New York, New York, it was a helluva town. Some people still think it is, even want to go so far as to creating their own reality with regard to what they want to portray as a “regular happening” there. But we all know that “the norm” is not Pride Month, which is when St. Vincent perhaps very strategically chose to shoot her video for the repurposed and remixed song (sounds a lot like what Tove Lo just did with “Bitches“) “Fast Slow Disco” from her 2017 album, Masseduction (on which it appeared as “Slow Disco”).
As St. Vincent admitted of the reimagining of the track (in reference to Jack Antonoff co-producing Masseduction), “…but I swear to God, you know because Jack Antonoff’s bros with Taylor Swift because they work together a lot, and I feel like Taylor was like, ‘You should make this a pop song.'” Well, at least someone thinks Swift isn’t totally valueless (unlike Trent Reznor). So she did. And also added while being interviewed for Beats 1, “For me it was like, it’s such a homage to ‘Like A Prayer’-era Madonna.” She might have meant “Erotica.” For there is no era of Madonna more suited to writhing and grinding gay men in leather also loosely fawning over a “straight” woman than this. That the Erotica album also coincided with Madonna’s Sex book and a time in New York when the gay community was just starting to feel vaguely frisky again after the AIDS scare that dominated headlines and fear-mongering in the 80s also finds its correlation to a video filled with straps and O-rings. God, it makes one yearn for such false portrayals of devil-may-care behavior to be accurate during a time when the First Lady is wearing declarative jackets regarding her and her husband’s immunity to your pain. A time when the only devil-may-care sorts are the people that aren’t supposed to be: the president and his purchased wife.
So yes, it is rather nice to fall into the vortex of this video, inundated as it is with bare-chested, sweat-drenched men that all seem to be telepathically communicating to St. Vincent (and us) that maybe it will be okay (if we never leave the club so as to avoid knowledge of headlines of any kind). Featuring scenes that look like a combination of outtakes from season one of Sex and the City (the grittiest season–one specifically thinks of “Oh Come All Ye Faithful” when they’re at the Limelight before it got turned into a gym) and Steven Meisel’s private stash of Sex book photos, the video is just the shot of sex positivity that almost makes you want to attempt going to the West Village before you remember that you’ll just end up at A Salt and Battery packing your already fat ass with fish and chips thanks to the hot guy that may or may not still work there.
Instead, you can just live vicariously through St. Vincent, squirming in ecstasy as she crowd surfs and then eventually becomes one with the mass of bodies. It is as such that “Fast Slow Disco” is an ironic celebration of life considering its lyrics: “Am I thinking what everybody’s thinkin’? I’m so glad I came, but I can’t wait to leave.” Would that one could say the same about exiting the womb and joining life these days, so filled with Boschian spectacles of late as it is.
This video is great. I think the bit at the end is meant to link in with the lyrics
you mentioned about “an ironic celebration of life”. St. Vincent is having fun in the
club, but then at the end it all goes dark and she’s on her own (is she meant to be
having a “comedown” after all that hedonism?)
I was lucky enough to see St. Vincent in the Republic of Ireland when she came there a few years ago. She’s a fantastic, energetic live performer.