We Are Scientists - It's A Hit

What this video is

Released in February 2006 as part of the UK single campaign for the debut album 'With Love and Squalor' (Virgin), 'It's A Hit' arrived at peak NME-era indie rock fever in Britain, where the song charted at #29 despite the Brooklyn-based band never approaching the US Hot 100. The video's director, Akiva Schaffer, was simultaneously being hired by SNL's writing staff in late 2005, positioning this clip at a unique…

Why it matters

A defining artifact of the mid-2000s indie-rock music video moment, notable for its early adoption of internet comedy aesthetics within a major-label promotional context. The Schaffer-directed boxing narrative represents a documented pre-SNL-Digital-Shorts application of his comedic film grammar,…

The director

Akiva Daniel Shebar Schaffer (born December 1, 1977, Berkeley, California) is a writer, director, editor, actor, and comedian. A founding member of comedy troupe The Lonely Island alongside Andy Samberg and Jorma Taccone, he joined Saturday Night Live as a…