Jack Antonoff Takes A Poignant Bath In Bleachers' 'I Wanna Get Better' Lyric Video
To be honest, we're still sort of marveling over how good Bleachers' "I Wanna Get Better" is. I mean, fun. guitarist Jack Antonoff's new venture is a lot, ahem, better than most side projects have any right to be.
Now, the single has a home movie-style lyric video. Pretty convenient, since it's kinda hard to keep up with the catalog of youthful transgressions and insecurities that the 2014 mtvU Woodies performer lists without a cheat sheet.
"And I've trained myself to give up on the past/ 'Cause I've frozen time between hearses and caskets," a fully-clothed Antonoff sings inside a bath tub in a staccato rhythm that matches the sharp piano stabs over the verse.
Antonoff puts his fingers in his ears, holds his breath, and sinks under the water. It's a fitting image for the song's sense of being overwhelmed by circumstances and the crush of a media-saturated life. But then, just as the exultant chorus arrives, he comes back up for air. "So now I'm standing on the overpass screaming at the cars, 'Hey!/ I wanna get better!'"
The rest of the clip finds Antonoff staring into the camera, rubbing the frustration out of his eyes with his fists, and jumping onto a bed over the cutest little dog EVER -- all of which is a lot better than sinking under the water.
Photo credit: RCA Records