Y'know, say what you will about Miley Cyrus; at least you can definitively say that there's something out there, some twisted algorithm of madness only visible to her line of sight that inspires her music. With Selena, though? Two words: Cookie, and cutter.
I can't figure out what keeps drawing people to her music. Other than the aura of familiarity it gives off, there is seriously nothing that Gomez offers to the music scene. She's merely the Disney star that never grew up... well, the non-fictional one, anyway.
But has all that changed with her new dark and depressing single "The Heart Wants What It Wants"?
Well... it's progress!
Compared to her laughable hit single of last year, "Come & Get It", I guess anything would be. But I do honestly think that rudimentary details of actual emotions are starting to seep through. She still sounds like a horribly manufactured pop star, but I actually find her lyrical content to be a little better this time around.
When I heard the opening of this video, I admit I rolled my eyes a little. "Oh, look. That cliché," I thought. "What, am I supposed to connect with Selena because her video starts with a garbled clip of her voice during an interview where she gets all deeeep and philosoooophicaaaaal?"
But then I listened to what she had to say, and... wow. What she was saying actually mattered. This wasn't some gobbledygook bullshit about losing yourself or finding yourself or whatever; this was real emotion. Something I never expected from Selena freakin' Gomez.
And the song does hold up well to that opening. Selena plays the part of an obsessive girlfriend who knows that her boyfriend is bad news, but somehow can't find it in herself to turn away.
The bed's getting cold and you're not here
The future that we hold is so unclear
But I'm not alive until you call
And I'll bet the odds against it all
And to Selena's credit, even though she doesn't fully succeed in conveying that emotion through her vocals, I get the feeling that she is trying. However, the music does seem to do more of the work for her.
But this is still by far the best Selena Gomez song I've heard, so like I said, this is definitive progress for her as an artist. I hope to hear further progress as time goes by. Could be interesting. Taylor Swift won me over this year; maybe Gomez can do the same in 2015. Only time will tell.
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