I read the Meet the Shaggs essay, because the Shaggs sounded like an interesting name for a band.  The story of how the Shaggs was created is almost funny; a guy gets a “prophecy” from his mom and then dedicates the last decades of his life trying to fulfill something so silly.  It becomes decidedly less funny when you realize that these are real people – these poor girls were forced to spend years under their father’s rule, trying to become a massively popular band, even though it seems like they had very little interest in doing such a thing.

The essay leaves me with a very poor opinion of their father, Austin Wiggin.  He seems to have been a very tyrannical and egotistical person.  While the story of how he got his shotgun to go after Helen’s husband, for her “crime” of daring to get married would also be a funny story if it was from a cartoon or show, but it’s just disturbing since this is the real world.  In many ways Mr. Wiggin does strike me as being an incredibly stereotypical sort of authoritarian father, which makes me feel that the author likely exaggerated some characteristics/stories, since people rarely fit into neat stereotyped boxes like that.  I did find their song “Who are Parents” to be rather funny; I imagine that Wiggins likely had a great deal of influence in that song’s lyrics, which further exemplify his egotistical qualities.

After hearing a few of those songs, I would say I don’t really fall into either category that the author talks about; I don’t love their music or hate it.  It’s simply somewhat mediocre.  I do have generally low standards for music though, so my mediocre rating may very well translate into a “hate it” rating for other people.  The lyrics in “Philosophy of the World” were interesting, essentially pointing out how people are never satisfied with what they have.  I think this song was definitely influenced by their demanding father – the author even remarks on how the father would usually harshly criticize their performance whenever they sang “Philosophy of the World.”