I adore music video.
Like music, it is a medium which never fails to get me genuinely excited. A combination of music and film with so many possibilities. You think you've seen a good music video? Send it my way and I will watch it with enthusiasm, but brace yourself for some babble over film techniques and stylistic choices afterwards. Be it literal VJ-esque visuals to beats and bleeps, concise narrative (which is an allusive thing in the world of music video), innovative visuals or just a honest and true performance video - i'm a fan of them all.
So herein lies the first of my posts on certain particular promos and why I feel they deserve some attention on this humble little blog. The first theme? Animated videos. I'm an animator and it's what I hope I can carry on doing until I patent my electric potato masher idea (it is the future in mash technology). My ideas usually stem from animation and music combined, so i'm naturally drawn to these particular types of videos. Here are a few of my all time favourites...
Unkle - Eye For An Eye Dir: Shynola
This one was one of the first music videos which really caught my attention, when I first came to realise the possibilities of animation in music promos. Whilst it's Pandora's Box-esque theme isn't new, but it still packs a punch. Also, I love the hues, tones and textures seen in this piece - soft, fuzzy and tactile matched with rough, angular and stark. Shynola just seem to have a knack for getting the colour of their work just right.
Queens of The Stone Age - Go With The Flow (Dir: Shynola)
Okay, i'm technically cheating here by mentioning the same set of directors and animators again, but when it's Shynola, i'm damn well allowed to. This video is one of those good examples where it fits perfectly with the song. Fast, sharp editing, bold colours and just generally oozing in rock n' roll badassery. Also, it's sexy. So. Very. Sexy.
Oui Oui - Les Cailloux (Dir: Michel Gondry)
Ah, Gondry! You big French genius, you. I don't think I need to mention that he's a God amongst music video creation and I can't name another director who is so hardcore when it comes to in camera effects as him. I won't gush about him any further but thought i'd show wonderful stop-motion promo of his, which you can see on the DVD of his works. Beautifully animated and lots of fun.
Hifana - Womano (Dir: +cruz)
I saw this video when I attended the Mirrorball screenings at the 2005 Edinburgh Film Festival. Mirrorball, in their dedication to music video as a serious art, always made sure to select the most eclectic range of work from around the world for the fest, and this one is no exception. It was part of the 'Made In Japan' event and it blew me away. It's pretty much a modern day Ukiyo-e woodcut, lovingly animated and edited to Hifana's grizzly beats to perfection.
Gorillaz - Feel Good Inc (Dir: Jamie Hewlett and Pete Candeland)
The Gorillaz came at a time in my life which meant they secured my instant fandom - i'd just discovered Tank Girl and I still liked Blur. So, seeing Jamie Hewlett's distinctive illustrations animated combined with Damon Albarn's musical tinkering, made me nerd-gasm. That said, Feel Good Inc is a video which knows it's shit hot, with a lovely seamless merging of lush CG backgrounds and bold comic book art. Who knew animated characters could rock, brood and pose as well as their real life counterparts?
The Knife - We Share Our Mothers Health (Dir:Motomichi Nakamara)
Again, this was another video which grabbed my attention at the Mirrorball programme of the Edinburgh Film Festival, many years ago. The Flash animation used achieves a simplistic yet highly stylistic aesthetic, giving the impression of something comfortably childlike and familiar. Yet, it's theme is cold. Calculating and dominating. It sends shivers up my spine every time I watch it.
Lyapis Trubetskoy - Capitol (Dir: Alexey Terekhov)
This video boggled my mind when I first witnessed it. The level of technical ability needed to handle so many layers of action astounds me. An obviously political charged song, you'll discover something new every time you watch it.
There you have it! Next time i'll babble on about another type of music video; the performance video.
Tuesday, 18 August 2009
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Awesome videos and analysis. I had never seen any of these before except for Feel Good. I really like Eye for an Eye's boldness of color, the almost monochromatic orange really captured the mood. It helps that orange is one of my favorite colors too. The story is really interesting in how it could be applied to current events. If I were to put on my political hat, which is pretty rare, I would say that it's interesting how monster teets could be seen as a super power and all the lesser powers look to it for nourishment. Then, the super power ends up corrupting the lesser powers and converting over to it's side. It just continues on and on. Pretty heady back story for those little taurus mouthed babies. Poor kids.
ReplyDeleteQueens of the Stone Age, Sexy indeed.
Les Cailloux was very fun. Gondry handles those effects masterfully. I love the rear projection shot when he's running down the mountain. Feels very Hitchcockian.
Hifana, Ha!, Some of the funkiest japanese music I've heard in my life! Very nice. You and all these festivals, man. Making me look bad, haha.
Feel Good, I can't express how much I love this video so I'm not even gonna try.
The knife, another very bold graphic style. I'm starting to see a pattern here, haha. For some reason when bondage dude came on I thought about that Phil Collins song, Air Tonight. Maybe I shouldn't be throwing that out on such a public forum, *nervous laugh*.
Capitol, Extremely lush with the After Effects. I love the language this guy's singing in. The words just goosh with saliva. It has a hell of a ring to it too. I catch myself yelling Capitol! every now and again. He started sounding like Triumph the insult comic dog towards the end there. Very passionate about that Capitol.