Beyoncé - Ring The Alarm Video

Send "Ring The Alarm" ringtone to your cell

"Ring The Alarm" Video Review

Beyonce has done a whole lot of things with her voice over the past nine years, but she’s never howled for blood. So "Ring the Alarm" registers first as shock, an unglued screech of rage and defiance, the last thing we’d expect from someone who’s worked like a machine to convince us that we love her. The song is on some irresistibly devious "Cry Me a River" shit -- first-rate tabloid-pop. Instead of brushing off Jay-Z’s rumored dalliance with Rihanna, she’s seized on it to launch her brand-new wronged-woman character. And like "Cry Me a River," it’s intended to announce Beyonce’s arrival as an artiste, to reveal new depths and nuances beneath the gorgeous surface she’s made a career out of showing.

But "Cry Me a River" dazzled on the strength of its symphonic complexity, while "Ring the Alarm" is an engine of simplistic fury. Everything about it is calculated for maximum neck-snap impact: siren wails, concussive drum-cracks, trebly and discordant synths. And Beyonce herself is either deeply pissed or unbelievably good at conveying the impression of being deeply pissed. It’s weirdly exciting to hear her magnificent voice being run through megaphone distorto-filters like she was, say, Al Jourgenson, and even more so to hear her turn that hegemonic roar into an accusatory yowl. "Alarm" is media shitstorm as music, but it’s hard to be mad at anything or anybody this mad.

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