much. And I was kind of rebelling against the record company. ... It was, like, put a quarter in the slot, watch the monkey dance."

While the title I'm Not Dead could be interpreted as a riposte regarding her last album's paltry sales, Pink insists it's really about "awakening, not having blinders on." With the help of über-producers Max Martin and Lukaz Gottwald (Britney Spears, Kelly Clarkson), Butch Walker (Avril Lavigne) and Billy Mann (Jessica Simpson), Pink has returned with a well-crafted CD (which one writer aptly described as "Britney Benatar") that could propel the punk-pop princess back into the sales stratosphere. The question that remains, however, is this: What messages will eager fans be forced to digest in the process?

Beyond "Stupid Girls"
The album opens with "Stupid Girls," the video for which is already generating buzz with its satirical skewering of Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan and Jessica Simpson. "They travel in packs of two or three/With their itsy-bitsy doggies and their teenie-weenie tees." In response, Pink proclaims, "I don't want to be a stupid girl," and asks, "What happened to the dream of a girl president?" Too bad, then, that the song turns really nasty when Pink describes "stupid girls" as "pretty, will-you-f--k-me girls."

Though Pink aspires to be different from her peers, most of what follows "Stupid Girls" alternates between melancholy songs about how she's been victimized and tracks glorifying rebellious behavior. These are familiar themes for anyone who's ever listened to Lindsay Lohan, Ashlee Simpson or Kelly Clarkson.

"Long Way to Be Happy" laments the loss of innocence from an early, anonymous sexual encounter: "No more waking up to innocence/... Now I'm numb as h---/And I can't feel a thing." "Nobody Knows" finds Pink holed up in self-imposed solitude, practically begging for our sympathy ("Nobody knows, nobody knows but me that sometimes I cry"). And on "Runaway" Pink plays the role of a young girl searching for attention by disappearing: "I wonder how long it'll take them/To notice that I'm gone." Never, however, does the song suggest such a choice might be the wrong answer to adolescent problems.

On the wilder side of things, "'Cuz I Can" exalts recklessness: "I'm f---ed because I live a life of sin/But it's alright, I don't give a d--n." On the crass "U + Ur Hand," Pink informs a drunken man at a bar that his evening will not end with her ("Keep your drink, just give me the money/It's just you and your hand tonight").

All of that sets up—oddly enough—a political rant. "Dear Mr. President" throws President George W. Bush's own alleged youthful indiscretions in his face. Pink then arrogantly takes the "high road" as she asks, "What do you feel when you see all the homeless on the street?" And she moves beyond criticizing Bush's policies as she stands in judgment upon his soul: "How do you walk with your head held high? ... You pave the road to hell."

Having It Both Ways?
I'm Not Dead is not without positive moments. "Stupid Girls" deserves measured praise for calling out our culture's love affair with superficiality. "I Got Money Now" rightly recognizes that money can't buy happiness, and "Conversations With My 13-Year-Old Self" finds the singer contemplating the message she'd deliver to her adolescent self. Nevertheless, the anger, frequent profanity, self-absorption and sexual references in many songs simply overwhelm these isolated praiseworthy themes.

I'm Not Dead also illustrates the postmodern tendency to define morality however we please. Just as in the time of the Old Testament Judges when "everyone did as he saw fit" (Judges 17:6), so entertainers today see no disconnect between attacking others' faults (perceived or otherwise) while flaunting their own self-centered, immoral choices.