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Tag: Miley Cyrus Something Beautiful deluxe

  • Miley Cyrus’ Something Beautiful Deluxe Likely Only Has Two Additional Songs On It Because One of Them Is Thirteen Minutes

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    Move over Taylor Swift and Lana Del Rey, there’s a new pop star in town with a track that’s somehow even longer than “All Too Well (Taylor’s Version)” and “Venice Bitch.” And it’s none other than Miley Cyrus with “Lockdown.” Even more clout-laden still is the fact that David Byrne has joined her on the song, which clocks in at thirteen minutes and thirty-one seconds. This now bumps up the length of the original (a.k.a. non-deluxe) version of Something Beautiful from fifty-two minutes and five seconds to sixty-nine minutes and twenty-five seconds. That makes a seventeen-minute, twenty-second difference. In other words, approximately the length of what Ariana Grande’s Eternal Sunshine went from (35:26) after becoming Eternal Sunshine Deluxe: Brighter Days Ahead (55:21). The latter featuring five new songs (because also counting the “extended” version of “intro [end of the world]” as six new songs feels inaccurate). Meaning that Miley achieved a “deluxe length” with just two tracks thanks to the robust duration of “Lockdown.”

    While some speculated that the track might be about the so-called lockdown that occurred during the pandemic (though it was hardly a “lockdown” in the U.S. compared to the more intense restrictions that other countries imposed), Cyrus’ lyrical motif is instead centered on the notion of a “secret” love. And, since “secrets” are a running theme of the two tracks that appear on the deluxe edition of Something Beautiful, it’s only right that she should mention that word again on “Lockdown,” singing, “I won’t lie, baby, you’re my secret/Oh, your love stays on lockdown.” A phrase not to be confused with what Kanye once said on 2008’s “Love Lockdown,” “So keep your love locked down/Your love locked down.” A.k.a. guard your heart and don’t open it to anyone. Cyrus, in contrast, is trying to keep her relationship both locked down and on lockdown—away from the prying eyes and opinions of others. So it is that she commences the song with the lyrics, “Oh, your love stays on lockdown/Can’t tell my friends, ‘cause they all talk now.” And what they’re likely to talk about is whether or not they “approve” of Cyrus’ romance.

    However, it doesn’t take David Byrne (who has been having quite a moment in terms of being embraced by female pop stars [/rockers, depending on who you ask] of a younger generation this year) long to weigh in on the matter from a supportive standpoint. A view that comes from a place of understanding for Cyrus’ situation—her desire to exist in a “love bubble,” as it were. Hence, “I don’t know if it’s day, I don’t know if it’s night/I don’t need to go out, I wanna stay inside/Come on over, love, and we’ll be lost and found/Come on over, love, and we can lock it down/Lock it down, down, down, down, down, down.” After Cyrus then delivers another round of the chorus, the song returns to its more experimental instrumental form. The one hinted at in the beginning, but that wasn’t quite “processed” by the listener due to how quickly Cyrus materialized with her vocals. But by the two-minute mark, the production comes into full focus.

    Amid the trippy horns and generally psychedelic aura (to that point, there is definitely something very Miley Cyrus & Her Dead Petz about “Lockdown”), Cyrus occasionally interjects with some minimal repetition of the same phrases. To create this transportive portion of the track—the part that takes up most of the thirteen minutes and thirty-one seconds—Cyrus clearly needed some co-production assistance. And she got it from Jonathan Rado, Maxx Morando (her still-current boyfriend), Max Taylor-Sheppard and Shawn Everett (with both Everett and Rado in particular working on most of the songs from Something Beautiful).

    The musical meandering of “Lockdown” changes tones and tinctures as the track goes on, eventually brought back to where it started around the ten-minute, forty-six-second mark, with Cyrus returning to the kind of vocal delivery that could actually be played on the radio (at least on an “indie” station) as she sings, “You bring out an animal feeling/Why’d you leave me waiting so long?/I’ve been drowning in your love beneath me/Drink my breath away ‘til it’s gone/Put me on your carousel, chandelier/Fairy tale, atmosphere/Marigold, fields of gold/Icon, centerfold/You’re the only one I chose/No one has to know, you know.” And so it is that Cyrus brings back the notion of “secrecy” into it, of keeping her “special relationship” away from anybody else to see, therefore judge (which is probably what would have made it a good song to play during Sex and the City’s “Secret Sex” episode, if only this single had existed at the time).

    Byrne then rejoins her to repeat his verse about not knowing if it’s day or night—this being a phrase that captures what it feels like to be caught in a kind of “sex haze” (a.k.a. honeymoon phase) with someone. Locked inside at all hours of the day because you’re still not sick of the other person (or the various orifices they have to offer). Of course, Byrne isn’t exactly referring to this, instead inviting his would-be lover over to join him in feeling lost together so they can, thus, be found (this echoing Addison Rae’s “Lost & Found” interlude on Addison, during which she repeats, “I lost myself and found myself again”).

    The length, “unwieldiness” and “incohesiveness” of the song all further point to what Cyrus suggested throughout interviews about Something Beautiful, which is that this might very well be her last attempt at bothering to write an album for the mainstream. Indeed, it’s clear she’s been gagging to go more full-tilt experimental for years (and yes, it all goes back to Miley Cyrus & Her Dead Petz). Even so, it’s also apparent that Cyrus continues to have a knack for creating “easily accessible” singles like “Secrets” (not to be confused with Madonna’s “Secret”), the first additional track on the deluxe version of Something Beautiful that helps listeners “ease in” more gently to the complexity of “Lockdown.”

    Or rather, “complexity” by the current standards of an “average” pop song (which scarcely clocks in at two minutes anymore). Luckily, Cyrus is still toeing the line between both “guises”: “experimental” and mainstream pop icon. Thereby making those who know and prefer her in the latter incarnation more amenable not just to her in the former incarnation, but also to the former genre itself.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Miley Cyrus Will Keep Your “Secrets” (So Long as She Can Do It in Haute Couture)

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    In a bid to remind people of what a still-underlooked masterpiece Something Beautiful is (in truth, among her best albums to date), Miley Cyrus has returned with a new single, “Secrets,” from the deluxe edition of the record. Perhaps unfortunately timing the release to coincide with the advent of Cardi B’s Am I the Drama? and Lola Young’s I’m Only F**king Myself, it’s possible that her new iteration of the album might get lost in the proverbial shuffle, but, hopefully, listeners will at least pay attention to the fact that “Secrets” exists, if not the fact that a deluxe album does. And that, more importantly, it’s Cyrus’ “peace offering” to her father, Billy Ray Cyrus (as in, the man that made her a nepo baby).

    That said, in captioning a clip of the video on her Instagram account, Cyrus was sure to say, “This song was written as a peace offering for someone I had lost for a time but always loved. In my experience, forgiveness and freedom are one and the same… This song is for my dad” (though, as alluded to, it’s as much for her as it is for him, because it means being free of the toxic emotions that come with resentment). Accordingly, the single, co-produced by Cyrus, Jonathan Rado, Shawn Everett and Michael Pollack, bears an extremely nostalgic sound—one that’s drenched in the vibe of 1980s-era Fleetwood Mac.

    So, naturally, why shouldn’t Cyrus have Lindsey Buckingham and Mick Fleetwood accompany her on the track (though, noticeably missing is Stevie Nicks—even if she seems to have reconciled her differences with Buckingham earlier this year)? Indeed, it’s their contributions that help make the song sound more distinctive and unique despite lyrics that are frequently ripe with banalities that have already been well-played. Namely, Cyrus’ assurance, “Anywhere you go, you know I’ll follow/I’ll follow anywhere you go.”

    This, of course, smacks of Peggy March’s “I Will Follow Him,” when she sings, “I will follow him/Follow him, wherever he may go.” Worse than that, it mimics The Calling’s only hit, “Wherever You Will Go,” when Alex Band promises, “I’ll go wherever you will go/Way up high or down low.” Regardless of Cyrus reemploying this cliché, she makes it all her own, especially with the haute couture-drenched visual that accompanies her earnest pledge. Fittingly dramatic in its presentation—while also embodying the aesthetic of one of Cyrus’ many high-fashion brand commercials/print ads of the moment (e.g., Gucci and Maison Margiela)—the newly “matured” singer roams an empty space while outfitted in an all-white getup (complete with the kind of headpiece Madonna was rocking at the 2021 VMAs afterparty), presumably Maison Margiela. And yes, she even has the audacity to insert a Katy Perry-coined phrase when she announces, “We’re chained to the rhythm.”

    But whatever baggage she was previously chained to when it came to her relationship with her father, Cyrus has decided to not only let it go, but to rebuild with this song. One that Billy Ray was so touched by that he even felt compelled to write of it on his Instagram account, “For my birthday, Miley gave me the gift of music and wrote me a song called ‘Secrets’ and got my favorite musicians Fleetwood Mac to play on it! I love you Mile.” And yes, it’s not lost on anyone that Cyrus has further layered the song’s weight and meaning by including these two heavy-hitting musicians from a previous generation. The intent being to “bridge the divide” by joining forces. Of course, that doesn’t mean that Lindsey or Mick were about to appear in the video with her.

    Instead, Cyrus carries the song all on her own in this regard, walking through an empty theater at the midpoint of the video in a perhaps even more dramatic ensemble, this one featuring a bejeweled black mask she wears while sitting down in one of the red fabric-upholstered seats. Slowly, she pulls the mask off, as though to symbolically mirror that she’s now decided to let down all her defenses when it comes to dealings with her father (would that Lana Del Rey could say the same about her mother). This echoing her surrender to vulnerability in the very first verse of the song (the verse that happens to contain the most original-sounding lyrics), “Secrets, I wanna keep your secrets/Like sunlight in the shadows/Like footsteps in the grass/I won’t ever break my promise/Like a songbird in the silence/Like stones against the glass.”

    This urging on Cyrus’ part for her father to fully grasp that he can trust her with things/information he might have previously been afraid to share (especially based on the reactions that Miley set a precedent with) is meant to be a sign of her growth. A show of newfound strength and resilience when it comes to handling family matters she previously couldn’t. In other words, the family matter pertaining her parents’ divorce in 2022. At the time, Cyrus heavily took sides with her mother, Tish, but, in the present, she’s learned to accept both parents’ choices and the individual lives they’re currently leading (with both having moved on to new partners).

    After lying down on the floor of the theater to sing, “Can I be your hero?/Call off all your forces/A white flag in the war” (an image and vocal timbre that recalls “End of the World,” itself a song written for her mother), Cyrus seems to purge something from within herself.

    So it is that she emerges from the theater bearing an aura that suggests she’s been “transformed,” with the marquee outside displaying the lyrics, “Anywhere You Go Know I’ll Follow” as though they’re a movie title. And, in the movie that’s been Cyrus’ life thus far, that little platitude hasn’t always been the case (except when it came to Liam Hemsworth—and we all saw how that turned out). If it is now, it’s only because Cyrus has gone through the emotional work to make it so. At least for select people in her orbit.

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    Genna Rivieccio

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