They Call It Puppy Love In This Week’s Holy Hunter Of Music Videos
J. Cole is a prolific rapper out of North Carolina, and his “Wet Dreamz” is a smooth, oftentimes awkwardly spelled-out elucidation of the artist’s first time. I know, I know, but stick with me because it takes a delightfully unanticipated turn once paired with Ryan Staake-helmed visuals of a more innocent, budding romance between a wee German Shepherd and King Charles Spaniel. Let this also serve as a reminder that the dog was the first domesticated animal. Take a seat, Paul Anka.
The short film set to “Falling from the Sky” is one half of a two-part narrative directed by Mikel Cee Karlsson for the desert-noir indie outfit Calexico. And the second is said to be from a perspective other than the striving, writhing worm-like savage in the first. Swedish singer-songwriter José González takes the stoic spotlight as the creature’s caretaker, calmly teaching the invertebrate how to eat cereal despite the unfavorable absence of hands and with a mouth that oddly resembles a you-know-what.
In Japanese culture, “honne” describes an individual’s true self and innermost desires as opposed to their “tatemae” or overt facade. An interesting bit of trivia when you consider the London-based synth duo’s chosen name, Honne, and label they’ll recently launch, Tatemae Records. Wandering back to the offering at hand, the mellow number (one of four from their forthcoming EP) “Coastal Love” explores a Danilo Parra-directed exchange of a bioluminescent marine vertebrate and secondly, a star-crossed romance more closely aligned with the tune’s underlying theme of long-distance love. The struggle is real (beautiful).
I’m extending this week’s column to a fourth bonus video directed by Saman Ghanbar for Austin’s own Oi!-shaped hardcore (read: fuck shit up) band, Concrete. Exploring your aggro alter-ego is a precarious and arguably ill-advised task, so in lieu of flipping tables just watch some other people kick and punch stuff and go to bed early. Full disclosure: Ghanbar is also a friend of mine, so I picked his brain for the inside scoop and learned that in the making one ACL was torn, a mob of rockers were diffused by Sam playing “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” and that all on-camera wreckage is real thanks to the homeowners whose only note was to not burn the house down.
