Watch Michel Gondry's Mesmerizing Video For The White Stripes' 'City Lights'
by Robin Hilton
September 13, 2016
Michel Gondry's latest video was a complete surprise to the band for whom he created it. Gondry made the short film for The White Stripes' song "City Lights" on his own and shared it with frontman Jack White over the weekend.
The video has a simple concept: A man takes a hot shower and uses his finger to draw images on the steam-covered glass door. The pictures capture innocent moments from his life and from a relationship: a jet plane, a cityscape, a couple holding hands. But the steam from the shower is so heavy that it erases each image almost as quickly as he can draw it. It beautifully captures the solitude of heartache and the drifting memories that surface during our most private moments, as well as the fleeting nature of life itself.
"City Lights" is a previously unreleased White Stripes song that White shared for the first time on his new retrospective, Jack White Acoustic Recordings: 1998-2016. That collection is out now on Third Man/Columbia Records.
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Resources
The White Stripes via Third Man Records
Michel Gondry - official site