It’s time to shake off those post-Labor Day doldrums with a tiny desk concert of hand-picked music videos! We can promise a few tears, a few scares, and some very quizzical reaction faces in this week’s roundup. So get to watching!

“The Very Best”—JME (Above)

Yes, this entire song and video is about Pokémon. Keep your eyes and ears sharp for creature name-drops and the background vocalists chanting “Poookemoooon!”

“Can’t Keep Checking My Phone”—Unknown Mortal Orchestra

So basically, be afraid. Be very afraid.

“Bump”—Ethereal feat. Lord Narf

This video is like if you got lost in virtual reality in 1997 and it turned into a drug trip nightmare.

“Hot Scary Summer”—The Villagers

Somehow, these clouds of colorful dots chasing each other through a cavernous desert landscape manage to be a very effective metaphor for a turbulent relationship.

“Make Em Purr”—Sage Francis

My God, it’s so sad!

“Aleph-bet (Hosh’ana)”—Victoria Hanna

Fun with the Hebrew alphabet!

“Freak”—Friction feat. Josh Barry

Turning music videos into short films is an excellent use of the medium, but sometimes you don’t need a plot to make a compelling narrative, as evidenced by all these faces telling beautiful stories with just their expressions. You don’t have to be fancy; you just have to find that emotional hook!

“Ghost”—August Eve

But damn if you are going to tell a story make it as heartbreakingly lovely as this one! August Eve, the 18-year-old songstress, wrote this song and the story and directed the video herself. Well played, Eve.

“Pretty Torn Up”—EZTV

EZTV gets the nod this week because we like the story behind the video, which was made in collaboration with the Children’s Museum of the Arts. Students in the CMA Art Colony pitched the idea to the band that they should be literally torn up and scattered around New York City, and then made the video for them. We dig it.

“Belly”—Keita Juma

According to this video’s description it was animated by hand using 5,000 printed photos, and for the sheer tedium of completing that task we are happy to honor the team behind “Belly.”

Bonus Track: “Supersonik”—Playbour

Playbour is actually the graduation project of Tereza Ruller, a student at the Royal Academy of Art. Ruller is the face of the video and she’s examining how work and recreation have become one in the same in the modern world. We like Ruller’s style, and she gets the bonus track treatment here for staying stone faced through this entire video.