St. Louis-natives and electronic duo 100 gecs have released a new video for their recent track “hand crushed by a mallet,” featuring Fall Out Boy, Craig Owens and Nicole Dollanganger. The song appears on the duo’s recent sophomore studio album of remixes 100 gecs & The Tree of Clues, which was released last month via Big Beat and Atlantic Records.
The uptempo electro-pop song, which finds itself stumbling on moments of both heavy metal and house beats, gets a psychedelic video treatment as we see a mushroom and rat chase each other through chaotic sets of checkered rooms and creepy forests. Directed by Dario Alva–whose previous collaborations include mega pop stars Lady Gaga, Post Malone and Travis Scott–the video marks the duo’s third off the new record following “stupid horse” (Remix) featuring GFOTY and Count Baldor along with “gec 2 u” (Remix) featuring Dorian Electra.
100 gecs & The Tree of Clues follows the group’s critically-lauded and commercially successful debut eponymous album, released in May of 2019 on founder Dylan Brady’s own label Dog Show Records. Noting the duo’s creative songwriting and crafty beats, The New York Times hailed the record as “some of the savviest pop music of the year.”
Earlier this year, the duo hosted their Square Garden experience on the popular video game platform Minecraft, which featured performances from Charlie XCX, Kero Kero and Bonito. The virtual performance attracted a total of 178,000 viewers across Minecraft, Twitch and YouTube while raising $50,000 for Feeding America.
100 gecs consists of Brady and Laura Les, two natives of the suburban St. Louis area who met at a party in 2012 before officially founding the band in 2015. The pair landed on the name 100 gecs after seeing it spray-painted on a building in Chicago, where they would go on to self release their debut eponymous EP in July of 2016. After launching their live career playing performances inside of Minecraft, the duo quickly grew a dedicated fanbase and started selling out live shows across the country.