“I told you I was okay but I was lying” is the chorus lyric that hits hardest on this new track by Demi Lovato: “Dancing With The Devil.” Lovato has gone through very public scandals and breakdowns over the years and it has been an unpleasant spectacle – the pap media show no mercy to young spiralling stars, especially if they are female and former television/ Disney actresses. We have seen it time and time again and though, thankfully, the conversation is now being had, thanks largely to the New York Times Brittney Spears documentary, young superstars have always been vulnerable in Hollywood … its a cliché to even say as much.
“Dancing With The Devil” is about the sinister ways addiction and self-medication creep up on us: “It’s just a little red wine, i’ll be fine/ Not like I wanna do this every night/ I’ve been good, don’t I deserve it?” The lyrics later move beyond alcohol and into much harder drug use, something Lovato has been confronting in her songwriting ever since her comeback in early 2020. When she says she “almost made it to heaven/ I was closer than you know,” her fans have cause to believe her 100% as they’ve been on this journey with her from the beginning.
One top commenter showed just how aware of her situation they are: “Demi always sang with prestige and with her heart, but this time it feels like she’s singing from her soul as if she has no more lifelines. So. Powerful. Her singing this gave me chills.” Indeed, this live video marks a vocal performance that will prove some of her detractors wrong, the ones who question the difference between her recording and live vocal quality.
