Yaeji does it again. After a night out in NYC, she asked herself, “If our current world is suffocating us, then what does the reality we wanna see actually look like?” Her answer turned out to be Dance Dance Revolution (or Pump It Up, the Korean dance game she grew up with, or a mix of both, because why not?). On her new single ddr, the revolution isn’t only about dancing. Yaeji still wants revolution, but she also wants community, safe spaces and a glass of water for everyone who’s been dancing their asses off.
Her last album, With A Hammer, featured her on the cover with a kawaii-looking white hammer and a defiant glance. The premise was a bit more aggressive. This time, she’s back with revolutionary ideas, but toned down. The video for ddr shows her on the metro, where everything seems a bit out of place, even Yaeji. At some point, she decides it’s a good idea to follow a complete stranger to a party to find the safe space she’s been craving all along. It looks a bit like she’s found the Fight Club basement, but instead of punches to relieve everyday stress, there’s a dance-off on a Pump It Up dance pad.
Her voice stays whispery even as the beat drops harder and harder, inviting everyone who isn’t in that basement (that means you and me) to dance the world away, as any hedonistic revolutionary would. The lyrics are demanding, like the game’s rules. Dance, left, right, left, right. For all their imperatives, the lyrics feel like an invitation to a really good party thrown by really cool people.
Her roots and her identity as the daughter of immigrant parents and as someone who has lived between New York, South Korea, China and Japan are clear from the very beginning, when we see someone playing on a Pump It Up machine, the Korean arcade game the singer used to play as a kid. The mix of Eastern and Western culture that runs throughout her career is still important, maybe more than ever, if we really want a safe space for everyone.
By the end of the video, Yaeji is asleep on the shoulder of the green-haired person she followed in the first place. So was it all a dream of something different? A dance-dance utopia? Or, since the windows reflect the morning sun, are they just coming back from the party? We can’t be sure, but what we can do is enjoy the beat, dance our troubles away and maybe start plotting the next (dance, dance) revolution.