With VHS decades in the past, people have warmed up to its resurgence in use for music videos. The format now has this warm, nostalgic charm that fits the lo-fi, throwback aesthetic that is a welcome reference.How long will it be before we’re nostalgic for the pixelated distortion we find on corrupted YouTube videos, currently annoying us by bursting into an indecipherable mash-up of color right when a guy’s about to fall off the ladder or a cat’s about to do something really, really adorable?The video team—Mark Gilligan, Brian O’Tauma, and Donovan Delaney—have brought this common glitch into the realm of art in their video for Devonwho’s “Strangebrew.” Combining stock footage with footage from all over Ireland and Tokyo, the Dublin-based trio purposely corrupted video files by interfering with the pixel movement. This makes for mind-bending transitions that are disorienting until you can piece together the emerging shot through all the distortion. From the directors:We wanted to explore the concept of an alternate reality, and had several other ideas before this one came about. We were somewhat disillusioned by the similarities we see in some music videos of this nature, and Olan [from All City Records] was happy to let us muck about and produce whatever we liked. Given that two of us are design students, and the other is working primarily with 3D programs, a music video opportunity gave us a chance to try something new, that we hadn’t much experience with, and that we felt suited the mood of the track.@ImYourKid
