Meaning of “Fall in Line” by Christina Aguilera (featuring Demi Lovato)
“Fall in Line” is a song performed by American singer and songwriter Christina Aguilera. The song also features the guest vocals of fellow American singer Demi Lovato. The lyrics of “Fall in Line” focus mainly on female empowerment. In the song, the singers (Aguilera and Lovato) talk about the challenges women of today face. The lyrics go on to encourage women never to back down or “fall in line” in spite of the adversities that come their way.
The song’s theme of female empowerment, which appears to be inspired by such international female empowerment movements as Me Too movement (also known as #MeToo) and Time’s Up movement, wasn’t really inspired by these movements.
According to Aguilera, she wrote the song a number of years before these women empowerment movements sprang up. She said she wrote the song because its message was something she felt the world needed to hear. According to the singer, from a very young age, she always wanted to champion the cause of women’s rights and anyone struggling to ensure that they “have their own voice”.
Taking to the social media platform Twitter, Aguilera said “Fall in Line” has the sole aim of liberating the voice of bold thinkers, truth seekers, and anyone who has ever been in the situation where they felt “silenced and repressed”. The song encourages the aforementioned categories of people to never ever “back down” or “fall in line” regardless of the challenges they might encounter.
In another post on her official Twitter account, Aguilera told her fans the song was also about “self empowerment” and “supporting each other” to gain freedom.
Facts about “Fall in Line”
- “Fall in Line” was co-written by Christina Aguilera and five other songwriters, namely Audra Mae, Mark Williams, Jon Bellion, Jonny Simpson and Raul Cubina.
- “Fall in Line” was produced by three of its writers: Cubina, Williams and Bellion. FYI: Bellion is an American singer who gained worldwide stardom for providing the vocals on the 2015 hit song “Beautiful Now” by Zedd as well as for his own 2016 worldwide hit single “All Time Low”. Mae, on the other hand, is also an American singer and songwriter best known for being the great-great-niece of the iconic American singer and actress Audra Mae.
- Singer Demi Lovato received no writing credit on the song since she didn’t contribute to the song’s writing process.
- The song’s background vocals were sung by two of its writers: Bellion and Mae.
- This song was released on 16th May, 2018 as the second single from Aguilera’s eight studio album titled Liberation.
- The song’s music video, which was directed by American filmmaker, writer and photographer Luke Gilford, was released on May 23rd, 2018.
- Aguilera performed this song publicly for the first time on the Carpool Karaoke on The Late Late Show with James Corden on May 16th, 2017. A few days after that performance, she and Demi Lovato performed the song live at the 2018 Billboard Music Awards which took place at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. The performance was one of the highlights of the ceremony.
Why Christina Aguilera worked with Demi Lovato on “Fall in Line”
According to Aguilera, the main reason why she chose to feature Lovato on the track was because she needed another “powerhouse singer” who had the ability to take the song to the next level with her powerful vocals. Aguilera said when she first heard Lovato’s vocals on the song, tears filled her eyes. It is worth noting that many have hailed this collaboration as one of the most powerful collaborations of 2018.
What is the meaning of the music video of “Fall In Line”?
The music video begins with the kidnapping of two young girls by a number of masked men. The two young girls are young Aguilera and Lovato. The video later shows the girls as adults being held captive in a male-dominated prison where they are made to sing. The two women, who work together, brave all odds and eventually fight their way out of the prison facility to gain their freedom. The prison facility in the music video of the song symbolizes the imprisonment many women “have felt” and the freedom they can achieve when they work together. Aguilera herself confirmed the above on Twitter to be the meaning of the song’s video.
As a Radfem I would say that it is sadly too po***graphic, so it has nothing really to do with the true feminism; radical-feminism.
Of course it has radfem points: sisterhood, that they come together in the video again and kill their rapists. And that listeners can interpret the song as female empowering too.
But the songwriting (mostly male writers) includes antifeminist messages. In the video they show up. Too much po***graphic exploitation, too much ambiguity in the text. Why this picture in the end of Aguilera, she looks too nude and death?
I wouldn’t show this to my daughter.
You would say that because you’re too damn chicken to be empowered do you like to be dominated by men
This message is for all women that are afraid to stand up for themselves that are dominated by the male figures in their life’s we women need to stand up for ourselves to never bow down to a man that brutally and sexually abuses us and to get out of that abusive relationship and never go back or look back.