Videodrone: Foals, Kate Nash and Paul Banks

This week Videodrone has taken off the night vision goggles to watch the latest music videos by Foals, Kate Nash & Interpol frontman Paul Banks

Foals return with ‘Inhaler’, and as a bunch of people lay down in a multi storey car park, Foals rock out in a graffiti strewn underpass.
For a relatively new band it is quite alarming how many bands have popped up recently sounding almost exactly the bloody same, so it’s fair play to Yannis & the lads for acknowledging this and upping the guitars on this single.
As the chorus builds a nice lady shows us her lovely lung tattoos that cover her entire chest, ‘Inhaler’ features some pretty fierce riffs on THAT chorus whilst the verses are swathed in a serious electro funk – imagine Prince discovering Metal and you’re not far from the mark.
Fireworks whizz past as nightfall descends on the video and we cut back to the bodies on the floor who over act to the directors instruction to inhale and appear to be convulsing wildly like John Hurt in Alien. As the extras rock back and forth, lurching about like a zombie work out video, the song fades out and you are left with the feeling that this is a great comeback song offering much hope for Foals new album. I just hope the girl with the lung/tit tattoos doesn’t regret her inking..
Kate Nash continues her career path into Riot Girl with ‘Fri-end?’ However her former pop sensibilities seem to be slipping back into the fray.

In the video for ‘Fri-end?’ Kate is a vampire and we witness her emerging from a coffin and then brushing her fangs as she serenades us in the bathroom mirror.
Hammer film studios seem to have missed a stroppy girl sub genre of the undead films to exploit as here we see Kate pouring blood onto her corn flakes before getting a Mummy mate round for cups of blood as they no doubt slag off boys or something.
Ms Nash then slips down into her dungeon (not a euphemism) to torment a young man she has chained up, before going to the local pub for a knees up with assorted Witches, Mummies & Werewolves.
‘Fri-end?’ features on Kate’s new EP and to be honest with you I am gravely disappointed..
On last single ‘Under estimate the girl’ she efficiently switched genre for a credible rock outing, but this track seems to have listened to the critics and Kate has calmed down the Courtney & Kat vibe. This has left ‘Fri-end?’ sounding more like Shampoo than Bikini Kill and that is not a band name I care to mention.
I’d recommend Kate goes and has a listen to some Babes In Toyland or Veruca Salt before unleashing her album.

Interpol frontman Paul Banks has gone solo but ‘Young Again’ sounds distressingly similar to his band, albeit without their killer basslines. If I didn’t like Interpol so much I would be inclined to think ‘what’s the point’.
As Paul parades around in school uniform in the promo clip, it becomes clear he is indeed ‘Young Again’ and we get to see him being bullied and told off by a teacher who seemingly sets him the task of performing his new single in detention – bloody stage schools.
Paul then takes part in a particularly brutal game of dodgeball, I thought it was just a ropey Ben Stiller movie but apparently this shit is real. It does seem most unfair that a grown man is hurling his balls at innocent young children who then lay on the floor terrified as he emerges apparently victorious.
‘Young Again’ is indeed a good song, but it does make you reach for your copy of ‘Antics’ for a quick dose of ‘Evil’ and ‘Slow Hands’