popcultureisdead

[popcultureisdead]

so this is going to be a totally casual discussion about all things i love/ am currently ‘consuming’ in the world of popular culture! (i feel like such a host of a radio show as i say this!) i totally just need a space to vent/ freely love the things i’m currently obsessed with/ can’t think about! i’m not studying anything remotely creative at university so this is also a place where i get to use up all this pent up creative energy! there have totally already been way too many exclamation marks in this paragraph ha! 

lorde’s GREEN LIGHT came out today - i woke at half past seven this morning, still super bleary eyed and fuck, it’s so bloody catchy! and SO different from PURE HEROINE! i’m totally not sure what i expected - perhaps an almost rehashed albeit darker version of surburbia/ adolescence/ youth in general? 

‘i’m waiting for it, that green light’ is playing in the background, i’ve replayed it, ‘we’ve ordered different drinks at the same bar’, there’s almost a strange, disjunct quality to the first few lyrics - none of the words rhyme, ella looks like she’s staring at something behind you, like she’s withholding some sort of secret from you - ‘sometimes i wake up in a different bedroom’, the scattered references to ‘teeth’, all signs of age, of time, used and reused in pure heroine and now this new single from her new album - lends itself to an almost visceral, raw experience - the chorus is almost a reprieve - earlier this day, playing this on my phone, repeatedly hitting the youtube replay button, i just wanted to get up and dance the fuck away, unrestrained. . . 

lorde in her pinkish purple dress, her adidas shoes, happy, blissfully drunk, uninhibited, on top of the car - i used to think her dancing was almost freakishly weird/ being almost embarrassing to watch a few years back. . . but i love it so, so much now, obviously not that she needs my approval or whatever, but the freedom, the 3am dancing, hands up in the air, the darkness, the mystery, shadows, the fluorescent lights. . . how could you not relate, how could a smile not escape. . . ? 

when the camera cuts to her side profile about half a minute in, there’s a strange, almost displaced kind of intimate feeling that arises - we see her, seeing herself, in the mirror, only that she was seeing us before - but not really seeing the audience, seeing past the audience. . . the earphones she’s got in, holding her phone, her music, her source of control being relinquished into the night, lorde’s acting out our fantasies, our desires, our connection to music

when she’s dancing on the car, there’s almost a sensual quality - she’s bathed in the familiar orange glow of streetlights - yet it’s not anchored to our reality - she’s on a car, she steps out the club like she’s expecting a limo - her driver’s vaping, not taking in this scene - jack antonoff’s on the piano - IT’S FUCKING LORDE - and no matter how much she let’s her hair down, it’s all flash and glamour in this produced music video - no matter how much she seems to relinquish control - the lyrics resonate, reflect, she’s working through something, and we’re just lucky enough to be witnessing it. 

the last frame, where ella’s looking at us, with the sunrise behind her - is so reminiscent of one of princess nokia’s vids and a lot of petra collins’ photography for rookiemag - it’s brave, raw, female - almost cyclical, different to the first frame, the gaze has shifted - it’s no longer voyeuristic, the audience isn’t looking at her anymore, instead it’s us that she’s looking at - and that’s what i’m excited for - she’s in control.