Video premiere: Lana Del Rey as Jackie O. and A$AP Rocky as JFK in "National Anthem"

The "gangster Nancy Sinatra" strikes again! Oh, Lana Del Rey. Can you believe she once charted here at WRMC? Where to begin with her... the name change or the makeover? The SNL debacle? The really great singles ("Video Games" 4ever) and the really bad album that followed? The apparent replacement of her personality with what amounted to a Tumblr blog's mixture of 2010s MTV glamor and faded Americana kitsch? Yeah, let's start with that last one -- and, hey, how timely: check out the video for "National Anthem," probably the most offensive song on Born To Die. If you haven't heard it, the lyrics go, "Money is the reason we exist, everybody knows it's a fact, kiss kiss...I need someone to hold me, he will do very well," and no, that's not feminism you smell, it's the vodka tonic Lizzy, I mean Lana, spilled on her neckline...could you wipe it up for her, sir? This atrocity stars LDR as, ahem, Jackie O AND Marilyn Monroe. Obviously she needs a JFK to have not one but two romances with, and luckily rapper A$AP Rocky was in the Hamptons that day. This might be some kind of far-fetched political/racial/cultural commentary, but since this is the same woman who turned the opening sentence of Lolita into the hook of a song about gambling, I'm guessing it's just an excuse to wear period-appropriate jewelry. Sex, drugs, cinematic string arrangements, multiple shots of LDR gazing despondently from behind rosebushes, and -- of course -- assassination ensue. Unintentionally funny, intentionally sad, or just really, grossly inappropriate? You decide!!!! Watch the video below, if you can deal with all eight minutes. A$AP Rocky called it "trippy...some real 2015 shit" and said we'll all understand it in three years. So, until then...God bless America?

PS. I'm also wondering if this means A$AP Rocky can tell the future...?? If so, that would be pretty exciting. This could mean something even bigger than Lana Del Rey's bump-it!

Video premiere: Twin Shadow, "Five Seconds"

Hey DJs and readers,

Today the sexiest man in indie rock, aka George Lewis Jr., aka Twin Shadow, released the incredible and long-awaited video for "Five Seconds," the very '80s-sounding first single from Confess (the upcoming follow-up to Twin Shadow's amazing 2010 debut LP Forget). The video, evocatively shot by Keith Musil, is seemingly just one part of some greater, postapocalyptic story -- dig the fake literary source material and that voiceover intro straight out of a '50s film noir -- although there's been no indication as of yet of an underlying conceptual narrative for Confess. The end of the video provides us with a muffled (but still enticing!) snippet of what appears to be the album's next single, entitled "Patient" -- hopefully its video will give us more information about the world and characters this clip presents, 'cause I'm pretty into the whole thing....

If sci-fi/fantasy isn't usually your cup of tea, 1) that sucks since sci-fi/fantasy is obviously the best; and 2) watch the video anyway, because it is also just really badass, what with those creepy crowbar-wielding masked warriors, a few Matrix-style slow-mo stunts, a motorcycle adorned with a dead coyote, and a whoooole lotta well-placed animal print fabric. Check it out below, along with another excellent Twin Shadow video, the Jamie Harley-directed found-footage clip for 2010's "Castles In The Snow."

Confess will be released in the U.S. on July 10 on 4AD. (That's the seriously hot cover art above.)

"Five Seconds":

"Castles In The Snow":

...And as a bonus, here's a 60-second way-too-close-up video of George Lewis, Jr. making out with someone, via Pitchfork.

How do you feel about Skrillex?

In the past two weeks, "brostep" figurehead and former Warped Tour small-fonter Sonny Moore, aka Skrillex, has played SXSW and received major coverage on the hipster tastemaking sites Pitchfork and Stereogum. So, some questions:

What's going on here? Is the indie music sphere warming up to Skrillex's bowel-movement-esque bass drops and cheap caffeine high aesthetic? Is this an earnest attempt to cut through the divisive maybe-bullshit about authenticity, legitimacy, and gender politics surrounding the chart-topping dance act? Did Pitchfork post an interview only to further its never-ending competition with Stereogum? Is this a case of the "underground" seizing upon and (possibly ironically) re-appropriating a mainstream sound just to mess with expectations and prove the supremacy of its cultural capital? Speaking of authenticity, how convincing is this sudden attention given that these publications and the audiences to which they cater have a history of derisively ridiculing this very act? Is the high traffic on these articles due to interest in Skrillex or interest in hearing the "victim" (or should that be "enemy"?) speak at long last? Is the polarizing Skrillex worthy of "defense" from the most renowned online independent music criticism publications currently running -- especially after being slammed by one of the most famous figures in U.K. dubstep (the "real" kind) on one of the same sites, to much praise? What is "real" dubstep, anyway? Why does this post require so many quotation marks? Is the U.S. fundamentally uglier, clumsier, worse at dancing, less aesthetically refined, and more misogynistic than the U.K.? Is Skrillex trying to simulate the sounds of gastroenteritis, or is that a coincidence? Is Skrillex's music sexist? Can it be listened to sober without inducing a headache? Is Skrillex a poser? Is Skrillex the 2010s answer to hair metal? I thought that was Sleigh Bells?

And, most importantly of all: Is Skrillex actually any good? Does he have anything interesting to say? Do you care?

If so, check out the articles here (Pitchfork) and here (Stereogum). And below, watch the video for "First of the Year" by Skrillex:



And here is the video for "Come to Daddy" by Aphex Twin. In the Pitchfork piece, Moore claims Aphex Twin as a major influence, and it's not hard to hear "Come to Daddy"'s sinister industrial slice-and-dice (and freaky vocal horrorshow) in Moore's work as Skrillex. In fact, Moore mentions this video (an obvious inspiration for the "First of the Year" video) specifically. If you still don't see why you should watch it, it's also one of the best works of the notoriously twisted British music video director Chris Cunningham.