Based in Los Angeles, A Bad Think is a musical project headed by Michael Marquart, a one man wonder, and multi-instrumentalist, who has worked with a cast of thousands, including No Doubt, Alias, The Connells, Abra Moore, Sponge, Buffalo Tom, Frente, Love Spit Love, The Nixons and Dishwalla.
‘Feel Me’ their latest release, comes from their seventh studio album, ‘Savior’ – a double album – and it’s accompanied by a music video which refuses to be dismissed. A very lively and most certainly entertaining clip, it’s set in a theatre, with the focus on Marquart, as he plays alone on stage, backed up by set dressing illustrating the words as he sings. It’s a packed audience, but there’s an unnerving factor: despite the glorious performance in front of them, every one in the audience is wearing a Virtual Reality mask.
The lyrics say it all: “They just don’t feel it anymore”.
Nobody can know what is going on in the minds of the audience, and they certainly don’t know what’s going on in front of them; Michael even walks off stage when he’s finished and not one person acknowledges it. It’s disturbing but there’s the underlying thought – how different is this to what goes on every day? With our heads bent over our phones and our lives as keyboard warriors on social media, are we actually aware of what is going on around us, or are we living our life as a virtual reality, while missing out on the actual beauty around us?
‘Feel Me’ is just the lastest in a series of provocative, defiantly topical clips from A Bad Think. They’ve worked with director Derrick Borte before, who shares their way of thinking, and has also done plenty of thinking of his own about the world and where we’re headed.
With ‘Feel Me’, Marquart is given the opportunity to explore the implications of technology, and to examine the intersections between science and social behaviour. The clip asks very important questions of the viewer, while at the same time being visually compelling. Is it a representation of what the audience are watching, or is the crowd missing the show altogether, too caught up in their virtual world?
