Ain't Trickin' Me

By Cynthia Fuchs, PopMatters. Posted May 3, 2002.

Suddenly and sadly, Lisa Lopes is gone. Details remain imprecise, but the basic facts are these: she was driving a rental car in Honduras in Thursday 25 April, tried to pass another vehicle, and crashed. Out of 8 (or maybe it was 9) people in the Mitsubishi Montero, including her brother and sister, Left Eye was the only fatality. According to Reuters, "investigators" say the accident was "caused by speeding." She will be buried Thursday, May 2, in Lithonia, Ga., at the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church.

As soon as word got out that Left Eye was dead, the news-and-entertainment industry kicked into a depressingly familiar gear. MTV, VH1, MTV2, and BET featured somber newsbreaks and invitations to "log on" to whatever website, as well as the expected video tribute packages. These images are simultaneously wonderful and excruciating to see -- Left Eye looking jaunty with neon green cap and baggy pants in "Ain't Too Proud to Beg"; floating in those fabulous silk pajamas for "Creep"; or sitting on one sofa after another with group-mates Rozonda "Chilli" Thomas and Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins, explaining that rumors of their impending breakup are untrue. The images rotated throughout the weekend, preempting previously scheduled programs, and even, over on MTV2, trading preemptive slots with Alice in Chains videos, which have been in semi-regular rotation following the death of Layne Staley.

As has been noted repeatedly over the past few days, Lopes was the "feisty" or "crazy" member of TLC, along with the "sexy" Chilli and "cool" T-Boz. Their "story" has abruptly become news, again: the Atlanta-based group broke with 1992's "Ain't Too Proud to Beg," off their multiplatinum debut, "Oooooohhh... On the TLC Tip." And the lyrics were refreshingly and often hilariously forthright: "If the lovin' is strong, then he got it goin' on, and / I ain't 2 proud 2 beg (no) / Two inches or a yard, rock hard or if it's saggin' / I ain't 2 proud 2 beg (no)." Needless to say, the radio/MTV edit usually excises this last couplet, yet these same venues celebrate TLC's pioneering efforts regarding women's self-expression.

Combining r&b, pop, and hiphop, TLC crossed over genres, genders, and generations, and gave LaFace Records (run by Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds and Antonio "L.A." Reid) its first humongous hit. With success -- surprise! -- came controversy, much of it having to do with the girls' candor concerning their chosen industry, especially, shady management deals and pressures to conform to image and lyric standards.

Their arrival on the music scene was exhilarating, not least because they addressed topics -- sexuality and sexism, for examples -- that pop-oriented girl groups traditionally avoided or finessed. What's more, TLC's self-assertions came packaged to sell. Bopping in t-shirts and suspenders, they performed an emotional continuum, from youthful innocence to womanist desire, commending male and female sexuality. Around the time of "Ain't Too Proud," Left Eye initially defined herself as the rapper and as "street" (compared to her girls, anyway) and, probably too preciously, mirrored fellow Philadelphian Will Smith, but with a twist: she taped a condom to the left lens of her glasses to draw attention to safe sex practices, and so earned the nickname that stayed with her for life. She rapped energetically, if somewhat cryptically, about sex: "Realize the realism of reality treats / Us both the same. / 'Cause satisfaction is the name of this game. / So I choose to explain, it's evident: / Left Eye don't mean the rest of my body is irrelevant."

Quite. It was immediately clear that nothing about Left Eye would ever be "irrelevant." She was early on vocal about her criticisms of business as usual, and she surely had her own raft of personal issues to sort out. Her disagreements with Chilli and T-Boz made for gossip, but -- bless her -- Left Eye would not back down. As much as the women may have argued, however, they also supported one another, at least in public, which is where solidarity counted. They knew they were up against a system designed to break them down and remake them. And they always fought the system more than each other.

It appears that their difficulties either did not affect or perhaps eveen improved their art. Each of their albums was progressively stronger, more expressive, and more sophisticated in conception and execution. Their second, 1994's CrazySexyCool revealed a "new," more "mature" TLC, won two Grammy Awards, and not incidentally, went 11 times platinum.

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