In times of turmoil, it's great that Katy Perry has stepped up to the plate and is keeping humanity aware of what the real issues are in the world. It doesn't matter that none of them (white nationalism, climate change) are explicitly named, just as long as we know that something's wrong. "Chained to the Rhythm" was already a new phase for Perry, but its video truly reveals the song as the disco version of Black Mirror, a Balearic Banksy if you will.Perry spends the video taking part in a cheerfully pastel, 50s Americana-themed amusement park where people get launched out of roller coasters to their painful deaths and eat mushroom cloud-shaped cotton candy. The "E.T." video touched on this Fallout/Bioshock-esque meeting of horror and art deco, but because Katy Perry never half-asses anything, she's gone full-bore with the retro-apocalypse vibes here. When Perry ceases to dance along at the end and stares at the viewer with the concerned conviction of someone who just finished reading The Feminine Mystique, a question is presented. Will you ever be as woke as she is?Phil thinks Muse did this whole shtick better. Follow or slander him on Twitter.
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