Written by Laurence Boyce | 13 June 2009 | in news - Animation | Print |

‘Where’s Your Head At?’ is one of those songs that people remember for the video just as much as they do for the tune. It was innovative, fresh and, quite frankly,  frigging terrifying as rock band monkeys with human faces (ah, in all my years as a journalist, how long have I wanted to be able to type that phrase) go mental to the driving beats. As good as the video is, the genius computer animation and idea started to – slightly – overshadow the song. So, when animator Max Hattler was asked to provide concert visuals for the song, there was one simple request: “There was no brief, no pitch, they just wanted me to do whatever I want – as long as it didn’t involve monkeys!”

Hattler is currently one of the world’s most exciting animators with films such as Drift and the quite brilliant Aanatt perfect examples of Hattler’s interest in the relationship between sound, music and the moving image. It was the success of Drift at this year’s London International Animation Festival that prompted Basement Jaxx to search out Hattler.

““One day last autumn I got a call from Basement Jaxx’s management,” says Hattler “They liked Drift enough to trawl through my website and get their manager to call me. They wanted concert visuals to accompany their hit song ‘Where’s Your Head At’. It was an absolute dream commission.”

With monkeys definitely off the table (and, lets face it, monkeys should always be off the table) Hattler looked at the very medium on which his piece would actually be shown

“I decided to base the concept on the grid structure of the LED display on which the visuals are shown,” he explains. “The 7 by 2 meter screen is made up of 60 square LED elements, four rows of 15 elements. I decided to go for a very flat, two-dimensional aesthetic, in which the screen acts as a wall, rather than a window to a three-dimensional space. Each of the blocks that make up the screen becomes a tile in the makeup of the overall picture, a pixel in the construction of the visual narrative, mirroring both old-school video games as well as ‘80s video walls.”

You can check it out, alongside the rest of Hattler’s audiovisual work, at http://www.maxhattler.com/live/