The Chainsmokers feat. Halsey - Closer

The best thing I can say about this song is that I made a remarkable observation: This is a collaboration between the duo who made "#SELFIE", and a singer who did a highly questionable version of Justin Bieber's "Love Yourself" that essentially made it "F**k Yourself". I caught a glipse of the video recently and realised that Halsey looked familiar, in the hotel scenes at least, remarkably resembling one Victoria Chase from "Life Is Strange". If you've played at least the first episode of it (if you haven't, it's free to buy on all platforms and very good), perhaps the line of dialogue that you'll most recall is when she tells you to 'go f**k your selfie' (which makes sense in context). This also means I have to dock points because Halsey never taught me anything about daguerreotypes, the process which gave portraits a sharp, reflective style like a mirror. Now I'm totally stuck in the retro zone :(

In all seriousness, it's kind of remarkable that Halsey ends up being far from the worst thing about this song, although the ensuing profile advancement from it may prove its most testing impact. No, the problem lies almost solely on The Chainsmokers, who as you might know, have gone great lengths (17 inches innit?) to show their inner bro. It's a shame really. I was once prepared to defend "#SELFIE" whose retractors felt more le wrong generation-y than anything else, but I can no longer look past just how exploitative the song is to the opposite sex.

A problem that seems to come up in just about all their songs once I started to notice it. Put simply, they just cannot seem to write a female perspective that feels on level, they always seem to be in need of this greater man. I can (most of the time) appreciate that they're using their influence to push lesser known artists into the spotlight, but I wish it were done in a more dignified way.

"Closer" is after all, a story song, told through two perspectives, but it's the guy who comes off looking stronger in this match up. He's the one whose life was perfectly in order, while she was immensely taken by him and even has to remark how attractive he still is. He's the one who's badmouthing her friends, while she's the one who's broke and living by off whatever she can scrounge up. Oh and she was insane.

You can say it's a millennial romance anthem, and in that sense it glamourises a whole sort of image that I just cannot allign to*. The people in this song are just people I would not want anything to do with, and the song isn't framed in any significant way to support this feeling. It's just dumb, overdramatised emotions that will have no tangible impact on their lives 10 years down the track when they've travelled every other state and hooked up with half a dozen other partners, never learning anything. Such is life?

Oh and something about Andrew's complete incapability to sing, and how unsatisfying the 3-note Fischer-Price breakdown is. The Chainsmokers regularly have lousy breakdowns but woah this is a disaster.

*The shoehorned blink-182 reference really seals it for me. If there ever were a band I retain no emotional connection to despite growing up at just the right time to do so, and part of me gets bothered that blink-182 get all the promotion when their new album is just so lousy. A few months on and "Built This Pool" is like the only thing I can remember from it.