Katy Perry – “Never Worn White”

Katy Perry – “Never Worn White”

So Katy Perry is pregnant. She’s got a little baby Legolas in there. That’s the point of Perry’s video for her new song “Never Worn White.” The song is a dramatic piano-ballad love song for the actor Orlando Bloom, Perry’s fiancé. (They got engaged on Valentine’s Day.) The clip ends with Perry, standing in what appears to be one of the hallways in Cloud City from The Empire Strikes Back, caressing her belly. The song and the music video pretty much take a backseat to the dramatic reveal. So, uh, sorry for spoiling it.

Perry, an absolutely dominant hitmaker not that long ago, has been releasing a lot of singles lately. None of them have really caught on, despite some of them (“Never Really Over,” “365“) being quite good. “Never Worn White” is a breathy and relatively stripped-down ballad all about being nervous to get engaged, and it fits the trend of extremely famous people singing emotionally about the narratives that they’ve been living out in front of everyone. Selena Gomez, for instance, got her first #1 with the similarly structured “Lose You To Love Me.” That one was about post-heartbreak triumph, not blissful romantic happiness, but maybe Perry can tap into that same kind of thing here.

Perry co-wrote “Never Worn White” with a team of veteran pop professionals: Johan Carlsson, Jacob Kasher, John Ryan. Carlsson produced it. The video, directed by the duo J.A.C.K., is mostly Perry looking sincerely lovestruck, sometimes while sitting at the top of a big ol’ mountain of flowers. Last night, immediately after dropping the video, she tweeted, “omg so glad I don’t have to suck it in anymore.” Watch the clip below.

“Never Worn White” is out now on the streaming services. That kid is going to be a very pretty human being.

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