Toro Y Moi – “Rose Quartz” Video

The videos for Toro Y Moi’s wonderfully idiosyncratic synth-soul album Anything In Return have already embraced a couple of disparate tones: Sidelong smooveness for “So Many Details” and “Say That,” slice-of-life comedy for “Never Matter.” And for the new “Rose Quartz” video, director Lauren Gregory has given us a completely new one: Mesmeric cartoon impressionism. The video looks like a moving Harlem Renaissance paint-swirl.

Katy B – “5AM” Video

“5AM,” the new big-room house single from the great British dance-pop singer Katy B. In its new video, Katy attends a vaguely creepy hallucinatory sex-party in a mansion, which is to say that this video has essentially the same plot as Mystikal’s “Shake Ya Ass” video (or, fine, that one part of Eyes Wide Shut).

Arcade Fire - "Here Comes the Night Time" Video

Directed by Roman Coppola. Featuring 'Here Comes The Night Time,' 'We Exist,' and 'Normal Person' from the new album REFLEKTOR out Oct 29th. It featured the debut performances of Reflektor songs “Here Comes The Night Time,” “We Exist,” and “Normal Person.” James Franco, Rainn Wilson, Bono, Ben Stiller, Michael Cera, Bill Hader, Zach Galifianakis, Eric Wareheim, Jason Schwartzman, and Aziz Ansari made cameos.

Haim "Desert Days"

The Guitar Trio of the Moment Jam Out “Honey & I” at Joshua Tree 

The Haim sisters embark on a lost weekend  in Joshua Tree National Park, two hours from their hometown Los Angeles, in this Tabitha Denholm-directed video celebrating the release of much-anticipated debut record, Days Are Gone. Set against the area's dusty backdrops, Alana, Este and Danielle Haim pose in a pick-up truck driven by a local named Ken (who didn't care for speed limits), dip into abandoned hot tubs and bunk down to jam new album highlight “Honey & I” in a cinder-block house Denholm found on Air B&B. “It was incredible, an amazing bonding experience for everyone involved,” says bassist and elder sister Este. “And it was our first time staying in Joshua tree, which was pretty magical.” Haim has enjoyed a meteoric rise since releasing EP Forever in February 2012: the sister trio are currently in Europe and tour the US with Io Echo from Sunday, continuing a year that's seen them perform on the Glastonbury main stage with Primal Scream, befriend Pharrell, and make bass faces cool again. Yet the experience of filming today's short reminded the band of spending time with their parents back in their pre-fame days. “I think my dad spent the first 14 years of our lives with a camcorder attached to his hand,” says Este. “Every family vacation, every performance, every soccer game, he filmed it.” 

Forest Swords – “Thor’s Stone” (Official Video)

Forest Swords has put out a new video for “Thor’s Stone,” one of the best tracks off our recent Album, Engravings. Director Dave Ma filmed dancer Guzman Rosado for eight hours in one night in the industrial outskirts of LA; the result is one of the most physically demanding videos you’ve seen in a while — it’s a fascinating and somewhat disturbing look at what the human body can do, but the way it fits the music is thrilling.

Pusha T – “King Push” (Official Video)

The cold-blooded Clipse rapper Pusha T releases his new solo album My Name Is My Name next month, and from all available evidence it is going to rule. Further evidence: “King Push,” a new track that Kanye West co-produced with, of all possible people, Joaquin Phoenix. Check the hard, minimal video for the track.

Tim Hecker – “Black Refraction” (Official Video)

Video by Sabrina Ratté

Mark Lanegan – “I’m Not the Loving Kind” (Official Video)

This past week, Mark Lanegan released Imitations, his album of old-timey covers. The video for his version of John Cale’s “I’m Not The Loving Kind” follows a haunted, leathery cowboy — a figure even more grizzled than Lanegan himself, if you can even conceive of this — as he trudges through the neon absurdities of Las Vegas. It’s a striking video.

The Killers – “Shot At The Night” Video

Later this fall, the Killers will drop their best-of collection Direct Hits, and it includes the gleaming new M83-produced single “Shot At The Night,” which now has an appropriately starry video of its own. The Roboshobo-directed clip stars Not Fade Away/Dark Shadows actress Bella Heathcote as a young woman who makes a living vacuuming casino floors in the Killers’ native Las Vegas and Social Network/Ides Of March actor Max Minghella as the young man who wants to take her away from all of this. It’s cute.

CocoRosie – “Gravediggress” (Official Video)

The art-pop sister duo CocoRosie released the new album Tales Of A Grass Widow earlier this year, and it’s already yielded two impressive videos, the prettily disorienting “After The Afterlife” and the prettily disturbing “Child Bride.” Bianca Casady, one half of the duo, directed the album’s third video, for “Gravediggress.” It’s a fucked-up vision of a clown and a masked witch figure. Casady filmed the video in the south of France, and in a note on YouTube, she writes that it’s “a loose journey thru the psyche of a lonely outcast who finds ecstasy and company in nature.”


Casady on the video:

Shot in Southern France, spanning several different seasons, The Gravediggress emerges from the imagination of the clown. Played and danced by Biño Sauitzvy, The Clown oscillates between young and old, innocent and deranged. Our mother plays the masked Gravediggress who’s stuffed hands struggle at menial tasks such as picking wheat and taking laundry from the line. The narrative is a loose journey thru the psyche of a lonely outcast who finds ecstasy and company in nature. The filming was spontaneous though it took much more time than a typical music video and without the pressure of a studio and crew we were able to wander and shoot in this way. We let the work steep and revisited the project months later for another stage of development. My working relationship with Biño, a Brazilian choreographer based in Paris, who has also trained in circus and clowning, started in 2011 when we developed Nightshift, my first theatrical work. We also started then to discover in dance, the brokenness of the outcast. He played a homeless-drunk, clown called Hummingbird Man. I have worked on many videos over the last 14 years and have shot many of them in this same location but this is my most narrative attempt to date. I prefer to shoot intimately, just me and the other and the force of the elements. Some times our hands got frozen cold, or we got attacked by swarms of mosquitos, spiders crawled out of every hole and we truly marveled over the moon and pink sky.

Young Galaxy – “Sleepwalk With Me” Official Video

The Vancouver synth-rockers Young Galaxy released their album Ultramarine earlier this year, and there’s a deluxe edition of the LP that came out this week; we posted one of its bonus tracks, the B-side “Talk To Her,” last week. And now, to celebrate that reissue, director Fabricio Lima has made a beautifully animated video about a World War II veteran who dreams about his experiences falling in love during wartime.

Happy Jawbone Family Band – “Stay-At-Home Soldier”

Directed by Mercer West // party party partners

Savages - "Husbands" (Official Video)

Savages have shared the video for their Silence Yourself single "Husbands". The grainy clip, directed by John Minton, cuts between footage of the band and close-up shots of insects and the elements.

Charli XCX – “SuperLove” (Official Video)

Earlier this year, the London pop singer Charli XCX released True Romance, one of the finest debut albums in a year full of fine debut albums. And now, she’s already making plans for the follow-up. We don’t know anything about Charli’s next album yet, but she’s just shared a flirty video for the fizzy, club-happy first single “SuperLove,” which has more of a big-room nightclub feel than anything on True Romance. In director Ryan Andrews‘s crazy-fun video, Charli and friends strut through Tokyo, hanging out with dancing robots and motorcycle gangs.

Psychic Friend – “We Do Not Belong” (Feat. Sarah Silverman) (Official Video)

The Dean Fleischer-Camp-directed music video for “We Do Not Belong” by Will Shwartz’s new group Psychic Friend stars Sarah Silverman, which might be why most people should watch it twice. There’s an expectation with Silverman being credited in a video that it’ll be funny or offensive or offensively funny. So it might take a little time the first play-through for it to sink in that there aren’t really any jokes coming. What follows instead is a touching story about a person (Silverman) raised apart from the world by abusive parents (we infer — the details are just ambiguous enough) and a therapist (Shwartz) who tries to break her catatonia.

Oneohtrix Point Never – “Still Life (Betamale)” Video

Usually, videos released the week before an album drops are intended to stoke interest in the new project, and I suppose the video Oneohtrix Point Never dropped today will accomplish that in a way, though it might be the kind of interest that drives people to watch Hoarders. Jon Rafman’s clip for R Plus 7 album track “Still Life (Betamale)” delves into the weird world of internet subcultures; it’s a series of photos featuring computers surrounded by squalor, anime, a dude with guns to his head, and what looks like a young girl’s underwear wrapped around his face and lots more stuff like that. It’s probably good to be reminded that the Internet is a big place and humankind is a strange species, but this video creeps me out big time. To experience the same sensation.

Small Black – “Breathless” (Official Video)

New York synthpoppers Small Black released the very good and sort of overlooked album Limits Of Desire earlier this year, and now they’ve got a video for the dizzy jam “Breathless.” In less than four minutes, director Nick Bentgen finds room for bonfires, rodeos, amateur acrobatics, skate-park bottle-smashings, freeway-overpass smoke sessions, quarries, makeouts, fights, and assorted other fun things. It’s all weirdly beautiful.

Foals – “Out Of The Woods” Video

Since the release of Holy Fire this February, British rockers Foals have now released videos for five of their new songs, the most recent being “Out Of The Woods.” From the grungy, head-banging first single “Inhaler“, released last October, to the shocking, slightly disturbing scenes of a sleazy European hotel in “Late Night,” Foals’ videos have earned a NSFW reputation, in the best way possible. “Out Of The Woods” is surprisingly tame in comparison; while the majority of the video focuses on a thin, fearful looking woman in a dimly lit apartment, straight out of a Gaspar Noe film, it comes to an eerie conclusion as we see the source of her fear. Lead singer Yannis Philippakis reiterates the song’s creepiness as he moodily cries out “I’ll never be afraid again now I’m out of here for good,” while the pauses are filled with a tribal yet ethereal beat.

A$AP Rocky – “Fashion Killa” (Feat. Rihanna) (Official Video)

“Fashion Killa” is a fundamentally silly song; it’s the Long.Live.A$AP track where A$AP Rocky spends the entire song rattling off the names of fashion brands. But with that gasping Friendzone beat, it’s also a sumptuously pretty piece of work. And now it also has a music video that’s both deeply silly and sumptuously pretty. It’s all slick soft-focus fashion-ad imagery of Rocky and Rihanna, playing a happy couple who go around trying on clothes. That’s it. A$AP Ferg also shows up to rap a few bars of “Murda Something” on a street corner for no reason. Rocky co-directed the video with Virgil Alboh.

Watch Haim Cover Miley Cyrus' "Wrecking Ball"

Haim, possibly the least controversial act in pop music today, is taking on the most controversial act. The trio dropped by BBC Radio 1's Live Lounge, where they offered up a live cover of Miley Cyrus' new single, "Wrecking Ball". And you know what? Not even Miley can taint Haim's guitar-pop wholesomeness. Watch their ode to Miley.

Rick Ross – “No Games” (Feat. Future) Video

The Future collab “No Games” is the most triumphant and visceral Rick Ross single in a long minute, so it’s mystifying that he decided to make the laziest imaginable video for it. The clip is entirely made up of footage of Ross rapping contemplatively in a hotel room, intercut with footage from Scarface, the most obvious cinematic pick in the entire history of movies. Imagine this video with scenes from any other movie.

Migos – “Chinatown” Video

In the Gabriel Hart directed video for “Chinatown,” Atlanta rappers Migos galavant around the streets of LA’s Chinatown district, riding around in the back of a convertible and stopping by a restaurant for some fried rice.

Drake – “Hold On, We’re Going Home” Video

“Hold On, We’re Going Home,” the big hit from Drake’s new album Nothing Was The Same, is a soft, sensitive new-wave love-ballad. So naturally, the video should culminate in a massive shipping-yard gun battle and a CGI explosion, right? Well, that’s what director (and Matrix cinematographer) Bill Pope has done with this grand, ridiculous video. The video takes place in 1985 Miami, and it has A$AP Rocky and the Chicago rapper Fredo Santana in supporting roles. The plot is basically what you’d find in a video game like Double Dragon: Dangerous thugs kidnap Drake’s girlfriend, so Drake and his friends have to fight to get her back. Watch the absurdity unfold.

Luscious Jackson – “Show Us What You Got” Official Video

The video for Luscious Jackson’s new song “Show Us What You Got” looks like it came straight out of the ’90s, complete with fuzzy NYC subway singing, an in-studio jam sesh, and some Powerpoint-esque lyric slides. The all-female crew, who released all of their previous albums on the Beastie Boys’ Grand Royal label, are self-releasing their fourth full-length Magic Hour on November 5. Directed by Josephine Wiggs

Steven Wilson - "Drive Home" (Official Video)

Steven Wilson - "Drive Home" (Official Video) directed by Jess Cope

Mudhoney – “The Only Son Of The Widow From Nain” (Official Video)

If you enjoyed the awesome single-shot video for Mudhoney’s “I Like It Small” from earlier this year, well here’s another one for “The Only Son Of The Widow From Nain.” The video is like a B-movie condensed to just a few entertaining minutes, with lots of things that would be creepy in theory, but end up skewing more toward silly. The central character stumbles through this creepy hospital, looking in room after room of unsettling things — a great horror movie trope that’s shown up in classics like The Shining, The Wickerman, or Shivers. Throw in plenty of cut-aways drunken dancing and you have another excellent Mudhoney video.

Autre Ne Veut – “Ego Free Sex Free” Video

Earlier this year, the wound-up and emotive bedroom-R&B explorer Autre Ne Veut released his very, very good sophomore album Anxiety. One of that album’s most immediate tracks was the disconnection anthem “Ego Free Sex Free.” And now the artist Bangs has made a video for that song, and on the face of it, it has practically nothing to do with the song itself. The video is a single camera shot of an ornate ballroom full of fancily dressed people, all moving around in an intricately choreographed synchronized motion that I’d hesitate to call “dancing.”

Sky Ferreira – “You’re Not The One” (Official Video)

Next month, the promising young narco-pop star Sky Ferreira is set to drop Night Time, My Time, her first full-length album. Her single “You’re Not The One” is a fluttery, immaculately produced ’80s-style breakup jam, and this morning, she’s shared it in the form of a stylish and artfully lit music video. The clip, from director Grant Singer, tells the story of an ill-fated nightclub romance. An ice pick figures prominently.

Fryars – “Cool Like Me" (Official Mike Skinner Remix Video)

It’s been more than three years since Fryars first full-length album, Dark Young Hearts, but the 22-year-old British electronic musician Ben Garrett has recently released two tracks from his next full-length album, due later this year. While “On Your Own” has a subdued ballad tone, “Cool Like Me” echoes the funky beats of European electronic music. Now Fryars has collaborated with Mike Skinner bka the Streets to remix “Cool Like Me,” so the beats are heavier and the vocals robotized. The video is filled with shots of the well-dressed and fashionable at this year’s London Fashion Week, with descriptive captions of which popular trends they’re sporting. Check out Fryars and Skinner’s even groovier remix

Giant Drag – “90210″ (Official Video)

I remember hearing Giant Drag‘s single “Kevin Is Gay” when I was 13 and thinking it was the coolest, most taboo song ever — so it is with great adolescent pain that I write: R.I.P. Giant Drag. Singer/Lyricist Annie Hardy has fronted the group since 2003, and this year, she announced that Giant Drag would embark on a farewell tour partially funded by IndieGogo. Last week, Hardy posted a video for the song “90210″ from the self-released sophomore album Waking Up Is Hard To Do, and although the aesthetic definitely fits into her DIY outlook, the video was definitely recorded in the Photo Booth application on a MacBook. Hardy has always been really, really good at writing catchy bummer-pop songs, and “90210″ is no exception. Giant Drag will play their final show tomorrow night in London. Check out the video for “90210″.

Scott & Charlene’s Wedding- “Jackie Boy”

Music video by Scott & Charlene's Wedding performing Jackie Boy, which shows Dermody running through the streets and training for some unexplained fight. While the music of Scott & Charlene’s Wedding could be simply classified as scratchy garage rock, it’s Dermody’s switching between drowsy vocals and sing-shouting the chorus that distinguishes him from other noisy indie rockers.

The Weeknd - “Pretty” Official Music Video (NSFW)

If you thought the Weeknd’s new album Kiss Land was misogynist, you had no idea. Abel Tesfaye’s new video for “Pretty,” an intense ballad from the LP, is a deeply NSFW and disturbing piece of work. It’s impressive, to be sure, but there’s a decent chance it’ll make you hate the guy. In the clip, Tesfaye goes drifting through Tokyo, looking for a particular lady (who gets very, very naked in the video). Things take some unexpected turns, and it all gets very messy. Director: Sam Pilling

Nirvana – “Forgotten Tune” [Full Song]

Last week, Nirvana’s In Utero turned 20. This week, the album comes out in deluxe-reissue form, with a four-CD box set full of extras. One of those extras is “Forgotten Tune,” a previously unreleased song from those In Utero sessions. It’s a crude, scratchy instrumental, and there’s a reason why it’s gone unheard through all these years of Nirvana reissue-mania; it’s not like there’s another “Heart Shaped Box” lurking out there. But it’s still a rare chance to hear this trio in full noisy form, even if they were just fucking around. (Just go ahead and ignore the weird interstitial music at the beginning.) Also included in the set is a DVD that features the December 1993 concert at Seattle’s Pier 48, broadcast on MTV as Live And Loud. And below, you can check two videos of rehearsals for that show, featuring rehearsal footage of “Radio Friendly Unit Shifter” and “Very Ape.”

Mazzy Star – “California” (Official Video)

First single from the new Mazzy Star album "Seasons of Your Day"

The Dodos – “Confidence” (Official Video)

The Nate Chan directed video for “Confidence,” a track off the Dodos’ new album, starts out seeming kind of funny. I mean, there’s a guy in a bathrobe and underwear running down the street — that is guaranteed to be funny, right? Yet, for all its strangeness this is actually a pretty thoughtful and sad video in between some the little touches of goofiness. A man wakes up with a pair of black eyes to see an ominous text from a friend about the night before and, after stumbling over some empty beer cans, eventually turns on the news. We never really know what he sees on there, but it’s enough to bring a cop to his door (looking for a missing person…) and to make him run for his life. There’s more going on here under the surface.

Bryce Dessner & The Kronos Quartet – “Aheym”

Bryce Dessner, one of the two twin brothers in the National, is the band member who studied music composition at Yale before going on to dour indie rock stardom. A few years ago, he arranged a new piece called “Aheym” for the Kronos Quartet, the long-running modern-classical institution, when they were getting ready for a show at Brooklyn’s Prospect Park bandshell. Since then, the group has performed the composition many times, and now they’re getting ready to release a full album together. The title track absolutely nothing like the National — or like indie rock in general — but it’s a chance to hear where Dessner’s passions push him, even beyond what he does in his relatively adventurous side project Clogs. Watch Matthew Ritchie’s video for the piece.

No Joy – “Blue Neck Riviera” Video

You might remember listening to No Joy earlier this year via singles like “Lunar Phobia” and “Hare Tarot Lies,” which led up to the glitching shoegaze of LP Wait To Pleasure. Here’s the Jason Harvey-directed music video for album track “Blue Neck Riviera,” which keeps a nice balance between the beauty of nature and the full-on digital wreckage you see above.

Pearl Jam – “Sirens” (Official Music Video)

Just yesterday, Pearl Jam dropped “Sirens,” the second single off their forthcoming Lightning Bolt, and today, they follow it up with a video. The clip is again helmed by Danny Clinch, who also directed the vid for lead single “Mind Your Manners,” as well as the band’s 2007 concert film, Immagine In Cornice. Unlike the frenetic weirdness of “Mind Your Manners, though, “Sirens” is presented as the purest of performance videos, just the band banging away on a dimly lit stage.

Kvelertak – “Evig Vandrar” (Official Music Video)

Norwegian black ‘n’ rollers Kvelertak recently announced a monster North American tour with the almighty High On Fire, and in conjunction with that announcement, they’ve released a new video for a song from their fucking awesome early-2013 self-titled sophomore album. The clip is a really cool cartoon that was pretty evidently inspired by the Tusken Raiders of Tattoine. The song of course kicks ass. And the tour is almost definitely the best live-music experience you’ll have in Q4; both Kvelertak and High On Fire are other-level live acts with few equals at the moment.

The Knife – “Let’s Talk About Gender Baby, Let’s Talk About You And Me (Planningtorock Rework)” Video

The Berlin-based dance-music feminist Planningtorock last worked with the Knife on their experimental 2010 opera Tomorrow, In A Year, and now she’s reworked their Shaking The Habitual single “Full Of Fire,” overhauling it completely and transforming it into a double-dutch electro playground chant called “Let’s Talk About Gender Baby, Let’s Talk About You And Me.” (You’ve probably already guessed this from the title, but the remix really takes more from Salt-N-Pepa’s “Let’s Talk About Sex” than it does from “Full Of Fire.) Planningtorock also directed the video for the remix, turning it into a kaleidoscope of computer-generated shapes and heavily painted lips.

Future – “How It Was”

If I’d known there was a new Future song in Grand Theft Auto V, I might’ve bought the goddam thing by now. The new video game blockbuster came out earlier this week, and some of the brightest minds of our generation have spent the past few days pickling their brains in it. The game’s radio stations have new songs from people like Twin Shadow, Wavves, Tyler, The Creator, and, it seems, the Atlanta sing-rap god. Future’s Metro Boomin-produced GTA contribution “How It Was” is smeary triumphant Auto-Tuned excellence — not Future at his best, by any means, but still a fitting soundtrack for when you finally figure out how to steal a tank (or whatever this game’s equivalent is). Listen below.

Solange – “Lovers In The Parking Lot” (Official Video)

Solange’s gloriously incandescent Dev Hynes-produced True EP is nearing its first birthday, but if you’ve gone a week this year without listening to it, you’re doing something wrong. And today, she’s given us an absolutely wonderful video for the shimmering midtempo ballad “Lovers In The Parking Lot.” In the clip, Solange’s dancing appears to magically control everything that happens in a decrepit Houston mini-mall. Her powers include, but are not limited to, summoning Bun B and Mannie Fresh to do a few quick synchonized dance steps, and if that doesn’t make your heart sing, I don’t know what to tell you. Along with Peter J. Brant and Emily Kai Bock, Solange co-directed the Creators Project-produced video, and you can watch.

Bass Drum Of Death – “Bad Reputation” Video

Bass Drum Of Death’s video for “Bad Reputation,” a rampaging garage rock track from the band’s self-titled LP, is your classic crime-spree fantasy capped off with a comeuppance. The clip features a teenage girl on a reign of terror that includes hotwiring a Dodge Challenger, swigging Jack and doing bumps while driving, stealing the winnings from a dice game, stabbing a street gambler in the eye, picking up a hooker, filming the two of them doing lines then jumping on a motel bed, swiping the prostitute’s cash while she sleeps and, at long last, getting what’s coming to her. Watch the video, directed by Wilcoxsessions.

Laura Marling – “Devil’s Resting Place” (Official Video)

Music video by Laura Marling performing Devil's Resting Place. Directed by Fred Scott and Nick Davies. In the video, a woman in Victorian garb wanders through the woods before returning to her spooky mansion a la Wuthering Heights, as Marling sings: “When you come to call on me that’s why my eyes are glazed/ I’ve been with the devil in the devil’s resting place.” The devil inevitably comes to call, sporting a wide-brimmed black hat and an evil bird tattoo above his left thumb. As we already know, Laura Marling is super into interpretive dance, and this video boasts some pretty violent solo-dancing that climaxes in back-bending levitation. It’s indicative of either an exorcism or an orgasm — up to you.

Tegan And Sara – “Goodbye, Goodbye” Video

Sorry, but this video is no longer available.

Tegan And Sara have premiered the music video for their song “Goodbye, Goodbye” off of this year’s Heartthrob. The video is a three and a half minute exploration of the myriad ways you can rid yourself of a terrible ex in the 21st century — none of which involve speaking face-to-face. Sara said the following about the song and accompanying video directed by Natalie Rae Robinson:

“Goodbye, Goodbye” is a sound off about rejection and the empowerment of shutting someone out after a break-up, but it’s also an acknowledgement of the distorted nature of intimacy that comes from communicating complex emotions through a cell phone or email. In a way we learn more about ourselves than each other when we interact this way. Our phones and computers are just mirrors for us to reflect again and again.

UPDATE: The Quins have also teamed up with YouTube.com/ThePetCollective to recreate with “Closer” with dogs. You know you wanna watch that, too:

Foxygen – “We Are The 21st Century Ambassadors Of Peace & Magic” (Official Video)

Foxygen's Sam France is going the full Jim Morrison in the new video for "We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic", off their 2013 record by the same name. Watch him prance around in a psychedelic graveyard in the new clip, directed by Neighborhood Watch Films' William Doyle.

 

Directed by William Doyle
Director of Photography: Ryan Dickey
Produced by Richard Peete
Edited by William Doyle
Animations: Alex Soto
Projections: Drippy Eye Projections
Special Thanks to Patrick Parker, Brett Doonan, Oosie, Ruben Hernandez and Youth Group Gallery
A Neighborhood Watch Production, www.neighborhoodwatchfilms.com

Celestial Shore - "Hour Minute" (Official Video)

What the hell? Since when did summer camp turn into “hanging out with cool Brooklyn bands and shooting music videos all week”? When I was a kid we just braided gimp. That’s all we did, all day, and we didn’t think it could get better than that. Not so since Brooklyn psych-pop trio Celestial Shore teamed up with some kids (roughly ages 6-11) from the Art Colony Day Camp (part of the Children’s Museum Of The Arts) to make a music video for “Hour Minute.” The track is a whirlpool of drum change-ups, trippy bass lines, and surf guitar — in other words it’s just as unpredictable and awesome as everything Celestial Shore has put out so far. The video, which is directed by Sean Dunn and Emily Alexander, has a patchwork, handmade vibe to it that matches the band perfectly, and the kids are all really adorable and enthusiastic.

PUP - “Reservoir” (Official Video)

Directed By: Chandler Levack and Jeremy Schaulin-Rioux

Steve Mason – “Fire!” (Official Video)

Former Beta Band vocalist Steve Mason has released the video for the second single off his latest solo album, Monkey Minds In The Devil’s Time, which came out back in March. In the video for “Fire!,” the Scottish musician continues with the politicized slant that was present on his sophomore release.

Gunplay – “Gallardo” (Feat. Rick Ross & Yo Gotti) Video (NSFW)

Gunplay is one of the greatest headknock rappers currently walking the face of the earth, and he’s also a part of one of rap’s most popular crews. And yet the closest he’ll come to a mainstream breakout moment might be this deeply NSFW strip-club video with Rick Ross and Memphis knucklehead Yo Gotti. Whatever, I’ll take it. DRE Films directs.

MGMT – “Cool Song No. 2″ Video (Feat. Michael K. Williams)

Today, MGMT release their messy self-titled third album, and they’ve also got a new video for us. The “Cool Song No. 2″ clip, directed by Isaiah Seret, stars Michael K. Williams — Omar from The Wire! In a bit of a riff on the character that made him famous, Williams plays an absolute badass with a male lover. We see him strutting around dressed like a member of A$AP Mob, driving a vintage sports car, and murdering people with his bare hands. But we also see him gently caring for a lover who appears to be transforming into a tree. This is, after all, an MGMT video.

Sebadoh – “I Will” (Official Video)

Defend Yourself, Sebadoh’s first full-length album since 1999, is finally out tomorrow. Way back on 7/24, “I Will” was our first taste of the album, and now that song has a studio-centric video featuring lots of closeups of Lou Barlow’s bearded mouth, his guitar, and his cat transposed with hand-scrawled lyrics. Adam Harding directed the clip.

Deltron 3030 – “City Rising From The Ashes” Video

Here's the video for Deltron 3030's post-apocalyptic "City Rising from the Ashes."

Video Directors: Eve Martin & Nicolas Bueno (bubbleduchesse) via Genero.tv
Video Producers: Adriana Piasek Wanski
Video Production company: La parti & Bubbleduchesse

Superchunk – “Staying Home” (Official Video)

Superchunk’s new I Hate Music manages to be a gut-punch and a fist-pump all at once. It’s among the year’s most emotionally resonant records, an all-time great indie band finding fresh life by reflecting on death. Although “Staying Home” is about the surest sign your youth is slipping away — opting for an evening in instead of going out for the night — it’s among the album’s most youthful energy bursts, racing to the finish in under two minutes on the back of some exceptionally chipper hardcore bombast. Taiyo Kimura’s egg-splattering, brain-brushing, toilet-feasting video for the song is appropriately juvenile and a whole lot of fun.

Daft Punk – “Lose Yourself To Dance” (Feat. Pharrell & Nile Rodgers)(Official Version)

"Lose Yourself to Dance"
The new Video from Daft Punk ft. Pharrell Williams
Watch the full version now
Directed by: Thomas Bangalter, Guyman de Homem-Christo, Warren Fu, Paul Hahn & Cedric Hervet

Yuck – “Middle Sea” (Official Video)

The newly frontman-free British fuzz-rockers Yuck are about to release Glow & Behold, their second album and their first since former leader Daniel Blumberg flew the coop, and now they’ve got a video for their gorgeously bleary recent single “Middle Sea.” In the clip, hirsute Yuck drummer Jonny Rogoff plays a competitive, emotional tennis match in an empty arena against an apparently unstable older gentleman. As as extreme tennis neophyte, I can only say that homeboy appears to know what he’s doing.

Watch Leonard Cohen Debut “I’ve Got A Secret” In Dublin

Leonard Cohen’s lengthy world tour brought him to Dublin a few days ago, where he debuted a new song, “I’ve Got A Secret.” The song has been a work in progress for the past few years; some of the lyrics were also used in the song “Feels So Good” that he debuted during his 2009 tour. Check out a video below. Cohen is on tour in Europe until September 18th; in two months, he’ll play shows in Australia and New Zealand.

Franz Ferdinand - Evil Eye (Official Video)

Franz Ferdinand - Evil Eye (Official Video)

The video for Evil Eye is very much inspired by the 'horror theme' of the song title. Directed by acclaimed U.S. film-maker Diane Martel, who said -- "This is a creepy nasty video for my dear friends and my favourite band. I'm proud to be part of this brilliant album's visuals!".

FKA twigs – “Papi Pacify” Video

“Water Me,” the last video from the London newcomer FKA twigs, was one of the more arresting and powerfully memorable music videos in recent memory, and her new video for the heaving, twitching soul song “Papi Pacify” (co-produced, like “Water Me,” by the electronic experimenter and Kanye collaborator Arca) is further evidence that this lady knows how to make a music video that grabs your brain. FKA twigs co-directed the video with Tom Beard, and it’s a loving, slow-mo, back-and-forth portrait of a moment that looks both romantic and violently terrifying. There’s also a lot of body-glitter involved. And while nothing explicit exactly happens, you might not want to watch this one at work.

Gambles – “So I Cry Out” Video

Matthew Sisken, who releases music under the name Gambles, is gearing up for the release of Trust, his debut album. “So I Cry Out” is the first single off that album and its video manages to be both uplifting and absolutely devastating at the same time. When we talked to him last month, the NYC-based singer-songwriter revealed the inspiration for the track: “This one is just like, ‘We’re just two fucking kids who had fucking bad luck.’ We both grew up in horrible circumstances where basically you grow up in like an hour because of this one thing that happened and then you’re never the same … and it’s sad that it happens.” Watch below.

Shit Robot – “We Got A Love” (Official Video)

Shit Robot aka Marcus Lambkin makes very nice Detroit-worshipping techno, and has a great knack for picking collaborators. As his track “We Got A Love” opens it sounds like the nephew to Derrick May’s “Strings Of Life” (done under the name Rhythm Is Rhythm, and a Detroit techno classic) at least until Reggie Watts steps in and completely makes it his own. The video features what it describes as a “galactic man,” have some laid back adventures around his city.

RAC – “Let Go” (Feat. Kele & MNDR) Official Video

RAC, or Remix Artists Collective, has come a long way since we first came across him over half a decade ago. Just look at the stylish video for “Let Go,” a track which features Kele of Bloc Party and MNDR. Claire had a point when she first described the dance-y track as having “an undercurrent of neuroses,” something that’s even clearer in this unsettling video which finds a man struggling with the fact that his girlfriend can’t control her habit of becoming a murderous cannibal. It’s something that would seem either silly or creepy in another video, but when you keep in mind that one of the first lyrics to this song is “I’m here for you, just try to, try to, try to stay sober,” you can see the sad truth of what’s going on.

Icona Pop - All Night (Official Extended Video)

“All Night” is probably the best non-”I Love It” song we’ve yet heard from Swedish dance-pop screamers Icona Pop. Its new video, from director Dori Oskowitz, takes the song’s kineticism and really does something with it. The video works as a sort of mini-documentary about New York’s ridiculously photogenic vogue-ball culture, showing the two members of Icona Pop performing at a club showdown, and it feels like a sports movie waiting to happen.

Glasser – “Design” Video

“Design” is the second full track Cameron Mesirow, bka Glasser, has shared from her upcoming album Interiors. Its Justin Turner-directed clip features Mesirow dancing through a sparsely decorated room, interacting with a constantly-morphing sculpture.

Kwes. – “36″ Video

London singer/producer Kwes. will release ilp, his first full-length album, next month, and first single “36” is a beautifully floaty plastic-soul song that doesn’t require the same brain-energy as the cerebral bass music he was making a year ago. The song’s brand-new video is even more welcoming. It shows Kwes. accompanying an utterly adorable quartet of kids through a suburban neighborhood as they try and mostly fail to impress girls.

Deerhunter – “Back To The Middle” (Official Video)

I feel like a lot of people slept on or forgot about Deerhunter’s awesome 2013 album Monomania, which is a drag because … it’s awesome. Well sleep no more, because Bradford Cox and Co. have just released a video for Monomania cut “Back To The Middle,” precding a fall tour. The vid stars British actor Durassie Kiangangu in ’60s drag; it’s mostly shot in vintage-looking B&W, except for a color cutaway toward the middle of the clip that shows Kiangangu’s transformation into character.

Shit Robot - "We Got A Love' ft Reggie Watts" (Official Video)

A galactic man rides the bus, plays basketball, and gambles. Dir. Tom Kenney

Junip – “Walking Lightly” (Official Video)

Thus far, Junip, the soft and textured Swedish rock band led by José González, have made two videos for songs from their recent self-titled sophomore album, with director Mikel Cee Karlsson. Both of those videos, for “Line Of Fire” and “Your Life, Your Call,” have been extremely Scandinavian fucked-up visions of interpersonal dynamics, everyone acting like vampires to everyone else. Their new one, for “Walking Lightly,” goes a different direction, with director Fredrik Egerstrand filming an atmospheric performance clip. The new direction makes sense. The band isn’t exactly the most commanding live presence, but they do work up a very pretty cloud of sound, and this video lets us see all the moving parts involved in that, while mirroring the song’s vibe.

Blood Orange – “Chamakay” (Feat. Caroline Polachek) Video

In recent years, Dev Hynes has been best-known as a collaborator, helping people like Solange and Sky Ferreira find a certain haze-pop sweet spot. But Hynes has also been running his solo project Blood Orange for a while now, and he’s got an album called Cupid Deluxe coming soon. The LP’s first single is an absolutely lovely airy midtempo groove called “Chamakay,” and it features Chairlift’s Caroline Polachek on backing vocals. Polachek’s not in the video. Instead, Hynes and director Adam Bainbridge, who records as Kindness, visited Georgetown, capital of the South American nation of Guyana and hometown of Hynes’s mother. In the video, Hynes meets some of his family members for the first time and shows off some gawky-but-slick dance moves. The combination of heartwarming ancestral connection, gorgeous scenery, and goofy charisma — not to mention a really good song — makes this a truly great video. Watch it and read some words from Hynes below.

Nite Jewel – “Stay A Little Longer” (Official Video)

Pretty soon Nite Jewel are releasing a greatest hits album, and while “Stay A Little Longer” probably doesn’t qualify as a “greatest hit,” that’s only because it’s never been released. It’s an especially sweet song by an artist who can boast a whole lot of those. Below is the new music video for “Longer,” directed by Cole MGN and Emily Jane Kuntz, a morphing blob of colors and shapes with effects that make it fall somewhere between rudimentary computer animation and a really pretty watercolor.

The Weeknd – “Live For” (Feat. Drake) Video

In the new video for Kiss Land highlight “Live For,” Abel Tesfaye really takes center stage. It’s strange now to think that when the Weeknd first came out he was nearly as mysterious as Burial, but here he’s completely direct and up front. At least at first. Once the beat drops it’s all strobe lights and darkness, until Drake shows up in fine form as usual.

Eagulls – “Nerve Endings” (Official Video)

The Leeds based rock band Eagulls came up with a pretty smart, albeit nauseating, way to get the anxious mood across in their song “Nerve Endings,” and apparently it led to some police involvement. The murky video consists of a pig brain, acquired from a local butcher shop, left out to rot and filmed in high-speed. Hazy footage of the band plays over it, but your eyes are definitely drawn to the slowly decomposing organ, which eventually is overcome with maggots and devoured completely. Apparently during the filming someone came across the brain and camera, and assumed something very fucked up was happening and called the authorities. In the words of Eagulls frontman George Mitchell: “Some guy had come round to sort the gas out ‘cos we hadn’t paid the bill. He’d gone downstairs, seen there was some fucking brain rotting and called the coppers.” Despite getting their door kicked down, it seems like everything worked out.

Au Revoir Simone – “Crazy” Video

Au Revoir Simone have done something pretty ambitious in their new video for “Crazy,” the single off their upcoming album. The video aims to remake Martin Scorsese’s lesser-known (by Scoresese standards) but excellent 1985 film After Hours with all the characters played by the synth-pop trio of Erika Forster, Annie Hart, and Heather D’Angelo. It’s a testament to the direction team of Alex Braverman and Poppy de Villeneuve, as well as the brilliance of After Hours to begin with, that you don’t even really need to know the film in advance to enjoy the absurd ride that its main character goes on. All three band members get their roles just right, and best of all “Crazy” makes for the perfect soundtrack to the bizarre evening adventure that poor Paul Hackett gets taken on.

Future – “Honest” (Official Video)

Future will release his sophomore full-length Honest in November and has now unleashed the visuals for its eponymous lead single. The video features multiple layers of opulence, from his white piano to vintage cameras all in a castle-like setting. His styling is also incredible — the oxblood suit! The leather pants! I’m not even mad he enlisted someone other than Ciara to play his leading lady, as the role is given to former Destiny’s Child member LeToya Luckett.

Dutch Uncles – “Nometo” Video

UK indie-poppers Dutch Uncles have delivered a couple of cool videos this year, especially their more-than-delightful one for “Flexxin.” Now they’ve released a collage clip for track “Nometo”

Father John Misty – “I’m Writing A Novel” (Official Video)

“I’m Writing A Novel,” off of Father John Misty’s recent album Fear Fun, was always a charming track and now there’s a video that matches it. Following Josh Tillman as he goes about his day — hanging out in his apartment, playing shows, shooting guns, etc. — it features little asides from him that are always pretty golden. Not much goes on, but that’s not really a complaint when he can make doing nothing much so entertaining.

Arcade Fire – “Reflektor” (Official Video)

Arcade Fire’s hotly anticipated “Reflektor” video, directed by Anton Corbijn, is finally here and despite being a little jaded from the tornado of hype that’s gone on today, you may find it pretty damn incredible. The whole thing is so big, so weird, so overwhelmingly stylish, and beautiful, not to mention it’s all shot in that stark black and white that made Corbijn iconic. It’s the sort of thing that already tops every other music video this week by the two minute mark, and that’s not even the halfway point.

Trentemøller – “Candy Tongue” (feat. Marie Fisker) (Official Video) (NSFW)

Trentemøller, who was recently named one of TIME’s 7 Scandinavian Bands You Should Listen To Now, is gearing up to release brand new album Lost at the end of the month. Among many collaborations on the record, including guest appearances from Blonde Redhead, Low, the Raveonettes, Lower Dens, and Jonny Pierce of the Drums, is “Candy Tongue,” a haunting twinkler featuring Danish singer Marie Fisker. Its accompanying video, directed by Thomas Jessen, showcases an array of naked bodies, young and old, morphing into each other in wisps of smoke.

Jonathan Rado - "Faces" (Official Music Video)

The music video for Foxygen-member Jonathan Rado’s “Faces” may start out like an intense bare-knuckle boxing match, but quickly becomes a far more intense dance-off. The video, directed by Austin Kearns, keeps bouncing back and forth between these vibes and it’s pretty fun to try and keep up. Kearns shoots it in an extremely narrow aspect ratio which only makes it all the more intense — and of course right when you think you’re done, it throws in one of the most WTF-worthy endings you could imagine.

Julia Holter - This Is A True Heart (Official Video)

After the theatrical “In The Green Wild” music video, Julia Holter has now released a very different sort of video for “This Is A True Heart.” Here Holter stars as a spy of some sort, doing a job involving a dead body, leaked information, and a very important flash drive. The entire Eugene Kotlyarenko directed video is purposely vague and played by the actors with the utmost noir-seriousness, which ends up being pretty funny. It just sends itself up more and more until a moment involving a saxophone player that is to ridiculous to ruin here. The reason why this all works though is because Kotlyarenko crafts the video exquisitely, every shot, light, and cut is perfect. It becomes something that makes you laugh while you marvel at it.

Obits – “Spun Out” (Official Video)

Obits have delivered a video for Bed & Bugs track “Spun Out.” What seems like a straight-forward performance clip turns into something trash-filled and slightly weird.

Waxahatchee – “Misery Over Dispute” (Official Video)

Katie Crutchfield, bka Waxahatchee, has released a video for her Cerulean Salt track “Misery Over Dispute.” The black-and-white clip features Crutchfield tap-dancing, so now we know not only can shred on the guitar and write songs that can kick you in the gut, but she can seriously cut a rug, too.

MØ – “XXX 88″

The icy Danish pop singer MØ appeared on our radar earlier this year with “Glass,” but she jumped up another level with the fearsome Diplo-produced banger “XXX 88.” And someone spent some serious money on the song’s just-released video, which stars MØ as a suburban teenager who imagines herself as some sort of world-traveling glam-pop superhero. Tim Erem directs, and Diplo shows up in oiled-up naked-except-for-tightie-whities cameo form.

Miley Cyrus - "Wrecking Ball" (Official Video)

Music video by Miley Cyrus performing Wrecking Ball. (C) 2013 RCA Records, a division of Sony Music Entertainment

Eminem – “Berzerk” (Official Video) (Explicit)

Eminem’s video for his aggro back-to-basics single “Berzerk” just hit the internet, and it’s as cartoonishly ugly as every Eminem video ever. It’s also, like every Eminem video ever, probably more fun than it should be. It mostly revolves around Em in a room with a gigantic boom box, and it also has copious use of fisheye lens, a visual quote of the Beastie Boys’ “So What Cha Want” video, and Rick Rubin pretending to rap. Kendrick Lamar, Kid Rock, Yelawolf, and Slaughterhouse also make appearances.

Watch “The Reflektors” Video From Creators Project

Making up for all of the subtlety and down-to-earth directness, Arcade Fire are going hard now with all of the promotions for their new album. This morning we got an ambitious new music video, and now there’s a teaser from the Creators Project for something else related to the new music. Featuring people walking through crowds in full fabric body suits (even faces are covered) and reflective pieces all over them with boom boxes playing music. Occasionally there are glances of the “Reflektor” symbol we’ve been seeing all over the internet. Perhaps this will all make more sense at 9PM tonight, when the band is planning to release Anton Corbijn’s video for the single.

Arcade Fire – “Reflektor” Interactive Video

Arcade Fire, trailblazers of the interactive video, have released one for “Reflektor.” It’s a virtual projection by Vincent Morisset and to watch, you need Google Chrome and either a mouse or webcam and a smartphone or tablet. Filmed in Jacmel, Haiti, “the story follows a young woman who travels between her world and our own.” Check it out here or watch a screengrab of the action.

Franz Ferdinand – “Evil Eye” (Official Video) (NSFW)

Franz Ferdinand’s gruesome, genuinely disgusting video for the Right Thoughts, Right Words, Right Actions song “Evil Eye” feels like what might happen if someone made a supercut of all the nastiest moments from Lucio Fulci’s ’70s cheapo Italian horror movies. The grainy video is all disconnected images that seem engineered to turn your stomach: Eyeballs floating in swimming pools, loving closeups of limb-hackings, entrails spilling on sidewalks. Also, frontman Alex Kapranos has apparently grown a Vincent Price mustache for the occasion, which is a nice touch. The whole thing is presented with a fair amount of morbid humor, and it’s pretty fine, but don’t do like me and click play immediately post-breakfast. The veteran music-video director Diane Martel — who, thanks to her videos for “Blurred Lines” and “We Can’t Stop,” is having a titanic year (and who also did one of history’s greatest music videos) — is the party responsible.

Katy Perry – “Roar” (Official Video)

Katy Perry – “Roar” (Dir. Grady Hall & Mark Kudsi)

If only the ending to Lost had been this satisfying. (I’m worried, however, that I’m getting an inaccurate image of Nokia smartphones’ durability and battery life.)

The Avalanches – “Stalking To A Stranger (Planets Collide Remix)” Video

The Avalanches don’t exactly believe in drowning us in new music. It’s been 13 years, and we’re still waiting for them to follow up Since I Left You. But the DJ collective does have something new for us: An eight-minute disco-damaged remix of “Talking To A Stranger,” a 1982 postpunk freakout by the Aussie band Hunters & Collectors. The Avalanches’ version of the track, “Stalking To A Stranger (Planets Collide Remix),” has its own video, which essentially serves as a remix of the original hallucinatory video. The remix will appear on the compilation Crucible: The Songs Of Hunters & Collectors.

Batwings Catwings – “September”

The energetic, guitar pop on Batwings Catwings’ Woah EP was about nostalgia without depending on nostalgia musically, which is tougher than it sounds. They’ve now released a video for their excellent song “September” which has a very back-to-school vibe. It opens with a young girl waking up and going through the routine of getting ready, with lingering shots of friendship bracelets and cigar-box pencil cases. And, of course, the most important part: playing with your cat before you take off. Nothing much happens, and it’s over pretty quick — but that’s kind of how September is when you’re going back to school and that’s a major reason why the video is so heartwarming. In the words of BWCW drummer Clay Johnson:

It’s loosely about the first day of school and actually not going ‘we should never move faster than nature’ but hanging with a cat named Diego instead. The meaning is up to the eye of the beholder though of course.

Notice the name on the friendship bracelet…

G-Dragon – “Coup D’Etat” (Video)

G-Dragon – “Coup D’Etat” (Dir. Suh Hyun Seung)

K-pop boy genius comes gunning for Nicki Minaj’s “evolutionary Missy Elliott” crown, gets beat from Diplo and Baauer, makes four-minute Jodorowsky movie. And it’s still not the week’s best movie, because amazing things happen all the time.

Team Spirit – “Phenomenon” (Official Video)

Team Spirit – “Phenomenon” (Dir. HannesJohannes)

An epic saga concludes with the sight of a dicknosed Nazi lady being sucked down a portal to hell, after the guy from the ’80s Big Mac commercials shoots Hitler’s brain through the back of its skull. So yeah, they stuck the landing.

Kitty – “Hittin Lixx” Video

Delinquents breaking glass and throwing glitter in an industrial space is the perfect treatment for Kitty’s ode to love hazards “Hittin’ Lixx” — and it is exactly that, with the Florida rapper smashing light bulbs with a group of friends. The clip includes a stoic cameo from producer Hot Sugar and rowdy appearance from her “Ay Shawty“-collaborator Lakutis.

They Might Be Giants – “You’re On Fire” (Official Video)

The Johns (Flannsburgh and Linnell) behind They Might Be Giants have just put out a music video (directed by Hoku Uchiyama and Adam Bolt) for “Your On Fire”. The video is sweet and romantic or grisly and horrible depending on who’s perspective you’re taking it from. On the one hand it’s about a girl (played by Lauren Lapkus from Orange Is The New Black) cooking dinner for her significant other, but from the perspective of the sentient food she’s cooking, well, things are about to get unpleasant.

There are some great effects here, from the singing ground beef (that has to turn back to normal every time she looks at him, Toy Story style) to the broccoli and carrots, which take turns playing each other as horns and guitars, respectively. It’s a very strange video.

Vattnet Viskar – “Breath Of The Almighty” (Official Video)

New Hampshire post-black metal band Vattnet Viskar’s debut album, Sky Swallower; I think it’s a great album, and a fucking remarkable debut, and I don’t know what else to say. It dropped earlier this week to uniformly enthusiastic praise (inexplicably it’s nowhere to be found on Metacritic — damn you, lamestream media and your anti-metal bias! — but I’m guessing it’d average somewhere in the mid-80s). Today the band released a video for the album’s gargantuan centerpiece, “Breath Of The Almighty.” Directed by Josh Graham — who served a crucial role as Neurosis’s visual and graphics artist for many years, and who also directed the new Soundgarden vid — the clip nicely reflects the qualities of music: extreme contrasts; towering scope; infinite space.

Empire Of The Sun – “DNA”

Aussie dance-pop duo Empire Of The Sun have gone all operatically ridiculous for their new album Ice On The Dune, and their new video for “DNA” gets the overblown absurdity of their whole act just right in ways that their too-serious “Alive” video couldn’t manage. In the video, we see both band members, in full-on glammed-out space-pirate uniform, partying their way through the more desolate edges of near-future Los Angeles.

TV On The Radio – “Mercy” Video

TV On The Radio have come off of their hiatus to give us two new songs this summer, “Mercy” and “Million Miles,” and they’ve both been awesome. “Million Miles” already had a video, and now “Mercy” does too. Director Dawn Garcia uses some truly tactile special effects to tell the story of an anthropomorphic asteroid that visits Earth and does its best to fit in. It’s a trippy but heartfelt clip.

Soundgarden – “Halfway There” Video

Reunited grunge titans Soundgarden returned last year with the shockingly solid comeback album King Animal, and they’ve already made a video for the stomping “By Crooked Steps.” Now there’s also a clip for the strummy and satisfying “Halfway There,” and it serves as a sort of stoner sci-fi mini-movie, telling the story of a space traveler who pushes his ship so hard that he starts getting visions of pretty ladies and Soundgarden dudes.

Crystal Stilts – “Star Crawl” (Official Music Video)

Brooklyn postpunkers Crystal Stilts are a couple of weeks away from releasing their fuzzed-out new album Nature Noir. And for the video for first single “Star Crawl,” director Daniel Fetherston has put together a series of shots of landscapes and animals and band members, all seen through fucked-up color filters.

Brendan Canning – “Plugged In”

Broken Social Scene member Brendan Canning will soon release his solo album You Gots 2 Chill, and his new video for the floaty acoustic track “Plugged In” tells the story of a deaf man who makes his living by selling those sign-language cards to random strangers on the streets. This seems like a deeply shitty way to live, but it sure seems like he’s getting by on it. Canning is in the video, but his appearance is limited to a cameo. Edward Fawcett Sharpe, Joel Barnes, and Steve Jones directed the video.

M.I.A. – “Come Walk With Me” Lyric Video

M.I.A.’s mutating new-wave jam “Come Walk With Me” made its way to Tumblr earlier this week, but obviously, the best way to hear the song is by reading the lyrics and looking at trippy CGI images of Hindu deities while you do it. To that end, M.I.A. has posted a lyric video of the track, one that looks like what would happen if a Spencer’s Gifts black-light poster could move and change camera angles.

Moby – “The Perfect Life” (Feat. Wayne Coyne) Video (NSFW)

'the idea for 'the perfect life' video is pretty simple...wayne and i in mariachi costumes walking around l.a picking up a very random
and disparate bunch of disenfranchised oddballs and leading them via trolley to a giant party on a roof overlooking l.a while the sun sets.'
- moby

Moby's 'The Perfect Life' is taken from new album 'Innocents', which comes out on 30 Sep and is available to pre-order now. It features vocals from Wayne Coyne of The Flaming Lips

Sleigh Bells – “Bitter Rivals” (Official Video)

Last week we heard a teaser of “Bitter Rivals,” the crunchy, Dickens-quoting title track from Sleigh Bells’ forthcoming third LP. Now Alexis Krauss and Derek Miller have unveiled the full song and its Creators Project music video, which they directed.

Eleanor Friedberger – “When I Knew” (Official Video)

Eleanor Friedberger has released a video for Personal Record track “When I Knew.” The clip was directed and animated by Ryan Junell and features a carefree Friedberger mostly frolicking in the grass in red, white, and blue (well, Canadian tuxedo) outfits.

Pixies – “Indie Cindy” (Official Video)

Almost a decade after they first reunited, and 22 years after their final album Trompe Le Monde, the Pixies are back with a brand-new studio release, with absolutely no warning, and you can buy the fucker now. On the band’s website, they’re selling a new EP called EP-1 — a title that suggests there’s even more of this on the way. They recorded it in Wales, with Gil Norton producing and someone called Ding playing bass.

“Bagboy,” the new song that the band released earlier this summer, isn’t on the EP. Instead, all four songs are brand-new. And one of them, “Indie Cindy,” already has a music video. The song swings back and forth between classic Black Francis ranting and sudden spangly beauty, and on first listen, it’s easily the best song that the Pixies have put together since reuniting. The song’s video, from directors Lamar + Nik, jumps around temporally to tell a murder story.

Natasha Khan & Jon Hopkins – “Garden’s Heart” (Official Video)

Following a collaboration with Purity Ring, Jon Hopkins has a new song out with Natasha Khan (bka Bat For Lashes) from the upcoming film How I Live Now for which Hopkins provides the score. The gorgeously shot video (directed by Kevin Macdonald) is built from film footage featuring Saoirse Ronan, yet doesn’t seem to be out of context at all. There’s obviously more going on that we’ll see in the film, but this still tells a sad and beautiful story in just a few minutes.

Dent May – “Born Too Late” Video

Dent May’s newest album Warm Blanket is out now via Paw Tracks. Here’s a video for album cut “Born Too Late,” shot at the Neshoba County Fair in Mississippi.

Hodgy Beats – “Karateman” (Feat. Left Brain)

Odd Future associate Hodgy Beats released a new video today for his track “Karateman” featuring Left Brain. The video was directed by Rob Haffey and Etienne Maurice. The track is from the Hodgy Beats Untitled 2 EP, released in June.