HIMSA - Big Timber
Let me start by saying that I know absolutely nothing about this band.
I’ve had a fantastically boring evening, which has been utterly consumed by the reformatting of my computer and the re-installation of all of my software habits.
While performing these tasks, I was casually browsing through basic cable in my office. I stopped on MTV2 because there was a Smashing Pumpkins video on, which sparked some 90’s nostalgia. This was quickly alleved by a slew of horrible videos, at which point I realized I was watching the current incarnation of “Headbanger’s Ball”. There was a point when I liked, or at least used to watch, Headbanger’s Ball - but I think that ended when Chris Cornell stopped Jesus Christ posing or something.
“What the fuck is this?” I thought. Then I took a step back and tried to rationalize the programming and do some kind of age to music appreciation ratio. I inevitably came back to the “What the fuck is this?” statement, so there you go.
This band’s video, however, still gave me a smile. Not for their music, but for the creativity of the video. The song… well, I think it sucks, but whatever. The visuals were fun, so fucking rock on Himsa!
Looking back, I didn’t like “Today” as a song by Smashing Pumpkins (the video I originally stopped on), but the video was good enough to make me stop my channel flipping finger on a video from 1993, which, in turn, made me miss MTV in general. MTV is how I learned about a lot of bands, but I suppose it’s time is over. That statement in itself makes me old, because MTV as “Music TV” has been dead forever. Still, for all the Last.fm’s, FineTune’s and Pandora’s out there, is there an easy way to find bands visually?
If I just found this band on Pandora and listened to them I would have hated them. I saw this particular video and I was intrigued; but than again, I’m a visual person. Is there some kind of music discovery network out on the intarwebs for me?
I’m going to sandwich this post with a band whose name I remember from said Headbanger’s Ball session, August Burns Red, and you tell me which video is better - regardless of musical prowess. If you had to just listen to the songs aurally, would you care? Once seeing them visually, would you make a more informed opinion? Does a carefully crafted marionette-themed video with interesting visuals trump a prototypical dirty-themed video with guys in grungy t-shirts with muscle cars in it? These are genuine questions…
