Bleedin' Frida

One of my favorite guilty-pleasure pop songs of recent vintage is Leona Lewis' "Bleeding Love." It always amuses me when a song with such morbid and disturbing lyrics becomes a mainstream hit... and I'm not trying to imply that that's a bad thing, since I love over-the-top music (opera, Broadway, girl-group melodrama, The Decemberists).

So, well, maybe I have more of a taste for the macabre than the average person does, but I am very disappointed in the two music videos Lewis taped for "Bleeding Love"--they're so tame! Not a splash of blood anywhere to be found! In the UK version, Lewis writhes around in a jeweled gown, her sultry eyes an incongruous fit with her sobbing vocals; in the US version, her boyfriend leaves her and she's sad, but it doesn't come near the crazy, obsessive, bleeding love described in the lyrics.

Personally, after seeing the Frida Kahlo exhibit last month, I think the music video should have gone for a Kahlo-inspired aesthetic:


"My heart's crippled by the vein that I keep on closing / You cut me open / And I keep bleeding / I keep, keep bleeding love" indeed.