Katy Perry's "Woman's World": How Did It Come To This?
"You better celebrate, 'cause baby we ain't going away."
Unfortunately, for Katy Perry and her team, Thursday's release of her hotly anticipated new single, "Woman's World," is proving to be no reason to celebrate.
After just three days, the track – publicized as a female empowerment anthem – is being heavily criticized and bashed for the blatant hypocrisy behind its production. Dr. Luke (a.k.a. Lukasz Gottwald), credited as a collaborator on the song, is the same Dr. Luke who faced sexual assault allegations in 2014 when fellow pop star Kesha publicly came out to accuse the successful writer-producer of abuse. (He has since denied everything.)
However, even if it didn't have the stench of controversy surrounding it, "Woman's World" (and its accompanying music video) looks and sounds like an item from a 2012 time capsule. Frankly, it's not good. By 2024 standards, everything about it screams "written and produced by AI," even though four out of its six writers are men (marinate on that for a second). The lyrics do nothing to fill out the hollow and soulless production, and the visuals (ironically?) seem orchestrated for the male gaze despite being directed by fashion photographer Charlotte Rutherford. And what's with the shot of that bedazzled vagina dangling from a rearview mirror? Is it implying only real women have certain reproductive organs? Hmmm... Additionally, the cameos of certain TikTok stars seem pandering – a desperate attempt to remain relevant.
In an era where pop audiences are responding well to the more specific, introspective, and personal, "Woman's World" comes off as vapid, careless, and trite.
And I'm not alone in these thoughts.
The Guardian calls it a “dated attempt at writing a feminist anthem about how women really can have it all.” Dazed says "it feels reductive" and "sounds like it was designed by a committee in a boardroom at Capitol Records whose sole objective was a sync on RuPaul's Drag Race." And Louis Virtel, a writer on Jimmy Kimmel Live and co-host of the podcast Keep It, recently DMed me with his response: "I can't believe how nothing this song is."
After seeing diminishing returns on her previous releases (Witness and Smile came and went with little fanfare), and now faced with this recent letdown, I think we need to have a larger conversation about the evolution of Katy Perry as a pop star. We have to ask ourselves: HOW DID SHE GET HERE? How did it come to this?
Let's consider the following:
- She spent the last five years as a judge on American Idol and two years in a Vegas residency singing alongside a giant toilet and anthropomorphic poop on stage. Did this keep her out of the pop loop? Does she not realize where we are as a pop nation?
- The photo of her posing with a Cybertruck several months ago, thanking Elon Musk, did nothing for her reputation. Does she need better optics leading up to new projects? Does she and her team need a lesson in tone deafness?
- Dropping a new single in a crowded season dominated by compelling new female artists like Sabrina Carpenter ("Espresso") and Chappell Roan (every track on The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess) is probably not the best tactic. But is it really all in the timing? A bad single is a bad single, right?
- Last year, she sold her entire catalog (from 2008's One of the Boys to 2020's Smile) for $225 million. Does she not care about her output from here on out? Is this new era of hers just a cash grab...or representative of something else?
- Who helps her make these decisions? Who is she surrounding herself with?
- And...what do all these reactions say about us as a pop fan collective?
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