[Premiere] Enter a Sci-Fi Sin City in Thug Entrancer's New Video

The video for "Curaga / Low-Life" is like a black and white Cowboy Bebop.

by Beckett Mufson

December 8, 2015, 3:25pm

Screencaps via

In the new video for "Curaga / Low-Life," the dirty grooves of Denver-based producer Ryan McRyhew, a.k.a. Thug Entrancer, are the heartbeat of a spacefaring metropolis that looks like Robert Rodriguez's Sin City-meets-cult classic anime Cowboy Bebop. This is the first video off Thug Entrancer's upcoming album, Arcology, to be released on March 4, 2016 via Software Recording Co.

Brooklyn artist and animator Milton Melvin Croissant III ("My real name," he emphasizes in his bio), couches the soaring double track in pure stylistic excess. You want a spacefaring chase scene? Done. Human-machine hybrids? Delivered. Sweeping vistas of foreign planets? Not a problem. And it all looks like it was ripped from the dreams of comic book visionary and rendered in surreal black-and-white.

Croissant will also be directing the visuals for Thug Entrancer's upcoming tour, and designed the album art for Arcology, which is heavily rooted in the mythos of "Curaga / Low-Life." Says Croissant, "The vision for this video was pretty succinct. I wanted to develop a short narrative that fleshes out the album artwork- brings to life the 'VR-Pilot' on the front cover and the 'Space-Arc' on the back."

We spoke to Milton Melvin Croissant III and Thug Entrancer about the video and their upcoming tour.

The Creators Project: How did you two meet?

Milton Melvin Croissant III (MMCIII) & Thug Entrancer (TE): We met through the music scene in Denver many years ago.

MMCIII: I was living in and running an all ages warehouse-space called Rhinoceropolis. "Rhino" was (and still is) the local freak-cave linked into the underground music touring circuit. Ryan and his wife Kristi Schaefer's band Hideous Men would play often, and was always amazing. We became fast friends and started collaborating soon after.

TE: I cut my teeth playing in various projects at Rhinocerpolis. Buddy (Croissant III) has always been a huge inspiration in the DIY community here. From his early days in the insane noise punk group Ultra Boyz, his 52X max computer compositions, and now with his incredible visual language he's developed, he's always been someone who's helped push our community into the beyond.

What did your original vision for the video look like? How did it change over time?

MMCIII: The vision for this video was pretty succinct. I wanted to develop a short narrative that fleshes out the album artwork- brings to life the "VR-Pilot" on the front cover and the "Space-Arc" on the back. The "Curaga" section of the video was always clear to me, but the "Low-Life" section was very nebulous when I started. Eventually I landed on linking the two by painting the first section as a simulated VR experience of a stranded man in the ruins of the same ship.This video is actually a link between the album art and the next Thug Entrancer video I'm currently developing.

How is designing these visuals for a music video different than the live visuals?

MMCIII: When I make a music video, I'm approaching the work as an animator and director producing a short film. My music videos are generally not freeform, visual joy, there is always some narrative element in play. I have 3-5 minutes of someone's attention and I want to tell them a story. When developing live visuals, you are no longer producing work for people to watch on their laptop, on their belly. Live video work is seen collectively by a crowd, in a dark and loud space. In that context visual information tends to exist on shorter loops, instead of broader narrative gestures. You're essentially trying to link up everyone in the room, get everyone's brain firing at the same rate. A music show is a collective experience as much as it is a performance by a band, and I try to keep that in mind.

What's next for you?

MMCIII: Currently I'm working on the next music video for Thug Entrancer that will tie in the art direction for the whole Arcology collaboration. This video is going to go much deeper in this world we are creating, very excited for it!