[Video Link] The Wilco track “Dawned On Me” re-imagined as a classic, early-era Popeye cartoon. The song is from the band’s Grammy-nominated 2011 album, “The Whole Love.” They’re on tour now, and should not be missed, as they are one of the greatest live acts on the planet. The animation is a collaboration with King Features, and is “the first hand-drawn Popeye cartoon in more than 30 years.” Directed by Darren Romanelli. Best url ever: wilcospinach.com.
A little more about how the video came to be, below, from Wilco and Romanelli…
This collaboration between American icons is one of the first music videos Wilco has released since 1999 and it presents the band to the masses in a fresh, new way: as animated images, side-by-side with Popeye and his friends Olive Oyl, Swee’ Pea, Wimpy and Bluto.
As one of the earliest animated characters, introduced in 1933 by Fleischer Studios, Popeye has become one of the most enduring and iconic cartoon characters of all time and is forever entwined in the evolution of animation. The music video marks the first new Popeye cartoon since “Popeye’s Voygage: The Quest for Pappy,” the 3-D CGI primetime TV special and deluxe DVD release produced by King Features Syndicate for Popeye’s 75th Anniversary in 2004. In what has become a primarily digital world, this new video marks the first hand-drawn, frame-by-frame rendering for Popeye cell animation since the Popeye and Son series from 1987.
This certainly isn’t Popeye’s first foray into love territory: the Sailor Man first met his “goil,” Olive Oyl, in Elzie Crisler Seagar’s popular Thimble Theatre comic strip in the 1930s and their legendary love only grew and captivated the imagination of fans all over the world. The couple even made People Magazine’s list of the Greatest Love Stories of the 20th Century.
(thanks, Tara McGinley, and Darren Romanelli!)