Pitchfork Forkcast: Video Premiere: Why?: "Song of the Sad Assassin"

Video Premiere: Why?: "Song of the Sad Assassin"

Nothing goes with weighty, genre-curious corpse songs quite like cartoons, right? Directed by animator Mike L. Mayfield ("Family Guy", "American Dad"), the video for Why?'s "Song of the Sad Assassin", from the indie hip-hop group's Pitchfork-recommended Alopecia, isn't exactly Saturday morning fare, although I guess you could still scarf down your Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs in front of it. "We lifted the body from the water like a gown/ You took off your bra to wrap the wound," Yoni Wolf sings to an accompaniment of a couple of repeated piano notes and a clunking beat. When his melody rises with guitar and (synth?) strings to close the verse, it could almost be a Cloud Cult song, except Wolf is singing about sucking the marrow out and raping the hollow bones. Mayfield's images of musical skeletons, pieces of clothing rising up from the water, and a bearded Wolf himself add a nicely apropos video element. The animated clip for Aesop Rock's "None Shall Pass" achieved a similar effect for me, but the visuals here are less busy, both graphically and in terms of metaphorical possibilities, so it's easier to focus on the song. "Billy the Kid did what he did and he died," Wolf repeats at the end, at a martial clip emphasized by the drums. Billy, you're so far away from home.