BUG

The evolution of music video

BUG 04, Thursday 29th November 2007, 8:45pm, BFI Southbank

Download these notes as a PDF document, as distributed at the event

Welcome to BUG 04, and our final offering of 2007. It's another night of dazzling creativity in music videos, the very latest examples of outstanding work from around the world, an eclectic mix of music styles, special guests, and the one and only Adam Buxton. But we'll admit right now: there's also something which is not actually a video, and something which is, well, pretty damn old.

We begin with Trans Am's 'Tesco vs. Sainsburys'. The BUG team have been aware of the work of a director called Lung for a little while now. Lung is Chris Harris, an artist who has been making videos for a few years, usually on very small budgets. This work from earlier this year is an intoxicating accumulation of animation styles. Chris built and shot everything himself over two weeks in, he says, a state of weird possession. 'It was a horrible experience,' he tells us.

Once you've been duly hypnotised by Lung's madcap animation, you'll be ready for the astonishing work of Jared Eberhardt for Seattle-based heavy metal/thrash outfit Himsa. Jared featured in BUG 02, with his brilliant puppet-and-card video for CSS's 'Alcohol'. Now Jared creates an altogether darker vision, imagining the band as fabled Yeti-like Sasquatch. But it's what happens when they tangle with a vengeful tree that will really blow your mind.

That's followed by another brilliantly warped story – 'Evil Bee' by punk/funk/indie outfit Menomena has been transformed into a blackly humorous animated tale by Stefan Nadelman, an acclaimed filmmaker behind several award-winning short films.

Our second group of videos begins with another graphic piece with no live action, and barely any animation: Italian director Mauro Vecchi's piece for The Whitest Guy Alive's 'The Golden Cage' is a fascinating exploration into the wonders of optical illusions.

It's followed by another video with an instructional theme. It's also possibly the most controversial music video yet shown at BUG – although it might not hold that record for very long. Keith Schofield's video for Wintergreen's 'Can't Sit Still' is not big, nor clever, and we do not endorse any of the activities portrayed in this video. But we like it. And remember, don't try to take notes in the dark.

Our next video by Montreal-based director Ben Steiger Levine's video for Socalled's 'You Are Never Alone' has been a huge YouTube hit in the past few months because it happens to be one of the greatest achievements in special effects this year. Steiger Levine has created astonishing spectacle of a man revealing a mechanism within – but apparently this is one video where CGI was not used. So can you figure out how it was done?

There's definitely CGI in our next one, because Nima Nourizadeh's video for Chromeo's 'Bonafide Lovin' is basically an affectionate, witty homage to the first video ever to use computer animation: Steve Barron's video for Dire Straits' 'Money For Nothing'. Nima recruited the assistance of London animation team Dirty UK to build those gigantic pixels.

We then introduce our first special guest of the evening: Jim Canty. Jim is probably still best known as one half of the very successful directing partnership Jake and Jim, with Jake Wynne. They made acclaimed videos for the likes of Super Furry Animals, Grandaddy, and The Bluetones. The pair gravitated towards commercials for a few years, until earlier this year when Jim became a solo director and returned to videos. He quickly assisted the promising career of Jack Penate with the video for Spit at Stars and recently made the video we're showing tonight for Kaiser Chief's 'Love's Not A Competition', which features the likely Leeds lads in a brilliantly executed one-shot around New York's Central Park. But Canty's directing partnership with Wynne is still intact when it comes to one project: the pair have been directing segments of what is planned to be the first feature film by artists Jake & Dino Chapman. And Jim will be introducing an extremely exclusive excerpt from this ongoing project entitled 'Fucking Hell'. Okay, it's not, strictly speaking, a music video. But it's astonishing. And as you might expect from the Chapman Brothers, it's not for the fainthearted. Indeed, it may well offend...

After this major cinematic event, Adam will introduce something from his own recent adventures in the crazy world of rock and roll, with his friend and rather famous video director Garth Jennings. Adam and Garth worked with Radiohead on an online event for the band's fans to celebrate the completion, and cheeky system of distribution, of their new album. We're showing the result of Adam and Garth's experiments with 'bike helmet-cam' for 'Jigsaw Falling Into Place' – now the official video for the track. It rocks. And wobbles.

After that comes another The Owl by I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness, directed by Emmanuel Ho. This mesmeric and gripping piece of animation is beautifully made and so minimal and replete with symbols – what's with the lipstick? – that you could analyse its meaning for far longer than its two or so minutes duration. And then we change the music mood entirely with… jazz! It's less a conventional video than a visual interpretation of the music of American jazz pianist Jason Lindner by his friend, Israeli filmmaker Michal Levy. The pair met a few years ago when Levy was an exchange student at New York's School of Visual Arts, and she's been planning this piece for almost as long.

Then we welcome our second guest: Ed Sayers, the man who conceived, founded and enthusiastically runs ingenious film competition straight 8. Since 1999, straight 8 has challenged filmmakers to make a film with a single cartridge of Super 8mm, completely in-camera. Ed's appearance coincides with the launch of straight 8 08, and he'll be presenting two further video-like entries with distinctly dreamlike qualities: the extraordinary Déjà Vu by Czech directing team and musicians Sandalz, and The Surrealist Brothel by Julia Jason, where one of the clients comes within frightening proximity to live eels in a bath.

And finally, another little something from Adam Buxton – a sneak preview of what we might expect from his new TV show.

We close tonight's BUG with what might seriously be described as the first ever music video. Okay, it's a highly contentious title, but back in 1965, when Richard Lester was making 'Help!' with The Beatles, the nature of the production meant that all kinds of new experimentation was required to make the most of footage shot of the Fab Four to be used with new songs recorded for the film. And thus... to celebrate the new special DVD release of 'Help!' we are delighted to present the sequence in the movie where the boys goof around on the Austrian ski slopes to the soundtrack of Ticket to Ride. Groundbreaking photography by David Watkin, barely a nod at lipsync, and all supervised with characteristic joie de vivre by the man dubbed by MTV as 'the father of music videos', Richard Lester. And with that frolic in the snow, we bid you an early Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Enjoy the show. We'll be back for BUG 05 on January 31st 2008. See you then.

David Knight

Artist	Title	Direction	Production company	Record company
Trans Am	Tesco Vs Sainsburys	Lung	Perish Factory	Thrill Jockey Records
Himsa	Big Timber	Jared Eberhardt	Network	Century Media Records
The Whitest Boy Alive	The Golden Cage	Mauro Vechhi	Filmaster Clip	Modular
Wintergreen	Can't Sit Still	Keith Schofield	Caviar LA	Wintergreen Music
Socalled	You Are Never Alone	Benjamin Steiger Levine	BSL Prods	J Dub Records
Chromeo	Bona Fide Lovin'	Nima Nourizadeh	Partizan	Backyard Records
Kaiser Chiefs	Love's Not A Competition	Jim Canty	HSI London	B Unique/Polydor Records
Jake & Dinos Chapman	Fucking Hell (scene 1, unfinished and unmastered)	Jim Canty and Jake Wynne
Radiohead	Jigsaw Falling Into Pieces	Adam Buxton and Garth Jennings
I Love You But I've Chosen Darkness	The Owl	Emmanuel Ho		Secretly Canadian
Jason Lindner	ONE	Michal Levy		Anzic
Straight 8	Déjà Vu	Sandalz
Straight 8	The Surrealist Brothel	Julia Jason Botkin
Adam Buxton	Sausages	Adam Buxton
The Beatles	Ticket To Ride	Richard Lester		Apple Records/EMI