“1000×” (pronounced “a thousand times”) is a single by Australian singer-songwriter Jarryd James featuring New Zealand indie pop group, Broods. It was released on 17 June 2016.
Even if I’m leaving you at the door
Even when I know that you’re never lonely
Harder than imagined
Harder when it’s cold
Even when I’m playing in the fire
Even when I’m doing it for all my life
Harder than imagined
Harder when I let it go
Tell me that love is enough
The seas will be parted for us
Tell me that love is, ooh
In another lifetime
I would never change my mind
I would do it again
Ooh, a thousand times
Just to let you in here
Where you make me lose my mind
In another life I’d do it all again a thousand times
Never would I ever let my love escape you
Never keep you from the promises I gave you
Further than imagined
Further than we’ve ever known
Directed by Sia and Daniel Askill and choreographed by Ryan Heffington, the video stars Maddie Ziegler, the young dancer who also brought Sia’s visions to life in videos for “Chandelier,” “Elastic Heart,” “Cheap Thrills” and “Big Girls Cry.”
The clip starts on a black screen with the words #WEAREYOURCHILDREN printed across. Then, we see a crying Ziegler wiping paint under her eyes, as if crying rainbow tears, or perhaps applying warpaint for battle. A large group of kids lies on the ground below her, motionless, and she begins screaming (though we don’t hear her), urging the kids to get up.
Once the music starts, the group begins moving in unison, with Maddie leading the charge. Attitude reports that the children represent the victims killed in the deadliest mass shooting in America’s history ― “49 dancers for 49 lives lost,” as the magazine put it. With lyrics like, “Don’t give up, I won’t give up / Don’t give up, no no no” and “Running out of breath but I / oh I I got stamina,” it’s hard not to draw those parallels.
The kids dance through an old house, eventually coming together as one group. They jump up and down, moving together as a single entity (much like individuals would at a club as music blares through the speakers) before collapsing to the ground, leaving behind the haunting visual of bodies on the floor.
Writers from numerous media outlets, including E! Online, Cosmopolitan, Variety, People magazine, concluded that the video was a tribute to the victims of the 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting. The video opens with a low drone and cuts between shots of a fraught Maddie Ziegler smearing rainbow colors on her cheeks. She frees 48 other young people trapped in a cage (49 being the number of people killed in the shooting); their freedom is shortlived, however. Later, a wall is seen riddled with bullet holes as everyone falls to the ground, and tears stream down Ziegler’s face. Kornhaber wrote:
Absent of any social context, it’s all striking and beautiful and ineffably sad. With the knowledge that it was inspired by queer youths and friends gunned down in the act of coming together and enjoying themselves, it becomes almost unbearably poignant. Sia keeps singing about having stamina; Kendrick Lamar’s verse, omitted from the video, is all about surviving adversity and haters. What’s so potent about the video—and so specifically awful about this massacre—is that its subjects do seem to have struggled and triumphed to find the freedom to flip out together, and they are still cut down. It’s bookended by Ziegler crying: As is appropriate, there’s no take-home moral to make what happened seem okay.
Faye Wong (born 8 August 1969) is a Chinese singer-songwriter and actress, often referred to as a “diva” (Chinese: 天后; literally: “Heavenly Queen”) in Chinese-language media. Born in Beijing, she moved to British Hong Kong in 1987 and came to public attention in the early 1990s by singing ballads in Cantonese.
Tian Kong (天空), known as Sky in the English-speaking world, is the ninth studio album (her second album in Mandarin) recorded by her when she was based in Hong Kong.
It was released 22 years ago, on 10 November 1994. I was still a schoolboy at that time.
Don’t think sorry’s easily said
Don’t try turning tables instead
You’ve taken lots of chances before
But I ain’t gonna give any more
Don’t ask me
That’s how it goes
‘Cause part of me knows what you’re thinking…
Don’t say words you’re gonna regret
Don’t let the fire rush to your head
I’ve heard the accusation before
And I ain’t gonna take any more
Believe me
The sun in your eyes
Made some of the lies worth believing
I am the eye in the sky
Looking at you
I can read your mind
I am the maker of rules
Dealing with fools
I can cheat you blind
And I don’t need to see any more
To know that I can read your mind, I can read your mind
Don’t leave false illusions behind
Don’t cry ’cause I ain’t changing my mind
So find another fool like before
‘Cause I ain’t gonna live anymore believing
Some of the lies while all of the signs are deceiving
Roof is falling let me love falling I just know
Roof is falling let me love me
Gold up in my, gold up in my teeth (Gold up, gold up in my teeth)
Don’t care what you say to me, I’m a bite your feelings out (Gold up in my teeth)
I missed you in the basement (Gold up in my teeth)
But your brother was a good substitute for you
And if you love me, love me but you never let me go
When the roof was on fire, you never let me know
Say you’re sorry honey, but you never really show
And I could leave the party without ever letting you know
Without ever letting you know
Roof is falling let me love me falling I just know
Roof is falling let me love me without ever letting you know
Roof is falling let me love me falling I just know
Without ever letting you know
Gold up in my, gold up in my teeth (Gold up, gold up in my teeth)
Taste like money when I speak (Gold up, gold up in my teeth)
And I missed you in the basement (Yeah, gold up in my teeth)
Bodies on the pavement (Oh, gold up in my teeth)
Crashing, hit a wall
Right now I need a miracle
Hurry up now, I need a miracle
Stranded, reaching out
I call your name but you’re not around
I say your name but you’re not around
I need you, I need you, I need you right now
Yeah, I need you right now
So don’t let me, don’t let me, don’t let me down
I think I’m losing my mind now
It’s in my head, darling I hope
That you’ll be here, when I need you the most
So don’t let me, don’t let me, don’t let me down
D-Don’t let me down