London duo known as The Desert and comprised of singer/songwriter Gina Leonard and Tom Fryer have given us a darkly intimate video for "Playing Dead", the band's second track ever. The sparse video features the two musicians and their band performing in an abandoned warehouse, to a robotic audience of vehicles with headlights blaring. The video begins and ends with a holographic image of Leonard appearing before the microphone, guitar already in hand, and it's as if Leonard and Fryer are the self-aware screen at a drive-in. Subverting the notion that performers love to be watched, Leonard is visibly uncomfortable – both blinded and hypnotized by the bright lights in front of her.
"Playing Dead" was written by Leonard at a time when she had moved home to live with her parents in a small village. Peppered with lyrical gems like "I'm empty, it's how I like it", and "Watching TV in a power cut, I've got nothing in my head", the song is a perfect depiction of boredom to the point of stagnation. Blending lyrics about emptiness with Fryer's warm, folky guitar sound, sparse percussion and a distinctly electronic production, perhaps listeners will pick up on a metaphor for and a warning about the world's deep attachment to technology.
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