Daniels Direct A Dizzying New Video For Passion Pit's "Cry Like A Ghost"

Indie pop sensation and dance-party-inducing band Passion Pit
have just released a new video for their song “Cry Like a Ghost,” off their second studio album Gossamer. The video tells us the dizzying and heart-wrenching tale of lost soul Sylvia and features the work of directorial duo extraordinaire, Daniels, aka Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert. Daniels’ direction totally carries the video, which clearly required a lot of on-point coordination and planning to execute.

In the beginning we find Sylvia, the subject of the song’s heartache, dancing alone in the woods, seemingly possessed. Just when it looks as though she’s about to take a tumble, a guy catches her. But it quickly becomes clear Sylvia is tossing herself from relationship to relationship. Through fast-forward and slow motion, rewinding and repeating, we get the feeling Sylvia’s been on quite the boozy bender—tossing herself into relationship hot potato. The visual effects are appropriately dizzying. She dances from guy to guy, drunken night to hazy morning. Her life has become “some blurry little quest,” Passion Pit sings. She alternates between wearing an expression of ultra-doom and ecstasy—clearly this lifestyle is taking a toll on her.

Daniels creatively combines elements of dance, narrative, and time-lapse effects to convey a sense of the expansion and contraction of time typical of a bender like Sylvia’s. The video is right on in communicating the story behind Passion Pit’s song. You can learn more about Daniels’ process in their making-of video. There’s also an extended cut of “Cry Like a Ghost” which offers a greater narrative backbone to Sylvia’s story.

The name-sharing filmmaking duo have made a plethora of other music videos that are at once visually stunning and narrative-oriented for artists like Chromeo and The Shins. They also directed math rock band Battles in their Creators Project-produced music video for “My Machines” from their album Glass Drop. You should probably, definitely check out that video below because it’s equally as rad.

@MlleDisser