Deaf Wish - The Rat Is Back

What this video is

Released June 27, 2018, the video arrives in the context of a broader international re-evaluation of Australian underground rock — bands like Deaf Wish, feedtime, and Total Control were being championed by Sub Pop as inheritors of a raw, working-class rock tradition. The self-directed, camera-locked format eschews narrative spectacle entirely, functioning instead as a punk-aligned refusal of music video production…

Why it matters

Represents the DIY noise-punk video tradition at its most reduced: no editing, no narrative, no crew artifice. A document of Melbourne's post-punk underground at the moment of its widest international reach via Sub Pop. Formally allied with the confessional minimalism of early hardcore and no-wave…

The director

Jensen Tjhung is guitarist and vocalist of Melbourne, Australia-based post-punk/noise-rock band Deaf Wish, signed to Sub Pop Records. The band formed in Melbourne in 2007. Lithium Zion (2018) was their fifth full-length album and second for Sub Pop. Tjhung…