With “Diet Pepsi,” Addison Rae proved herself a pop force to be reckoned with. Now, her new song “Aquamarine” proves she’s here to stay.
There has been a lot of anticipation around the singer’s second major label single. Rae first teased the track back in June, in an Instagram carousel where she sauntered around a pool in high heels while the track played in the background. Then, the song was teased again two months later, when a snippet of it played in the beginning of the “Diet Pepsi” music video. To Rae, she feels that the two songs work in harmony.
“‘Diet Pepsi’ was always going to be the first thing I dropped,” she says. “This one only felt right to follow up... I think it’s very different from ‘Diet Pepsi,’ but also in the same universe. And I think that was really essential—that it felt very cohesive and it can exist in the same world.”
However, Rae hoped to challenge listeners a bit with “Aquamarine.” She says: “I think people expect a follow-up to something like ‘Diet Pepsi’ to be very similar to it... which is exactly why I couldn’t give [it to] them. You know what I mean?”
The resulting sound is thrilling, and it proves that Rae can’t be contained to any single lane. Those who loved “Pepsi” will be content to hear more synths and spectral vocals, but this new track is more electro, with a chant-like chorus, twinkly bridge, and a groove that feels like its coming from underwater.
To Rae, this song is about “transforming and finding what message you want to tell and what story you want to tell through your life,” and these ideas are only emphasized through the visual.
Directed by Sean Price Williams, with Mel Ottenberg serving as creative director, the “Aquamarine” video starts out with Rae at a masquerade event in Paris. Like a modern Gatsby bash, partygoers dance in pearls, masks, and feathers, until eventually the party trickles outside, where Rae and crew are stripped down to nude, dancer-like leotards. “[It’s about] this rawness and acceptance,” Rae notes.
For her looks, which consist of sequined dress, beaded bodysuits, towering feather headbands, Louboutin pumps and more, Rae teamed up with her go-to stylist, Dara, who recently outfitted the singer for the 2024 MTV Video Music Awards and the Academy Museum Gala.
On crafting the looks for the video, Dara says she wanted to contrast Rae’s character against the more judge-y, buttoned-up figures from the party at the beginning. “I feel like it was so much about creating a language for the Aqua character that was about being free in that kind of space,” Dara notes. “It’s sort of like, you’re unafraid to make others uncomfortable because you’re so comfortable in what you’re doing... you take the mask off and you’re free.”
Dara notes that she was inspired by fashion legends from the ’60s and ’70s like Jane Birkin and Brigitte Bardot—“these women [who] have a very fabulous dress on but maybe their hair is messy and there’s not a lot of makeup and there’s no jewelry and they just kind of like, threw it on and went out,” she says. “I love that kind of ease and effortlessness because it’s indulging in glamour in a way that’s comfortable for you and it’s not for the rest of [the world] to understand.”
While the team turned to real-life inspirations when crafting the video, it’s clear that there were some artistic ones as well. Of course, the track’s title calls to mind the beloved teen fantasy film Aquamarine (2006), which Rae says she actually watched a week before making the song.
“I have seen that movie so many times,” she says with a laugh, noting that another lyric in the song—about a “heart of the ocean”—was inspired by Titanic. (Some think the “ray of light” lyric is also a nod to Madonna.)
“The title, I think it’s so glamorous and so beautiful,” Rae adds. “But yeah, I like to draw inspiration from everywhere and I never shy away from feeling like there’s something to learn from a movie, for example.”
Watching Aquamarine, and also making this song helped Rae onto a journey of “falling in love with the way [she] approaches life.” And she adds, “I’ve gone through my own journey of figuring that out in the last few years and... I plan on evolving and growing and transforming and realigning with myself and who I dream to be, and being very unapologetic on the journey there.” Let’s hope “Aquamarine” is just the start.
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