Category: music video

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 19, 202621:45

New Video: AN_NA Shares Glitchy Visual for Seething “Too Much”

French-born, Montréal-based married couple and electronic music duo AN_NA formed over three decades ago. And over the course of their lengthy careers, they’ve used their experiences within electronic music, industrial and experimental music scenes to create a unique sound that sees them frequently experimenting with different styles and genres. Their long-held penchant for experimentation has given them the space to evolve as artists, while keeping them open to new ideas and influences that they readily incorporate into their own songwriting approach.

If you’ve worked in the music industry long enough, you’ll recognize that surveying longer than a few seconds in a hyper-competitive and often cutthroat industry is extremely difficult. But for the Montréal-based duo, they’ve credited their longevity to being true to their art — and to making music that they’re passionate about.

“Too Much,” is the French-born, Canadian-based duo’s latest single — and the first since the release of 2024’s sophomore album More Pills. Arguably one of the more confrontational songs of the duo’s catalog to date, “Too Much” is a seething song, featuring propulsive, tweeter and woofer rattling, industrial thump and scorching synth oscillations beneath an unhinged Nicola Kuperus-like vocal performance that’s defiant, furious and paranoid within a turn of a phrase.

While being a club banger for a dystopian age that’s inching ever so much closer to the apocalypse, “Too Much” as the duo explains finds them moving a bit closer to their punk roots. “Having lost none of our rage, ‘Too Much’ explores, without embellishment, the questions surrounding violence.”

The accompanying video for “Too Much” features the duo performing the song in a darkened club with hot, analog/VHS fuzz and glitch that undulates with the song’s propulsive thump.

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 19, 202613:30

New Video: Shudder To Think Shares Atmospheric and Intimate “Release The Ball”

Back in 2024 Shudder To Think — currently Craig Wedren (vocals), Nathan Larson (guitar), Clint Walsh (guitar), Jherek Bischoff (bass) and Adam Wade (drums) — celebrated the 30th anniversary of their groundbreaking 1994 effort, Pony Express Record, their Epic Records debut, which followed several releases on Dischord Records.

After the initial release of Pony Express Record, the band dove into the world of scoring films and creating music for soundtracks with the 1998 releases of Jesse Peretz’s First Love, Last Rites, Lisa Cholodenko’s High Art and Todd Haynes’ Velvet Goldmine. Shudder to Think’s Wedren and Larson have gone to be prolific film and television with Wedren working on YELLOWJACKETS, Wet Hot American Summer, School of Rock, Laurel Canyon and more; and Larson working on Our Idiot Brother, The Skeleton Twins, Juliet, Naked, the High Fidelity TV series and a list of others.

Last year, the band made their first live performances in over a decade and released the “Thirst Walk”/”Playback” 7 inch, which drew on the band’s classic, beloved sound — melodic, unpredictable and unmistakably their own. The 7 inch vinyl sold out quickly and was repressed for the band’s most recent run of live dates. And if you’ve been frequenting this site, you’d recall that the band recently released the three-song Who Sent You EP, the first new effort from the band in almost 30 years. The EP includes the previously released, semi-autobiographical EP title track ““Who Sent You,” their cover of Depeche Mode’s “Something To Do” off 1984’s Some Great Reward and the EP’s third and final single “Release The Ball.”

“Release The Ball” is a stark, atmospheric tune built around a looping, metronomic-like guitar figure, bursts of caterwauling synths and a metronomic drum patterns beneath Craig Wedren’s yearning delivery.

“Craig had a little looping guitar figure inspired by Arthur Russell,” the band says. ” He threw the idea down so as not to forget it, sang a mostly-gibberish vocal, and sent it to the band as something that could be turned into something. But Adam was like ‘no, leave it! It’s cool.’ So we added some rhythm and texture to the demo, served with love.”

Directed by the band’s Craig Wedren, the accompanying black and white video reflects the song’s stark, intimate nature, featuring live footage of the band projected onto a glittering disco ball.

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 18, 202600:00

New Video: Allegories Return with Ethereal “Glorious Vanity”

Canadian experimental pop duo and JOVM mainstays Allegories — childhood friends Adam Bentley and Jordan Mitchell — just released their newest album, By accident, On purpose on this past Friday.

The album includes ““Honestly, that’s enough honesty” “They’ll Never Suspect Us” “Pure Comedy” and the album’s latest single “Glorious Vanity.” Arguably, one of By accident, On Purpose‘s most minimalist and ethereal songs, “Glorious Vanity” serves as one of the more extreme examples of the JOVM mainstay’s experimental creative process with only the title remaining from the initial composition. The result is song that’s a hauntingly eerie, slow-burning, half-remembered dream rooted in palpable yearning.

The song captures the duo’s willingness to abandon a predetermined designation that largely came to define the album. Rather than ruthlessly potting their original idea, the duo allowed instinct and experimentation to dictate what the song needed to become, crafting a weightless entry point into the album.

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 17, 202610:00

Throwback: Happy 54th Birthday, Eminem!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Eminem’s 54th birthday.

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 16, 202613:00

Throwback: Happy 79th Birthday, Bob Weir!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates the 79th anniversary of the birth of Grateful Dead co-founderBob Weir.

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 16, 202610:00

Throwback: Happy 64th Birthday, Flea!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Red Hot Chili Peppers’ bassist Flea’s 64th birthday.

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 15, 202622:00

New Video: Montréal’s DONALDA Share a Glitchy, Politically-Charged Banger

Montréal-based electronic dance music duo DONALDA — Florence Lafontaine and Olivier Martin-Fréchette — derive their project’s name from the name given to the first women admitted to college in Québec in the late 19th century, and is a nod to the fictional character introduced in Claude-Henri Grignon’s 1933 novel Un homme et son péché, who, for several generations, embodied the consequences of patriarchy.

Lafontaine and Martin-Fréchette both have an academic background in digital, contemporary mixed-media and instrumental composition, as well as in jazz interpretation. Inspired by UK garage, dubstep, left field bass and other British electronic music sub-genres as well as the queer nightlife scene, the duo take a pedagogical approach to music in order to deconstruct the boundaries of musical genres. While getting people onto the dance floor is their ultimate goal, they also seek to spark musical curiosity among their audience, something that is at the core of their inclusive, unifying philosophy.

Through composition, sound design and creative coding, the Montréal-based duo tap into their wide-ranging experiences to bring every stage of DONALDA’s creative process to life. And fittingly, their versatility imbued their sound with a coherent and deeply personal artistic identity rooted in a celebration of diversity and inclusion, freedom and the French language.

Earlier this year, the duo signed to Bonsound. And since then, French Canadian outfit have released “C FOU,” “C BEN D’VALEUR” and their latest single “C CHER.” Translated into English as “It’s expensive,” “C CHER” is one-part footwork, one-part Larry Levan/Chicago-styled house and one-part glitchcore with wobbling bass that references Daniel Lanois’ 1989 song “O Marie,” which focused on the grueling, back-breaking labor of French Canadians who used to work in Ontario’s tobacco fields while also being a critique of the frantic pace of capitalism and its physical and psychological effects. The result is a song that turns collective physical and mental exhaustion into a visceral, deeply universal anthem — and is both a cry of frustration and a call to question a broken system that hinders individual and collective fulfillment.

Directed by Cori & Zacksta, the accompanying visualizer features the French Canadian duo making beats, brushing their teeth, stopping a bloody nose, making beats and hanging out with VHS video glitch and in heat mapped-style footage. It’s as trippy and high energy as the song it accompanies.

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 15, 202619:00

New Video: Total Fucking Darkness Shares Yearning, Pop Gem “This Is The Last Time”

Electronic music outfit and JOVM mainstays Total Fucking Darkness features:

Stars‘ Torquil Campbell

Young Galaxy‘s Stephen Ramsey

English studio genius and synth player Tom McFall, whose engineering credits include R.E.M., Bloc Party, Twin Shadow and Regina Spektor

Over the past 18 months or so, the trio have released a handful of standalone singles, including “Desolation Boys,” “Take It Easy,” “Give Me Everything You Own” “Horizontal Rain” and “Beaten to Write.” Their latest single “This Is The Last Time” is glistening sophistipop-meets-80s New Wave-meets New Order-like tune anchored around what may arguably be the most melodic and the most earnest and achingly oversized yearning song of the trio’s growing catalog.

Sonically, “This Is The Last Time” sees the JOVM mainstays looking backward to move forward. Campbell, Ramsey and McFall have had a long-held obsession with late 1980s and early 1990s electronic music, and the new single pushes that fixation towards its biggest pop-leaning instincts. There aren’t software shortcuts hiding beneath the surface either. “No plug-ins, anywhere. This track is all analog, baby.”

When asked what inspired it, Total Fucking Darkness’ Stephen Ramsey offers a characteristically economic answer, “New Order.”

“This Is The Last Time” arrived with similarly little ceremony. Ramsay had barely made it through the instrumental once before Torquil Campbell had the lyrics ready. “It may as well be called ‘Real Time’ because Torq wrote this in real time,” Ramsay explains. “By the time I played him the instrumental once, he had written the lyrics.”

“‘This Is The Last Time” is about the point where letting go becomes forward motion, following whatever dream remains, committing to it completely, and accepting that the only sensible response to uncertainty is to set your heart on fire — and see what survives.

“Every band says their latest music is the best thing they’ve ever done,”the band’s Stephen Ramsay says. “It’s obviously cliché at this point and therefore categorically untrue in almost all cases, but I’m telling you, this is the best song we’ve written.”

The accompanying video features edited footage from some movie that follows two dogs, who are in love. It’s adorable.

Video by William Ruben HelmsOct 15, 202616:00

New Video: Normal Bias Share Surreal Visual for Thumping, Club Banger “Soft Power”

Currently split between New York and Atlanta, electro pop duo Normal Bias — Matt W.(vocals) and Chris C. (synths) — are a self-described “pump and dump scheme, mining the most bloodthirsty parts of decades of electronic music and striping it for parts” while describing their sound and approach as “equal parts techno synth pop and ruthless venture capital.” The duo have supported their recorded output — 2022’s self-titled EP and 2024’s Kingdom Come — with shows and touring with Nitzer Ebb, Boy Harsher, Nuovo Testamento, High Functioning Flesh and Phase Fatale. Adding to a growing reputation in the electronic music scene, the band is currently on tour with Spike Hellis, who has performed and collaborated with Nitzer Ebb, Boy Harsher, Pixel Grip, Buzz Kull, Nuovo Testamento, and more.

The duo’s sophomore album Ways of Keeping Clean will be released next year through DKA Records. Ways of Keeping Clean‘s first single “Soft Power” is an EBM and goth-styled banger built with thumping, wall-rattling beats, walls of glistening synths, razor sharp hooks paired with Matt W’s sultry Dave Gahan/Michael Hutchence-like vocals. Sonically seeming to channel early Depechde Mode, the song as the do explains “confronts the numbing effects of propagandized multimedia addiction that looms over the modern world and enables the worst instincts of our leaders and institutions, and leads us further into nowhere and nothing.”

Directed by Logan Devlin, the accompanying video for “Soft Power” is a sleek blend of live performance, stop-motion amination and Dali-esque landscapes with bursts of VHS glitch. While watching it, I thought of So and Us-era Peter Gabriel and Pet Shop Boys — but with a mix of mischief and menace.