NG:  Good lord do I love me some stop-motion.  Alan Poon delivered some seriously awesome visuals for this beautiful Bowerbirds tune.  An obvious hit for this video were the mantis’ making out but what really makes this video a winner is the place where stop-motion, animation, and live-action meet.  A lot of the best music videos that I have seen come out in the last few years are of this hybrid type and Poon’s is no exception, though it is exceptionally good.
 
The miniature team alone for this project was extraordinary.  The post-production team did a seamless job of cleaning the whole thing up.  The live footage he shot is incorporated perfectly but I don’t really get one shot.  I am not 100% on why we see ink dropped into water, despite how awesome it looks.  I love this video.  EK nailed it between the crab ballet to the incredible song by the incredible Bowerbirds.  For a little extra on the process of putting this video together check out how Alan Poon made the Zeus video for “Marching Through Your Head” on the left-hand side.

EK:  Another  pretty video we are giving you this week, in the pretty snowy woods. This video for the Bowerbirds was directed by Canadian born Alan Poon and, wow, what a beautiful example of stop motion animation. My favorite part of the video is the dancing Crow, so real looking and I love the part where the underside of his wings change colors. The video, which takes place in this beautiful place of nature ends tragically with the burning down of the forest. A sad reality. Go quick now, save the forests!!  Ok good, hope you helped, now back to videos.

“Fleet Foxes – Mykonos” Dir. by Sean Pecknold

NG:  I figured, hey, winter melancholy, why not?  I immediately thought of Fleet Foxes “Mykonos”  The video is directed by Sean Pecknold who does a fair amount of work for Sub Pop.  He loves stop-motion as much as we do but has the capacity to pull it down.  He does so fairly well with this one.  The video is abstract but somehow conveys a story.  Don’t just write this off as a bunch of shapes and give the whole thing a chance.  I love the song and though I know most everyone knows about Fleet Foxes by now, if you don’t, enjoy.

EK:  I am not sure why I chose the video “Bear”. Maybe it is because it is the middle of February and I am feeling a bit melancholy, maybe it was because ‘Hospice’ was one of my favorite albums of the year, or maybe it is simply because its a pretty video put to a pretty song. The video, directed by Evan Owen Dennis, (check out his blog <===) takes place in a snowy, woody, forest, it is a moody and nostalgic video with beautiful sun glares and slow motion wagon pulling. It is stunningly shot with beautiful woods and beautiful people. Who wouldn’t want Peter Silberman to offer them a helping hand? The video is an inviting place and I wish I could be there to wander through the woods and help pull that cart, but for now I am drinking milky coffee waiting for the snow to thaw.

“The Antlers – Bear” Dir. Evan Owen Dennis

NG:  Thank EK because she brought us this brand spankin new Antlers video.  In terms of camera work and the like it rules.  The symbolism is maybe a little obvious but who needs symbolism these days?  The album the song is on, Hospice, is a story about a cancer patient.  A female cancer patient.  And a man who tries to take care of her and ultimately can’t.  Got it right?  Anyway you slice it though Evan Owen Davis nailed this sad but pretty song with a bleak but striking music video.

 Lastly, we hit this week’s Artist Feature.  February is Radical Friend month and so we are going to show you one of their most interesting pieces this week.  They made a video for a song called “Dark Bubbles” by Black Moth Super Rainbow.  BMSR, according to Kirby McClure, was the soundtrack to Radical Friend’s trip to LA from Georgia and is a band they hoped to and looked forward to working with.  This particular video is an incredible merging of graphic design, stop-motion, video, and technology.  If you have a webcam, fire it up, if you don’t your mouse will do just fine.  Get ready for a good time and keep watching, you might want to give up because you think it will be the same thing throughout but like any video it does expand as the song does.  We’ll be posting twice this week so come on back Wednesday night or Thursday.

“Black Moth Super Rainbow – Dark Bubbles” Dir. by Radical Friend

NG:  Welcome, welcome, welcome. Every month we will be doing an artist feature and this month the spotlight will be on an audio-visual team called Radical Friend. Radical Friend is a young directing team that has done some short film work as well as a few interesting and groundbreaking music videos.  The group is Kirby McClure and Julia Grigorian and when one goes on a fact-finding mission they turn up little.  They graduated from the Savannah College of Art and Design together, drove to LA and began producing.  They both are tremendous photographers outside of their film work, Julia likes Lost, and Kirby likes the movie the Emerald Forest.  That’s damn near all!

Their website says something, somehow, but it is hard to describe what.  The page is not exactly informative but worth checking out.  Follow link in sidebar to see the page. We picked the Yeasayer music video which they made because it is a fun video and an awesome song which gets us super-pumped.  I particularly like the setting and the colors and though it is reeeeally abstract (Why the hell is that woman torturing/massaging/violating the lead singers face?) it seems to fairly accurately portray what’s going on in the song.  Those glass and sequin boxers rocked my world.  EK has our next video for us.

EK: I chose Tonight, Tonight by the Smashing Pumpkins because it was one of the first videos I remember paying attention to. I loved the way it was filmed with all the wonderful colors and characters, which to me, looked like the paper cut out dolls you used to glue on Popsicle sticks. It was one of the first videos, along with Madonna’s ‘Papa Don’t Preach’ video, which I remember told a story through images. I particularly loved the part where the woman hits the monsters with her umbrella and they disappear in a thick white cloud. I did not care at the time who the video was directed by or what is was based off of. I just saw wonderfully bold colors, characters moving in an endearingly choppy way and a fantasy world all set to Billy Corgan’s unique voice.  The video was inspired by George Méliès’ 1902 silent film “A Trip to the Moon.”  Follow link in the sidebar to see the film.

“Smashing Pumpkins – Tonight, Tonight” Dir. by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris

NG:  I love this video.  Obviously, the song is one of the best off of one of the better Smashing Pumpkin albums, in most people’s estimation, fine in my estimation.  I remember this video growing up and have only noticed a few important things more recently.  Who’s ready for some names?

The music video is directed by music video demi-gods Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, a team that has collaborated on some of the coolest music videos made in the past two decades.  They also co-directed and –wrote the awesome breakaway indie film Little Miss Sunshine.  Next we should address the main characters.  The main characters are played by people who are familiar but you might not know it: Tom Kenny and Jill Talley.  Kenny voices the character of Spongebob Squarepants, a host of other characters, and appeared on the HBO sketch show Mr. Show, which rules.  Talley was also on Mr. Show and voices a number of characters on animated shows as well.

Names aside the video itself is a ton of fun.  It’s beautiful and colorful and won 6 awards at the Video Music Awards on MTV the year it was released.  Hell yeah EK.  Love it.

The first video I’m showing everyone is the video that got me into music videos. I loved music videos growing up but never took them seriously until Chris Cunningham came into my life. Firstly, according to Cunningham the video is supposed to be funny and chaotic. Secondly, Aphex Twin is a very particular brand of electronica pioneered by the awesome Richard D. James so expect some sounds you may have not heard before. Thirdly, give it a chance, it might be terrifying but it’s the right terrifying. People will watch Saw 37 when it comes out and that’s way worse than Aphex Twin’s-Come to Daddy by Chris Cunningham. Enjoy.

“Aphex Twin – Come to Daddy” Dir. by Chris Cunningham

EK: Watching this video early in the morning drinking tea its no wonder terror set in the first few seconds of this video. I actually had to hit pause take another sip, a deep breath and hit play with both eyes glued.

The video does not build up shock slowly but rather lets the viewer become immediately transfixed on the happenings of the video after a short minute and a half of silence watching an old woman walk her dog in a place where no Grandma should be walking, yet she seems happy and totally unaware. Then loudly and suddenly the video comes to life, giving the viewer a sudden jolt and keeping them there for the rest of the video. Once the initial fear of the video wears thinner you notice Chris Cunningham’s and Aphex’s not so subtle jab at the world being taken over by the Internet; Our souls, particularly the souls of the youth, being sucked into the screens and regurgitated as evil little man-faced child gremlins. The images are cold and haunting and match perfectly with the beat of the song, each beat becoming more frightening and suspenseful.

What is noteworthy and standout about “Come to Daddy” is Cunningham’s monochrome colors and in-your-face subject. He is clearly not afraid to shock his audience nor quiet his style but all done in a well edited and hauntingly stunning video.

I hope Grandma made it out OK. Thanks Nick for the nightmares.

NG and EK:  Time to relax little ones.  Glosoli, a beautiful video, directed by Arni and Kinski, is a nice way to end our first blog entry. Actually, it is a nice way to end anything. A soothing beautiful video with muted jewel tones and the best-looking kids taken fresh from the streets of Iceland. A vivid beautiful dream come to life, a world where it seems only children exist and fields of plenty.  Oh Iceland, we’ll never wholly understand you but whatever it is you’re doing, keep doing it.  Come back next week for some more Radical Friend, among other things, or don’t.  We’ll keep posting though so you might as well.

“Sigur Ros – Glosoli” Dir. by Arni and Kinski