On the one hand, the idea that a guy is amenable to being “taught” the tricks of the tongue trade when it comes to pussy licking is seemingly, on the surface, a positive, reassuring thing, on the other, it seems to indicate an inherent inability to comprehend this “arcane” temple that woman is built upon. And it’s the concept that serves as the basis to Tove Lo’s video for a remix of “Bitches,” off of 2017’s fittingly titled Blue Lips.
Opening with a “straight” couple, Alex (Paul W. Downs a.k.a. Trey from Broad City, always willing to be subjugated) and Lingretta (Jessy Hodges), walking down the street, Alex whines, “Do we really need to do this?” Lingretta whines back, “This is important to me.”
So they enter the “Tove Love Center,” where Tove Lo and her “associates” await to help remedy some long-standing issues in the relationship. Explaining to the others, “Today we have Alex and Lingretta. They’ve been together four years and she made the appointment,” it’s already clear she sees Alex as ultimately inutile. Knows that he can never understand the innerworkings of a genital that requires empathy to operate.
Observing Alex as he licks his teeth while unaware of being already viewed like a specimen, the onlookers, Elliphant, ALMA, Charli XCX and Icona Pop (for that extra Swedish flourish), are instantly aware that they’re going to have their work cut out for them. And that it might not even be worth it when “bitches” can use each other just as readily as a man, but at least possess the expert knowledge of how to go down where life begins.
Appraising the girth and length of his tongue with her own version of a tongue depressor, Charli takes a long, hard look inside Alex’s mouth to see that she hasn’t got a lot to work with. With both members of the couple in bondage collars, Tove Lo pulls them along in her dungeon of combined pleasure and pain to help better instruct Alex on how to deliver the former.
That Tove Lo has adopted the same sort of machismo a man is generally attributed with having as she declares, “Bitches I don’t trust ’em, but they give me what I want for the night,” speaks to her ownership of bisexuality in a far more subversive and enlightened way than Rita Ora’s “Girls” (which also features Charli XCX, who is clearly making her rounds on the lesbian-centric scene). For unlike the latter, Tove Lo isn’t speaking of her pussy love in a way that suggests she’s into it solely for the fact that she’s drunk or otherwise drugged, but that she truly enjoys giving what she gets…down there. However, it’s Elliphant who says it best with her own re-definement of Latrice Royale’s acronym for BITCH: “B is for balance, I for intelligence/T stands for tough, trouble, truly terrific/C for courage, H, bitch, holy…/I’m a free-headed goddess from the full moon land/Venus hit the bong, gon’ sing it straight/We tough it out, we stand strong in the storm/We don’t back down, we don’t take shit no more…/It’s a new day of bitches that no man can tame.” No, instead the man that remains is a little too tame, most especially in the boudoir. Hence, Alex’s need for this “hands-on” form of tutelage. And it does further broach the subject of what purpose a man really serves in a matriarchy if he’s not even–on average–an adequate bestower of orgasms. At the very least, in a patriarchy, a man can, if nothing else, ogle his prey. Women don’t generally play that card thanks to being cursed with too much of a cerebral notion of the carnal. Then again, Tove Lo shows us that carnality is something that women can shine in as well, especially once they find someone worthy of “the source of all life.”
Drinking shots to loosen his inhibition as much as his tongue muscles, Tove Lo eventually sits before Alex and the neon backdrops to show him how to whip his tongue about in the most “potent” ways. His form is disappointing and she smacks him across the face to ensure the Pavlovian response she wants. Mercifully, for even the most patient of teachers have their limit, the alarm sounds for lunch, and Tove Lo and her cohorts are permitted the luxury of eating sushi (how strategic). Meanwhile, Alex and Lingretta wait in the cage next to them, just grateful to be fed the unwanted avocado rolls.
After the break, it’s a new session of learning through watching porn and having their mouths crammed with food/what have you in order to condition the boca’s ability to hold a certain capacity (because if anyone gives head well, there should be quite a load at the finale). By the end, it’s the girls watching Alex execute what he’s learned on Lingretta, the former still automatically pleased at the first signs of “ecstasy,” forcing the others to shove his face back down where it belongs–for his work is nowhere near done.
But, eventually, their intensive course must come to an end, and, once outside, Alex asks, “Wanna go home and practice what we learned?” Lingretta rebuffs, “Um…I think I’m gonna leave…you. And go back there.” It certainly accents the point of a matriarchal system not really having a purpose for men–or, to put it more bluntly, the sort of men that exist now: flaccid in tongue, personality and panisse. As though to bow to his own uselessness, Alex nods, “I totally get that…and you know what, if you ever need a couch moved or something…please call.” So there you have it, if nothing else, women can use men for moving furniture in the future. That they’ll probably just sit on afterward to play their video games.
