"Hard Liquor"

9 January 2017

4 mins 04s

Hard Liquor

With 'Hard Liquor' SOHN adds Moby-style blues to his usual cocktail of plangency and tricksy electronics. Jovan Todorovic's accompanying promo amplifies the mood, centring around a man stumbling through a monochrome setting in which a car lurks predatorily in the shadows.

Croatian actor Dado's intensity is such that it seems to have its own gravitational field as, drink-dazed and grimy, he compels us to watch him navigate his own personal crisis.

The highly stylised backdrop serves as both a contrast to our human frailty and a reflection of it: like fractals, everything echoes everything else whether man-made or in nature.

The industrial pipe he walks through mirrors the close-up of an eye. The pipe's end and the iris are black, suggesting a journey to the unknown, an other-worldly interior; perhaps we are seeing him enter the consciousness of the woman gazing into the camera as she sits on the bed.

Indeed, circles and ripples are a visual leitmotif suggesting our actions are both endlessly repetitive and full of consequences. In a particularly impressive sequence the car spins around the man so closely it feels catastrophe must be imminent - and then we see that he is also the driver. He is the black hole dragging all around him into nothingness; he is being crushed under the weight of his own mind. Powerful and enigmatic stuff - Todorovic is a talented man.

UK

Promos