Meiert Avis completely flipped the script for New Found Glory’s new video. Instead of portraying the band as larger than life, as he did in the effects-laden clip for “All Downhill From Here,” the visionary director shrunk the group way, way down for “Failure’s Not Flattering.”
Shot in late June, the video for the second single from NFG’s Catalyst opens with the five bandmembers trapped under a drinking glass. Their muffled pleas for help are ignored by the two regular-size guys holding them hostage. Only when the band breaks into song are their captors interested enough to take a closer look, and that’s when the band makes their escape.
Fleeing the kitchen for the living room, they encounter a party, but since they’re not much bigger than ants, their presence is hardly noticed. The place is rockin’ – but not rockin’ enough for the band’s taste, apparently, since they plug their instruments into the stereo and pump up the volume. That’s when things really get weird.
First, the lead singer of a ridiculous heavy metal band, played by NFG’s guitar tech, steps off the cover of his album and joins the bash. Before long, characters and images from other record covers, books, the TV screen, and pictures on the wall spring to life and start rocking out. When NFG realizes the animating power of their music, they have an idea. While giving life to a pin-up model from the pages of a girlie mag seems like a grand plan, it backfires when the woman grows to normal proportions and towers over the miniscule band.
Eventually, a big wet one is planted on one of the band members – although the kisser is a dog, played by bassist Ian Gruska’s pug, Webster.
When the revelry finally subsides and the party people are all passed out, New Found Glory are peacefully asleep. Their slumber is soon disturbed by the sounds of a vacuum cleaner, which sucks up the band like so many potato chips crushed underfoot.
The video for “Failure’s Not Flattering” is expected to premier on July 28, while the song should start to surface at radio two days earlier, according to a Geffen Records spokesperson.
