If I Had A Heart

Fever Ray is the new musical project of Karin from the Knife. She has a startling new single out, called If I Had A Heart. It's a nastier cousin of Portishead's Machine Gun, except instead of being led by beats it's led by an oscillating hum. It is not a song you would want to be alone with on a dark night. Very few pieces of music manage to sound unsettling, but If I Had A Heart is one of them. I like it - very much so.
But what's the video all about? I wish I could tell you. We'll need to take a closer look. Again, it's genuinely disquieting. I'm warning you. I can't be there to hold your hand, so if you might be creeped out you'll have to look away.

We open with some urchins in a canoe, drifting on a misty lake. Don't worry, they are being supervised by an adult at the back. However, they don't look too cheerful. I suspect there will not be a happily ever after ending.

On the shore are some peoploids in masks that resemble owls. With an alsatian. They're searching for something. Ominously.

Suddenly, we see a country house. It appears there has been a mass suicide in the drained swimming pool. I told you this wasn't pleasant, so don't start complaining.

Inside, the decor is opulent but there are more bodies. They're just sleeping, right?

Ah, there's Karin. Well, I'm assuming it's Karin. It's her music video, after all. Is she responsible for the horrors we have seen so far? Possibly. She looks rather demonic, and is clasping a white rodent to her chest. It could be a ferret, a rabbit or a guinea pig. It might not be a rodent at all, but a white dove. Actually, it could be a white tea towel for all I can see.

Now the masked peoploids are in the house. On closer inspection, they look more like fish. Whatever they are, I do not like them.

We end with the canoe disappearing over the horizon of a bleak sea. Now I feel very insignificant and powerless, as if I too am adrift on an uncaring ocean. Wait - is that the whole point of the video? It's all quite upsetting because it makes me think about the futility of it all, and wonder whether masked strangers are peeping at me from the bushes. Even the idea of the hook ('if I had a heart I could love you') is horrible... the idea of being simultaneously alive and not alive, and entirely emotionally detached. I'm scared. Could you hold my hand, please?
It was directed by a chap called Andreas Nilsson. Just look at how many cool videos he has made. I wish he was my friend.