Olivia O'Brien - Better Than Feeling Lonely

What this video is

Released on January 1, 2021, 'Better Than Feeling Lonely' arrived as the global pandemic had effectively suspended live music for nearly a year. The stripped acoustic version and its accompanying retro-styled video reflect a broader 2020–2021 trend in which artists pivoted toward intimate, nostalgia-coded aesthetics—partly shaped by the constraints of small-crew production and partly by TikTok's appetite for…

Why it matters

Represents a key document of early-2020s stripped acoustic pop: a sub-format in which digitally native artists issued 'raw' re-versions of songs to serve both streaming discovery algorithms and TikTok virality loops. The 1960s Mod visual referencing situates O'Brien within a lineage of young…

The director

Another Realm is a female directing duo comprising Elizabeth Miranda and Jacqueline Kulla, active in the early 2020s music video space. Kulla's solo/duo credits include Lauv & Conan Gray: Fake (2020) and Cameron Hardy: Perfume (2021). Kulla also co-directed…