Kay Lives Through the Torture in Shygirl’s “Lucky (Hymn)” Video, a “Part II” to “Alyse”

For those who have been waiting with bated breath to figure out where the two goons from Shygirl’s “Alyse” video took “Kay” (Samson Hughes) in the final moments—during which he was thrown into a trunk—the second single and visual from Swallow!, “Lucky (Hymn),” immediately answers that question. Or rather, does so about eight seconds into the video, when the fabric is pulled off the person enduring a “classic” hooding to reveal, quelle surprise, it’s Kay. And while “Alyse” was co-directed by Shygirl, Francesco Loy Bell and Oliver Bell, “Lucky (Hymn)” finds Shygirl in the director’s seat with Austen Taylor Pease to bring the viewer into a much more claustrophobic setting than what was seen in “Alyse.”

Indeed, the entirety of the video takes place in the kitchen of one of the goons. And right as Goon 1 rips the hood off Kay’s head, Shygirl bursts into the first verse, “I’m so lucky, fortunate, it’s true/So lucky in the things I do.” At this point, the “lightly strumming” guitar in the background can be heard before it bursts out with an empowering force at the twenty-one-second mark. At which point, as the camera has been aimed at Goon 1 preparing some kind of tea-looking “concoction,” it whips back over to where Kay was sitting to reveal that—gasp!—Shygirl is now in his place. Invoking the immediate connection between her and this character, almost as if Kay is an alter ego. Or as if, as she presents herself in the “Alyse” video at the end, she’s a kind of “guardian angel” (albeit a bit of a deadbeat one).

Looking fearful and disoriented as the sonic landscape sounds more and more like a combination of Sneaker Pimps and Massive Attack (in keeping with the late 90s musical oeuvre Shygirl is pulling from for this era [as she also pulled from The Prodigy for “Alyse”]), the camera then pans over to Goon 2, as the lyrics, “I call it faith” soundtrack the instant before the camera pans back to the seat where Kay is now shown again. This time, being “lightly” strangled by Goon 1 as his presumable mom walks by nonchalantly to make a cup of tea. Clearly, she’s seen it all before when it comes to these two and their “line of work.”

The “trading places” method of the video then goes back to Shygirl once more, this time coming across as much more “I don’t give a fuck” and “There’s not shit you can do to me that will ever destroy me.” To that point, Shygirl herself wrote when announcing the release of the single and its video, “I wanted something that felt as overpowering and visceral as the feeling[:] what can they take from you when you know your truth[?] [or, as Britney Spears once declared, “People can take everything away from you/But they can never take away your truth”]. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” (Or makes you really weird at parties, as it is now also said.)

At the same time, “Lucky (Hymn)” (that parenthetical perhaps being Shygirl’s way of respectfully differentiating her song from Britney’s 2000 hit of mostly the same name) is very clearly a love song. More specifically, a “love of love” song. Because, after all, Shygirl is a Taurus and it’s no secret that said sign is ruled by Aphrodite. Accordingly, Shygirl also remarked in announcing the release of Swallow!, “If there’s anything I stand for, it’s the pursuit of love; to love and be loved and all the emotions in between.” And in that regard, “Lucky (Hymn)” is her, you guessed it, hymn. One that praises the divine that can be found in falling in love, as she elucidates with a verse like, “Why not give in?/Why not give grace?/Don’t need no reason, no better place/What are you afraid of?/Why don’t you know?/Fall into love/Love, it breaks fall.”

Meanwhile, the goons have broken some eggs. Into a pitcher. They then cover Kay’s mouth with a cloth to cut off his breathing as Goon 2 pours the raw eggs into the place where his open mouth ought to be, but is already being suffocated. This done as, at one point, Shygirl asks, “How does it taste?” The likely answer in this scenario? Not great. And as for the torturing methods that go on throughout the video, it does have an element of Madonna’s “Die Another Day” to it. In said video, Madonna herself is tortured in various “classic” ways (including being waterboarded) in an homage to the Bond movie of the same name.

And, on the subject of Madonna, sonically speaking, there are generally hints of American Life-era Madonna (that album being as awash as it is in guitar sounds of this nature), on which “Die Another Day” eventually appeared. And since Charli XCX is so obviously doing something related to this album soon, based on all her uses and teases of it in various posts, it makes sense that Shygirl would be a part of American Life’s “resuscitation” as well, she being seemingly as in on the “Charli gang” as, say, Rachel Sennott. To boot, she also shouted out the album during a recent interview with Sam Murphy of PopSamCam, also noting, “It’s so easy to reference her or find where her music has infiltrated my psyche.” That it is. Especially now that Shygirl has also been in a Madonna video herself (namely, “Danceteria” from Confessions II: The Film).

As such, the casual Madonna allusions continue as the video comes to a close, with Shygirl offering the camera an almost mischievous—and, of course, defiant—smile that starts to vaguely form on her bloodied face (even though it was Kay who took the punch). Something in this instant very much channeling how Madonna looks during the end of a video backdrop for “Mer Girl” as it’s performed during 2001’s Drowned World Tour.

It’s a conclusion that not only assures the viewer that Kay (de facto, Shy) will endure through the torture, but that, as Shygirl captioned a teaser clip (featuring a scene that doesn’t actually appear in the video of her eerily singing the chorus a capella), “Luck is what you make it.” And here, both have decided that they’re still lucky to be alive. To keep living to fight another battle. Because, it would seem, nothing can topple them when love is on their side (since, as “Alyse” viewers will remember, Kay’s love for a certain man’s daughter is what led to all this violence in the first place). It’s an important message to remember at a time like this, when there are so many oppressive forces in the world trying to keep a lover/lover of love down.