Video: Super Furry Animals: "Run-Away"
As you might expect from Welsh psych-pop pranksters Super Furry Animals, the video for the excellent single "Run-Away", from the band's new Hey Venus!, is as much about driving as running. Singer Gruff Rhys introduces the song as "based on a true story, which would be fine if it wasn't autobiographical," but this clip sheds light on that story only obliquely. Directed by Richard Ayoade, the video is a winking look at a mini-soap opera centering on unshaven actor Matt Berry.
As Berry cruises down a road full of trees lit with Christmas lights, driver's seat conspicuously on the American side of the car, he runs into a pearls-bedecked, brown-haired woman who is running away from something. The song's dramatic guitar flourishes conjure up a romantic atmosphere as Berry drives with her back to his friends, explaining to them that the girl has amnesia. A dude in a bow tie walks in who claims to be her husband, and now Berry is the one running into the road. Good thing there's a pouty-lipped lady in red-- driving on the English side of the car-- to pick him up and start all over again. Hello sunshine.
[from Hey Venus!; out now on vinyl and digital and due 01/22/08 on CD from Rough Trade]