After the musical vibe established by the Tame Impala (a.k.a. Kevin Parker)-produced “Houdini,” Dua Lipa persists in giving us a sonic sample of what her third album will be like. Once again co-produced by Kevin Parker and Danny L Harle (known for his work with Caroline Polachek), “Training Season” continues the 70s psychedelic motif of “Houdini” with perhaps even more attitude. Indeed, the song was reportedly inspired by a slew of middling dates that made Lipa realize such truisms as, “Don’t wanna have to teach you how to love me right/I hope it hits me like an arrow/Someone with some potential/Is it too much to ask for, who understands?”
The answer, based on the clientele she’s endured in the past, is a resounding yes. It is too much to ask for (particularly now, when the chicness of polyamory has given men even more incentive to flit around like little birds). And it’s a question that Sheryl Crow effectively demanded long ago on her 1994 single, “Strong Enough,” during which she sings, “I’d be the last to help you understand/Are you strong enough to be my man?” There are other portions of the track that also mirror Lipa’s frustration with the landscape of available men (though, in Crow’s case, she seems to be addressing just one man in particular), namely when Crow laments, “Nothing’s true and nothing’s right/So let me be alone tonight/‘Cause you can’t change the way I am/Are you strong enough to be my man?” What Lipa rues, however, isn’t that she can’t change, but that none of the men around her are capable of doing so…at least not without needing to be, that’s right, trained. And, obviously, Lipa is so over that at this stage in her life.
To that end, she diverges from Crow urging, “Lie to me/I promise I’ll believe/Lie to me/But please don’t leave.” In contrast, Lipa would urge her mediocre suitors to bugger right off. Because, as she states quite plainly, “Need someone to hold me close/Deeper than I’ve ever known/Whose love feels like a rodeo/Knows just how to take control/When I’m vulnerable He’s straight talking to my soul/(If that ain’t you, then let me know, yeah)/Conversation overload.” The rodeo theme is something Lipa glommed onto long before Beyoncé came along to graft the “ghetto fabulous cowgirl” look from Madonna’s Music era. In fact, it’s an aesthetic she acknowledged in the 2021 video for Future Nostalgia’s “Love Again.”
Rodeo or not, though, based on Lipa’s unending assortment of bland (not just blind) dates at the coffee shop in the accompanying video directed by Vincent Haycock (known mostly for directing Lana Del Rey’s “West Coast,” as well as numerous videos for Florence + the Machine), there is no such “conversation overload” to be had. And if there is, it’s certainly not anything of a scintillating variety.
To underscore that grim dating reality, Lipa opens the video with a series of apologetic messages on her phone’s answering machine (again emphasizing that she’s in a retro mood) from various fuckboys who have bored her in the past. That she’s posted up in a date setting—the proverbial coffee shop—that is known for being the “safe approach” to first or blind dates only amplifies the general lack of expectation she has for any of these gits. And there’s quite a large lot of them as the video progresses, whether huddled outside staring at her through the window like she’s an animal in a zoo (clearly a fame metaphor), ogling her from inside the cafe or generally peacocking around each other as they vie for Lipa’s attention.
Alas, none of them can seem to hold her interest for very long, prompting her to head to the bathroom at one point to languidly reapply her lipstick. If anyone else can relate to Lindsay Lohan as Elizabeth Taylor screaming, “I’m bored! I’m so bored!,” it’s Dua Lipa in this video. Even so, she keeps staying at the coffee shop, hoping that even just one of these suitors might be strong (and interesting) enough to be her man as they all start to swirl around her like rabid, wild animals.
To her advantage, she’s accustomed to such frenzy. To her dismay, none of the blokes can deliver even a modicum of what she’s looking for. Hence, her automated outbox message recording at the end of the video declaring, “The mailbox is full and cannot accept any messages at this time. Goodbye.”
[…] Genna Rivieccio Source link […]