This week’s music video lounge features songs about robots, sticks and rust, which are all recommended if you’re on a high-fibre diet. Step this way for brand-new singles from Royksopp, Jamie T, The Voluntary Butler Scheme, The Gaslight Anthem and Canadian rockers Billy Talent…
Royksopp - The Girl And The Robot
This little ditty about a girl falling for a hunk of red metal is a touching ode to modern love, albeit one in that weird Scandinavian way we’ve come to love about Royksopp. In it, Robyn curses that age-old conundrum - robots: can’t live with them, can’t live without them. She sports a precision blond quiff throughout while agonising over Mr Robot, who, in typcial robot-style seems content with a spot of horticulture. Robyn twirls, waits by the phone, drinks water and wanders about her Ikea-inspired pad. At the end she collapses on the bed, pleased to discover she’s not about to give birth to some robot puppies. Seeping through the beautifully shot crushed red velvet video is a scorchingly hot pop track that deserves to be a hit.
Jamie T - Sticks ‘N’ Stones
Hailing from deepest Wimbledon, it seems fitting that Jamie T has chosen the borough’s most famous fortnight as the time to release his comeback single from upcoming album Kings And Queens. A thrillingly bouyant track - we reckon no matter how hard you tried to drown it it’d still survive - the single picks up where Jamie left off with Sheila, packed with more of his cockerney-geezer-’avin-a-larf charm. The video obviously had zero budget, being that it involves Jamie and some mates walking up alleys and jumping up and down, but no matter because they get their point across: hello, here’s a summer track that will appeal to blokes innit? Girls too, if they like drinking White Lightning. Throughout, Jamie looks like he’d rather be in The Jam, but as he’s years too late this will have to do. Jaunty and with not one but two choruses, this has hit written all over it.
The Voluntary Butler Scheme - Tabasco Sole
This latest from Stourbridge’s finest features the Christal Connections Line Dancers tripping the light fantastic to Tabasco Sole live from Chadlington Memorial Hall, which boasts some fine polished wooden floors - big up to the cleaners. The track sums up VBS superbly with its suburban pop panache, but if you’re looking for the real stars of the show, look no further than the quartet of ladies with their colour co-ordinated country-and-western over-the-shoulder tassles. They look casual, but we reckon a lot of thought went into these.
The Gaslight Anthem - The ‘59 Sound
When The Gaslight Anthem played Glastonbury this weekend, they were joined on-stage by none other than fellow New Jersey resident Bruce Springsteen - and the Boss’s influence can be heard seeping out of every pore of the band’s new single. The video is played out in an empty house with pristinely painted walls and the quartet look intense as they fondle subjects like death while wearing patchwork flat caps and chequered shirts. During the song, we learn that dying on a Saturday night isn’t the best day to choose, presumably because you might miss Match Of The Day or similar. Jersey rawk played out in primary colours, you might want to turn the contrast down before watching.
Billy Talent - Rusted From The Rain
Billy Talent are huge in their homeland of Canada, while Germany and Austria have a certain appreciation of their punk-rock charms too. The UK has proved more stubborn to succumb to their masculine wiles, but they’ll be hoping that this single and upcoming album Billy Talent III will turn the tide. Rusted From The Rain is a taut and rippling rawk number, draped in black and with a dash of mascara added for good measure. The sound brings to mind Green Day and old-school Guns N Roses, plus in dazzingly handsome frontman Ben Kowalewicz the group have a fine focal point to decorate as they see fit. To prove just how rusted from the rain they are, the combo play out the video in a pretend scrapyard with piles of iron but some klutz forgot to order the rain. Next time, eh?
(Clare Lydon)
