Music

This Year’s Met Gala Looks Were Fucking Satanic

The first Monday in May is my favourite day of the year. Some people like the Grand Final, some people like Christmas, I like the Met Gala. You’re probably thinking “It’s just fashion! Fashion doesn’t matter!” But here’s the thing: you’re wrong, and fashion is the only thing that matters. I spend roughly 45 hours a week being paid to write about music and another 10 to 15 thinking about it for free, but I’m not at all being facetious when I say that I would probably give up the ability to hear music ever again if it meant that I could go to the Met Gala just one time. For now, though, I haven’t been given that option, so I have to settle for the next best thing: providing unsolicited opinions about all the different looks musicians pulled this year.

If I ever did give up my ability to hear music ever again and was given a choice of which past Met Gala I wanted to go to, I wouldn’t pick this year. In fact, if I was given the option to go to this year’s gala with the hindsight that I have now, I probably would say no. (That’s a bald-faced lie, but you get my point.) Because frankly, this year’s Met Gala outfits were god damn satanic. We’ve seen some pretty sketchy interpretations of past themes––lest we forget the flood of untreated sewage that was 2015’s “China: Through the Looking Glass”––but this year was particularly bad. With a theme like “Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination,” you’d think people would excel, especially considering that at least three major fashion houses––Dolce & Gabbana, Gucci, and Versace, the latter of which inspired this year’s theme––practically live on this shit year in and year out. And yet somehow, all we got was big squids, ugly headpieces and strange military outfits. I hope some stylists are getting fired tonight.

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But first, let’s talk about who really turned it out. While there’s a lot to be said for Rihanna’s sexy pope look, my personal pick for holiest outfit goes to SZA, who looked absolutely stunning as a Weeping Madonna in custom Versace, replete with golden tears underneath her eyes. Once again, SZA proves herself as the god damn queen.

https://twitter.com/CampSZA/status/993640384478638081

Rihanna’s sexy pope look was very good though, and deserves mention. This outfit feels like it was designed to elicit the face crack of the century, and while it’s jaw dropping at first, this doesn’t really sit with me as one of Rihanna’s most fire Met Gala looks, or looks in general. When the Costume Institute inevitably has a Gala honouring Rihanna’s iconic looks throughout the years, I have a feeling we’ll probably be seeing a lot of yellow blankies and not many pearl-encrusted popes. You have to appreciate the craftsmanship, though! This dress was designed by Maison Margiela creative director John Galliano, a designer who was widely disgraced a few years back for saying that he “love[s] Hitler,” which, y’know. Not a great look, my dude, but hey! Apparently fashion’s forgiven him, so I guess we’re letting it slide. Man makes a good pope ‘fit!

Also in the heavily beaded stakes was Cardi B, pulling up to the party very pregnant and looking like a beautiful bejewelled pierogi. As far as dressing for the theme “Heavenly Bodies” goes, I feel like ‘Arriving With Child’ pretty much takes the cake. So big points to Cardi for planning her outfit so far in advance, I guess.

Katy Perry, Patron Saint of Cooked Met Gala Outfits, wore some very big wings. I guess this outfit probably would have been really good if everything under the wings––the actual dress bit of the dress––didn’t look like something a fourteen-year-old might wear to a birthday party under the guise of wanting to look sophisticated. (All due respect to the furry community, but I also might have liked this outfit better if she hadn’t done so many sexy bird poses on the red carpet.)

Also doing animal cosplay: Solange, dressed as a big squid. (Just kidding, it’s Iris van Herpen! I know that because this specific dress was featured on an episode of Naomi Campbell’s wildly unpopular modelling reality show The Face.) Solange has spent a lot of time over the past few years working on becoming a beautiful, woke fashion icon, so it’s kinda disappointing to see her show up as the xenomorph from Alien. Seriously though, maybe it’s best not to let your Twitter followers choose your outfit.

Continuing the night’s unofficial theme of inexplicably non-Catholic style outfits were Emma Stone and Travis Scott, who both wore semi-militaristic garb. (I know Emma Stone isn’t technically a “”musician”” but I am working very hard here to try and separate all these terrible outfits thematically, so please, just give me this one.) More than anything, these outfits are just pretty boring. Travis, Emma, please: next time you get invited to a $30k-per-head fashion gala, consider all the internet voyeurs whose time you’re wasting with these boring-ass outfits. I’m not here to fuck spiders.

https://twitter.com/PopCraveNet/status/993666359308546048

And then, of course, there’s the main talking point of the night: Grimes and Elon Musk appearing together on the carpet. APage Six story was published this morning about Grimes and Elon secretly dating after bonding over A.I. jokes (seriously) and today’s Met Gala appearance basically confirmed it. I’m not going to parse judgement on anyone’s relationships (publically, that is––I am still a human internet ‘journalist’, after all) but good God is this a sight. Elon, who dresses kinda like I did when I wanted a job at noted Australian goth shop Dangerfield, seemingly couldn’t find a pair of white pants to match the all-white upper half of his ensemble, and also decided to channel the clergy and wear a shirt with a clerical collar. I guess that’s a pretty chill way of interpreting the theme, but if there was ever a look I would really, deeply advise people to stay away from in 2018 it’d probably be ‘looking like a member of the clergy.’ Grimes, on the other hand, wore a collar with the Tesla logo on it around her neck. Burn the Met to the fucking ground.

Shaad is Noisey’s Australian Editor, and knows nothing at all about fashion. Follow him on Twitter.