In case you somehow missed the memo, the industry’s leading Concrete Rose, Ashanti, has a new single out. It’s called “Never Should Have,” and it’s genuinely great.
And now, there’s an accompanying video! And it’s…well, it’s a video!
Ashanti turns the emotions on high in her new clip, donning various colorful dresses (House of Deréon could quite literally never) and trouncing about on an abandoned beach (too real), an abandoned road (too real) and laying out on top of some sort of mystical stone palace, not unlike the forgotten ruins that Nicole Scherzinger once desecrated with “Try With Me.”
The plot centers around a variety of random couples in crisis, in between masterfully awkward close-up shots of the “Foolish” chanteuse shedding tears. But what kind of crises? Uh, vague ones! From what I can gather from limited visual cues, it’s break up angst and #PregnancyProblems—AND GAYS IN TURMOIL, meaning that we can now add “Tireless LGBT Warrior” to Miss Douglas’ steadily growing CV. Praise her light!
But hardships soon come to pass as ‘Shanti chokes back the tears, sends her praises up the sky and sprinkles the ashes of Blu Cantrell‘s career into the sea.
Does anyone know what’s happening? I don’t know what’s happening. It all sort of looks like this was shot on a $40 budget for an Intro to Filmmaking course at DeVry University, and while the message is truly sincere, perhaps ‘Shanti never should have made this video.
But, hey—at least the song’s still good!
“Never Should Have” was released on March 26. (iTunes)