Neon Trees - Songs I Can't Listen To

March 22, 2017 Critic Jonni 0 Comments


Songs I Can't Listen To - Neon Trees |

Back to YouTube recommendations and the thumbnail made me pick this one, obviously. Neon Trees has always been a band we are all aware of, but they haven't quite had a hit. This song is full of emotion and it really does make you think. It's so sad it didn't become the hit we all needed. The music video is cute and just as emotional, although it doesn't come off real instead it's quite awkward. Watch Neon Trees perform, as frontman, Tyler Glenn, takes on one of the lead roles in the narrative storyline about a gay relationship that falls apart, in the music video for "Songs I Can't Listen To".

Neon Trees are a four-piece American rock band consisting of Tyler Glenn, Chris Allen, Branden Campbell, and Elaine Bradley. The band dropped their debut single "Animal" back in 2010 and it has been one of their biggest singles to date, as well as "Everybody Talks". This song is their most recently released single, which was a non-album single, way back in mid-2015, so I guess it's good to presume that they have plans to release a new single and album soon, if not this year then surely next year. This song was written by Tyler Glenn.

Directed by Rebecca Thomas and co-starring actor and model Dustin Lance Black as the love interest, the music video has both a narrative and a performance piece shown throughout. We watch Tyler Glenn sing this song, thinking about the past memories, the ones shared with Dustin Lance Black and the ones where he's single and alone.

The narrative shows Dustin Lance Black and Tyler Glenn listening to a song together, then shots of their loving relationship unfolds between our eyes, then the fights and the arguments follow towards the end of the video, and we can see that Tyler Glenn is singing this song because he's thinking of Dustin Lance Black, knowing that he can't listen to the songs they listened to together as it reminds him of their time as a couple.

Luckily, I haven't been able to hold a boyfriend long enough for this to happen to me, and I'm dreading the day that it does. Occasionally Tove Lo's "Talking Body" makes me think of boyfriend number one, and any song of Tulisa's, mainly "Sight of You", makes me think of boyfriend number two, but it's not to the extent where I'll stop listening to them because of it. It's just a slight reminder, but I don't feel loss at all, I am better off without them, and they only lasted a week and a half each so it wasn't a big impact on me. I shall continue to listen to those songs, and I do.

My problem with this narrative is that we don't see them kiss, it's not even properly implied, with it being cut here and there. It's always awkward when they draw in close, and I feel like it comes across as bad acting because it doesn't feel real whatsoever. Many people believe the reason is because Dustin Lance Black is the fiancé to Tom Daley. Yet, I feel the music video lacks integrity because of it.

Then there's the performance piece, which Neon Trees totally smash. Tyler Glenn is quite the performer and anyone is lucky to see them live in concert. The rest of the band is just as energetic, channelling the vibes coming from Tyler Glenn and releasing them on the instruments. This is one of the best performance pieces in a rock music video, for sure.

Overall, the video on paper should be amazing, it relates to the song perfectly and keeps the viewers entertained from start to finish. In visual, this is not entirely the case due to the plenty of awkward scenes between Tyler Glenn and Dustin Lance Black. This should've been a perfectly polished music video, but it just falls short. I also don't get the moment when they lose gravity and are suspended in air, did the soundwaves from the record really fling them into the air? That's a confusing scene for sure.
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