"Two muses, one artist in love". This is the basic plot of French luxury house KENZO's 2018 Spring/Summer campaign film: a seamless blend of fashion, cinema, and music. Drawing inspiration from “two historic muses”: contemporary composer Ryuichi Sakamoto (his 2017 album Async recently wowed critics) and noted 1970s model Sayoko Yamaguchi, it features a fashion photographer (Dirty Beaches’ Alex Zhang Hungtai) falling in turbulent love with two models (Jessica Henwick and Kiko Mizuhara). The 9-minute film was directed by Ana Lily Amirpour (A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night), who artfully presents the collection's vibrant sartorial highlights in the setting of a photoshoot and a karaoke lounge.
The film is not a music video, but it heavily relies on “YO! MY SAINT" - the original song composed by Yeah Yeah Yeahs frontwoman Karen O. Back in 2003, O revealed to Australia's Triple J Radio that she had first reacted to PSY's breakthrough hit "Gangnam Style" with happy tears: "I'm half-Korean and all my life I've been waiting for Korea to be on the [musical] radar". The indie rock stalwart looked eastwards herself for artistic inspiration for this collaboration: "For the music, I immediately wanted to do melodramatic and romantic and with lots of yearning and high stakes—all the good stuff that’s in any Korean soap opera".
O cited Shin Jung Hyun, who she described as the “Korean psychedelic godfather of soul", as a sonic inspiration for the track. Characterized by searing heartbreak and yearning, it sets up a passionate dialogue between O and English soul singer Michael Kiwanuka. Romance is couched as a life-or-death affair, with Kiwanuka singing poignantly "Don't you tell another lie/Don't you tell another truth/ My heart, it isn't bulletproof/ From visions of you' and O responding dramatically with 'The perfect crime that I'll commit/ Is loving you despite all of it'. The operatic tensions dissolve in the second half of the song, a plaintive lullaby that carves out serenity after the storm: 'Don't you know my eyes, my eyes/ They'll see you blue/ In blue/ My one and only'. The theme of desire is maintained throughout, but the song's erratic shifts in intensity, pace, register, and sentiment point towards the sheer unpredictability of the endeavor.
