As you may have heard by now, Rachael Ray, the raspy-voiced ball o' grins who bounces all over daytime TV leaving a trail of EVOO in her wake, is throwing a day party at this year's SXSW music festival in Austin, featuring bands like The Ravonettes, Holy Fuck, and The I Am Rachael Ray's Husband Band. Many people found something a bit incongruous about Ms. Yum-O hosting an indie rock showcase. These are two almost diametrically opposed postures, you see: Aloof indie rock, and obnoxious, relentless Daytime TV cheeriness.
But Rach herself doesn't see why everyone finds this so weird, in part, it seems because she has no idea who Rachael Ray is. From MTV.com:
"To be honest, I have five jobs, so I'm aware of what I have to do for them when we get up in the morning. But I don't see why we'd be out of place down there, when we're just fans of music who decided to put on a show. I guess if they don't like good music, and they don't like good food, they don't have to go…"
And for those wondering whether or not Ray actually listens to Holy Fuck, well, the answer is yes. Sort of. In fact, she finds it rather difficult to understand why people are amazed that she's an indie-rock fan.
"And I don't understand why that's so surprising. I find it weird that they find it weird. People think I'm like this food robot or something, but music is a huge part of my life," she continued. "I'm a huge fan of rock music in general – all kinds. I like indie stuff, my favorite band is the Foo Fighters.
People don't think you're a "food robot," Rachael, they think you're a chattin' n' chewin' machine fueled by sheer annoyingness. And can you blame them? Are you too busy posing for Nabisco box corner photos that you don't know your face is going to be on Nabisco boxes, grinning loudly?
Are you aware of the fact that you have a highly successful daytime TV talk show that has done more than one segment on frying cheese ravioli, but has yet to do a segment on, say, Holy Fuck or any other indie rock group? What about this, Rachael?
Do you remember putting together How Cool Is That Christmas? Is there a Vampire Weekend cover on there I'm unaware of?
Obviously, fundamentally irritating people with their own series of Dunkin Donuts commercials (hi, Zach Braff) are allowed to like any kind of music they want and/or put together SXSW showcases. But acting "surprised" by the public's very reasonable surprise that you would do something totally incongruous with the public image you've aggressively calculated for years makes you even more annoying. Congrats & Yum-o, Rachael, I didn't think that was even possible!