Music Mondays: Sia "Elastic Heart"

Chances are, you saw this video the moment it was released last week. It was pretty much everywhere, and judging by the views in just 5 days... this probably isn't new to anyone. However! The brilliant Sia and her song "Chandelier" were the first Music Mondays selection for this blog, and I thought it only appropriate to include its sequel of sorts. Sia's new video for her song "Elastic Heart" is spellbinding. It features young Maddie Ziegler, the little sprite who gave a tour de force performance in the "Chandelier" video, now paired alongside actor Shia LaBeouf.

Immediately people made comments about this video as only rabid pontificaters online can about how "inappropriate" this video is, a young girl dancing with an older man. I find this so preposterous (and so does The Guardian is this wonderful article), but it's not a fight that even needs to happen. Really, you can't look at either of them as themselves. Maddie has been acting as Sia's doppelganger for some time now, and if anyone took 5 seconds to read about Sia's history, you would see the significance of this video immediately. Addiction, loss, abuse, and an inability to cope and move on. It's touching and brilliant, and I wanted to add to the masses sharing it by featuring it here today.

This song is wonderful, as is the video. I hope Sia continues this trend and releases videos for other songs off of her 1000 Forms of Fear album, one of my favorites released last year.

What are your thoughts on this video? Do you find anything wrong with it?

Artist: Sia
Song: "Elastic Heart" | download | stream
Album: 1000 Forms of Fear
Choreography by: Ryan Heffington
Featuring: Maddie Ziegler & Shia LaBeouf