Social Treble Turns Corporate Dread Into Futuristic Cinema on “Crowded Silence”
Punk Head: The idea of a “Persistent Cognitive Token” feels uncomfortably close to how many people already experience work. How much of this world came from observation versus extrapolation?
Social Treble: The idea actually came from experiencing this phenomenon myself but not in the way it is visualized in the video. See. Whatever concepts you see or will see in a music video or video essay on Social Treble’s YouTube channel is inspired by real life experiences or stories. It’s just that the real-life story is reimagined and set in a futuristic world.
Punk Head: Binaural audio places the listener inside the protagonist’s headspace, almost literally. Were you thinking of the listener as a witness, or as the token themselves?
Social Treble: Whether the listeners are witnesses or the token themselves, that is completely up to them, right? But if I had to imagine myself listening to the song and watching the video for the first time, I would surely be the token.
Punk Head: The protagonist doesn’t rebel. He reads. That’s almost anti-cinematic. Was that intentional?
Social Treble: That’s the beauty of it, isn’t it? Rebellion is almost always not the right path to get what you want or need when you face a dire situation. Rebellion almost always leads to utter destruction which is not good for anyone. At least, I feel so. On a personal level, I have always stayed within the system to either change the system or escape from it if things went south. And how did I do it? By simply knowing every line of every policy and law there is. And believe me or not, every policy, every compliance document and every law have multiple loopholes. History has told us that these loopholes have always been exploited by bad actors for dire purposes. But what about the good actors? Why can’t they actually read through and understand everything to save themselves from exploitation? The message implied by the visuals, story and audio of “Crowded Silence” is: “Do your due diligence. Read and understand everything when it comes to papers or contracts that you sign. Because you never know when this knowledge will come in handy and you will need to use this knowledge to defend yourself.”
As for the anti-cinematic aspect of it, I respectfully beg to differ. The most cinematic and climatic moment in the video is the final smile by the protagonist when he finally breaks away and finds himself in a real-life natural park in Bengaluru.
Punk Head: The glitches in the video are framed as the system failing to render him. At what point did you realize imperfections could carry the story?
Social Treble: The imperfections are actually deliberate because of the way AI video generation models actually work. If someone knows exactly how they work and what their limitations are, then that person can bend an AI model to his/her will simply by prompting. I realized this years ago and simply used it to my advantage to create the video for what it is. The imperfections are prompts specifically designed to generate the imperfections to suit the storyline.
Punk Head: You built this entirely alone, from composition to mastering to video. Was that a creative necessity, a philosophical stance, or a practical reality?
Social Treble: This is a creative choice, a philosophical stance and a practical reality. See. The stories I tell through the music videos (both sound and visuals) are extremely personal. So, it is almost an obligation to see everything through myself. And that is because involving others might dilute the vision and the craft, which is something I cannot tolerate. It might also be because I am completely self-reliant. I have built my skill set in such a way that I do not need to depend on others to do my work, be it in my day job or the work I do for Social Treble.
