Yassou – “To Sink” Video (Stereogum Premiere)

Yassou – “To Sink” Video (Stereogum Premiere)

“To Sink” is the third of five installments. Rather than release a conventional EP, the Bay Area/upstate New York band Yassou decided to spread six new songs over five videos by three directors, trickling them out gradually over the course of an “album cycle.” Today’s segment follows “Fall Again” and “Two Win/Youngblood.” It finds Lilie Hoy gently unfurling lyrics about bravery and longing and the brink destruction against an astral piano ballad reminiscent of Radiohead’s “All I Need.” Hoy collaborated with director Peter McCollough on the clip’s stirring array of urban and seaside images. Combined with Yassou’s truly gorgeous musical work, the footage makes for a consuming experience.

Hoy submitted this poem to accompany the video:

Lost in the world, lost in love the warrior wanders
What is the source of true power?
What is the worth of your final hour?
Conclusion draws her towards the brink
To embrace her fear
To want to sink
On the barren cliffs
Where the waves break
She questioned the keepers of the gate
For the price of her lover
They show her the way.

Submerge yourself in “To Sink” below.

Here’s Hoy on the making of the video:

I was drawn back to the cliffs at dawn with two of the bravest girls I know, dancing exposed to the elements makes you feel both numb and utterly alive.

Slow motion is an alternate reality in which I like to spend a lot of time. I am there when I sing, when I swim. I love to watch the grace of something flying too fast for the human eye to enjoy.

Peter McXollough and I were wanderers in this suspended reality searching for the perfect mood and the perfect light. He captured and edited the movement and feeling of the song perfectly. As if you are under the pressure of the sea on land, held under by a wave, being tossed and turned flipped and righted, fighting to an end with no definition.

Look out for the next Yassou video on 10/15.

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