Things That Are Well Good : Five Tracks
It's been a minute (three months) since I dropped off Five Tracks for your audio visual pleasure. So in the midst of organising myself for a trip to Barcelona at the weekend, I thought now would be a good time to resurrect the feature. I'm a sucker for a good music video and this selection brings a mixed bag of execution from hip hop and funk to soul and rock and roll. All bases are covered with some live performance and animation. Read on and press play.
Possibly one of the most underrated musicians in recent times, Sampha, made his return after a year or so of radio silence with Timmy's Prayer. Now he's linked up with the FADER performing a live debut, piano rendition of his new track, Plastic 100°C. Press play below and check out his new feature interview for FADER, available here.
Plastic 100°C - Sampha
Thundercat and Adult swim make that sweet connection again to produce the video for "Song For The Dead". The animated clip, comes courtesy of Ryan McShane aka RY NO who had this to say about his professional experience and relationship with Thundercat,
“I was born in 1995, the year Kids came out and Jerry Garcia passed away, and I’ve been drawing ever since.
15 years later I dropped out of high school to spend a couple of years indoors, drawing in my room. One night in August 2013, I drew a fake cover for Captain Murphy’s ‘Between Villains’. I posted it to Twitter and the villain himself retweeted it, and so did Thundercat.
Thundercat and I started chatting over Twitter after that – fast forward to 2015, I’m working at digital ventures practice Josephmark and motion studio Breeder, and making pictures and music on the weekends.
Then ‘Where The Giants Roam’ drops, I’m nearing the end of a two week break where I’ve been spending indoors, drawing in my room. When I heard ‘A Song For The Dead’, this part – 1:49 – gave me the idea to animate. I wanted to animate this few seconds of a transformation as the sound spins around in stereo. But I had a few days free, so I decided to block out a full video. Super rough, black and white, with NASA footage backgrounds – I had a bunch on hand that I found whilst researching for Breeder’s The Expanse titles – and then I just sent it to Thundercat.
He loved it. So I was locked into it now, my first big solo animation. Naturally, the way I work, I made it even harder for myself – adding colours and extra seconds. Shout out to Breeder co-worker Alex Gee for suggesting I add colour.
Six months later, I’m backstage at Thundercat’s show in Brisbane. Talking about art and Kendrick, drinking Hendricks.”
Pretty awesome. press play and enjoy below.
Song For The Dead - Thundercat
It's been a few years since The Strokes released some music and even longer since they've served up a visual. So when the "Future Present Past" EP landed on my streaming service a few weeks ago, I was surprised and intrigued to check out the project. It's pretty safe to say the band haven't deviated terribly in their approach (a good thing) but I did enjoy OBLIVIUS especially.
The narrative for the clip below springs from the idea that some cronies have taken the footage from that video shoot and we are left with a video for the decidedly more average track, "Threat of Joy." That being said, I do enjoy the bizarre little story they've concocted for the visual treatment and it's good to see these gents back with some music out there. Check it out below.
"Threat of Joy" - The Strokes
Dev Hynes aka Blood Orange is releasing his new project, Freetown Sound in a few days. He's come a long way since his Lightspeed Champion days. Of course if you've followed his path, you'll know he's switched lanes with the Blood Orange alias, focussing more so on R&B and electronica. This track has a kind of 80's vibe, plumped up with the styling from the crop tops to the high waisted washed out jeans and dad hats.
Don't be fooled by the restrictive use of musical elements as they create a pretty expansive sound and scale. If you delve into the lyricism you'll find a story that deals with faith, existence and vulnerability. Press play and enjoy "Augustine" below. Side note, Julian Casablancas features.
Last but not least, we have producer Clams Casino with All Nite, featuring Vince Staples. The rapper's flow, delivery and lyricism is very much on point across the beat. And Clams does his part of course, creating a rich sound using some bird singing samples juxtaposing a heavy wad of bass and synth patterns. The video editing is quality as well. Cheers for reading!
All Nite - Clams Casino ft. Vince Staples