If you haven’t heard me say it before, you could probably have guessed that it is my firm belief that the music video is the highest art form, the culmination of nearly all that has come before, visual art, music and poetry.

So I hear you saying now “but Paul, your last few posts have been silent on the video aspect of the music video, talking only about the music.” Yes, dear reader, you speak truth. So let’s fix that. I present for your viewing pleasure PJ Harvey’s newest release “I Inside The Old I Dying.”

I haven’t been this entranced by a video in quite a long time. Directed by Chilean stop motion animators Cristóbal León & Joaquín Cociña, this video recalls, rather than replicates, the universes of the Brothers Quay and Jan Svankmajer. This is really all one needs to say about the video in this short form. It is brilliant and perfectly paired to this new song from PJ Harvey!

And what an amazing song it is. That title, those lyrics. I’m not certain we spend enough time talking about how good her lyrics can be. This is haunting.

This is what is driving my creativity this week: a new rabbit hole (a la Savankmajer’s “Alice”) to fall down.