Here at GIITTV we’ve been Y Dail (The Leaves) enthusiasts for a while now, 19 yar old Huw Griffiths and sister Elan releasing a series of fresh, quirky indie pop singles over the past couple of years. The best pop songs are those with hidden depths; in Y Dail’s case we revel in music, literature and pop culture influences both past and present whilst enjoying their playful and often deceptively deep take of the world.
New single Whizz Kids – their first on Libertino Records – continues that tradition. ‘There is something timeless about Y Dail songs that could have seen them as C86 Indie darlings, sharing NME pages with early 80s Postcard Records trailblazers Orange Juice and Aztec Camera. It’s this timeless romantic quality that enthralled us from the start,’ say Libertino.
Whizz Kids sees Y Dail – who this year contributed a version of Goffin & King’s Loco-Motion for our Macmillan Cancer fundraiser compilation Come Into My World – in a wistful mood, a Brian Wilson romanticism offset by the skippy yet slightly churchy insistence of a vintage 1980s keyboard. ‘I read an old interview with Paddy McAloon (Prefab Sprout) where he said he wanted to sound like Picasso with a JX3P synth……Whizz Kids is me trying to be Brian Wilson on an old Casio,’ says Huw.
The video for the single, which we are delighted to premiere today, sees Huw take a nourishing walk through city parks and streets, taking in the movements and atmosphere around him. ‘The promo for Whizz Kids is inspired by the flâneur and by the Situationist concept of the Dèrive; a mood walk through the city as a means of liberation from everyday life,’ he explains.
The video also stars a Sony Walkman taking the walk with him. Everyone’s got one of those in a cupboard somewhere. Time to dig it out and take that urban stroll, maybe?
