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Friday, December 7, 2012

One Republic – “Feel Again”



  We start off with a nice nature shot of, well, not sure what it is, some bit of land with trees that hasn’t been turned into high-priced condos that nobody really needs or wants. Here comes lead singer Ryan bopping along a little path like he can’t see the camera right there. What he can see is a glowing orb plunked in the middle of the trail, which he promptly picks up even though it doesn’t have his name on it and one really shouldn’t mess with things that have no visible source of energy.

  Ryan studies the orb for a bit, and apparently his jacking around with it causes a little side path to light up and tempt him further into the trees. He hesitates for roughly two seconds, and then he happily heads into the trees, like nothing bad ever happens to people who follow strange lights into the forest at night, all alone and not carrying any survival gear. I’m thinking Ryan should spend less time without some form of supervision.

  Anyway, sparkly fairy path eventually leads Ryan to a clearing where there are lots more little lights, some of them making interesting patterns, as well as some folks dressed like futuristic hippies and dancing in the fairy light. (Didn’t see that one coming.) Ryan, instead of heading for the hills, wanders further into the clearing to find more pretty lights, ropes and panels of them, as well as the rest of his band. (You’d think they would have said something if they knew about this place, but sometimes the people in bands keep secrets from one another until their solo album is ready.)

  While the secretive members of the band keep playing, Ryan starts fondling some of the light strands and trying to figure out what’s going on. Before he can quite do that, a woman dressed in more of the odd clothing, and who is clearly a descendent of Esmerelda from Bewitched  based on that hair and makeup, throws an important switch and suddenly we have tons more lights blinking and dancing through the trees. (It’s like a Skittles factory exploded, only in a happy way, and the survivors decided to decorate with the fallout.)

  Ryan pauses to sing with the band for a little bit, because even if they are plotting a coup of some kind, they still have a recording contract to fulfill and they might as well get that part done. Then Ryan goes back to studying the colorful décor and citizens in this place, including some dancing stewardesses from the 1960’s, a woman who is rudely listening to something on headphones when she’s got a live band right in front of her, and a couple who appear to be playing badminton with a ball of light.

  This inspires Ryan to pick up an old-school megaphone and start hollering the words of the song into it. What he expects to accomplish by doing that is unclear, but he seems to be enjoying it so we’ll let it go for now. (He also raises his left fist in the air so we can see he’s wearing some really cool bracelets that you can probably order at the end of the video.)

  Hold up, Ryan’s breath is now coming out as a string of lights which then proceed to run up the trees around him. This is a very interesting superpower to have, although I would personally choose something that can destroy evil warlords instead of help passing spaceships land. No matter, Ryan likes that his very essence can light the world, and he seems quite pleased with his new ability. Now all he needs is a phone booth where he can change into some tights.

  While he looks for that, we get little vignettes of the other citizens, with some of them giving each other flowers that light up and some of them blowing air kisses that look like rainbows. Since we’re nearing the last section of the song, all the folks gather into a large opening and start dancing, because that’s what you’re supposed to do in music videos when you get to this part of the song, even if you live in an odd village with mystical lighting.

  Because Ryan is really wailing the lyrics by now, the words are shooting out of his mouth like a much happier version of Pong. (Side note to the youngsters out there: Pong is a video game that old cave-dwellers like me played hundreds of years ago on an ancient device made by a company called Atari. You can still find rusty examples of this contraption in antique stores and buried in the pyramids of Egypt.)

  As the song and music fade, we get a tight shot of Ryan and his chest, where we can see that is heart is lighting up with each beat. Then the camera shoots up into the sky and we swivel back down to watch a last few bursts of color over the trees before the little happy place disappears.

  The next morning, Ryan awakes from his dream and discovers that he has eaten an entire bag of Lite-Brite pegs….


Click Here to Watch this Video on YouTube.


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