The Arcade Fire has me by the ears

Posted by JR Buchbinder on January 29 at 10:41 AM
In a world where so much effort is focused on the visual interactivity of a website, I have to admit that The Arcade Fire has opened my eyes. Well, to be plain, they've opened my ears.

Check out The Black Mirror (well, it's actually spelled "rorriM kcalB"). I'll admit that there is a bit of a hellacious loading time to contend with (almost 3 minutes, gasp! horror! plague!) but I assure you that the wait is more than worth it. Plus, to keep you busy, they mirror your cursor on the loading screen, making a doppelganger cursor that reflects your every drag. It creates a ball-of-string-and-a-cat situation that actually kept me busy for 30 seconds.

But then the true experience starts - a grainy, black and white video that looks like something out of the Nosferatu age of film. At the bottom of the screen are the numbers 1-6 and the instructions to use your keyboard to manipulate the sound.

I didn't get it at first. But then I started playing, and got it real fast. The Black Mirror has 6 different audio tracks that you can turn on and off using the numbers on your keyboard. It sounds like a gimmick, but this was clearly well thought out. You can almost entirely change the soundtrack for the video as you tinker with the tracks. A classical movie score track, a vocal track (though the vocals seem to switch tracks sometimes), and still more than that.

You can listen through on just one track or mix it up.

And my verdict? This is pretty damned smart. It's got a delicious viral flavor because it allows us to personalize our experience. it has the same "come what you may" attitude of Subservient Chicken. You control your experience based on the keys you hit. And every time the video plays, you are guaranteed a completely unique auditory experience. And of course it caught peoples' attention, since it was featured on Yahoo's The 9

So bravo, Arcade Fire. I may just head over to itunes and buy your CD as reward for grabbing my attention, and keeping it for five whole minutes. Topics: interactive        SHARE: