The Preatures – Is This How You Feel?
2013 · Directed by Alex Ryan
32K Likes
Best comments
1.“Hi, my name is David, and I'm responsible for 500,000 of these views.”
More comments
- 2.“Good to see Lucy Lawless making a comeback.”
- 3.“Probably the best song I've heard that no one else I know has heard.”
The story
This is the song that put Sydney's The Preatures on the map. Before most people had heard of them, Is This How You Feel? won first place at the 2013 Vanda & Young Global Songwriting Competition. It came out in May 2013 as the lead single and title track of their EP, with Isabella Manfredi's voice up front over a rubbery, funky bass line that one reviewer compared to Prince in the '80s.
Alex Ryan directed and produced the video, shot by Adam Howden from a concept by the band's manager Andy Cassell. It keeps things simple: the band performing on a dark stage under bright colored lights, Manfredi dancing around in a loose, erratic way, all layered with split screens and overlapping frames. The same crew came back a few months later for Manic Baby.
The slow burn paid off. Triple J listeners voted it number nine in the Hottest 100 of 2013, it peaked at number 46 on the ARIA chart in February 2014, and it went platinum in Australia in 2018.
