Who Knows Where Thoughts Come From? They Just Appear: The New Spike Jonze/Arcade Fire Video Looks Familiar

Back in high school, I didn't attend classes so much as I arrived at them, my mind left long behind in the car where I'd just smoked up with my buddies.  How I graduated on time, with decent marks I'll never know, but let that be a lesson to you kids: high school is obviously total bullshit.

Anyway, it was during one of those long lunch hour parking lot sessions that I told my friend the pipe was "cashed". I mentally patted myself on the back for the awesome invention of some awesome slang that I had never used and had surely never heard before and then headed off to class. 

Immediately after that day,it seemed to me that that word spread like wildfire. Everyone was using it. And for about four months I felt cool. After all, I thought, something I invented is popular! Right?! I invented that word! Didn't I invent that word? I definitely don't remember hearing it anywhere before so the first time I said it must be the first time anyone ever said it.. Or wait...Did I? ...oh, dude, there's a Laffy Taffy in my purse! Yeah, whatever on that word. I probably picked it up subconsciously.  Maybe I never even said it in the first place. Dammit this stuff gets stuck in your teeth so bad...

Why did I think I'd invented a word when there is virtually no chance that I did? As a great man* once said: "Who knows where thoughts come from? They just appear." Mmhmm. 

And sometimes, the same great thought occurs to more than one person at a time. How else to explain the fact that the fan-created video for "The Suburbs" bears a striking similarity to the real thing directed by Spike Jonze? The former was uploaded back in October, and the latter released last week. Take a look.


Fan video:

Official Video:

Obviously they aren't exactly the same. And the lyrics do send the mind in a direction something like this no matter who you are. So this is less a "who was first" thing and more a "poetic imagery doing exactly what it's supposed to do" thing. Still. It's freaky. Or maybe I'm just high.

In any case, I really like the official video. And at the very mention of Spike Jonze I feel compelled to direct traffic to his greatest work, my favourite commercial ever. 

*If you've never seen this movie--or even better, if you have, go here for an amazing synopsis.