Kevin Bronson on February 9th, 2010

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The Happy Hollows’ video for “Death to Vivek Kemp” beat out of handful of other newbies’ in an online contest to earn a spot in regular rotation starting Monday on MTVU. The video, the work of Benjamin Hoste, was hand-animated, with the trio’s silhouettes traced from a video shot at band practice – more than 2,000 frames in all. Hoste writes that it took more than 40 hours just to scan the images into his computer. Tangentially, the emergence of this song, long a local favorite, shows you what a slow grind it’s been for the Hollows. It’s on the trio’s debut album “Spells” (self-released last year, re-released on Autumn Tone in January), but the tune dates back to the middle part of last decade. In fact, I only recently found a 2006 piece online from the Vivek Kemp explaining the surprise of discovering his name in the song. (I also wasn’t aware that Death to Anders’ Rob Danson had a hand in writing the song.) So enjoy your new song, MTVU kids.

||| Live: The Happy Hollows perform Feb. 18 at the Smell and March 12 at the Troubadour.