Today, Dhani Harrison, son of the late Beatles guitarist George Harrison, has released a surreal animated video for his new track “All About Waiting,” of his first-ever proper solo LP, IN///PARALLEL, released earlier this month. The visuals for “All About Waiting” focus on a scientist working with bees at a high-tech, classified genetic manipulation lab. It displays a bleak depiction of modern science that feels distinctly pessimistic yet almost unsettlingly plausible.
As Rolling Stone explains about the stark representation of modern science: “She starts to doubt the benefits of her research and suffers from a myriad of health issues – nosebleeds, vomiting. At the end of the video, she is replaced by an identical character, as if she is an expendable replicant from the world of Blade Runner. In the clip’s final shot, the woman hurtles to her death from the top of her office building while Harrison’s hard-driving, relentlessly melodic guitar rock zips through the background.”
In an earlier interview with the music magazine, Harrison explained that this dystopian theme at the core of the album was born organically from the divisive social, political, and literal climate of today’s world: Everyone’s more disconnected than we’ve ever been before,” he noted. “…News stories have a life of, what, a day now? The feed is just continuous. People just forget about stuff because the next day there’s something equally bad or terrible or fearful or wonderful that you’re missing out on.”
The depiction of bees throughout the video is likely also a nod to the real world’s apparent route toward destruction. One widespread theory among scholarly experts and aluminum foil hat-wearing doomsday theorists alike stipulates that humankind has only 30 years left once the bees go extinct–and they’re already disappearing at alarming rates.
With all the feelings of fear and foreboding that permeate today’s life, the music remains a welcome respite from the chaos. “All About Waiting” sounds like a harmonious synthesis of Gorillaz-style electro indie-pop caricature and late Beatles-like close-harmony vocal swells (think “Because”)–a thoroughly satisfying single that feels simultaneously familiar and fresh, a
Watch the new music video for “All About Waiting” from Dhani Harrison’s first-ever solo album, IN///PARALLEL, below:
You can also stream Dhani Harrison’s new album in its entirety via Spotify:
[Cover photo via Josh Giroux/Rolling Stone]
[h/t – Rolling Stone]