Pantha Du Prince

It’s video roundup time! Once again, Howl And Echoes are coming in hot with the freshest, most eyeball-stimulating music videos to be dropped by the artists you love and some of the artists you don’t know you love yet this week. We do all the dirty work and herd them all into one convenient web-based location for you to enjoy every Friday so that you don’t have to. Have yourself a good old gander at the latest offerings from:

Shabazz Palaces – Dawn In Luxor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4j6TcLiANW8

Starting in Seattle this week with experimental hip-hop duo Shabazz Palaces and their latest video for Dawn In Luxor. It’s a track from all the way back in 2014 and their second album Lese Majesty, and majestic is definitely the operative word here. This is hip-hop soaring with wings, clever bars over a thick backbeat and a wall of noise that’s almost suffocating.

The visuals are an equally stunning accompaniment, gorgeous scenic shots of mountains and raging rivers, sunsets and the great unknown of outer space. The footage comes courtesy of the Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit, NASA’s Johnson Space Center, Hubble and Cassini missions, which is all so unbelievably cool. The entire experience is just utterly immersive.

Lese Majesty is out now on Sub Pop via Inertia.

MOSSY – Ginsberg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8H10z83zcE4

MOSSY has been quite the regular in our video roundup since signing to I Oh You not so long ago and proceeding to drop jaw-dropper after jaw-dropper out of the gate. With his debut EP having just touched down, the Sydney producer has this week released another single in Ginsberg and he hasn’t disappointed.

A slow-burning jazzy backbeat and MOSSY’s gentle crooning create a smoking lounge atmosphere, his pipes soar skywards over the chorus with unexpected power. It’s dark and dusky and yet another solid outing from MOSSY. The video finds the producer suiting up and cutting some proper shapes in a completely blanketed living room before the world’s most adorable baby makes a cameo at the end and yanks on every one of your heartstrings.

MOSSY’s self-titled debut is out now via I Oh You.

Pantha Du Prince – In An Open Space

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQ8QWAIjLiQ

German producer Pantha Du Prince has shared his latest in the lead-up to his next album The Triad. It’s called In An Open Space and it’s just gorgeous. A discordant opening slowly blends into a shimmering backbeat under some whisper-soft vocals. It’s a beautiful melody that is perfect for dim lights on a cold night.

The video follows the trail of three mysterious masked figures (who have made previous appearances in Pantha Du Prince’s other videos) who traipse an overcast countryside before meeting and unmasking. It’s a tad creepy and ritualistic in parts (especially those stony-faced reflective masks) but with moments of light-hearted humanity and all wonderfully shot by Cedric Reitzmann.

The Triad is out today via Rough Trade/Remote Control Records.

Foursix – Favors

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRuXFSCRsm4

Over to the Big Apple for this next one from music and art collective Foursix. Favors is the name of their debut single and video. Seven members make up Foursix but just two of them feature on Favors in Verdé Madera and J-Payso. Deliberate production anchored by simple piano chords and off-kilter trap beats form the tapestry over which Madera and Payso cleverly flow about the daily grind.

The video is fantastic, a look at Madera and Payso’s initially shitty workaday world before their tight-buttoned office all of a sudden lets their hair down and gets Wolf Of Wall Street messy. It’s as slick a debut as you could ask for and there’s something about these guys that is just magnetic.

Looking very much forward to what the rest of the Foursix collective can do.

Highasakite – Golden Ticket

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2NopIx3sTg&feature=youtu.be

Over the Atlantic to Norway for this next one with dream pop outfit Highasakite. Their new record Camp Echo is out this week and they’ve squeezed out one last single and video before that bomb drops in the glittery Golden Ticket.

It’s an up-tempo electro pop number, driven by a pulsating beat and leading into that absolutely heavenly chorus that will shoot you to the stars. Pop distilled to it’s purest form, I can’t stress enough the near cocaine-effect of that chorus. The video will grip you just as hard, gold and electric purple hues coating some mesmerising contemporary dancing. The entire thing is incredibly satisfying on both sonic and aesthetic levels and it certainly does appear that Highasakite have the golden ticket to spend the rest of 2016 lifting right off.

Camp Echo is out today via Caroline Australia

Tired Lion – Not My Friends

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNKzInyG9n4

Music video homages are always great and this week’s effort from Perth upstarts Tired Lion is no exception. For the appropriately titled Not My Friends, Tired Lion have reimagined the iconic opening credits scene from the mother of all sitcoms in Friends as well as a whole bunch of your other favourite shows of all time including That 70s Show, The Office, Home Improvement and a whole lot of others we won’t spoil, just watch and enjoy.

The song goes all kind of hard (frontlady Sophie Hopes is rock and roll as all fuck) and the gargantuan grimy riffs and lyrical subjects are a heavy pairing, but its all juxtaposed amazingly with the sheer amount of fun the band are having emulating all these classic television moments. It’s videos like this that make these roundups such a joy to write and big ups to Tired Lion for killing it in both audio and visual formats on this latest tune.

You can catch the guys on their headlining Australian tour happening right now before they head to the UK and Europe for a jaunt and then get back here in time for Splendour. 2016 is absolutely shaping up to be the year of the (Tired) Lion.

The Last Shadow Puppets – Miracle Aligner

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPsyynjHpbY

Rock super-duo Alex Turner and Miles Kane, also known as The Last Shadow Puppets made their triumphant return in 2016 with their massive sophomore record Everything You’ve Come To Expect. The latest single from that album is the silky smooth Miracle Aligner, gentle crooning over pure rock and roll. Picture mum-rock artists of yesteryear like Bread and Air Supply but with a somewhat dark modern twist.

Looking to emulate the aesthetics of that era, The Last Shadow Puppets set their spray tan guns to ‘kill’ and donned suits and hairdos for their choreographed slow motion dance routine that would make Countdown dancing extras beam with pride. It’s all a bit of a poke at the shallow world of the famous and it’s up there with previous visual efforts Aviation and Everything You’ve Come To Expect for excellence.

Everything You’ve Come To Expect is out now via Domino.

Hockey Dad – So Tired

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xjAS7Q0fmY

Surf punk might be the favourite genre of this writer and there are few practitioners of it in this part of the world more proficient at it than Windang dynamic duo Hockey Dad. That statement rings especially true of their latest single, the hook laden, fuzzed up summer jam So Tired.

Catchy as the clap, frontman Zach Stephenson’s wail is refreshingly unique and hooks you as much as the chugging melody. The video will make you long for summer, awash in pink hues with Hockey Dad and friends jamming out on a sun-drenched beach and having what looks like the single best time ever (while you’re probably watching it from a cold, heartless office desk).

It’s tunes like So Tired and bands like Hockey Dad that have us so excited for the future of Australian rock, and we’re thoroughly fiending for their debut record. It’s called Boronia and it’s out August 12th on Farmer And The Owl via Inertia.