Awesome Music Videos

Alternative band The Academic used the slight delay in Facebook Live’s video streaming to record and remix their song Bear Claws on the spot. By showing their stream on a screen while they were streaming, they were able to play along with their past selves.

Paper Forest’s music video for Alaska Pollock’s jangly alt-pop tune follows the story of a boy’s cardboard robot who leaves home and sets off on an adventure around Amsterdam. The animation style and storytelling is as charming and cheerful as it gets. BTS here.

This new bonus track from our favorite, ever-mutating cartoon band starts out slow and subdued, then kicks into high gear, as 2-D draws us in with his tale of drug addiction, and won’t let go. We’re only bummed that this track didn’t make it onto Humanz.

Dave Grohl directed the bipolar music video for Foo Fighters’ latest track – a clip which stars the members of the band rocking a retirement home, aged to look how they’ll look if they keep performing for another 30 years or so. We love the Thriller-esque choreography at the end.

(Flashing images) “JVC is nice; I’ve been around Japan; It’s electronic, calls me Viktor; High on the scales, off the Richter.” Director Kris Merc’s dope visual feast is the perfect complement to hip hop legends Kool Keith and MF Doom’s track about a rapper with super powers.

(PG-13: Language) Isaiah Howard (@isaiahxavier10) uses the smartphone app musical.ly to create totally trippy selfie music videos, which feature fast camera movements, and rapid edits which are at once completely disorienting and hypnotic.

Film Radar digs into the techniques that director Michel Gondry used to create The White Stripes‘ most classic videos. Gondry’s sense of whimsy and effective use of simple visual effects were the perfect accompaniment to Jack and Meg’s reductive sound. (Thanks Daniel!)

(Gross) It’s an age old story of a girl falling in love with her one true soulmate – except in this case, her significant other just happens to be creepy alien creature. Oh Yeah Wow’s video for Millington’s jangly love song starts out silly, and ends like a horror film.

(PG-13) Cassius, Cat Power, and Pharell Williams collaborated on this awesome dance track which we missed when the album Ibifornia dropped last Summer. Director Alex Courtès‘ literally cheeky music video works wonders with the best use of split-screen ever.

David Ariew, Derrick Borte, and Michael Marquat of A Bad Think collaborated on this haunting music video about an astronaut’s journey through the cosmos. The song reminds us more than a little bit of Pink Floyd, and we mean that as the highest of compliments.

(PG-13: Gore) Since we don’t speak Russian, we don’t understand what the song is about, but the sheer insanity of the events that play out make this one of the wildest music videos we’ve seen. The clip was directed by Ilya Naishuller (Hardcore Henry and The Stampede)

“Here, there’s no music here. I’m lost in streams of sound. Here, am I nowhere now? No plan.” Tom Hingston’s music video for one of Bowie’s final tracks will pierce you to the core, its static-filled screens where Ziggy, the Thin White Duke, and Bowie’s other personas once appeared.

Director Carlín Díaz presents a charming and wonderfully animated music video about two strangers who share a wonderful day together, but will never see each other again – except in their dreams and memories. The song comes from Norwegian indie rockers KMF.

The latest from video maestros OK Go starts off with a bang, making a destructive mess in its first 4.2 seconds. The rest of the video is simply those same 4.2 seconds shown in super slow-motion, revealing numerous details you surely missed the first time around. BTS here.

Romain Gavras’ video for Jamie XX’s electronica track Gosh leaves a whole lot open to interpretation, but it’s still one of the most visually powerful music videos we’ve seen, as a veritable army of followers flock to a mysterious man. From the album In Colour.

Hélène Jeudy & Antoine Caëcke’s animated video for LORN’s retrofuturist track envisions a future in which overpopulation is “cured” by making humans terminate their bodies, and upload their souls into a social network. Let’s hope Facebook doesn’t get any funny ideas.

Singer/songwriter Tom Rosenthal’s track tells the story of a very sad man named Bob, and a lizard who ultimately saves his life. The tale of hope is perfectly complemented by a Wizard of Oz-esque transition from black and white to colorful worlds by animator Dave Anderson.

We love the juxtaposition of nature and visual effects in director Michał Marczak’s music video for Mark Pritchard’s collaboration with Radiohead’s Thom Yorke. Pritchard’s original instrumental is about loss, contrasted with Yorke’s vocals about love and hope.

If The Strokes and Cake had a baby, their offspring would be Car Seat Headrest. The band deftly melds founder Will Toledo’s sharp vocals and lyrics with raw garage rock, trumpet and trombone in this track from the new album Teens of Denial.

Band of Horses lets their freak flags fly in Ben Fee’s video for their awesomely catchy new single, set at a party filled with strange and wonderful creatures. It’s like the alt-pop version of Cantina Band. Lyrics here.

Vania Heymann and Gal Muggia’s video for Coldplay’s single combines visuals of real world settings filmed at dramatically different distances. The result is a surreal world in which soccer is played on a sponge, volcanoes spew popcorn, and babies fly on airplane wings.

“I’m the World Ender, baby, and I’m back from the grave… They can run for their lives but they cannot be saved.” We got a serious No Country for Old Men vibe from Ariel Vida’s sinister music video for Lord Huron’s vengeance-filled, ’50s surf music influenced track.

Jeff Lynne has continued to produce and create music since the heyday of Electric Light Orchestra, and he’s still got it. His latest single is a reflection on his own childhood dreams, and Warren Fu’s video is a love letter to Lynne himself. From the album Alone in the Universe.