Chipmunk - 'Beast'
Whoo! Nice video! They say the best things are always the most simple, and what could be simpler than shooting a black-and-white video against a white background? No need to worry about it being boring either, just throw in a few inky swirls here and there, twirl the cameras around a bit, and you've something that feels sumptuous to watch, and serves the song rather well. Well done everyone!
But I haven't gathered you all here to talk about the video. I've gathered you all here to talk about the song. A slow grinding sort of a song which allows Chippy to spit (and I'm not trying to talk street here, he really does sound like he's hissing wetly through his teeth) three verses of self-embiggening poetry, which can be boiled down to one essential statement:
"I'm proof that hard work pays off"
Which is not a statement you hear every day in pop music. There's a lot of "I always knew I was special", a fair amount of "you can't believe the stuff I have had to go through to get where I am", and the ever-popular "hey, guess what? I'm totally amazing, yeah?"
What you don't tend to get so much is someone admitting that it takes practise to become any good at anything. And that achieving something hard, after putting your best effort into it, is an amazing feeling.
In fact, given that we're already talking about it, isn't this exactly the kind of tune we should be giving to the winner of the X Factor? It's not too fast, could be considered to be anthemic, has a simple enough melody to be left open to interpretation, and contains a message about climbing up through adversity to emerge victorious on the other side.
Does anyone have Simon Cowell's phone number? I think he may have missed a trick...
Download: Out now
CD Released: December 8th
Watch Chipmunk on The 5:15 Show
(Fraser McAlpine)
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