The cinematic glam of the 1940’s can be easily seen in Rina Sawayama’s black and white video Bad Friend which has a touch of Humphrey Bogart’s ‘Casablanca’. But here there’s no romance, instead for these two friends their destructive behaviour is encouraged by one another – both being the bad friend. It’s finale ending with more violence than the three stooges could handle. The slapstick hits not missing their mark but landing with dead-on accuracy.
Transformed beyond recognition, Rina Sawayama enters the whisky-and-smoke filled bar as a man who’s obviously in the throes of depression, taking off his fedora hat while continuing to hang his head low. Clearly miserable, Sawayama fishes out a wedding ring kept safe/concealed in his breast pocket, but as he examines the ring and thinks of his marriage the chorus cuts in;
“I’m so good at crashing in
Making sparks and shit, but then
I’m a bad, I’m a bad, I’m a bad friend…”
And with this a drunken friend bangs into Sawayama, insisting that he drinks with him, despite Sawayama shaking his head. But peer pressure more than works at a low point in life, and soon more drinks are poured down the throat. There’s a gorgeous moment when Sawayama’s face is reflected upside down in a drink – indicating the level of drunkenness, whilst being a possible metaphor of hitting rock-bottom. But, as with most over-drinking, the laughter ends just as abruptly as it began – and from fast friends, these become faster enemies. They truly are bad friends.
The video, directed by Ali Kurr, continues the meaning of Sawayama’s Bad Friend, but takes the setting to a more forgotten past of film noir than the setting of 2012 – which Sawayama mentions in her lyric’s. At the video’s end Sawayama throws the hardest and final punches at her “friend,” in an act that truly ends their relationship. Although this is clearly fictional, in the lyrics Sawayama recalls a very real friendship that’s been lost, and of having closed themselves off – “So don’t ask me where I’ve been/Been avoiding everything” – relatable, it’s easy to see how we can all be bad friends, whilst having a few ourselves.
Debuting her first feature album in 2020 with SAWAYAMA, a follow up to her 2017 EP Rina, the artist continues a reflection of her personal life; from the effect of family, struggles of self-love, to exploring and living out a passion for music. Rina Sawayama’s vocals are not just impressive but backed by a music selection of the most eccentric tastes – 80s/90s pop, electronic, metal rock and remixed dance hits – nothing being off-limits and providing an album of tracks as highly varied as the ones before, while with just a whisper of their intro they’ll steal your breath away.
Other songs by Rina Sawayama we love:
- Catch Me In The Air (2022 – Hold The Girl)
- XS (Bree Runway Remix) (feat. Bree Runway) (2020 – single)
- Chosen Family (2020 – SAWAYAMA)
- Dynasty (2020 – SAWAYAMA)
- Fuck This World (Interlude) (2020 – SAWAYAMA)
- Snakeskin (2020 – SAWAYAMA)
- Who’s Gonna Save U Now? (2020 – SAWAYAMA)
- Cherry (2018 – single)
- Afterlife (2017 – RINA [EP])
Other artists you might like:
- Allie X
- Caroline Polachek
- Chloe x Halle
