Heartbreaking Bravery

Allyssa Yohana’s tenderly constructed and affecting clip for the title track off of Girlpool’s upcoming Before The World Was Big was one of the most intrinsically human pieces of art unveiled over the last few days. In an age that so readily celebrates bombast, grandeur, and general post-production gloss to achieve greater accessibility, when something that feels as deeply personal as “Before The World Was Big Arrives” arrives it becomes even more arresting than it would have been stripped of industry context. That’s not to say there weren’t other pieces of multimedia that made an impression over the past few days. As always, there was a steady influx of material worth hearing, both in the single and full stream categories.

Representing the single streams were Heyrocco’s spiky basement pop rave-up “Loser Denial“, Looming’s compellingly dark “Onwards“,  Nots’ manic “Virgin Mary“, Mutoid Man’s oddly punishing “Reptilian Soul“, Future Death’s frenetic “Familial Tremors“, Sitcom’s intuitively layered “Ginger Ale“, The Velvet Teen’s triumphant return in “The Giving In”, and an absolute monster of a collaboration between Ghostface Killah, Adrian Younge, Raekwon, and RZA entitled “Return Of The Savage“. While the full streams didn’t quite match the sheer volume of that collection of songs, they matched their strength. Dustin Lovelis’ sprawling punk-leaning psych-pop Dimensions revealed all the makings of an unexpected contemporary classic, Nocturnal Sunshine’s brooding, glitchy self-titled, and Town Portal’s restless The Occident. For music videos, there was Girlpool’s “Before The World Was Big” and that was more than enough.

Girlpool have earned their fare share of written content on here over the years and a lot of the reasoning for that can be clearly evidenced in “Before The World Was Big”. Both in the song, which is an exquisitely rendered burst of well-placed nostalgia, and the video, which eschews any unnecessary distractions to present something heartfelt and honest. While the home-movie VHS aesthetic has been to death in music videos at this point, it can still maximize emotional impact when paired with the right content. Here, the visuals act in perfect tandem to their soundtrack, emphasizing both the yearning and uncertainty present in the lyrics while simultaneously relaying the duo’s joy of simply being together to share in their experiences. It’s a deceptively complex structure that winds up with an unshakable resonance thanks to the abundance of care and genuine feeling. It’s a short, sublime piece of work that feels perfectly representative of the band and their ideologies while retaining an atmosphere that suggests Before The World Was Big is going to be something truly special.

Watch “Before The World Was Big” and pre-order the album of the same name from Wichita here.