PLAYING DETROIT: Flint Eastwood “Oblivious”

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New year, old song, new video: the perfect transition into a what is sure to be a creatively bountiful year for Detroit and beyond. While our gaggle of talent puts the finishing touches on upcoming projects, releases and new visions Flint Eastwood’s latest video for “Oblivious” a track from last year’s Small Victories EP is a beautifully hyped visual for a song that begs to brace for change with a tumultuous fluidity. We find our heroine Jax Anderson, dressed in her usual dapper, western priestess attire dancing a warrior dance with similarly clad compatriots in a warehouse space. We are also introduced to our antagonist and mysterious femme fatale, who is shown by the lakeside and sauntering through a wheat field cloaked in black with rope precariously in hand. “Oh, I keep my eyes closed/Keep my mind oblivious, oblivious” claims Anderson, covering her eyes mid-dance as if to insinuate that our blindness is voluntary. It is with that imagery that Anderson is ambushed and a black bag is thrown over her head as she is dragged off and kidnapped. The most striking visual component is the violently ethereal underwater footage of our simply clothed leading women, swirling about in a tangled tango of light and dark as we are confronted with sporadic shots of what must be a brief life-flashing-before-your-eyes moment. The water bubbles look like cosmic explosions against bare skin and the mirrored black tile crosses which feel curiously morbid in context. Are we in control? Is it best to remain oblivious and be swept up in spontaneous fate? For a pop song, Flint Eastwood poses existential quandaries and pairs them with brooding cinematic storytelling that keeps us guessing, heads just above water.

The most striking visual component is the violently ethereal underwater footage of our simply clothed leading women, swirling about in a tangled tango of light and dark as we are confronted with sporadic shots of what must be a brief life-flashing-before-your-eyes moment. The water bubbles look like cosmic explosions against bare skin and the mirrored black tile crosses which feel curiously morbid in context. Are we in control? Is it best to remain oblivious and be swept up in spontaneous fate? For a pop song, Flint Eastwood poses existential quandaries and pairs them with brooding cinematic storytelling that keeps us guessing, heads just above water.

Watch the video, via the band’s Facebook page, below: