Customer Reviews

Death Cab for Cutie - Directions

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I laughed. I cried. I even pondered.

This is a great project, and one you should purchase, to both enjoy the videos and support the concept.

I did not know much about Death Cab for Cutie, but had a couple of their songs from CMJ Magazine, and I liked them enough. Then I saw a press-report about Death Cab's upcoming project, to let separate different directors create their separate visions of each and every song on their new album Plans. In the end, some wondered if the whole would stand together. I think it has, as Death Cab's music was direction enough to the directors, but you will need to see them all together to judge for yourself. I love music videos, especially the more creative ones, so I thought that this, music even aside, could be great fun.

They released 1 a week, and each Monday during that time, I visited their website, enjoying, even looking forward to Monday! It was with the video for "Summer Skin" that I concluded, this is art, and told all my friends. I have purchased the album, and grown to love the music seperately. The music and videos are deliberate art, which is sometimes hard to find, and even harder to find as well executed as this.

For you Death Cab for Cutie fans, of course you will buy this. For you art and video enthusiasts, and even you industry wonks, check this out. It was a great idea, brilliantly pulled off, and definitely earned a sale from me.

5 stars!

What an awesome idea and tremendous videos from a band with great emotionally powerful songs. I wish more bands would do this kind of thing maybe without any commentary from the band themselves and only from the directors and maybe in Surround sound!! The only flaw that I saw was not having director's commentaries although it was advertised on the back of the package. I remember as a child wanting to create computer aided videos for an entire album and now it's finally been done by DCFC in 2006!! My heroes!!

I was very impressed with Directions. All the videos are unique and personal. The combination of the music and video worked really well! The DVD has lyrics, a message from each director, plus an interview with the band. Overall- definetely worth the time, and the money.

If you enjoy the music of Death Cab For Cutie, then this is for you. It's not about the band, it's about the music. This is the way music videos were meant to be. If you enjoyed the Plans album, this will bring new perspective to each of the songs.

Very enjoyable experience for a very enjoyable price.

I have yet to get the regular cd version of "plans", but this dvd is really great. It is a neat idea to do make a music video for every song on the album. All of the videos are very different (there is a different director for each song) and enjoyable to watch (my favorite is "Crooked Teeth" which is about three crazy looking cardboard caracters who tell about disapointments in their lives). Doing their album in this format lets the musicians add more meaning to their songs, and hopefully other bands will try doing what Death Cab for Cutie has done here.

I am a huge death cab for cutie fan and I was really looking forward to seeing this as I love artistic music videos but I must say I just did not get almost any of these videos. I have yet to watch all of them but the ones I have seen were the ones recommended by others and I just don't think they were particularly note worthy. They don't seem to have anything to do with the music or the story in the songs. They are just weird 'artistic' amateurish videos shot in poor quality with mostly bad editing.

This dvd is awesome! My favorite thing most of all about the Directions dvd is that there is large variety of filming styles for each song that is different from the last song. Every music video is highly creative and entertaining.
Buy Directions immediatly if you are a fan of death cab's music or great film. Also, If you enjoyed this dvd, I would also highly recomend the Smashing Pumpkins greatest hits dvd, which is also a dvd of really creative music video interpretations.

The bonus short film on Directions is called "Jealousy Rides With Me", the song itself can only be found on the import version of the Plans c.d.

In the past I was never a fan of the group, 'Death Cab for Cutie'. Just on a random whim of a purchase, I bought the CD,"Plans" for my music collection. But like many random whims, I never really got around to listening to it. Then a few months ago, I heard "I Will Follow You into the Dark" on the car radio. It just knocked me out. It was so moving. I thought it was one of the most beautiful love songs, I have ever heard in my life. After a bit of detective work, I was surprised to learn that I already owned it. I began to really listen to "Plans" and now its a real favorite. Rarely a week goes by that its not playing in my CD player, computer or car stereo.

So its only natural then, that I would eventually get a hold of DCfC's DVD, "Directions". "Directions" is such a wonderful, original concept. Take the nearly dozen songs from the CD, "Plans" and give each one to a different filmmaker to follow his or her own personal vision. This is a concept, that could have very easily failed in the wrong hands. But it is obvious that the band took great pains to pick talented artists, who were quite original and intent on taking their visualizatons of these songs to a new place.

There is a real mix on how these songs were approached. Some are more successful then others, but as a whole they flow together quite well. If I had a favorite it would have to be Rob Scrab's take on "Crooked Teeth". Its both funny, heart breaking and original. His video is sort of a take-off on those kiddie shows, we use to watch in the '60s and '70s. Through an interesting mix of puppetry & animation he evokes the ideal, that the things we wish for, might not turn out to be, what we actually end up with. Even my six year old son (who was fascinated by the creative visuals of the pirate, dragon & robot) got the video's concept.

There are a number other videos that are quite good. The love story of "I Will Follow into the Dark" is told very simply and elegantly through a pair of animated rabbits. Autumn de Wilde's video of a high school band playing "Different Names for the Same Thing" really evokes a fun, spirited sense of freedom, that musicians can feel. I Love the comic-strip like animation of "Your Heart is an Empty Room". That video is really ambiguous in its meaning, but I like the sense of longing it leaves me with. Finally, I really like the emotionally moving, Sci-Fi story, that Aaron Stewart-Ahn depicts with "Stable Song". It reminds me of those old '70s Sci-Fi/enviromental films like "Silent Running" and "Soylent Green".

The DVD also contains personal statements or thoughts of the Directors on their work. Like the videos, these statements take all sorts of different forms (check out Lance Bang's 'Spinal Tap'-like explanation of "Talking Like Turnstiles".) that can be quite interesting. As a project, "Directions" is quite successful in having artists re-imagine someone else's work. If you liked "Plans", then you'll love "Directions".

I am a huge fan of Death Cab For Cutie and own pretty much all their albums and live dvds and I was pretty certain I would enjoy this and I did to a certain extent but most of these videos were pretty boring. One or two of them were very interesting and symbolic but the rest were pretty plain and boring videos. Unless you are a devoted fan of Death Cab For Cutie I wouldn't recommend buying it.

The videos in this, although my musical taste has sprung a different direction(no pun intended), have and still are as good as when I was a big fan of Death Cab. Their best album followed by an even better visual, this is worth the money. Each video for each song has so much work put into it. My all time favorite video on this DVD is Summer Skin. There is one video I disliked and that was Soul Meets Body, the musical video was better but beyond that this is a good purchase. Each director and each track (beyond previuously mentioned) could stand alone.