Video: "The Owl and the Pussycat" - Heidi Swedberg

Heidi Swedberg and Daniel Ward are heading to China in a couple weeks to do some playing and teaching for Ohana Ukuleles -- a sweet gig if you can get it, right?  In any case, to help with promotion, they've produced a simple video of Swedberg and Ward playing their rendition of "The Owl and the Pussycat," recorded but not (yet) released on an album amidst many ukuleles in an Ohana warehouse.  The odd setting for a video is appropriate, I think, for Swedberg's slightly mysterious reading of Edward Lear's poem.

Heidi Swedberg (with Daniel Ward) - "The Owl and the Pussycat" [YouTube]

Video: "Arctic Fox" - Elska

I wouldn't say that a lot happens in this video for "Arctic Fox," from Elska's brand-new album Middle of Nowhere.  But is it cute?  Oh, but yes.  (If the fox looks slightly akin to those in the Wes Anderson film The Fantastic Mr. Fox, that's because Elska's slumber-disturbing canid was animated by Andy Biddle, who also worked on the movie.)

Elska - "Arctic Fox" [YouTube]

Video: "Robots on the Dance Floor" - RhymeZwell

This, friends, is why you might want to consider a Kickstarter campaign to make your next video.  Because this video for "Robots on the Dance Floor," the lead single from RhymeZwell's second album Bigfoot Stomp, Kickstarted last year, looks fantastic.  It's funky and shiny, and as long as you don't think the ending has a little bit of a Terminator vibe, pretty happy.  (Like it? Kickstart the next video.)

RhymeZwell - "Robots on the Dance Floor" [YouTube]

Video: "I'm Thinking of an Animal" - Billy Kelly

Billy Kelly and public television.  Now that's what I'm talkin' about, man!  He's a triple threat -- he sings, he draws, and he's willing to kiss a stuffed-animal giraffe on video.

For this last component, we have public television station WXXI in Rochester, New York to thank for being crazy enough to agree to Kelly's proposal for a series of 1-minute videos based on his song "I'm Thinking of an Animal."  The song, from his 2011 disk The Family Garden, gets chopped up here into four segments -- I'm highlighting my favorite, but you can see all four at the link above.  Can I just say that I love, love, love Kelly Knox's Bucknell University Dancing Dancers?

Billy Kelly - "I'm Thinking of an Animal (that's really tall)" [YouTube]

Video: "Animal Alphabet" - Key Wilde & Mr. Clarke

Yaaay!  A new video and a new song from Key Wilde & Mr. Clarke.  OK, the song's been around for a little while (if not generally available), but the video?  Definitely new.  Yes, the "animals representing the alphabet" thing has been done before, but even Sandra Boynton didn't make a song out of hers.  (And Wilde's illustrations are every bit as cute.)

Key Wilde & Mr. Clarke - "Animal Alphabet" [YouTube]

Video: "Hiddi Hiddi" - Elska

This is video (and music) as landscape and soundscape.  It's not much more than Elska saying "Hi!"  Which, apparently is what "Hiddi Hiddi" (from the album Middle of Nowhere, out Sept. 4) means on the Island of Elska.  Kinda hypnotic.  I dig.

Elska - "Hiddi Hiddi" [YouTube]