"Pacify Her" is the eleventh track by Melanie Martinez featured on her debut album, Cry Baby. It is one of the few songs to have two studio snippets released in summer/fall of 2014. Melanie released a snippet for this song on August 7th, 2015 on her Instagram. The music video for the song was released on November 15th, 2016.
Theme
Cry Baby no longer cares whether she's with a guy, but she gets rid of the girl (Basic Bitch) he was with just for fun. Cry Baby is set on trying to free a boy from the grip of a girlfriend, even though she doesn’t really love the boy herself. She uses a play on words in the title – it can be heard as “pacifier”, which is a rubber object used to silence a crying infant. She knows that the boy has feelings for her and not for his current lover, so she insists that he should get rid of her once and for all: she’s embraced being a home wrecker. This may be Cry Baby taking after her father, whom she has experienced witnessing his many affairs behind her drunken mother's back before his death.
Lyrics
[Verse 1]
Tired, blue boy walks my way
Holding a girl's hand
That basic bitch leaves finally
Now I can take her man
[Pre-Chorus]
Someone told me stay away from things that aren't yours
But was he yours if he wanted me so bad?
[Chorus]
Pacify her
She's getting on my nerves
You don't love her
Stop lying with those words
Pacify her
She's getting on my nerves
You don't love her
Stop lying with those words
[Verse 2]
I can't stand her whining
Where's her binky now?
And loving her seems tiring
So boy, just love me, down, down, down
[Pre-Chorus]
Someone told me stay away from things that aren't yours
But was he yours if he wanted me so bad?
[Chorus]
Pacify her
She's getting on my nerves
You don't love her
Stop lying with those words
Pacify her
She's getting on my nerves
You don't love her
Stop lying with those words
[Bridge]
Pacify her
She's getting on my nerves
You don't love her
Stop lying with those words
[Chorus]
Pacify her
She's getting on my nerves
You don't love her
Stop lying with those words
Pacify her
She's getting on my nerves
You don't love her
Stop lying with those words
Videos
The video begins showing Cry Baby playing a board game in a playpen in her house. Throughout the video, shots of Melanie singing and dancing with a background of toys and stars are shown. Basic Bitch and Blue Boy enter and begin to play Patty Cake. Cry Baby and Blue Boy look at each other, clearly in love. Cry Baby writes a note reading "Do you want to play?" She swallows it and it appears in Blue Boy's lap. He reads the note and they look at each other, as Cry Baby's eyes enlarge, showing that she is in love again. Basic Bitch then reads the note, rips it in Blue Boy's face, and throws it at Cry Baby. Growing angry, Cry Baby uses telekinesis to lift her board game and throw it at Basic Bitch. Cry Baby then begins to rip the head off of her dolls, causing Basic Bitch to become uncomfortable. To get Blue Boy's attention, Cry Baby lifts her own head off of her body, causing him to laugh. To regain his interest, Basic Bitch goes in for a kiss, only to have a pacifier appear in her mouth. Cry Baby and Blue Boy crawl towards each other, but Basic Bitch steps in the middle. She shows Blue Boy her breasts. Convinced, Blue Boy leaves with Basic Bitch, leaving Cry Baby crying.
Cast
- Basic Bitch: Melanie Martinez
- Blue Boy: Lucas Mogerley
Trivia
- The instrumentals were extremely different for this song during early performances. For example, there was a music box crank at the beginning and after each post-chorus instrumental.
- Blue Boy is a reference to the nursery rhyme Little Boy Blue, in which Boy Blue is asleep and not doing his job, hence the lyrics "Tired, Blue Boy..."
- This is one of the few songs performed on the Dollhouse Tour before Cry Baby's release.
- Cry Baby's eyes enlarge again while looking at the Blue Boy in the music video, similar to the way she looked at Johnny in Soap and Training Wheels.
- The enlarged eyes may represent Cry Baby's desire for those two.
- The music video reached over 100 million views on YouTube on January 11th, 2019, making it Melanie's fourth music video and her first non-single music video to reach this achievement. The music video has now reached over 104 million views and 1.7 million likes.
- In the music video, Melanie plays both Cry Baby and Basic Bitch. Her friend Brian gave her this idea.
- For the role of Basic Bitch, Melanie covered up all of her tattoos with foundation, then used CGI to make it look more realistic.
- In the video, Cry Baby plays a game called Funny Bunnies, likely inspired by the real game Funny Bunny.[1]
- Cry Baby taking the heads off of the dolls is a possible reference to the doll heads in Dollhouse.
- The pacifier that appears in the mouth of Basic Bitch is the same one from the Alphabet Boy music video.
- On the music video's set there was a dog called Lucas.
- The title of the song is a homophone on the word 'pacifier'.
- Despite the lyrics containing the word 'bitch', this song is not considered to be explicit.
- The reason it's not considered explicit is because 'bitch' isn't considered as a swear word
- Therefore, there is no official clean version of this song.
- This song was never performed at any of Melanie's concerts in 2017.
- On September 19th, 2017, this song was certified gold.
- It is unknown why Cry Baby had telekinesis and the ability to detach her head from her body in the music video.
- The story and illustration for this song appears on the 23rd page of the Cry Baby storybook, reading:
Pacify Her's Digital Booklet Page
"She escaped and was never the same
She swayed a boy who had been claimed
And pacified ol' what’s her name
Not out of love, just played a game"
