Wes Anderson meets hip-hop?
A couple of months ago, Pell released “Chirpin’” which is one of his singles off of his latest EP titled “girasoul.” From the use of one-point perspective to the close-ups to the color grading, the music video for Chirpin’ almost feels like it could be a Wes Anderson short. It was only after watching the video a few times that had I realized the painted backdrops which felt like a stylistic nod to Wes. However, they did opt to set the titles in Avenir rather than Futura. Nevertheless, the influence is definitely there, and I’d say that Pell’s tweets from just yesterday confirms his admiration for Wes Anderson’s work.
Beyond just the visual aesthetics of the music video, it seems that the concept of the video and the song itself stem from a desire to disconnect. The song kicks off with the pre-chorus which ends with the following lines:
Need to get off of the internet, searching for something more intimate
I’m closing up all of the curtains, and hiding way under the surface
Throughout the video, shots switch between Pell with his “friends” and birds whose colors mirror their outfits (or vice versa). Of course the song is titled Chirpin’ which makes the birds thematically on point, but as Pell continues to talk about the internet and technology in general, and the characters follow Pell from set to set, the video seems to play as a metaphor for twitter (or all online social interaction for that matter.)
The video concludes with the set and Pell’s outfit reducing to grayscale, and the colorful birds being replaced with pigeons. What I get from all of this is that the internet and our ability to now be immediately connected all of the time is often painted all bright and beautiful, but the reality is that we’re often sacrficing a bit of our own privacy and are in a constant charade of dressing ourselves up. In the colorful world, Pell couldn’t escape being followed, but in the grayscale world he is greeted by the courtesy of another young man giving him his space. While Pell may not be saying he wishes to disconnect entirely, the song acknowledges the disconnect between our social lives online and our social lives in person.
Here is all of “girasoul” for you to listen to: