Matty Healy Frolics Through a Meme-Filled Dystopia in The 1975’s ‘The Birthday Party’ Watch
The 1975 head out to "The Birthday Party" of every sad meme lover's dreams in their latest music video released today (Feb. 19) with the new single Dirty Hit/ Interscope Records. It's the fifth single off the band's forthcoming fourth studio album Notes on a Conditional Form, due April 24.
Healy confronts the growing vapidness of house parties when he steps back out into the social scene after becoming clean. The alternative rock band's frontman croons about girls insisting, "Do you wanna come and get f–ked up?" and repeatedly drones about depending on his bandmates to stay clean and his desperate attempt to be seen "as sad as it seems," but what he sees in the music video is an entirely different affair.
A virtual avator of Healy enters Mindshower, a digital detox center, to unplug from the online world but rather submits himself to it where he encounters assorted human-like characters cherry-picked from and 4chan meme subculture in a magical forest, from Pepe the Frog to Goth GF. The dystopian world connects back to the song's message of struggling to connect with others, but as opposed to drugs and alcohol getting in the way, the video makes commentary about how genuine human connection cannot be achieved by technological means when narcissism and isolation seep through the divisions social media creates.
"It was truly inspiring to work with The 1975 on this project, combining digital craft with true emotion and a subversive and multilayered narrative,” said music video director Ben Ditto in a press release. “Matty and I have a shared fascination with the underbelly of Internet culture and how that impacts modern life, and we looked to address this from several directions and created an engaging and beautiful piece of filmmaking to contain these messages and their performance in a revolutionary way.”
The 1975 also teamed up again with co-director/ lead artist Jon Emmony, who was also responsible for helming their outside-the-box "People" visual from last August. This time around, Emmony worked with Mimic Productions to render 3D digital versions of each member, capturing their mouth and body movements and adorning them in simulated digital costumes.
Fans can expect immersive shows that embody the fantasy world from "The Birthday Party" visual during the English band's spring 2020 North American tour, which will kick off April 27 at Houston's Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion.
Enjoy "The Birthday Party" below.