Savages channel Camus in new video for 'Strife'

In the classic existentialist novel by Albert Camus, L'Etranger (The Outsider), the misanthropic anti-hero takes a walk on a French beach and ends up killing a young Arab man. In the new video from post-punk revivalists Savages, the "timeless human physicality and physical expression" embodied by that murder is used as a poignant narrative for the track Strife, from their critically-acclaimed debut Silence Yourself.

Speaking to The Skinny in April last year, the band's Jehnny Beth talked about the literary influences of the Manchester band: "When we started the band I was reading Nietzsche and one thing that I got really into was the idea that, from when you start writing, you try not to lose what made you first begin, even as you continue further; the first spark is the purest and you should try to keep hold of that and not get distracted along the path,” she told us. “But it demands a lot of concentration! The actual process of it is hard because your brain is not trained to be so simple, and as a human you naturally want to be seen as this complex personality – indeed you are a complex animal."

From the archive

INTERVIEWS
Savages' Jehnny Beth: "Guitar music has been adrift..."

REVIEWS
Savages – Silence Yourself