Video: Alex Lilly, ‘Infantile’ (feat. Daedelus)

S.Lo on April 18th, 2019

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For all the expansive vocal harmonies and underlying Moog-y foundations paired with undulating melodies and tap dancing pianos, the video for Alex Lilly’s two-minute stretch for her debut album’s third single, “Infantile,” is a perfect pairing. Directed by Lilly and Daiana Feuer, it features the singer-songwriter with her collaborator Daedelus and the ingenious, inflated and twisted balloon art of Addi Somekh. The air-infused sculptures are not only tactile instruments to handle, such as an intricate 49-key-sized keyboard at risk of floating out of the musicians’ hands. They also become an extension of personality, as Lilly and Daedelus playfully interpret how more complex balloon armor or accessories enhance their identities in the way of antennae or crown and veil. Because it’s air-filled balloons, this roleplaying is nothing if not fun, the two poking each other non-injuriously. It’s a bit like extracting an idea and playing with it until it becomes a song.

“I’ve known about the brilliant balloon artist Addi Somekh for some time,” Lilly says. “It was almost too perfect: The marriage between the twisty intricate keyboard lines of ‘Infantile’ and the complex balloon inventions. The song is about throwing adult tantrums so it just seemed natural to get dressed up in balloon outfits and frolic in the controlled chaos.”

That playful intention was held through the making of Lilly’s album, “2% Milk,” with producers Jake Bercovici (The Voidz), Andy Bauer (Twin Shadow), Daedelus as well as in her own production work. “Like me, Jake, has no fear of the ridiculous,” she shares. For her good friend Daedelus, working together flowed even easier, “I asked him if he had any instrumental demos lying around I could write a melody and words to, and he had this beautiful piece that sounds like an intricate mechanism. I was so excited to add something to it, like a fancy chain to an already remarkable pocket watch.”

“2% Milk,” in all its thoughtful and whimsical musical-, word- and role-play is out now via Release Me Records.

||| Watch: The video for “Infantile”