The best music videos of last year take you higher, open up wormholes, create you from an embryo, and rap sublimely
We missed this great overview from Creative Review of the best music videos of 2023 - let’s bring it to you before January closes… We love music videos for their sheer optimism and idealism (and sometimes darkness and brokenness), the visuals driven by the intensity of the music. Things can go anywhere, any shape… Above is “Higher”, from London Grammar, playing around with dance experiences and art history. Why not?
From Creative Review:
British-Nepali artist Tsunaina explored the theme of rebirth for the video for her track Tenderer, which she directed herself with co-directors Jake Jelicich and Justin Ridler. Featuring 3D work created with David Guerrero, the artist appears in digitised form and is seemingly suspended in animation.
As the track progresses, the artist is slowly pieced back together from her “embryonic form”, with this sense of rebuilding supposedly stemming from Tsunaina’s time working in the fashion industry.
We’ve featured this earlier this year, but worthwhile to see it again. From CR:
Over the years Aphex Twin has become known for commissioning mind-bending visuals to accompany his music and for this summer’s Blackbox Life Recorder 21f, the artist teamed up with long-time collaborator Weirdcore.
The video is a nod to classic rave visuals and employs the skills of animators Alfie Dwyer together with Misha Notley and Archie Taylor, who developed AI imagery and backgrounds to form part of the hypnotic wormhole visuals. The video uses similar techniques as those developed for Aphex Twin’s current live shows and takes us on a weird journey through space.
And finally, from CR:
Back in June, music video director Dave Meyers, who has worked with big names including Kendrick Lamar, Missy Elliot, Harry Styles and more, teamed up with British-Nigerian rapper Little Simz for the promo of her track Gorilla.
The film is reminiscent of 90s hip hop music videos but is crammed with contemporary twists, including Little Simz’s distorted image mirrored multiple times or floating up in the sky, dodging paintballs in an empty swimming pool, and spiralling down a multistory carpark laid down on a skateboard. Interestingly, the video also has an alternate interactive version, ‘powered by Microsoft Cloud and AI’, that changes with every watch, which can be seen here.