Grimes, an objectively good musician making extremely special music, stunned Twitter into incoherence when she made her relationship with Tesla/SpaceX CEO Elon Musk public at the Met Gala earlier this month. Rationalizing Claire Boucher’s progressive beliefs with Musk’s peak late capitalism indulgences (which range from the harmlessly kooky—like launching a car into space—to the pretty dang malicious—like clamping down on Tesla workers who want to unionize, allowing unsafe cars to go to production because it’s likely cheaper to do so, and being chummy with Donald Trump even though he was on record as not being a fan initially) proved to be a headfuck for outside observers, few of whom had any knowledge of what Musk and Boucher are like as actual people and instead resorted to memeing their public personas. Whatever the actual reality of the situation, it’s relatively unimportant because celebrity love lives aren’t really something I care about. That being said, the next chapter in the Grusk expanded universe (Grusk galaxy?) seems to have arrived via another beloved Canadian musical figure: Avril Lavigne.
According to E! News, Lavigne is currently dating Phillip Sarofim, the son of billionaire Fayez Sarofim. The Sarofim family is one of those dynasties that’s rich from a whole bunch of investments, like being the second-largest shareholder in energy company Kinder Morgan, partially owning the Houston Texans, and managing the stock funds of the equally powerful Dreyfus family. Fayez Sarofim is the 847th richest human on this planet, which seems like kind of an L until you read that his net worth is nearly $2 billion, which is still more money than most of us will ever know what to do with. That there are 846 other assholes above this guy sucks ass in all regards. Phillip Sarofim, aka Avril Lavigne’s new beau, will inherit that fortune, which is good for them if they stay together, truly.
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E!’s source says that the pair have only been dating for two or three months, which means they couldn’t have been influenced by Grusk in their decision to start dating, but we also don’t know exactly how long Grusk has been a thing so maybe the news of their coupling was already disseminated through the secret networks of the ultra-wealthy and thusly influenced… what do we call this couple? Sarovigne? Avrofim? Phavril? These sound like Aphex Twin song titles. Ugh.
Maybe it makes sense though, as Avril’s last high-profile relationship was her marriage to fellow angsty Canuck Chad Kroeger, frontman of Nickelback. Chavril was too great and it could not last. Inevitably, we all stop seeking perfection and just settle for the easiest option. If you’re a rich artist, just date another rich person who isn’t an artist. It’s probably less stressful and better for your health. And who knows, the two of them might not even be an item next year because human attraction is ephemeral. Still, we are very happy for them. Avril’s probably got the future of humanity figured out, though: we must literally embrace the 1 percent and allow them to escort us into that doomsday DNA vault in Norway. The best damn thing is really knowing that your genetic material is preserved for millennia should calamity strike the human race (e.g. self-driving Tesla cars going rogue). Read more about Phavril here.
Phil is on Twitter.
