Meghan Trainor's Gap Song

Meghan Trainor's first music video from her new album, "Thank You," is a far departure from her previous music videos. This, of course, is the video for "No," which is set in an abandoned factory with Trainor and her back-up dancers in tight-fitting black or dark work-clothes. The movements are more sensual as Trainor makes it known that she doesn't want any romantic prospect's attention right now – she's just having fun for herself.The music video for "Me Too" comes on the tailwinds of this with a return to Trainor's signiature bright colors but, importantly, it shows part of the process of the creation of the polished pastels which are (almost) omnipresent in Trainor's corpus. The lyrics of this song in combination with "No" are very much about Meghan Trainor thinking the world of herself, in a vein not unlike that of Guilhem IX's gap songs. "No" is about being sought after by others and "Me Too" is about being envied by others. The music video for "Me Too," however, helps keep this thematic track from moving into self-obsession with its silly visuals to accompany the lyrics. As Trainor sings about being a "sexy thing," she's brushing her teeth in her pyjamas, her going-out-top is a giraffe suit, and despite her proclamation that she "don't need nobody else," she is still goofing off with friends, softening the implication that she is a loner such a statement might make. The recording of Guilhem IX's melody as a contrafacture in a religious text shows us that his transformation from boastful to pious was successful (to a degree) with the public. Trainor's coupling of these lyrics with these images (and her follow-up of "No" with the music video for "Me Too") makes her boastfulness accessible. It is an empowering one for her and those of us who aren't her, too.