OMD – History of Modern, Part 1

The strangest stop-motion music video since Peter Gabriel’s Sledgehammer

Tom: I know, I’ve harped on about OMD twice recently, but that’s because they’re so damn good. The title track off the recent album is the next single, and it’s wonderful not only for all the typical reasons, but also because of the strangest stop-motion music video since Peter Gabriel’s Sledgehammer.

(Technically there’s a bit of nudity in this video, but even YouTube doesn’t seem to mind it.)

Tim: You’re certainly right about it being an odd video.

Tom: Now, I’m a bit of an OMD fanboy, but even I have to admit that perhaps they’re now hitting the ‘album track’ material rather than the ‘lead single’ stuff; so this is probably the last single off the album that I’ll mention here.

But I still like this – the synth riff in the background just makes me smile, and even the nihilistic lyrics don’t seem to bad when they’re paired with a track like this. Perhaps they haven’t quite pulled it off as well as Hurts, but it works for me.

Tim: Well, it’s certainly not at all bad, although you might be right about the album track material – for me, it doesn’t do enough. Yes, it’s a good background riff, but that starts right at the beginning, and then it doesn’t really build on it at all. Still, it’ll do.