Are You A Certified Pop Genius?

Are You A Certified Pop Music Genius?
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New York State Pop Genius Certification Exam

1. Education

a. Some college

b. Binge-watched whole first season of School of Rock on a Pam-spray high

c. Learned more from a three-minute record, baby, than ever learned in school

d. Learned more from tax accountant, baby, than ever learned from a record

2. Honors and prizes

a. Star of the Week at Twinkling Stars after-school program

b. Watched Grammy Awards all the way to the end once

c. Nobel Prize for Literature

3. Notable performances

a. Tantric sex with production team for my first album, Memories of Mom

b. Did whole plastic-cup song from Pitch Perfect with specimen-sample vials in rehab

c. Have never performed before an audience

d. Have never performed before self-medicating

4. How would you best describe your music?

a. Ariana Grande meets Anton Berg

b. Beyonce meets Sasha Fierce and gets really confused

c. Cole Porter meets Leonard Bernstein while their wives are out of town

d. Nicki Minaj meets Katy Perry and brings in Shawn Mendes for a tag team

5. Pop genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent _________.

a. Simulation

b. Amortization

c. High-fructose corn syrup

d. Metamphetamine

6. If the tonic chord of a song is G sharp, what is the relative minor?

a. G not-so-sharp

b. Any minor who is also a relative, such as Jerry Lee Lewis’ second wife, Myra

c. Ask my old music teacher, Mrs. Gunderpuss or Gunderpoo or whatever her name was, who never liked me, and see how she feels now that I’m on Youtube and she’ll never be, except for that video of her playing some song I never heard of on the piano for a bunch of scary sick kids

7. What’s your Snapchat score?

a. 100,000-500,000

b. Over 500,000, including the 250,000 accounts of my own in clever fake names

c. My social media of choice is MySpace. I also prefer medieval instruments tuned to the original Phygian scales.

8. Provide the best excuse you can think of for picking a fight with Kanye on the MTV Awards:

a. He wants me so bad. So I have to fight him off out of sisterly comradeship with Kim.

b. He has a perscecution complex and enjoys suffering, and all I want is for him to be happy.

c. I’m the pop genius. He’s not the pop genius. I am. He’s not. I am.

9. You just won your first Grammy. Tears flowing, lips quivering, you’d like to thank

a. The Lord God, who gave the world the great gift of my existence

b. Gustav Vasa, who in the 16th century led the break-up of the Hanseatic League and formed the country we know today as Sweden, where they make all the good pop now

c. My forebearers and inspirations in popular music ― Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Bing Crosby, Louis Armstrong, and the Beatles. I’ll always remember them all, in the order I’ve memorized their names.

10. List your top three favorite social causes or charities:

a. The one Madonna was promoting in the picture of her in khakis and a floral scarf, with lots of skinny children standing around her looking poor

b. The one for the big flood in New Orleans. I love New Orleans and hope to go there some day.

c. The one where you wear a yellow bracelet. I care very deeply about bracelets.

11. If certified as a pop genius, how will you leverage your superstardom with branded products?

a. Coric TM (Ciroc in reverse, wink, wink) vodka-flavored peaches

b. Nosebuds TM ― like Beats, but for your nose. They pump perfumey smells into your nostrils to cover up the odors of people and the world.

c. Blackout TM make-up, for making black rings under your eyes and making your cheeks look hollow, so you can stay home and watch shows all day, and when you go out, you look like you’ve been up for three days doing drugs and having sex

12. The critics say:

a. “A singer...today.”

b. “I don’t [often] get [to hear music] this [fabulous].”

c. I write for the people, not for the critics. Why? What have you heard?

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