ALWAYS EVERYTHING

VIDEO // GENEVA JACUZZI “BAD MOODS”

For some people, it seems like the only difference between “hipster shit” and “high concept, hypnagogic masterpiece” is the attractiveness of the artists in question. Message board bores look away now then, lest Geneva Jacuzzi and Ariel Pink’s Roman cavorting inspire the dorky vitriol of the chronically unfun. Lifted from this year’s quite fantastic Lamaze, Bad Moods’ wonky take on 80s ephemera is matched exquisitely with similarly low budget approximations to synth pop video weirdness. Sex! Costumes! And a hero of the US underground meets his maker! 

One of my favourite things about Ariel Pink pre-Before Today were the ridiculous $5 dollar Bowie videos, ranging from fantastical, extradimensional power ballads to unbelievably mundane comings and goings about town. 

Though they’re continually dogged by lame-o internet dwellers-

Sample critique:

“This is truly hipster garbage. This isn’t music. This is pure shit. No good melodies, no good arcs, no good transitions, just garbage. Anyone who claims to actually like this is either trolling or has no musical insight (or is a hipster, trying to defy mainstream music by listening to this).”

- they’re quite clearly made with a huge dose of self awareness and humour, and are the perfect aesthetic accomplice to lo fi revivalism. A string of videos from Outer Limits Recordings, LA Vampires and now Geneva Jacuzzi follow in those footsteps, recasting bedroom mischief makers as warped popstars of their own making: and isn’t that what all us music people wanted when we were kids?

Londoners would do well to catch Ariel Pink & Geneva Jacuzzi on Nov 3rd at The Social. The rest of the UK isn’t completely out of luck as Geneva’s playing alone at Leeds venue Nation Of Shopkeepers on Nov 2nd.