self-titled Managing Editor Arye Dworken is a damn handsome man. Last night he had his small-screen debut on MTV2’s Subterranean with an interview of Brooklyn duo Matt & Kim. Arye asked the tough questions and looked like a regular John Norris. (Too bad they spelled his name wrong…oopies!) However, we only have one question for you, Arye: Where did you get your shirt? 

As you might have noticed in recent months, self-titled struck a loose partnership with MTV2’s Subterranean show earlier this year, one where the folks over there shared their favorite clips with us while we schooled them on some of our favorite acts. Tonight at 1 a.m. EST, our managing editor, Arye Dworken, takes things to another level as Subterranean’s Matt & Kim-interviewing host.

We hear the program’s looking to finally fill its vacant talking-head position, so if you like what you see—despite Arye’s young Woody Allen demeanor—be sure to shoot us some feedback and we’ll pass it on to the proper authorities.

Mazel tov, Arye!

We premiered this video on MTV2’s Subterranean show late Thursday night in conjunction with our sister channel mtvU, who continue to premiere it all day today. Lately, the Subterranean staff has become obsessed with Okkervil River’s obsessive fans. They do stuff like go to the Okkervil message board and post up stories of meeting the band that end with strange questions about why Will Sheff seemed awkward and/or uncomfortable while meeting them.

A word to the wise: we encourage you to never meet your idols. The more you love them and identify with them the more likely they are to completely let you down in person. That is why we’ll never meet Okkervil River. Plus we probably don’t have enough clever literary references to be engaging for very long.

Anyway, presenting “Lost Coastlines” …

Gosh, how long has it been since Stereolab made their last video? It’s kind of amazing because the video for “Neon Beanbag” will leave you feeling like it’s still 1996. They are hell bent on maintaining that old school 4AD aesthetic, aren’t they? If you put this next to, say, “Ping Pong” or “The Free Design” you’ll see a lot of visual overlap … aesthetically. And yet the actual visuals couldn’t be more different. It’s funny how the fabled 4AD video style manages to do that—encompassing lo-fi, colorful, out of focus videos by twee bands.

That said, the MTV2 Subterranean crew are really enjoying the new Stereolab album … all 20-plus tracks of it.

Summer’s almost over and those of us at Subterranean headquarters are gearing up for the VMAs this weekend. It’s kind of headache inducing so as an offering to this lovely, temperate summer NYC has offered us we give back this lovely, temperate music video from a new Vice band, Japanese Motors. They’re just four kinda hipster-y dudes from Orange County who want to play house parties, listen to Pet Sounds and surf. We second that motion and are ready to put a foot in the ocean.

This week over at ye ole Subterranean Blog we premiered the new Ra Ra Riot video for “Ghost Under Rocks” and so naturally that is our video pick for self-titled, especially since they are (rightly) giving the album a “Buy It” nod.

The video is a pretty straightforward performance piece but director Brian Savelson uses this great world map backdrop, in the same colors as the album art, that at least elevate it to a performance piece on an engaging set. It’s interesting that something so simple could make a video seem significantly more sophisticated.

File under the embarrassments of blogging: we mis-attributed the Band of Horses video for “The Funeral” to Savelson after misreading his website when really he only did their “Is There A Ghost” video. We stand by “The Funeral” being one of the worst videos ever … for the purposes of showing it on TV.

Wondering when MTV’s gonna play music videos again? They certainly do on Subterranean, today’s answer to 120 Minutes. Presenting the show’s clip of the week, an s/t exclusive …

We premiered this Bowerbirds music video for “In Our Talons” over at the Subterranean Blog last week but thought we’d reprise it here. They’re a relatively unknown trio from Raliegh, NC, who’ve toured with the Mountain Goats and most recently have been out supporting Bon Iver. And yes, they are in fact named after a species of bird that quite strongly resembles the bird in this video (or, alternately, a crow).

The “Talons” video was done by first time music video director (but longtime commercial director) Alan Poon. We have some circumspect theories about the trio of animals shown in the video representing the trio of members in Bowerbirds, but we think they’re not likely to be true. Poon wrote in an email about the video that it takes about one day to create 5 seconds of the animation you see here, leading us to suspect perhaps the video was created and then matched to the song.

We’re all for it as it makes quite a lovely match.

Wondering when MTV’s gonna play music videos again? They certainly do on Subterranean, today’s answer to 120 Minutes. Presenting the show’s clip of the week, an s/t exclusive …

self-titled has restricted their previous Fleet Foxes coverage to encouraging you not to buy their album, so when they gave us a chance to blog about our video of the week we couldn’t resist recommending the band’s “White Winter Hymnal” music video. Over at MTV2 Subterranean we enjoy our Americana music, our My Morning Jacket albums, and sipping on a good light beer while playing some hacky sack. In all seriousness though, we are great fans of The Shins, MMJ, early Wilco, the late Graham Parsons and all that jazz so we find that Fleet Foxes naturally appeals to us.

The video for “White Winter Hymnal” was created by Grandchildren, which is the production name for one Sean Pecknold, the brother of Fleet Foxes vocalist/guitarist Robin Pecknold. He’s done previous work in animation, including a lot of shorts that seem to stylistically bite on legendary indie rock director Christopher Mills (Modest Mouse, Interpol, Broken Social Scene).

Claymation is an unexpected medium for this video, but the basic premise of changing seasons and nature in general is a nice fit. While the lighting could have been better (night is perhaps too dark, daylight not light or long enough as the old clay man spins from night to day) the representation of sadness in the clay characters and an intense feeling representing the Pacific Northwest is spot on.