Northern Lites - Music Video

Music Video

A promotional music video, directed by Super Furry Animals and Martin McCarthy, was produced to accompany the release of "Northern Lites" as a single. The video begins with a shot of Super Furry Animals' 'SFA' logo, which appears on the cover of "Northern Lites", displayed above the words "Public information service". This shot fades to show a full-screen translucent, fluorescent blue, image of the "warrior", also from the single's cover, which moves from the centre to the bottom right before shrinking and remaining stationary in the top right for the duration of the video. The SFA logo from the introduction is shown in the top left, opposite the "warrior" image, and also remains throughout the video. Images of an island, the sea and birds in flight are shown before footage of a bearded man, sitting on rocks beside the sea and singing along to the first verse is shown. This footage is intercut with shots of a man using a hammer and chisel on some boulders before walking away with a large rock. The rock is shown being spun and polished into a curling stone. A yellow handle is added to the stone and it is placed into a wooden box alongside another stone with a red handle. The box is closed and the word Nagano is seen printed on the lid. The video then cuts to shots of a Boeing 747 before wintery scenes of Nagano are shown, including a shot of people with umbrellas stood in the snow in front of a sign that reads "Nagano Olympics". Footage from curling events are then shown until 2 minutes and 40 seconds when the video cuts to show a man in a grey suit dropping a handful of grass on a road. The video then ends with shots of Irish road bowling–several men are shown throwing a bowl down a road surrounded by spectators alongside scenes of men with measuring sticks and men exchanging banknotes. In a 2008 interview with Uncut, Gruff Rhys stated that "Northern Lites" "didn't have a video" and suggested this as the reason the track was not a bigger hit than it was. The director who was originally scheduled to work on the video took up an offer of a Red Stripe commercial in Jamaica, leaving the band to collaborate with McCarthy. According to Rhys the group met the original director later and told him "We understand, we'd have done the same." Despite this, bassist Guto Pryce has described the "Northern Lites" music video as one of only a handful of the group's videos that he actually likes.