Pop Culture Will Eat Itself » Friday Night Video

Friday Night Video – The Apples in Stereo Hit the “Dance Floor”

Sean — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 00:02:08 +0000

The Apples in Stereo are back! And they brought a hobbit with them… Robert Schneider and crew are getting set to release an album called Travellers in Space and Time, and they’ve released the video for the first single, “Dance Floor”. The song is a departure for the band, bringing them into a sort of electro-pop-dance world. The video features Elijah Wood, who, in addition to being a hobbit, owns Simian Records, the company behind the album. And he directed the video for the band’s awesome song “Energy”. Check out “Dance Floor”, and let me know what you think:

Travellers in Space & Time is out Tuesday, but you can pre-order it now.

via You Ain’t No Picasso

Friday Night Video – The Boss’ Ode to Jesse James

Sean — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 01:30:02 +0000

Sometimes you have to love the iPod’s Genius feature. You’re in the mood for a certain type of song, so you put one on and hit the Genius button, and the iPod magically finds more songs that are similar to it. Kind of. Sometimes it gets a little confused. For instance, today I started a Genius playlist on Jimmy Buffett’s “Kick it in Second Wind”, and the next song that came up was Bruce Springsteen’s “Pay Me My Money Down”, from We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions. Not exactly similar. One of Buffett’s more straight-ahead rock songs into The Boss doing essentially a folk/bluegrass song. Sorry Apple, you’re no genius this time. But…

I hadn’t listened to that Bruce album in a while, and this little Genius slip up made me go back and listen to it again. And I then I remembered just how much I love the whole album. So tonight we’re going to get my favorite song from it, performed live. Here’s Mr, Springsteen, paying homage to Pete Seeger, with “Jesse James”:

Thanks Apple! Your screw up actually paid off this time!

Friday Night Video – Dawn Landes’ “Young Girl”

Sean — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 03:27:24 +0000

I really need to listen to Dawn Landes’ music more often. Every time I do I enjoy it, but somehow it rarely crosses my mind to put it on. I’m not sure why that is either. She’s right in my wheelhouse: her music is in that quirky-country ballpark I tend to enjoy a lot. And, she’s married to Josh Ritter, to whom I have listened a lot.

Whatever the reason, I’m resolving to rectify the situation, and I’m starting by posting this, the video to “Young Girl”, from her most recent album, Sweet Heart Rodeo:

Friday Night Video – Those Darlins, Live!

Sean — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 22:14:56 +0000

By this point I would think that everyone who reads this site knows of my love for Those Darlins. Frankly, I’ve written about them so much now that I’m having a hard time coming up with new ways to explain how awesome they are. So let’s just let their music do the talking for me, shall we?

The ladies were cool enough to do a session for Laundromatinee, playing a few tunes behind the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Check them out as they blow through their classic country-fried southern punk:

“The Whole Damn Thing”

Three more videos after the jump!

“Red Light Love”

“Mr Money”

“Cannonball Blues”

Friday Night Video – David Byrne, Fatboy Slim, and Santigold’s Ode to Imelda Marcos

Sean — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:25:36 +0000

Follow me here: David Byrne and Fatboy Slim got together to make a concept album about Imelda Marcos, the former Philippine first lady who is best known for having a shitload of shoes. That’s already a little odd, right? They the pair collaborated with singer/songwriter Santigold for the first single, “Please Don’t”. The song’s video is cobbled together from news footage of the exiled Filipino, and it’s strangely fascinating. Check it out:

via StereoGum

Friday Night Video – She & Him’s “In the Sun”

Sean — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 04:12:19 +0000

Zooey Deschanel and I have a pretty one-sided relationship: I worship her from afar, she doesn’t know I exist. I’m ok with that though. I have a feeling meeting her would ruin it. In real life she’s probably not the manic pixie dream girl she plays in most of her movies. And I’m probably not that interesting to a big shot musician and actor. So it’s probably best that we keep our relationship at a comfortable distance. She can keep going on not having any idea I’m out here, and I’ll keep admiring her work a little too much.

On that note, she and M. Ward are getting ready to release their second album as She & Him. Volume 2 comes out March 23rd, and from what they’ve released so far it seems to pick up where the last one left off. The video for “In the Sun” shows the pair back in high school. Loner M. punches away at his phone and practices guitar, while popular Zooey dances with her friends and perfects the dying art of hula hoop. That’s right. Zooey. Deschanel. Hula. Hoop. Enjoy:

Via Pitchfork

Friday Night Video – Another Insane Video from OK Go

Sean — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 02:05:28 +0000

Whether you like their music or not, you have to admit that they make some of the most interesting music videos you’ll see. They’re most famous for their treadmill dancing to “Here it Goes Again”, but they don’t stop there. For their latest album, Of the Blue Color of the Sky, they’ve already had a cool techno acid trip for “WTF?” and performed “This Too Shall Pass” with the Notre Dame marching band. Now they’ve managed to top them all.

This is going to sound like hyperbole, but it’s honestly true: this is the best music video I’ve seen in the last 10 years. It’s not even close. The band enlisted some help from Synn Labs to build a giant Rube Goldberg Machine, timed to the music, to be in the official video for “This Too Shall Pass”. It’s a staggering work of ingenious engineering, and it was filmed in one continuous take. I can’t even begin to imagine the amount of planning, testing, and failing that went into this.

Friday Night Video – Bowerbirds – “Northern Lights”

Sean — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 03:30:46 +0000

I didn’t really pay enough attention to Bowerbirds’ 2009 release, Upper Air. I listened to it a couple of times, got a sense that it was solidly put-together, and a continuation of what they did on In Our Talons, but not enough to really appreciate it. The new video for “Northern Lights” has gotten me to go back to it though, and I’m starting to realize just how good it is. Check out the video:

via StereoGum

Friday Night Video – The Morning Benders Offer Up “Excuses”

Sean — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 02:24:07 +0000

The Morning Benders are back with a new album due out in March. To build up anticipation they’ve released a video of their new single, “Excuses”, performed live in studio with a whole bunch of friends, including John Vanderslice, Chris from Girls, The Mumlers, and Gram LeBron. The song is really, really good. Check it out:

The Morning Benders’ new album, Big Echo, is out March 9th.

via StereoGum

Friday Night Video – Spoon Gets Written in Reverse

Sean — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 07:33:10 +0000

In case you missed it, Spoon released their latest album, Transference, a couple of weeks ago. The single “Written in Reverse” has been making the rounds for a while now, but the video just came out this week. It’s kind of cool, with a high-contrast look and interesting use of mirrors. Oh, and the song kind of kicks ass. So it’s got that going for it. Check it out:

via You Ain’t No Picasso