“Experimental Film” – They Might Be Giants
(Words/music: They Might Be Giants, available on The Spine, Zoe 2004)
I’ve never really delved much into They Might Be Giants’ body of work and I’m not really sure why. I know a handful of their major songs – among others, “Particle Man” from the 120 Minutes Live compilation, “Ana Ng” from Rhino’s Left of the Dial box set, and “Birdhouse in Your Soul” from late nights watching VH-1 Classic. They’re all songs I like, but I’ve never been compelled to seek out an entire album of their songs. I imagine this is my loss, as I’m sure I’d enjoy Johns Flansburg and Linnell’s off beat humor and goofy song structure. Perhaps it’s just my self-conscious preventing me from overdosing on their songs, as I rarely want to listen to more than one of the TMBG songs I have in one sitting. Maybe this is the right way for me to approach this band – on a single-by-single basis, enjoying the three minute bits of bizarre and catchy pop sparingly.
Back in college, my roommate Jim and I spent many hours watching Homestar Runner cartoons. In the pre-Youtube era (I feel old typing that), Homestar Runner was a consistent source of irreverent videos on the internet. It’s the same type of goofy yet clever humor that I enjoy in the TMBG songs I own, so it seemed natural that the band and the cartoon’s creators would partner up. Both were mutual fans of each other, and before long the band and the cartoon’s characters began collaborating (and by “collaborating” I mean TMBG songs showing up in cartoons and puppets of the Homestar characters appearing at their concerts). The collaboration climaxed with the Homestar Runner creators (Mark and Matt Chapman) creating a full-length animation for their song “Experimental Film,” a catchy, tongue-in-cheek song about the pretentious leanings of many experimental filmmakers. The video combined two of the cartoon’s own auteurs making their own movies – one a stereotypical student film featuring an ATM machine shot in black and white, and the other a crudely put together computer generated cartoon – with both playing on the stereotypes of bad amateur filmmaking. It’s a cute, funny video and a loving tribute to TMBG (and filled with a bunch of HSR in-jokes, which probably won’t make sense if you haven’t watched a few of Strong Bad’s E-Mails).
Still, whether intentional or not, the animation brings out the strong’s strongest feature – it’s simplicity. Despite being about difficult cinema, the song is pure pop, complete with frequent shouts of “yeah!” throughout the chorus. The cartoon hammers this home by putting “yeah” everywhere – a computer keyboard, the reflection of the ATM screen, a piñata. The characters even bop around near the end, joyously singing along to the “yeahs.” Sometimes the simplest things are the ones that stick the best, and in this case it’s the
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