There’s an awful lot of setup to Adele’s new music video “Hello” — but when one finally gets to the vocals, they’re as powerful as ever.
The song itself has essentially the exact same note kickoff as the chorus of Lionel Richie’s 1983 tune of the same name. The newer ditty becomes very different from there: Adele belts out lyrics of a tragic breakup, and the video follows suit in sepia tone.
The video for Adele’s “Hello” contains about as much phone chatter as the title would suggest. There’s even a payphone booth out in the middle of the woods — which is where the singer apparently resides these days.
It’s unclear if the songstress is going for a direct Verizon reference when she drops a “Can you hear me now?” — but the cellular carrier probably isn’t complaining if the plug is unintentional.
On Thursday Adele announced her new age-named album, “25,” which will hit shelves on Nov. 20. Her 2011 album “21” spent 24 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart, the longest stretch atop the list for female recording artist.
Watch the video above.