Like the song that inspired it, there’s not a lot of parts to Feist’s “Pleasure” video. The bare-bones track that alternates between Feist bottoming out into a near growl on the verses and shrieking at the heavens in the chorus just got an equally unadorned and disorienting video. The clip shows Feist singing directly at the camera in front of a photo studio backdrop, while a distorted effect on the camera gives the whole thing a sense of being underwater.
Occasionally, Feist air guitars. Once or twice, her outfit changes. But there’s very little here to take away from the scream and stomp of her new album’s title track. The weirdness, intimacy and weird intimacy of the clip makes sense when you consider the words that Feist used to describe her upcoming project. She said that Pleasure would be about “loneliness, private ritual, secrets, shame, mounting pressures, disconnect, tenderness, rejection, care and the lack thereof” in the release announcing her first album in six years.
Feist’s surprise return is bringing all sorts of dormant rockers out of the woodwork. She recently collaborated with Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker on the single “Century” and the collective-band-thing Broken Social Scene — of which Feist was an original member — popped up on late night with a new song last month.
Pleasure is out on April 28 via Universal.
