youtube music videos: cause, wax, mayer hawthorne, 410 pharoahs

Our old friend Cause has put out this new video called “I am Us” which also serves to promote the filmmakers of Last Pictures and especially the gallery style sneaker store Sole Food NYC. The hook is the winner here “from the back of the bus to the front of the world, from the underground railroad all the way up”. Uplifting lyrics that probably could have used more suitable visuals than sneaker shopping. Just saying.

I’m seeing a lot of nice visuals on videos by indie or unsigned artists so I guess people have been listening to the old advice of Bruce Warila about musicians teaming up with filmmakers to create compelling videos, making filmmakers part of the band so to speak.

Along the same lines here’s a really well-made video I dig by another old friend, this is Wax and EOM with “Music and Liquor”. Love the video concept, it’s about time the “I Used to Love H.E.R.” personification approach got applied to alcohol. And it figures it’d be some dimepiece who made you feel like a champ but was always disappearing. Sorry for the spoiler. This vid is directed by an outfit called LeftLane6 who by coincidence also made the “So Amazing” trick shot video I ran on here a few weeks back after Shaq tweeted about it.

Also on some weeded bachelor shit – but less melancholy – is Stone Throw artist Mayer Hawthorne’s remake of “Just Ain’t Gonna Work Out”. This one was going around a bit but check it out if you haven’t already seen it.

The external heart metaphor actually called to mind Gnarls Barkley’s “Who’s Gonna Save My Soul” for me even though the videos are completely different. Mayer cheerily moves from one meaningless breakup to the next so he is well-suited by his cartoon 2-dimensional heart while the breakup in the Gnarls song is ugly and appropriately gets this grotesque creature for a heart – actually it’s own person. I did some defending of that video once upon a time in the comments at Quan’s blog. You’ll see Brandon and Casimir in there as well. But you won’t see the video – it’s been pulled by the label.

Finally, Brandon on Twitter tonight posted this 410 Pharoahs video “Real Fresh” that I hadn’t seen before. And it’s a good note to close on as a reminder that you don’t need an artsy look or slick video production. The effects may be cheezy but the video is fun and colorful and bounces along just like the song does.