The day before she’s set to perform for the second time at Super Bowl 50, Beyoncé dropped a surprise new video for a song called “Formation.” It references a lot — from Hurricane Katrina to police violence to other aspects of black and Southern culture.
The video starts with Beyonce standing on top of a submerged police cruiser, while a disembodied voice asks, “What happened after New Orleans?” The rest of the video then cycles through Queen Bey dancing in various mansions, her hanging out the passenger window of a blue vintage car, dressed like a witch from American Horror Story, and dancing in the parking lot of a rundown strip mall.
“My daddy Alabama/my ma Louisiana/you mix that negro with that creole/Make a Texas bama,” is one memorable line in a song that also taunts us with, “y’all haters corny with this illuminati mess,” and “I like my baby hair with baby hair and afros,” likely referencing the controversy over her daughter’s hair. With her dancing on top of a New Orleans police car, and other lyrics like “I like my negro nose with Jackson Five nostrils,” Beyoncé has a lot more explicitly political to say, all set to a catchy beat and a provocative video.
