Slayyyter DANCE…

To those who would try to say that Kesha never had any influence, one need only look either to Reneé Rapp’s undying devotion or to Slayyyter’s latest single from her upcoming album, WOR$T GIRL IN AMERICA. Note the dollar sign for an “S” that once also took up residence in Kesha’s mononym during the early 2010s. And, considering that Slayyyter was an opener during the U.S. dates of Kesha’s Tits Out Tour, her appreciation for the pop icon is surely undoubted. So no wonder Kesha’s presence is felt throughout the video for “DANCE…,” which marks the fourth offering from Slayyyter’s upcoming album following “BEAT UP CHANEL$,” “CANNIBALISM!” (not to be confused with Kesha’s “Cannibal”) and “CRANK.” Like the others, “DANCE…,” too, offers up some memorably “trashy chic” visuals and thumping basslines. Except, in this particular video, directed once again by Slayyyter herself, the narrative is less about being trashily fabulous and more about adhering to the message Cyndi Lauper once conveyed: girls just want to have fun.

To that point, Lauper sings early on during her signature track, “The phone rings in the middle of the night/My father yells, ‘What you gonna do with your life?’” This after Lauper already mentioned in the first verse that she “[came] home in the morning light.” Slayyyter tries to come home slightly earlier than that at the beginning of the “DANCE…” video, attempting, more than somewhat foolishly, to open the door to her house only to find that (quelle surprise) it’s locked. It’s then that she slinks all sneakily over to her bedroom window (which is conveniently located on the ground floor as it’s a one-story house), crawls in and makes her way to the kitchen. That her bedroom is decorated in “girlie” décor (complete with a merry-go-round-themed snow globe and a giant bunny stuffed animal) is belied by the empty beer bottle—(presumably) one of many on her dresser. This indicating that any trace of the “Daddy’s girl” that might have existed is now long gone. Not that the patriarchal figure that Slayyyter goes up against in the video seems as if he could ever have a “soft spot” for anyone, let alone his own daughter. And he appears capable of doing far more ominous things than merely asking what she’s gonna do with her life.

So it is that, as Slayyyter approaches the kitchen to open the refrigerator, an intercut scene of blood being mopped up is shown—along with a brief flash of the dolls in her room (as if to indicate the “little girl” is still somewhere inside). Then, as she’s trying to pull another beer out of the fridge, her creepy-looking father—wearing a wife beater, “Mark David Chapman glasses” and all—materializes behind the door. Subsequently, it takes no time for this hostile patriarch to start laying into Slayyyter, no doubt for her “poor life choices” a.k.a. love of partying and late-night life. And no, she certainly isn’t echoing the Lauper lyric that assures, “Oh, Daddy dear, you know you’re still number one.” Instead, the exchange between Slayyyter and her “Daddy dear” is one that visually represents the lines in the first verse of “DANCE…” that go, “I’m real quiet when you run your mouth,” along with, “I kinda hate you, but/It doesn’t matter, let me dance/You seem so miserable, it doesn’t matter, let me dance.”

In order to ensure that he will, in fact, “let” her dance (among other things), Slayyyter then runs away from him and back into her room where, naturally, she has a shotgun on hand (she being such an exemplar of the “new Americana,” as it were). What’s more, the instant she pulls the trigger, the scene then instantly cuts to a tiara-wearing Slayyyter looking much freer and less burdened than before, declaring her own independence, in a way, as she holds a sparkler in her hand and fireworks go off behind her in the background (in visuals that recall the same ones that occur in Slayyyter’s Kesha-meets-Lana Del Rey-coded video for “BEAT UP CHANEL$”—because, who knows, the videos were probably made at the same time). And as the Valley Girl-produced bassline continues to thump in the background, much of the musical sound recalls what Kim Petras achieved with 2019’s “mixtape” (which really just feels like a right proper album), Turn Off the Light. You know, before she decided to go corporate and sign with Republic Records (and then beg to be dropped from said label because of how ineffectual it’s been for her autonomy, de facto her career—though Kesha, incidentally, was quite supportive of Petras’ “rebellion” despite the latter so frequently working with Dr. Luke).

As for Slayyyter, even her steadfast “indie-ness” has come to an end with this third album, which marks her own major label debut after signing with Columbia. Even so, the visuals that have accompanied WOR$T GIRL IN AMERICA thus far have been reassuring in terms of Slayyyter remaining true to her own artistic vision. Particularly as she appears in a scene wearing ribbons (as in, the kind one gets as an award) as part of her bikini top and bottom. This interconnecting to a scene from the “CRANK” video when she sits in her room holding a trophy and wearing a tiara and a pink ribbon that reads “Worst Girl in America.” Indeed, “DANCE…” is very much a part of the “universe” that Slayyyter has created with this set of videos. But what makes “DANCE…” stand out is that it finds her wielding what can only be described as “Keshacore” at its most overt. Particularly during the scenes when she’s on a dance floor (that itself harkens back to the kind shown in Madonna’s “Ray of Light” video toward the end) wearing a sparkly American flag bikini bottom.

Granted, the scenes of Slayyyter additionally carrying a garbage bag that’s implied to be the remains of her overbearing/abusive patriarch are probably farther than Kesha would go in one of her own videos (with this “body disposal” allusion also heightening the backbeat’s slightly sinister feel). In other moments, Slayyyter’s face is positioned in such a way as to truly look like a dead ringer for Kesha, including the moments when she sits in an empty bathtub wearing a flamingo “headdress.” And then there’s the image of her standing in front of a graffito of a dollar sign with a circle around it, also harkening back to the “S” in Kesha’s name that was once presented as “$.” Or the time she sits in front of a deer head that’s mounted to the wall, which can be argued as an unintentional allusion to Kesha sitting in front of James Van Der Beek’s mounted head in the video for “Blow” (a single that opens with her commanding, “Dance!”—yet another connection to Slayyyter’s “DANCE…”).

As the video draws to a close, it’s Britney Spears that Slayyyter appears to be channeling as “rain” pours down onto her dance floor (and some blood, too), giving her the same kind of “wet look” that Spears had during her performance of “…Baby One More Time” during the Dream Within a Dream Tour. But Kesha remains “the reference” in another all too brief scene of Slayyyter perched atop a carousel horse planted in the front yard of her house. This radiating the kind of playful “Americana trashball” vibe that Kesha has exuded since the days before indie sleaze had a name. And with “DANCE…,” Slayyyter is continuing the tradition of not only Kesha’s “aesthetic,” but her unique ability to serve as a pied piper of the dance floor.