Soundness of Soundies

I’m old enough to remember when Music Television actually showed music videos – not just sometimes but all the time. They were a true novelty back then, and usually they were rather awful, but we liked them nonetheless. There was a certain hokeyness about them – I remember that weird Wild Boys video from Duran Duran. I still have no idea what it was about.

Videos nowadays are passe, too expensive, and no television station shows them (OK, MTV2, once in a wild blue moon). Bands now use videos as a way to showcase another side, sometimes using weird avant garde directors for stunning four-minute movies. The videos of Michel Gondry – for The White Stripes and Daft Punk – were fabulous and set a stir around the music.

Athens has been no stranger to music videos – Michael Stipe’s penchant for using Athens people and places for R.E.M. videos has been going on for years. And add to the list Athens Soundies, the vision of a pair of UGA grads (Ethan Payne and Jason Miller) who thought it great to marry Athens bands with Athens places for Athens prices (which in this case is free). They find the locations, and within two hours they’re done. So far the duo has done videos for local bands such as The Empties, Modern Skirts and Dead Confederate, as well as ones for national bands including Dr. Dog, Pattern is Movement and Chairlift.

It’s another example of why Athens is that fantasy-land Patton Oswalt likes to joke about. Where else but Athens would you find two guys who shoot music videos for free, sought out by some of the country’s top up-and-coming acts?

Here’s Wrecking Ball from Dead Confederate, outside one of the greatest places on Earth: