What Ariana Grande's New Single"We Can't Be Friends" Actually Means
Her latest studio album was inspired by the heartbreaking 2004 film starring Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet.
Ariana Grande is living her Clementine dream and starring in a remake of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind — well, kind of.
On Friday, March 8, the former The Voice Coach released her seventh studio album, Eternal Sunshine, referencing the Oscar-winning 2004 film, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, directed by Michel Gondry, and starring Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet. The heartbreaking movie's inspiration is even more apparent in the new music video for the album's second single, "We Can't Be Friends (Wait for Your Love)."
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On the Robyn-esque melancholic dance bop Grande sings about the end of a relationship, and realizing how she won't even be able to continue a friendship with her former partner since she can't be her true self around them.
"I didn’t think you’d understand me/ How could you ever even try?/ I don’t wanna tiptoe, but I don’t wanna hide/ But I don’t wanna feed this monstrous fire/ Just wanna let this story die/ And I’ll be alright," she sings in the first verse, ending it with a glimmer of hope.
What Ariana Grande's "We Can't Be Friends" means
Eternal Sunshine is Grande's first album since her divorce in summer 2023, and there are hints of the relationship all over the collection of songs.
In an interview with Apple Music's Zane Lowe, he said the "We Can't Be Friends" was a "classic, emotive dance floor moment." When Lowe asked Grande how the track fits into the concept of the album, Grande said it fits "in a different way for me than it does for most of my friends and most of my family and people who have listened."
"They all sort of interpret it a little bit differently which I love about that song because I think it can be applied to any kind of relationship," she continued. "Especially when you se the video you'll understand the importance of it. The video is the album in a video."
The music video by Christian Breslaur, who also directed the "Yes, and?" video, shows Grande signing up for a memory-wiping procedure, like the one in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, so she can forget her ex, who is played by Dahmer's Evan Peters. The "We Can't Be Friends" video then recreates some of the film's most iconic scenes, and even adds the birthday cake kiss scene from the '80s teen classic, Sixteen Candles.
“I think the movie is so beloved because so many people can relate to knowing that something isn't right, but loving so much, and wanting to stay, and wanting to figure it out, and that cycle that can happen in the film," Grande told Lowe when asked about Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. "I think that's why the film is so beloved. It's because so many people can relate to it, and I think it kind of fell into place that these songs had little tidbits of that theme. I just felt really inspired by it.”
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Grab your shades because Grande will be bringing some Eternal Sunshine to Saturday Night Live as the show's musical guest, on March 9.
