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View Winners → Archive Feb 07, 2017
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The London-to-Los Angeles DJ presents “Fine Day,” her psychotropic take on Opus III’s early ‘90s MTV-cult hit.
“Fine” is the politest way to fail in self-assurance. You know it’s bad, so you say “it’s fine,” but “fine” is a lie, a step fabricated from sand.
This is why we never trust those texts from passive-aggressive girlfriends. This is why we don’t trust Icelandic talent Aníta Briem’s breathy vocals on DJ Henri’s psychotropic take on Opus III’s previously upbeat trance track “Fine Day.”
Galvanized by Japanese pop culture, director Constantine Paraskevopoulos produces a brash contrast to an otherwise soft, melodic synth arpeggio and piano track sure to loop in your head post play.
“All my music has a lot of melody because I really love heightened emotions and lush strings,” Henri comments. “I like everything to be quite dramatic.”
Releasing today, the music video offers a brilliantly outré visual that samples themes innate to Surrealism and Pop art.
Crowned in vibrant bob-cut wigs, lead Briem and Henri play animated dolls in a spontaneous traipse. They’re skipping along the Fashion District’s Sauntee Alley and picnicking at Brookside Park. Briem’s icy gaze convinces onlookers that everything will be alright (“people open windows / they leave their houses”). There’s no option to leave, so we follow in a hand-hold, swallowing unsettled doubt.
The outing ends in some mismanaged makeup and an awkward-as-hell food fight turned make out session. But by then, almost anything slightly off is normalized. You’re one with the trance.
There’s a distant despondence in the looping melody – hinting that yesterday wasn’t all that “fine.” This sentiment is paralleled by Briem’s stiff movements, cursed with Mattel appendages.
“Because it’s my song and she is the singer on it, she’s like my puppet in a way,” Henri notes. “But if you don’t read into the video, then I guess it could look like we’re just trying to be cute.”
Perhaps it’s a subliminal double entendre: a quip on the glorified sheen of Los Angeles and its fake plastic Hollywooders while also a tip to all the playful creatives the city harvests.
“I love everything to be a spectacle, but at the same time not in the cheap, girly, sex-kitten kind of way,” Henri notes. “More in the artsy, creative way – I love wearing really crazy space-age costumes. Fashion and music are arts that feed into each other in a way.”
DJ Henri recently moved home to London, but she’ll most likely be back for Coachella. Keep an ear out for her single releasing on March 13 under Armada Music titled “Sunshine of Your Love.”
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