''Royals'' - Lorde

12:01 PM Reviews 0 Comments

     Americans have a weird relationship with wealth. They want to be rich, but they hate rich people. They hate their rich, stupid faces so much, that the rich guy is almost always the bad guy in American movies. Except when it comes to Bruce Wayne. It's okay to be rich if you dress up like a bat, and whoop large portions of ass. But most movies involving a rich character will make him the antagonist, while the poor or working class dude is the protagonist. He's the guy the audience can relate to, because we're all jealous of rich people, and we want to experience the lovely Schadenfreude that comes with a rich guy finally experiencing some fucken hardships.

     You know another area where our disdain of rich people often turns up? Politics. In a classic case of Evil vs Evil, the 2012 American presidential election was Mitt Romney vs Barack Obama. Naturally, one of the biggest criticisms against Romney was that he has money. No, but like, a fucken lot of money. Don't get me wrong, the criticism that he wasn't paying his taxes was a legitimate point to throw in his rich, stupid face. But even people unaware of that were talking about him being rich like it was a scandal.

     And yet, for all the demonization of the poor-impaired, Musik seems to be the exception. When it comes to Musik, most Americans don't seem to mind hearing about how MC ScheißtGold is filthy stinkin' rich. Maybe it's because it's generally rap that indulges in this kind of bragging, and rappers are seen as poor thugs who worked hard, and became rich through pure perseverance. If Tupac went from rags to riches, so can you!

     Anyway, 2013 would see a lass straight outta New Zealand come along, and bring some poor pride to the American Musik scene. The lass I speak of is Ella Marija Lani Yelich-O'Connor, who had the common decency to adopt the name "Lorde," so I don't have to keep typing her full novella of a name. However, "Lorde" is pronounced just like "Lord," that way she's still slightly difficult.

     Of all the mainstream artists of 2013, none appeared to be as unique as Lorde. Aside from being only seventeen years old, her sound and lyrics actually have a really soulful emotional feel. In our hypersexual and materialistic Musik scene, artists who do what Lorde does are rare.

     And that brings me to the Musik Video I'm reviewing today, "Royals." Royals is about growing up poor, but giving exactly no fucks.


     It would be easy for cynical me to write these lyrics off as simply trying to cash in on America's jealousy of the rich. Especially since Lorde attended one of the richest schools in New Zealand. I don't know how autobiographical this song is supposed to be, but Lorde probably didn't live in a "torn up town" as she mentions in this song.

     However, one of the good things about this song is that it's not bashing wealth or wealthy people, it's simply saying Lorde doesn't care for materialism.

     The type of wealth Lorde is shunning here is the in-your-face flashy materialistic crap that people with low self-esteem embrace as a way to feel better about themselves. "Royals" is essentially about seeing the unimportance in buying the most expensive car simply because it's the most expensive. Yeah, this may all be for show. And yeah, Lorde probably is trying to pass herself off as a poor Tupacesque come-from-nothing girl. But whatevs. The lyrics are good. They perfectly paint the story of a girl who feels she and her friends appreciate the important things in life.

     I do have a gripe with the "driving Cadillacs in our dreams" line. If you don't care about having materialistic crap, why are you dreaming about driving a Cadillac? Maybe she meant "in our dreams" as in it'll never happen? Ah well, onto the Video.

     So the Video is super simplistic, which I'm starting to see is a theme in Lorde Videos. It basically goes back and forth between a close-up of Lorde singing, and two young males doing young male things. I really like how minimalist this Video is, since it reflects the minimalist lifestyle Lorde is singing about. At one point, we see the living room of one of the guys, and it has a television that doesn't work. During another point, they're boxing in the living room, and one gets punched in the mouth, causing him to bleed. A little later, he's seen looking in the mirror and laughing out of his bloody mouth. I really loved this scene. It shows this kid doing something pretty mundane, kind of dangerous, but fun. It's the type of fun you have when the TV doesn't work, and you don't have money to go out and do something. It's the type of thing we guys do with our friends when we're young, stupid, and have the house to ourselves. This scene totally reminds me of the time me and two friends decided to have our own unscripted wrestling matches in my friend's living room. We were each playing a wrestler. Since I was playing Mankind, I hid Mr. Socko in my pants and, halfway through the match, I surprised my opponent by whipping Mr. Socko out and shoving it in his mouth, which we all found hilarious. Yeah, we were that young and stupid.