Nedelle Torrisi - “Don’t Play Dumb” (Official Video)

In the grand Kevin Bacon game that is indie-rock, Cryptacize co-founder Nedelle Torrisi is the connective thread between Sufjan Stevens and Ariel Pink. (She appears on Sufjan’s new Carrie & Lowell and used to live with Haunted Graffiti member Kenny Gilmore.) “Don’t Play Dumb” — from Torrisi’s self-titled 2013 LP, soon to be reissued on vinyl under the title Advice From Paradise — illustrates that connection, landing somewhere between the digital distress of The Age Of Adz and the soft-rock bloodletting of Pink’s “Picture Me Gone.” In retrospect, the track’s processed, MIDI-esque take on synthpop feels like a precursor for the whole PC Music thing. (Btw, one of those background vocalists is Julia Holter.) For the video, Torrisi posed as a Target employee — and she director Travis Peterson were kicked out of Target twice while filming — who also watches Family Guy on her laptop and dances at the club all by her lonesome.