On the heels of Zara Larsson making her “scandalous” (read: absolutely true) comments about ICE, it seems only ironically fitting that the Charlotte Rutherford-directed video for PinkPantheress’ reworking of “Stateside” should come out. And, although there’s three other versions of the single featuring Kylie Minogue, Bladee and Groove Armada, respectively, on her remix version of Fancy That (titled Fancy Some More?), PinkPantheress has chosen to unleash a visual for the Larsson-featuring rendition at, inarguably, the most political moment in the Swede’s career. Though it seemed no one could have imagined someone as “rainbows and butterflies” as Larsson possessing the “chutzpah” to make any kind of “real” political statement (as if fighting for your right to party and be happy isn’t political).
Those people were dead wrong, realizing the extent of Larsson’s commitment to advocating for basic human rights over the January 11-12th weekend when she posted a series of Instagram stories that began with, “I love immigrants, I love criminals, I love trans people, I love abortions, I love queers, I love slutty women, I love contraception, I love welfare, I love socialism, I fucking hate ICE.”
In these times, that’s nothing short of a courageous, “invoking” statement to make so publicly, and it’s even left members of certain demographics (ones far more targeted by ICE than white women [though that notion seemed to shift on January 7th with the killing of Renee Good]) wondering why they aren’t being more vocal as well. It was such a “loud” statement, in fact, that the White House responded swiftly by posting a TikTok video of the Orange One making his cringeworthy “dance” maneuvers as Larsson’s currently viral single from 2015, “Lush Life,” plays in the background while the following sentences, mirroring the antithesis of what Larsson said, appear: “We love America First, we love deportations, we love cheap gas prices, we love a secure border, we love world peace, we love law and order, we love work not welfare, WE LOVE ICE and our law enforcement!” It’s the stuff that dystopian nightmares are made of, all spurred by a Swedish pop star.
One who then released a video for what now comes across as a satirical song, “Stateside.” This includes PinkPantheress singing, “You could be my American, ha, ha, ha, ha/Is it right? I don’t know, yet you’re taking my control” and “No one treats me this way, are all boys out here the same?” But then, at the one-minute-thirty-four-second mark, when Larsson shows up to deliver her verse, “Stateside” takes on an especially ironic tincture as she declares, “All those years I put in for the American dream/Is it worth all the work if you can’t be here with me?” An allusion to her longtime boyfriend, Lamin Holmén, who isn’t allowed into the U.S. because he is considered a “criminal” for smoking weed way back when. Hence, Larsson saying, “I love criminals.” Or at least, those considered as such by the U.S. government. Larsson went on to elaborate in her Instagram story, “We spend months and months apart every year because of a little spliff six years ago… I’m just saying there’s thousands and thousands of people who go to jail over nonviolent crimes like drugs, mostly Black and Brown people because of Ronald Reagan being racist in the 80s and fucking up communities. Idk about y’all but I’d rather have someone smoking crack on my couch than a fucking ICE agent ewwwwwwwwwww. They’re criminals too. Killing, kidnapping, violent, hateful ones.”
That said, it should be obvious that PinkPantheress and Larsson are not referring to anyone working for ICE when they say, “You could be my American hot, hot boy.” In the accompanying video, Rutherford (who also previously worked with Larsson on the videos for “Pretty Ugly” and “Midnight Sun”) opens on PinkPantheress posing as a mannequin behind a department store window (as though to tongue-in-cheekly flip the script on her being outside of a JCPenney in the original video) while a presumable “American boy” stares at her as he passes by (yes, it feels like a familiar plotline…specifically, from 1987’s Mannequin). After he leaves, PinkPantheress starts to move about freely before an abrupt cut to a man sitting inside a tartan-wallpapered room in front of a desk filled with accoutrements that one would assume makes him a tailor. PinkPantheress and a slew of boys (men?) then appear on the scene to start dancing in harmony in between close-ups on various “touristy things” of a British nature (for, in the end, Fancy That is about being British despite all the talk of going to the U.S. on “Stateside”).
At the fifty-five-second mark, Rutherford pans the camera out far enough to reveal another display window next to PinkPantheress’—one that showcases Larsson framed against a summery blue color palette in contrast to PinkPantheress’ “British red” one. Above PinkPantheress, a neon sign reads, “Fancy That,” while Larsson’s reads, “Midnight Sun” (as she continues to successfully promote her album of the same name). As the two then strike poses next to each other, Rutherford intercuts shots of the tartan room, along with PinkPantheress and Larsson standing side by side against a tartan backdrop in matching shirts that read, “Stateside”—paying homage to the airbrushed crop top that Larsson wears in the “Midnight Sun” video, which bears the same kind of vibrancy and graphics that would make Lisa Frank proud.
When Larsson is finally given her moment in the choreo spotlight, she delivers one of the uncanniest lines of all upon asking, “Who knew opening up would make me a headline?” It’s a lyric that would turn out to be more prescient than Larsson could have envisioned in recent days, with her contempt for American politics at war with her appreciation for erstwhile American ideals (not the capitalism kind). Though, of course, she’s not alone in these increasingly conflicting feelings about deigning to dip one’s toe in “Stateside.” Perhaps having to settle for sending a postcard (like one of the many that swirl around at the end of the video) from abroad instead.
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