Katy Perry has returned to the charts with her Zedd collaboration “365,” dropping a slick new music video that is an AI-inspired love story. Well, not the healthy kind of love. The robotic, obsessive, kill-you-with-my-metal-arm-hug love. We’re not sure there’s a Valentine’s Day card for that.
Perry’s first new piece of music since releasing her 2017 album Witness, “365” has the same ominous beat as her fifth studio album’s lead single “Chained To The Rhythm.” While the new single doesn’t have the same call to action as the aforementioned Skip Marley duet, “365” still comes with a cautionary tale about the future of AI. In a nutshell, robots are going to kill us with their affection.
The new video features Zedd as a volunteer in a robot study that is testing whether Perry, an AI robot, can pass as a human. She can’t, and Zedd becomes increasingly distant as Perry’s obsession with him grows. Obviously, his character didn’t watch Ex-Machina. Don’t try to make a relationship with a computer work. They always try to kill you in the end.
Part inspired by the Penn Badgley-Shay Mitchell series You, part Westworld, “365” turns Perry into a robot with a heart and Zedd into a human without one. The moral of the story is, dating is hard for everyone, even people who aren’t actual people.
Perry and Zedd spent time together in 2018, with Zedd opening for Perry during a handful of stops on her worldwide Witness Tour. In a statement about the collaboration, Zedd says “After we got off tour and with our musical value systems even more aligned we continued working together and that’s when ‘365’ started to take shape. As it all came together, we knew we had something special. I love how Katy sounds on this record. I’m so excited to finally share this with our fans.”
Both Perry and Zedd were in attendance at Sunday night’s Grammy awards, where Zedd was nominated for three Grammys, including Pop Duo/Group Performance, Song of the Year, and Record of the Year for his track “The Middle” with Maren Morris. Perry returned to the stage for one of the biggest performances of the night, with the singer paying tribute to Dolly Parton alongside country singer Kacey Musgraves.