Robyn – Page 22 – 5000 Ways to Love You

Steriogram “On and On”

I like that Steriogram always have a bit of fun with their videos without totally playing for laughs. “On and On” is another of those.

We find the band playing on the roof of a parking building, with singer Tyson entering the stage by jumping from above. A flamboyant rock entrance, or is there more to it?

There’s more to it, of course. In the middle of the song Tyson leaves the stage and goes running down through the parking building. There’s something about car parks in music videos that never quite works. The difficulty of big empty grey spaces?

But things soon get interesting when Tyson discovers the band and pals waiting on some mini choppers (“and yes they are our bikes!”, says the band’s YouTube description). This leads to the highlight of the video – a 30-second shot of the band riding the bikes, with perfect vehicular choreography.

Tyson gets separated from the group, is pursued by a bat-wielding maniac. In desperation, Tyson jumps off the edge of the car park, landing in the middle of his band performing. Oh, it’s the exact same scene from the beginning of the video. And on and on it goes. Clever.

Director: Adam Jones
Nga Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… empty cans of, wait, what?

Stellar “Whiplash”

With their previous video funded in 2002, Stellar returned with “Whiplash”, the first single from the band’s final album Something Like Strangers. “Whiplash” was the band’s 13th funded video, and comes a decade after their very first video was funded back in the ’90s.

While Boh Runga has always been the star of previous Stellar videos, this is the first to ditch the band entirely. Her first solo release was only three years away.

So, it’s night time in Auckland. Looking down from the balcony of a high-rise hotel room, Boh decides to go for a walk along Queen Street. As she wanders along the street (shot in black and white), various genuine drunken revellers play up to the cameras behind her. This kills any notion that Boh is just a lady taking a night stroll – no, she’s a pop star with crowd-attracting capabilities. And wearing a skirt decorated with fairy lights isn’t exactly something a shy lady does.

I was wondering if having the video shot in black and white would obscure its setting, but no – the expats there are in the comments. When a video inspires outpourings from homesick New Zealanders, that’s a sure sign that it’s hit a minimum level of Aotearoan identity.

Best bit: Boh stops off at the White Lady for a burger.

http://youtu.be/1_aGO61VYs8

Next… a never-ending story.

Shaft “I Just Wanna Have Your Baby”

This was Shaft’s third and final funded video, coming a decade after their debut vid, “Downhill Racer”. It’s just as offbeat as their first one, though without the retro thrills of the bomb-recipe websites that featured in “Downhill Racer”.

Filmed in high-contrast black and white, the video is based around a backyard shed. In the shed we find the band, with singer Bob allowed out to rock around the garden. There’s also some particularly blokeish DIY happening. A hairy fellow in a Led Zeppelin t-shirt constructs a musical instrument out of hooks and wires, that could handily double as a bean trellis.

The video is mad, messy, chaotic fun. And when you consider the unusual theme of the song – a man having a baby – it makes sense that if a bloke were to give birth, he’d do it out in his shed, with support from his mates and a bit of number-eight fencing wire.

Best bit: something that looks like maybe a religious birthing ritual.

Director: Stuart Page

Next… a Queen Street wander.

Savage “If You Love Savage”

It’s very easy to compare “If You Love Savage” with “Mareko (Here to Stay)”. Both are solo singles by members of the Deceptikonz, and both are about reinforcing the personal brand of the singer. “Here to Stay” was a weak song and its video was so determined to push Mareko’s name that it ended up not being much fun at all.

Two years later, “If You Love Savage” seems to have learned a lesson or two from “Here To Stay”. The song is an upbeat, super catchy, highly danceable number. Even though it’s all about Savage (and being a fan of him), the song is so good that it makes perfect sense. And Savage has earned it, with the number one hits “Swing” and the non-funded “Moonshine”. At this stage, yeah, Savage is allowed to celebrate his successes.

The video is shot in South Auckland, filmed in high-contrast black and white so everything looks cool and cinematic. Savage wanders around the Otara markets with a posse of boys and/or the Deceptikonz. This boys’ zone is far removed from the girly world of “Swing”.

The South Auckland locations visited in “If You Love Savage” are very popular ones for music videos (I’ve counted eight videos so far that feature the Otara markets), but the bold black and white footage gives it a different tone. Other bands manage to slip around the markets unnoticed, but Savage is a force of nature who draws the attention of the shoppers.

There’s no sense that this has all been faked for a music video. The crowd of kids surrounding Savage don’t need to be prompted to get them to adore their idol. And when Savage signs an autograph outside the local Pizza Hut, that’s just how big he is.

Best bit: the special guest appearance of Crayfish of hit TV sitcom Melody Rules, who is apparently some sort of rather good graffiti artist these days.

Director: Sophie Findlay
Nga Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… the multipurpose garden shed.

Rhombus “Mile High”

“Mile High” is an aeronautically inspired ode to good times in flight, and Rhombus have fun with the music video. Rather than showing people shagging in aeroplane toilets, the video goes sci-fi in a passenger spaceship, a mix of CGI and real sets.

The video is at its best when it’s being a bit silly – tropical beach girls sashaying in space, a dude on a motorbike floating outside the vessel. But the video also spends a lot of time lingering on shots of passengers looking out of windows. This just feels lazy, like there weren’t enough crazy space antics to fill up the video. There’s even a 30-second scene of a man looking out a window and (eventually) seeing a giant chicken.

The end of the video seems to be where most of the effort has gone, with the spaceship flying through space. The animation is adequate, but it just has no spark. Bring back the cocktails in coconuts!

Best bit: the spaceship’s rear end is a thong-wearing booty.

Director: Scott Harens
Nga Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… being recognised down at the shops.

Pluto “Radio Crimes”

There’s the song and there’s the visuals and there’s not much connection between the two. The “Radio Crimes” song is a big, bold indie rock number, tempered with Pluto’s trademark delicate falsetto harmonies. But the video pushes Pluto right back. It puts Baby in the corner.

The video is based around a bank of television sets, which broadcast parts of members of Pluto. That immediately puts distance between Pluto and the viewer. But then Pluto themselves are all hiding behind sunglasses and scarves and the other accoutrements of rock they’re so fond of. The end result is a band who seem like they’re too cool to star in their own video.

There’s no rule that says a band must appear in their own music video. New Order even used a youthful stand-in group in the “Crystal” video. Instead we get Pluto coming across as concentrating so hard on emoting into the microphone that they lose all connection with the viewer.

Some of Pluto’s earlier videos were pretty goofy. I get the feeling that in later years Pluto wanted to be portrayed as an edgy rock band. They managed that with the super “Dance Stamina” video, but “Radio Crimes” goes too far, making them seem to inhabit their own world, totally removed from their audience.

Best bit: when the TVs show a whole lot of cartoons.

Director: Adam Jones

Next… chickens in spaaaace.

Opshop “Levitate”

In Auckland, it is possible to walk from Queen Street to Federal street through buildings, using a series of private escalators (and one lift) to avoid the treacherous incline of Wellesley Street West.

The “Levitate” video is set on one of these escalators, the super narrow ones in the lobby of the old ASB building between Albert and Federal Streets, which conveniently enough looks like something out of a 1960s sci-fi film. This provides the location for Opshop’s theatrical rock number.

In the world of “Levitate”, people are trying to escape via the escalators, but two heavies wearing gas masks usually pull any runners back. Jason makes a few goes at it, but there’s always something that brings him back down – a mysterious woman, a man with a briefcase full of money and general tiredness.

Finally, pursued by the masked men, he makes it to the top. The ending of the video is ambiguous. Has he made it to freedom (across the road to the casino!) or has he somehow disappeared, because this is a mysterious sci-fi world?

Best bit: Jason angrily hurls a suitcase full of money into a water feature. He has no need for your space dollars!

Director: Adam Jones
Nga Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… radios and televisions.

Nytemare “Ghetto Princess”

How many female MCs have we come across so far? There’s Ladi6, Nemesis of Ill Semantics and Emcee Lucia, whose video is missing. And now comes Tauranga MC Nytemare with her ode to women and girls from the ghetto.

We meet Nytemare sitting on a couch in the middle of a set evoking a suburban living room. Also in the room is a young girl, who becomes an older girl (picking up the grown-ups’ empty bottles), then a young woman.

This young woman then becomes the star of the video. Out in the real world, she is hassled by her loser boyfriend/drug dealer and walks past some street hookers (subtext: it could be her). All the while Nytemare is in the background, rapping words of support.

Fortunately a life of P or car park handjobs is not to be for the ghetto princess. She shows up to a playground, dressed in a very modest long skirt and high-neck shirt, and hands out booklets to all the kids. Some sort of religious tract? No, it’s an educational pamphlet called Body Safe, which appears to be an actual sex education programme.

Whatever happened to Nytemare? This was her one and only funded video. And the URL nytemare.co.nz (seen on a sweatshirt in the video) no longer works. She released a video called “Real Hip Hop” in 2011, but it seems she’s now an MMA fighter, going by the name Tha Nytmare.

Best bit: the awkward vibe of the lady handing out safe sex pamphlets in a kids’ playground.

Director: Ivan Slavov

Next… the escalator of eternity.

Mumsdollar “Nevertheless”

Mumsdollar were a punk-pop band made up of Christians, though I don’t think their music was overtly Christian. But it says a lot that, according to Wikipedia, the band got their name when one of the members was putting in for a church offering but only had one dollar – his mum’s dollar.

The “Nevertheless” video puts the group out in the bush. A mysterious woman’s voice says “hey”. Instead of going to see if maybe she needs their help, instead they freak out and run away. So begins a series of misfortunes, brought on by their panicked state.

Steve (they all have a freeze frame with a name caption) passes out and dreams of three girls wearing pink tops. Tim almost drowns, but comes to just as one of his bandmates is about to give him mouth-to-mouth (eew, gay). Ben trips over and gashes his leg, and we’re treated to some special effects make-up of his injury (hey, someone put their NZQA film make-up training to good use), Dave is enchanted by a country band getting down in the woods. And poor Pete hallucinates a roast chicken on the head of one of his band mates and almost eats him (eew, gay).

After running all night, the five dudes have almost escaped The Lady Who Said ‘Hey’. But suddenly five chicks appear down by the river. Are they sirens, about to love them up and turn the band into horny toads? Or are they just fives girls on a camping trip? We never find out. The Mumsdollar five run away, eventually emerging from the woods, alone in a grassy field. Oh, ok.

I get the concept of the video, but there’s too much of the band running through the woods and not enough plot or rock. I feel like with the combination of their mum’s dollar and NZOA’s $5000, the band could have made a better video.

Best bit: Steve’s flirt face – watch out, ladies.

http://youtu.be/YFPR75dX-xQ

Next… community outreach.

Misfits of Science “Chemical Madness”

Misfits of Science seem like the kind of band who has been buoyed along by their one bona fide hit single, “Fools Love”. Nothing they have done since has been as good, but they’re still there, still making music.

Like their previous videos, “Chemical Madness” involves digital trickery. This time the Misfits have been shrunken down and are hanging out amongst the balls on a pool table. (Judging by the red and yellow balls, it’s a game of blackball, a British variant of eight-ball, though the sky-blue baise is more an American style. And yes, five minutes ago I did not know this.)

Obviously the balls have to move. The balls have to chase the rappers around the table. And this happens. The problem is the computer animation isn’t all that great. The balls are too perfectly spherical and they move without friction. If this was made using 2014 technology, each of the balls would be different, with its own personality, its own backstory. But the technology of 2005 makes it look like looks like a sci-fi attack of the 5cm cyber Jaffas and their albino Jaffa cousins.

Quirky semi-animated videos seem to be the Misfits of Science style, but I’d like to see something a bit different, away from the green screen, into the real world.

Best bit: the two Misfits being chased by a giant yellow ball, Indiana Jones style.

https://youtu.be/WjxfPtSmPAI

Next… the mystery of the lady who said ‘hey’.