Fairytale - Sara Bareilles

So much for happy endings.—Ya know, those fairytale feel good endings we believed in as kids? According to music artist Sara Bareilles such stories don’t match up with real life. Disappointing and hurtful relationships, especially of the romantic type, are no new issue in our postmodern world. In 2007, Bareilles released her first major label album, Little Voice, which contained the song “Fairytale.”

The song “Fairytale” reveals the well-known fairytale princesses and makes a mockery of their stories by telling them with a postmodern twist. Cinderella has been drinking and her prince “doesn’t come home anymore.” Sleeping beauty would rather keep sleeping and dreaming then have a prince who is a jerk and doesn’t really care... “The story needs some mending and a better happy ending,” sings Bareilles. The princess should be free to do what she wants to do and be who she wants to be, since “She's only waiting, spent the whole life being graded on the sanctity of patience and a dumb appreciation”—She’s been waiting around for a prince, holding onto the idea that there is a beautiful ending.

Bareilles, well known for her top hit “Love Song” (also on Little Voice), tries to write down-to-earth, real life songs that also reflect her life. Her pop style has been said to be similar to Nora Jones and Fiona Apple. She has a classy, melancholy voice that matches well with her talent on the piano.

On her website, Bareilles wrote about her album Little Voice. “This record was really about me learning to trust my own instincts, and more importantly, recognize how desperately I needed to learn to listen to myself, however inexperienced and naïve I may be. It sounds cliché, but that little voice is sometimes the only voice that's speaking the truth.”

In “Fairytale,” Bareilles sings,” Once upon a time in a faraway kingdom, Man made up a story said that I should believe him.” Although it seems to do with fairytales, could this also reflect Bareilles’ religious beliefs? Maybe God is a made up reality and heaven is a happy-ending story we’ve been fed? Whatever the case, it’s not definite that she doesn’t believe in God. But her self-trust may suggest a spiritualistic worldview.

“Fairytale” addresses the unrealistic dream of modern fairytale ideals and the reality of a postmodern society where pain, distrust, and selfishness reign, instead of a prince and princess for