IDLES - MODEL VILLAGE

What this video is

Released 11 August 2020 during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, 'Model Village' channels IDLES' satirical rage toward English insularity, provincial nationalism, and the Brexit political climate. The video's remote, lockdown-born production method — two brothers collaborating across continents using iPhones and bespoke CGI — is itself a document of pandemic-era creative adaptation. Thematically, the song…

Why it matters

A defining artefact of the 2018–2022 UK post-punk revival, 'Model Village' demonstrates the genre's capacity to merge visceral punk energy with high-concept visual art. The Gondry collaboration elevates the music video form to an art object, placing IDLES in a tradition of bands — Björk,…

The director

Michel Gondry is a French filmmaker and music video auteur whose credits include Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) and landmark videos for Daft Punk, Björk, The White Stripes, Radiohead, The Chemical Brothers, Foo Fighters, and Kylie Minogue.…