There are three things that Bridgerton does very well: frilly gowns, steamy romances, and the most unhinged pop anthem string covers you’ve ever heard. But there is one particularly brazen Bridgerton cover in the new season that is too unhinged to pass by — a cover of a song so deeply rooted in collective millenial memories as a sort of Proustian aural symbol of the drunken nights of youth that it gave me an instant emotional hangover. And, somehow, it totally works.
Bear with me while I set the scene: after years of silently pining for Colin (Luke Newton), Penelope (Nicola Coughlan) is finally about to hook up with him. They’ve just had a fight at a ball; he accused her of going after a man she doesn’t love, while she accused him of getting in the way of a marriage proposal that would save her from spinsterdom. After their rather sexually charged row, she storms away from the ballroom to her carriage — he, of course, is close on her heels. There, he finally musters up the courage to make the long-awaited confession.
“These past few weeks have been full of confounding feelings. Feelings like a total inability to stop thinking about you,†he says breathlessly. (Not a feeling, but we move on.) “Please, do not say things you do not mean,†replies Penelope. (Strings play in the background. What song are they covering this time, I wonder.) “I do,†says Colin. “It is everything I have wanted to say to you for weeks.†(Weird, this song doesn’t seem to have a tune, it’s just repeated chords on the violin.) “I would very much like to be more than friends,†whispers Penelope. (The strings pick up their pace; it’s beginning to feel a bit like a slasher movie.) “So much more.†(Okay, what actually is this song?) They kiss. (The chorus hits like a ton of tequila-drenched bricks: It is 2011 club banger “Give Me Everything†by Pitbull featuring Afrojack and Ne-Yo.)
Yes, I repeat, the song they have chosen to set the mood for Penelope and Colin’s first sexy scene — “the carriage scene,†as Bridgerton book readers intone breathlessly — is “Give Me Everything,†the ultimate anthem of the mid-2010 party scene.
Of course, Bridgerton has done this before. In season one, Daphne and Simon got down and dirty to the sounds of Taylor Swift’s “Wildest Dreams†and Celeste’s “Strange,†while season two’s Anthony and Kate’s love scene was accompanied by Calvin Harris’s “How Deep Is Your Love,†another pulsating club classic. Elsewhere this season, Penelope struts through a ballroom to a violin rendition of GAYLE’s “abcdefu.†But Pitbull is a new level of unhinged for a number of reasons.
Firstly, there is the simple fact that a string cover of a Pitbull song now exists. Does this work? As a musical concept? I would argue no. Transposing a song that is primarily just a club beat onto the strings is very hard to do. There is no real tune and, as a result, the first minute is dangerously reminiscent of Bernard Hermann’s atonal Psycho score. Francesca Bridgerton would certainly not approve.
Secondly, there is the matter of context. Many of us have vivid, horrifying memories associated with this song. All of them take place in the dark corners of a sticky bar circa 2012 — and none of them are particularly refined. For me, this song has the unique ability to send chilling images of sticky blue vodka cocktails and painful stiletto heels flashing before my eyes. Then there are the deeply unserious lyrics — lyrics like, “And I might drink a little more than I should tonight / And I might take you home with me if I could tonight,†and, of course, “Grab somebody sexy tell them / Hey, Give me everything tonight.â€
It’s an objectively frivolous song. But it does capture a very specific brand of 2010s hedonism — the hedonism embraced when ladies took off their owl necklaces and slipped into their American Apparel mini skirts, got pre-drunk on vodka cranberries, and set off with a troop of friends for a place with a name like Dance Cave. If you were really, really lucky, you might just get to hook up with your crush in the toilets. “Give me everything tonight! We might not get tomorrow!â€
It is at this point that we must consider the possibility that this song choice is not only totally bonkers, but, perhaps, genius. After all, this is a song that instantly brings you back not only to the grimy nights of your youth but also to the feelings that came with them. It’s a song that forces you to remember what it felt like to be 19 and flooded with heightened emotions and desperate to make out with your crush after knocking back three Sambucas. And let’s face it — the context may be different, but these feelings are exactly what Penelope is going through in this scene. She’s young, she’s in love, and she’s just been to a ball — and when you’re young, that first hookup with your crush is the most exciting, freeing thing in the world. And so, in a strange way, “Give Me Everything†couldn’t be more spot on.
Unlike the bathroom hookups of the collective past, this scene ends with Colin confessing his love to Penelope and asking her to marry him. Wait, you’re thinking, This would never happen in any setting where “Give Me Everything†is playing in the background of a make-out session. Yes, but Bridgerton is a romantic fantasy. Their hookup ends not with smudged eye makeup, morning regrets, and nausea, but with true love. As Pitbull himself says, we might not get tomorrow — but Penelope does. And what could be more romantic than that?