When he pull up, wanna pop my hood up

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Xmas presents for the world of pop, courtesy of Beyoncé! Not one but TWO new videos. 'Diva' - maybe the track I'm most addicted to on the album - features ridiculous sunglasses, a mermaid outfit and a more ghetto, more crunk (= better) version of the 'Single Ladies' dance routine. 'Halo' features a lot of soft-focus lighting.

BTW, one of the many awesome things about 'Diva': remember that line from 'Survivor', "you thought I wouldn't sell without you - sold nine million"? She's UPDATED THE SALES FIGURES Y'ALL: "Fifty million round the world and they said that I couldn't get it." Always at her best when focused on the cold, hard economics of a situation, that girl.

Comments

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

'Halo' is clearly the result of Beyoncé hearing 'Bleeding Love' and 'Umbrella' and shrieking "GET ME ONE OF THOSE" at her staff. Or, both of those in one song. Christina Milian's 'Us Against The World' (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEroN6hFJIs) and Cassie's 'Soldier 4 Your Love' (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYBfqTfsq8I) belong in this mini-genre which I am terming "cosmic declarative ryde-or-die epics" (though Cassie drags it back to her own introverted territory, inevitably).

'Diva' was the first song on Sasha Fierce that I couldn't stop jamming - really think B should do a version of every big hip-hop hit going, she clearly wants to. As with her 'In Da Club', it's amazing how much gravitational pull her voice has even when she's not doing much with it ("every radio in the world know me cuz that's where I be!"). Think my favourite moment in the video is between the dollar-bill fan and the...hypnotising movement of the fins on the mermaid outfit.