Kesha’s true colors shine on ‘Rainbow’
Film starkly reveals her tough Grammy moments
Kesha spends much of her new Apple Music documentary “Rainbow” (out Friday) in a dream world, moving through trippy vignettes that alternately show her trapped in a glass box on a scenic beach, pulling a keyboard from a glowing swamp and straddling her own comatose likeness as a shirtless man in a bunny mask injects her body double with pink sludge.
As visually striking as the more psychedelic scenes of “Rainbow” may be, it’s the other footage included in the half-hour documentary, including behind-the-scenes moments from Kesha’s 2015 tour and her “Rainbow” studio sessions, that contain the real revelations. And 20 minutes in, “Rainbow” reaches its emotional climax as it follows the days before Kesha’s 2018 Grammys performance, a devastating sequence that elevates the documentary to must-see viewing for her fans.
“Rainbow” shares its name with Kesha’s 2017 album – her return to music, which she began writing while in treatment for a severe eating disorder and continued recording during her lengthy legal battle with her former producer, Dr. Luke, whom she accused of sexual and emotional abuse. The uncomfortable backstory is that during the trial, Kesha’s contract restricted her from releasing her new music unless she worked with her alleged abuser, which resulted in years of silence from the singer.
Eventually freed from those restrictions, Kesha re-emerged last year with “Rainbow,” led by her aching comeback single “Praying,” and earned her first pair of Grammy nominations for the new album – bringing her journey full circle with her performance of “Praying” at the awards.
During an otherwise forgettable ceremony, Kesha’s Grammys moment was easily the night’s most powerful, a roughly sung revelation that left the artist in tears by the end.
Those weren’t the only tears shed during Kesha’s Grammys journey, the documentary reveals. It features footage of the difficult rehearsals in the days leading up to her performance.
“When the Grammys called and said that not only was my album nominated but they wanted me to perform, it was a dream come true,” she says in a voiceover. “But it also triggered my intense anxiety. This song (‘Praying’) was incredibly hard to sing on such a grand stage, both emotionally and technically.”
Pacing through a hotel room during a rehearsal three days before the awards, Kesha gets visibly frustrated, venting to vocal coach Nick Cooper about the pressures of singing in front of stars such as Beyonce in the Grammys crowd. As she struggles to sing one line in “Praying,” “I found a strength I’ve never known.”
“I sing it really good sometimes, and sometimes I don’t, and sometimes my voice cracks,” she frets. “And this line about ‘strength’ – I’ll be up there, with all the people, and Beyonce, and I want to do a good job, and I want to (expletive) kill it.”
Two days before the performance, she’s in an even more fragile state, rehearsing in a larger performance space with a string section and backing vocalists. The tears begin flowing before she sings a note as she steps away from the microphone to sob and Cooper steps in with some encouraging words.
“You do not have to sing this heavy (song) to prove anything,” he says as the singers surround Kesha in a huddle. “You need to tell the doggone story and stop trying to prove (something). You were courageous enough to write a song about your experiences, to share them with the rest of the world. So deal with the pain, but share your love on stage.”
Days later, viewers would see Kesha’s struggle between love and pain playing out on the Grammys stage. And watching her difficult journey in the days before – wearing T-shirts and no makeup, with no interest of getting glammed up for the rolling cameras – makes her groundbreaking performance all the more real and serves as a reminder how lucky listeners are to have a pop star such as Kesha with us.