Hello Kitty - Single
Epic
Release date: 2013 (Single) / April 21, 2014 (Music Video)
Are you done yet? Yes, you. You kitty-hater!
As we (proud citizens of pop-niverse) are all well-aware, Avril Lavigne recently released the music video for her dubstep heavy technopop track 'Hello Kitty' off of her self-titled fifth studio album. Paying homage to everyone's favourite cat caricature and the Japanese subculture in general, the 29-year old punk princess shot the video in Japan with everything Japanese, including the director, the location, the extras and even the cupcakes! This however, disappointingly, did not go down well with the masses.
Unlike most media outlets out there who decided to jump in on the Avril-bashing immediately, we here at The Record Blog decided to wait it out to let the dust clear. Besides what we want to add is the opposite of what already has been said. What more can we say? We liked Avril's Hello Kitty quite a lot!
Filmed in Tokyo, the colourific video features Avril in various locales in the country with four local backup dancers behind her performing identical moves. Throughout the song, the blonde songstress is shown being involved in various random activities while being surrounded by neon bright objects, including delectable cupcakes and shocking hair extensions. What's not to like about that? Okay that was a rhetorical question as we are not completely sold on the visual treat either.
Following the release of the MV, Avril has been accused of being culturally insensitive and lazy for churning out a video that conformed to stereotypical notions of the 21st century Japanese subculture and the people practising it while not doing much at all. Is it easy to write-off something as insensitive and irresponsible from the comfort of your desk but who we are we to say that the portrayal of Avril's backup extras are not real somewhere in the corners and crannies of Tokyo after all? And maybe Avril herself is playing the role of a delusional cupcake enthusiast imagining herself as the Princess of Japan?
Okay we both know that was not what the diva-with-an-identity crisis was vying to do at all but culture-wise it is hard to say she was on the wrong side of the tracks. Clearly distinct from Clear Bandit's similarly Japanese-themed music video for their hit single 'Rather Be', which showed the everyday life of mainstream people from the Land of the Rising Sun as opposed to Avril's more cheekier take on the nation's culture, the 'Hello Kitty' video stays true to the colourful kitty by being fun and comical.
We do have some piques with the video however. Mainly the bad lip-synching. Come on team Avril! What are you doing back there? Is it so hard to synch the audio to her lip movements? It just undermines the great track that 'Hello Kitty' is and adds fuel to the venom-machine run by the haters. All in all, 'Hello Kitty' is a solid track in the deviant diva's latest studio effort and we (both Shawal Ras and I) can vouch for how good the track sounds live! Now, can someone chuck a cupcake at us?
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.
This awesome review above is submitted by our reader, Vimal Esvaren. If you’d like to have your review(s) in our blog, do send ‘em over to therecordblog@gmail.com and do include a copy text of the review, main image, and the cover of the album or single. Just follow the format above and you'll be fine!
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