Earlier this week a friend of mine sent me the following video. This friend and I have similar tastes and he’s usually pretty up on the latest. This time was no different. Give it a view and then read my babbling after the jump.
As soon as that last lingering shot of the fireworks with the couple on the shore faded to black I zipped right over to Wikipedia to see if these boys were legal. And it turns out some of them are (!!!) I took a few more minutes to look at pictures of them for research purposes and then got down to some real investigating. I learned that they all tried out separately for the X-Factor (a British entertainment competition kind of like American Idol). However Simon Cowell decided that they would be great as a group and hence, One Direction was born (almost literally, these kids look like babies).
YouTube provided some videos of them in the early competition days, such as this one where they performed Viva La Vida by Coldplay.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krfye9DKYiM
I admit, they sound pretty good but singing competitions, especially group ones, always make me uncomfortable. There’s the weird choreographed finger snapping and shoulder jiving, the constant changing of the line order, way too many smug smiles and apathetic crowd hyping. It’s like they’re doing everything in their power to direct your attention away from the actual song. But that’s ok. I forgive you One Direction, you have to pimp yourself out for those phone line votes. But let’s get back to the crux of the matter, the video for “Gotta Be You.”
I also wondered what a J Crew movie would look like (drum lick). Say what you will about manufactured boy bands but this video is sure nice to look at. The scenery, the storyline (I’m pretty sure there’s one buried in there) all the really really good looking people. I just felt so happy after watching it. Like someday I might be invited to a really swanky party with all my British friends. And the part where the fireworks explode. It’s like they were celebrating 4th of July! In the Fall! Those Brits are just too cute sometimes.
Honestly, I can’t wait to see what One Direction has to offer me in the future. Let’s just hope they don’t stick to one direction musically! Anyone?? But seriously I hope they let the blond kid have a little more screen time for the next video. He seemed to get shafted, especially on the group shots. Like the camera was panning, panning and oops! Just before they got to him we’d cut to more bonfire shots. And as my friend pointed out, he’s seen playing guitar a lot… even though there is no guitar in the song. Ouch.
One Direction ladies and gentleman. Haters to the left. I know you already put this on your iPods.