-Music Videos on my Mind- Chromatics’ “Cherry”

Chromatics is an indie electro group from Portland, Oregon that’s been making music for the last 12 years. Their sound is cool and cinematic, so much so that some guy on the radio this week was talking about how Nicolas Winding Refn cut his 2011 cult movie Drive to their music, though ultimately, Tick of the Clock was the only track to feature in the film.

Cherry is the band’s brand new song and it may finally help them court some attention in their home country. The worry is that they may be perceived as being too cool for school, especially when we consider that Karl Lagerfeld invited them to play at the Chanel Spring Summer 2013 fashion show in Paris last month where the band was placed above the runway overlooking the catwalk, tasked with enhancing the hip factor by performing their greatest hits, hits that most people in attendance never even knew were great.

 

Cherry is a good song, dreamy and spaced out. Lead singer Ruth Radelet is comparable to a latter day Debbie Harry, though the group’s sound is more redolent of the British electro post-punk movement that brought about bands like New Order and Depeche Mode. In that sense Cherry is classic alternative music, the kind that’s been evergreen for more than a generation.

-Music Videos on my Mind- Nite Jewel's “Weak For Me”

If bipolar could be conveyed in song, perhaps it would sound something like this.

Ramona Gonzalez’s music project, known as Nite Jewel, is, for some reason, rereleasing its 2009 album Good Evening. Weak for me, a standout track from that LP, now has a music video to accompany it and it suits the song pretty well.

There are echoes of Tom Tom Club matched with early ‘80s synth pop magic, however, there’s a structureless edge to it all, dovetailing dark bass sounds with aching vocals. It’s weird but in a good way.

-Music Videos on my Mind- Tame Impala’s “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards”

Australian psychedelic rock project, Tame Impala, have got a new track and video doing the rounds. Feels like we only go backwards is happy and clappy in dangerous doses, injecting big bursts of colour and song in amounts huge enough to bring on convulsions.

Impala’s mission has always been to create sounds that immerse the listener into a dreamlike melody. Watching this video makes one think they may have accomplished that, exceedingly well.

Twenty Nine Steps to Wasting Five Years of your Life

When your small little drama about a Columbian drug mule bags its lead actress an Oscar nomination and its director a slew of international festival prizes, you’re guaranteed that Hollywood will come along and present a panoply of potential projects to get your attention. Chances are it’ll be an absolute exercise in futility, wasting precious creativity and energy.

Joshua Marston made Maria Full of Grace in 2004 and turned actress Catalina Sandino Moreno into a temporary temptation (she did the role of Maria the vampire in a few Twilight flicks). In 2007, Marston was announced to be developing a supernatural thriller with J.J. Abrams for Paramount Pictures. Five years passed and no supernatural thriller came to fruition. All that Marston has to show is a flow chart he did for npr that describes 29 steps to creative dissolution and heartbreak.

Hooray for Hollywood.

-Music Videos on my Mind- Phantogram’s “Don’t Move”

New York indie pop duo Phantogram make the perfect kind of music for the ADD Generation. Beats and sounds materialise and immaterialise in nanoseconds, while new rhythms loop into existence only to be trumpeted by a sound you knew was coming but still pleases nonetheless.

Don’t Move’s genius is almost what makes it hollow. This is a tune that can feature everywhere and anywhere, from nightclubs to detergent commercials. It’s radio-friendly to the max, but cool enough to smoke a joint to. It pleases everyone and bowls over no one.

Also, lead singer Sarah Barthel is kind of attractive, until you realise she looks like the girl that served you at the pharmacy this morning, totally fed up in her job and wanting to make the kind of impact that will win the world over. A girl that’s noticeable but ordinary, much like this song and video.

-Music Videos on my Mind- The Ravonettes’ “Curse the Night”

The Eurozone crisis is making monsters of its citizens, including kids.

The Ravonettes have produced a great little music video for their latest song Curse the Night that totally feeds off the current economic miasma. The deplorable financial situation in Europe has resulted in the youngest (and the very oldest) in society carrying the burden of suffering caused by an unequal redistribution wealth and suppressed opportunities. Therefore, it makes sense for a European indie pop band to make a song and dance about it.

Not one to break from tradition, Danish duo Sune Rose Wagner and Sharin Foo deliver another tune that sounds remarkably like all their other songs, but when it’s this good, who can complain. Bad times have never sounded so soothing.

-Music Videos on my Mind- The Staves’ “Mexico”

It seems that an ideal retirement package nowadays is having three daughters who can write, sing and get on well enough to form a group. The Staves are a British acoustic folk rock trio doing exactly that.

Taking their cue from successful modern sister acts like Haim and the Peasall Sisters, The Staves hope to venture the same trodden path that ersatz British folk deals like Mumford & Sons and King Charles have. Knowing full well that only a heartless fiend could resist the soothing charms of three pretty English girls who play their own instruments, The Staves may actually luck out.

Mexico is such a nonchalant little number that it’s in danger of reluctantly causing mass comas. The dreary art school music video doesn’t help much either.