Video of The Day: COMA

There’s a bunch of videos out there. Some of them are good. Some of them are a cut above. I like to think my picks for Video of The Day are a cut (or two) above.

A spiracle is, to quote the internet, "an external respiratory opening, especially each of a number of pores on the body of an insect, or each of a pair of vestigial gill slits behind the eye of a cartilaginous fish." In short, spiracles are about breathing, and air.

COMA's "Spiracles" has less to do with breathing mechanisms for various lifeforms and more to do with the human condition. Marius Bubat, half of the Cologne duo (with partner in crime Georg Conrad), says that the song has its genesis in "a feeling that reflects human behaviour in general." Indeed, the lyrics do convey a repetitive frustration - something there's a lot of in the world at large these days. Those lyrics, delivered in buttery vocal tones and against a backdrop of a come hither bassline and retro-tinted synths, help the song become rather captivating.

The video, directed by Janosch Pugnaghi, goes in a somewhat creepy direction, coating the twosome in a sort of cloak of invisibility, letting them blend in with a number of urban environments. It's a little off-putting, and a little surreal.     

[posted 10.25.19]