Post-Nothing Rock: PUP - The Dream Is Over (2016)

Why I Like It:

To start out this blog post I will not be talking about PUP, but instead Twenty One Pilots. Just follow me along the rabbit hole and we will get to what major thing them and PUP have in common.

For Twenty One Pilot's latest album, called Breach, they spent a 1 Million dollars on a 10 minute long epic music video, called City Walls, that wraps up their decade spanning story of Dema. Ya, they went all out. Do I know all the lore and backstory of this story? No, I'm a casual fan of the band, but I madly respect the effort and craftsmanship that went into this work for their true fans. One thing that really stood out to me from the "City Walls" music video was the very end where it reads:

"Thank you for still believing in music videos. It gives a lot of great people great jobs".

This quote really got me thinking about music videos, with regards to their relevancy and importance, for todays age. Do people still hold music videos with high regard like back when they were on MTV? Wellll that's a hard one to quantify. Today we have different platforms - YouTube, Tik Tok, short reels, the visualizers on Spotify/Apple music - that the someone can use to have an visual experience for a song. The music video could be argued as dead but I would like to think it has just evolved with the current social media zeitgeist. Mic The Snare has an excellent video on this subject.

My personal option is that a traditional music video, that involves real people and their creativity, is still the superior form of a visual music experience. Especially when a band decides to create it themselves, like PUP. See? I got there. It took me four paragraphs but we are at the core of the onion.

Mic The Snare asked if anyone is still doing music videos well these days, and I got the answer for him, PUP is. Since their first studio album in 2013 (PUP) to their latest in 2025 (Who Will Look After The Dogs?) the Canadian boys have been crafting their own music videos that are unique, witty, and a blast. The album that I chose to talk about, The Dream Is Over, has the best run of videos. Let's list them off because people love lists.

- If This Tour Doesn't Kill You Then I Will. A video of the band members all trying to kill eachother but still play their set.

- DVP. Uses an old CRT TV screen to show old video games that play the lyrics of the song.

-Sleep In The Heat. Continues off the storyline for the video Guilt Trip, where now after bondin from a shared murder crime, the lead singer gets a dog and...just watch it, there's Air Bud levels of emotion. Also the video has Finn Wolfhard in it! He's got mad indie cred.

-Old Wounds. A choose your own adventure video, where you're the tour manager and have to pick a band member (all with different levels of difficulty) to get to their hotel room after a gig. Simple right? Hell no. Try escaping from aliens, fist fighting Golden State Warriors fans, or not dying of starvation from lack of pizza. I did the hard work for this blog and personally played through all 4 scenarios, even Stefan's impossible route (with a little help from this Reddit post).

Not only is PUP S tier level at making music videos, and have a treasure trove of others to check out, but their live set everyone raves about. I so want to dance my face off at one of their shows! I love their aggressively happy style so much. Please check PUP out if you've made it this far into my post, you must be invested at this point right?

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