The Adorable Conceals the Disturbing in Poppies’ New Video for “Devin” – AdHoc

The Adorable Conceals the Disturbing in Poppies’ New Video for “Devin”

The eerie animation stresses the risks of letting “bad boys” run rampant.

A year out from their formation, Poppies has turned heads as a band with a knack at concealment. Under the band’s unassuming pop lullabies lie lyrics that point to the darkness hidden in what we assume to be comfortable and adorable. That knack is on full display in the band’s new video for “Devin,” a standout track off their Good EP released in June. The track follows the titular boy, a troublemaker for his family and well as those around him. While the boy’s bad antics are seen as common at first, passed off as “boys will be boys,” his behavior quickly grows out of hand, compounding and following him as he grows into someone that is hardly recognizable, even to his own mother (“sometimes I feel like he’s not mine, that boy is Rosemary’s child”). While on its surface the song remains purely focused on the boy himself, Poppies seems to be offering up a storybook lesson—that tolerating rotten behavior from boys without an attempt to change them for the better only leads them to grow into rotten men.

The animations for the video itself match Poppies’ interests precisely. Poppies says the video “was hand drawn and inked by our good friend Annie Zhao. She was inspired by Hieronymus Bosch, Run Wrake, and Lord of the Flies.” The inspiration of Run Wrake seems particularly obvious, as the video’s children’s story animals playing with one another soon lose their heads, literally and figuratively, and take to playing tug of war with one of their friend’s. Things soon take increasingly disturbing turns as the whole scene becomes more and more akin to a pagan ritual than a day at the playground. Just as with so much of their other work, Poppies is a band that shows us just how dark things can be under rosy surfaces.

Poppies will play alongside Cende, Anna McClellan, and Spirit Was at Baby’s All Right on September 6th.

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