Watching “Simply Complicated” after listening to Demi’s latest album, Tell Me You Love Me just makes sense. The documentary highlights the Disney star turned pop singer as the confident woman she is today. Not only does it chronicle her journey to stardom but features insights from the people who were/are closest to her in her darkest times.
Demi sits down for an interview and admits she’s nervous. When asked why, she says the last time she did an interview this long she was coked out. This statement paves the way for the next hour and 18 minutes; raw honesty about subjects that need to be talked about. Substance abuse, eating disorders, mental issues, violence, Demi remains honest about each topic with no filter in between. She talks about how her eating disorder has come back recently, how working out helped with her anger and mental issues, and how substance abuse almost led to her death.
“The key to being happy is to tell your truth” says Lovato. She talked in depth about her love life when mentioning her six year relationship with actor Wilmer Valderrama. After the breakup she realized she forgot what it was like to be alone. Her latest album touches on this in an emotional yet beautiful way. We see Demi, now in her element, flirting and talking to other people, playing the field and having fun in the dating scene; something she hasn’t been comfortable with for a long time. Tell Me You Love Me does a perfect job at expressing Demi’s pent up lovebird-side.
Now back to why we know Demi in the first place; the music. We see her in the studio thrusting out every note as hard as she can. She goes over and over to make sure every run and verse is perfect. When a studio friend tells her she did a good job, she says “I know…I mean…thank you”. The confident Demi is all over this album; confident in her sexuality, confident in her business, confident in herself. While explaining why “Sorry Not Sorry” should be the lead single off this album, Demi says it’s the fun side fans need to see from her. She didn’t want people to remember her music as “heavy” she wanted to bring fun back, like we saw with 2015’s “Cool for the Summer”. So, she poured her heart out, danced more, laughed more, and created one of her best albums to date.
If there’s one thing I learned while watching “Simply Complicated”, it’s that Demi Lovato is as truthful as it gets. She’ll be honest with herself and her fans, no matter what. It’s only going to get better from here on forward for Demi.
Music blogger 