Beach House - Teen Dream (Bonus DVD)

After making another routine stop at Newbury comics, I departed with The Antlers' Hospice, and my brand spankin' new Super Deluxe Teen Dream by Beach House (both of which, mind you in cardboard packaging, which is really starting to be a major turn-on for me). Or at least the sticker on the cover told me that it was Super Deluxe. Little did I know that one half of the package was going to be Super Deluxe, while the other side was going to be Super Deluxe-coated crap.

Well, anyways, to the review. Beach house had a bit of fun with their package. On one side of the case, you can pull out the actual CD and the little booklet. However, on the other side was the real Super Deluxe-ness. A DVD with music videos to the songs all done by independent film directors. Sometimes I'll read somewhere in some post by someone that the word 'indie' is becoming more and more synonymous with 'bad.' Well, up until now, I had blown these certain someones off. Beach House's Super Deluxe extra DVD has single-handedly destroyed this album for me.

Here's why: First of all, Teen Dream is a great album, right? Yeah, nice pleasant harmonies, sweet vocals, good instrumentals. Check. So then who on the face of the earth would make a terribly gross and unappealing music videos to go along with it. Well, I have found that person. Actually, I have found ten of those people. It is unbelievable that I cannot stand to watch a single music video on this DVD.
Here's a little breakdown:
USED TO BE: Basically an ugly face singing at you and blowing steam into your face for four minutes.

BETTER TIMES: Crappy footage of dandelions, more ugly faces, and people in parkas. None of it in focus mind you. Oh yes, and little kids singing. Overall, not as bad as some, surprisingly.

WALK IN THE PARK: Don't even get me started. A guy with a really bad facial hair problem takes a stroll in a poor neighbor hood and checks out this girl who spits on her glasses. The dude is tortured by these creepers, that I guess are in his mind, and are really, REALLY creepy and move (digitally) in and out of the picture's foreground and background. They dance creepily, too. Then he gets beaten up by these people, pulls a sandwich out of his middle chest, and we get a close up of each creeper eating the sandwich. And then throwing up.

Sound appealing?

ZEBRA: I don't really know. Seems to be some sort of thing. It's moving, too. Maybe if it was slightly in focus we might know what it is.

10 MILE STEREO: "Hey, dude, you know what would look great in this corner next to the fire and the BH logo? A baby's face and some Japanese!" said one of the two completely wasted guys that used a couple special effects on their iChat conversation and stuck some random stuff around the edges.
SILVER SOUL: Females wearing sunglasses and swimsuits spray-painted silver. Oh yeah, and they're hoola-hooping.

LOVER OF MINE: Some mostly-naked dudes holding bananas and jumping off a roof.

NORWAY: Ahh, finally. What would this album be without some puppets? Kind of cute, actually. I think I like this one.

REAL LOVE: Are you still really watching this?

TAKE CARE: An old lady swinging and dancing to the music. Are you kidding me?

So, to conclude. Writing this album was sickening, as I had to watch each one of these again. I plan on locking this up in my closet so I can actually listen to Beach House and not feel the need to know where the closest bucket is.

So please, for your own safety, don't buy the Super-Deluxe version. But if you do, don't open the DVD, because you will be scarred. But if you do open the DVD, I suppose you could watch Norway, because the puppets with Snowbeast are pretty darn cute.

I'll give the REALLY IMPORTANT Super Deluxe DVD a two out of ten. Why so high, you ask?

I was feeling generous today.



-Owen