Velocity Girl - I Can't Stop Smiling

What this video is

Released in June 1994, this video sits at a pivotal cultural intersection: Sub Pop's strategic pivot away from grunge toward melodic indie pop following Nirvana's mainstream explosion, and the peak of Spike Jonze's ascendancy as the pre-eminent music video director for indie and alternative acts. Velocity Girl — a Washington, D.C.-area band combining British shoegaze influences with American indie-pop hooks —…

Why it matters

A document of the mid-90s US indie-pop moment when British shoegaze and Amerindie noise-pop hybridized into a melodic, Sub Pop-distributed sound. The Jonze direction gives the video outsized cultural weight beyond the band's commercial footprint, marking it as an artifact of the director's…

The director

Born Adam Spiegel on October 22, 1969, in Rockville, Maryland. Began career photographing BMX and skateboarding for Freestylin' Magazine and Transworld Skateboarding, then directing the influential skate film Video Days (1991). Co-founded Girl Skateboards…