Video: Cuffed Up, ‘Danger, Danger’

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Cuffed Up (Photo by Justin Cook)

’Tis the season for political hostilities — and isn’t a lot of the vitriol all about words?

Explosive new L.A. quartet Cuffed Up deliver the message slyly in director Josh Drew’s video for “Danger, Danger,” the final single on their self-titled EP (which came out Feb. 21).

The video starts with a seemingly harmless bit of gamesmanship: two friends playing Scrabble (with the band raging in the background). As each scores points with loaded words, the tension mounts. All hell breaks loose, game board and tiles flying, about the time frontman Ralph Torrefranca shouts the line “Same. Fucking. Team.”

The song makes a relevant (and currently familiar) argument about our fractured society. “The far right inching their way into the majority and the left working on trying to preserve progress,” Torrefranca says. “Despite being connected by technology, we’re in this constant cycle of fear-mongering that’s created a gigantic separation between all of us, but none of us realize that our differences are our real strengths in this whole thing.”

The tune puts an exclamation point on the punk/post-punk quartet’s first go-round as a band. They’ve already landed some choice support gigs and are on their way to South by Southwest.

||| Watch: The video for “Danger, Danger”

||| Live: Cuffed Up perform Sunday night along with I’m Glad It’s You and Talker at the Bootleg Theater. Tickets.

||| Previously: “French Exit,” “Small Town Kid”

||| Also: Stream the whole EP via Spotify