Ruben Do Valle directs a hypnotic and haunting promo for techno artist Moullinex △ GPU Panic.The video for Towards The Sun is a celebration of the sun as a massive source of joy and energy. It's also a portrait of Max, an enigmatic, mulleted local steelworker with no previous acting experience - recruited via an open Reddit casting call. Shot on film over the course of three days in the sun drenched desert of Palm Springs, California, pieced together on-the-fly, the video blends documentary and music video aesthetics, intercut with spoken word voiceovers and a focus on character and location, as it follows Max through his utterly strange routine. Whether by accident or design, Do Valle's absorbing film follows in a treasured sub-genre of dance videos that document eccentricity in a charming and mysterious fashion, skirting a line between truth and fiction - such as Kristoffer Borgli's videos for Young Dreams and Todd Terje's Inspector Norse. A marvellous piece of work, and a captivating, intimate portrait of someone who lets himself get completely absorbed in the role.

Samuel Douek directs an intriguing guerilla-shot visual for Baby Queen, played out in reverse.This seemingly doc-style video for Ride Or Die captures Bella Latham, aka Baby Queen, on her progress through the bars, highways and hotels in New York, in intimate close-up. Initially the fact this is happening in reverse is a device that provides an additional dimension to the emphasis on lo-fi portraiture.That changes when, finally, Douek plays his ace - a shock reveal that is a very effective jolt into full narrative. After that, we're all looking at Baby Queen in a completely different way...

Directing duo Broken Antenna reunite with Hak Baker for his collaboration with Ezra Collective member Joe Armon-Jones's new project to create not just a terrific promo but a hugely powerful short doc about gentrification in London's East End.As Armon-Jones and Baker's song Wrong Side Of Town is about being priced out of a traditionally working class quarter of London, the video sees Baker cycling through the area he grew up in, observing the effects of gentrification, but also the surviving parts of a working-class community that continue to define the city.Myles and Gustav of Broken Antenna have addressed this subject with righteous passion and considerable skill. With their experience in mixed media, they use various tools to augment the already excellent camerawork capturing Hak's cycle journey. And they continue to introduce new elements to grip the viewer to their subject - even as the track follows an appealing laidback reggae rhythm - leading to a stirring final section involving interviews with some proud East Enders.Giving more context, Hak Baker says: “All our lives people have been looking down their noses at us but we used to have the safe haven of the estate, blocks and high roads to commune and be human. Now, we hardly have that. The wealthy come to our area to take over and not take part, shoving us outwardly looking down their biased beaks."Nah mate, not round here. I think it’s time to scream and shout that we’re here to stay and if you don’t like it, you must be on the wrong side of the town.” Ultimately this is a film which potentially transcends its nominal purpose as a pop promo to reach a wider audience, to raise awareness and emotions, putting the issue of gentrification on the political agenda. Something like that does not happen too often. Bravo to all involved.

Jake Dypka directs his second video for acoustic duo Memorial, and another life-affirming essay of ordinary folk in Britain. In 2021, for Memorial's cover of Fontaine DC's A Hero's Death, Dypka documented the holidaymakers at Butlin's resort in Skegness, on the East coast of England. Now for Corduroy, Dypka's subject is the South Wales town of Port Talbot - home to the famous steelworks - and its residents.Even more so than for A Hero's Death, Dypka and his small crew, including DoP Spike Morris, are unobtrusive observers of the everyday in a local working class community, creating wonderfully evocative portraits of the individuals and also capturing the almost unique surroundings: a town hemmed in by sea and hills, where the steelworks and the M4 motorway flyover are nearly always visible. "Continuing the theme from our last promo, I wanted to combine a loose documentary approach with very pared-back photography - a combination of control and happenstance," says Dypka. "The aim was to see what I could do with the most minimal tools at my disposal: a camera, a place, and just reacting to what I found on the day."Unlike last time, I wanted to keep my distance and observe my subjects rather than engineer the situation, which I felt would better reflect the emotional experience of the song."The idea for Port Talbot came about from trying to find somewhere that had strong visual contrasts to reflect the emotional contrasts I felt while listening to the music. At first, I thought it was a happy song about having good times in the sun until I spent more time with it. Later, I thought the song was wearing a mask - happy on the surface with something darker lurking beneath. What Memorial did so well was to move seamlessly between joy and sorrow, and that was at the heart of what I was trying to do with the video."The director adds that budget constraints meant that shooting on film was not an option. "So right from the beginning it was about getting the most organic feel from digital," he says. "Being just me Spike and Joe (producer) we knew it needed to be small and workable to the conditions."In the end it was between Alexa Mini and RED Komodo. I probably would have preferred the former but Spike pushed for the RED and he was right to do so. We used Zeiss Superspeeds which we both knew would be spot on for it."