Every year the Houston Press combs through the best indie and lesser-known artists to find the best music videos. You can keep your Taylor Swift, Lil Nas X and even your Ghosts. This week we enter the underground to close our 2021 edition.

100. Split Second Meltdown, “Big Game Hunting”

It’s time for a little light furry cosplay. “Big Game Hunting” follows a hunter and a lion in a delicate flirtation…at least until the tea party turns out to be a trap. It’s a very thirsty hunt, indeed.

99. The Joker’s Hand, “Gothic Girlfriend”

Goth girlfriends are the best. It’s known, but I appreciate Joker’s Hand checking the paperwork in his latest video.

98. Adult., “Fools (we are…)”

I let Nicola Kuperus and Adam Lee Miller explain why we watch a clown play with a potty: “Toilets are a universal motif, a shared human situation or, in some cases, shituation. We are all fools in one way or another, from war to waste to societal trends in ridiculous human behavior.

97. Ignite, “The River”

The US immigration system is racist bullshit. Don’t take my word for it. Let Ignite yell it at you until it sinks. Thanks guys.

96. TV Coma, “Celebrities”

In the minimalist video, the group take on the ubiquity of celebrity culture, mimicking a fancy dinner party against a completely blank white backdrop. It’s not exactly the most subtle of analogies, but it gets the point across.

95. Love By Numb3rs, “lie like that”

Some days are simply better spent in bed. “Lie Like This” has Dan Connor staring at the camera, finally hallucinating for a good while. It’s kind of a lazy video, but again, it’s a lazy time to be alive.

94. Dead Posey, “Sorry I’m Not Dead”

If you like your music videos with a bit of BDSM, here’s a good place to start. The group spends most of the runtime torturing a man wearing a large mask. It’s sexier than it looks and fun to listen to.

93. Dan Reed Network, “Starlight”

I’ll be honest, this video makes its way up the list based on how sick the track is and how much I miss fire dancers at gothic events. Every inch of it screams a hot night at an unsavory gathering. Thanks, DRN, for a fiery flashback to the times before.

92. Riley, “Call Him Anytime”

Riley had one of the most evil earworms this year on “Call Me When You Want.” The video shows him working at a convenience store, lamenting a broken heart until his friends show up. From maudlin to playful, it’s a delight to watch.

91. Zero Authority, “Ollie Ollie Oxen Free”

One of the most underrated punk bands in the world knows how to build a scene. As the group cruises around in a combination of oil and water, a little girl (Ava Moore) frolics through a cornfield pursued by a bird-headed specter. The video never really goes beyond acting, but given that it’s named after a children’s nursery rhyme used hide-and-seek, that’s all that’s needed.

90. Venom Prison, “The Pain of Oizys”

It’s always nice to see a subversion of a music video trope. Director Thomas Coe-Brooker guides his wife Toni through what feels like a slow game of suicide to find himself in a place of empowerment. It meshes well with Venom Prison, a metal band that still sneakily has endless expectations.

89. Wallice, “Wisdom Tooth”

Wallice drops a good grief track with some very dental visuals. The wisdom tooth may be a metaphor, but the video takes it to the bone with Wallice taking a trip to the dentist. At the end, she is cornered by chattering teeth.

88. Adrian Conner, “Victoria”

Austin-based Adrian Conner directed “Victoria” herself and it’s a neat little parade of guts and makeup. She vampirizes in front of a screen while two young lovers meet awkwardly. The song has a haunting blues sensibility that punches up the visual story, and Conner definitely has an eye for what makes a great music video.

87. Kelly Musler, “Summer of 1998”

For my part, I’m glad Gen X/Xennials have reached the stage where we can write sad songs about the good old days of the 90s. Kelly Musler puts together a sparse but effective ode to “reaching level 40” which hit some in a great way.
86. Old Crow Medicine Show, “Paint This Town”

Sometimes what makes a video count is the context in which it is shown. For example, “Paint This Town” comes to us at a time when a high school party seems almost mythical under pandemic conditions. There are some great alien worlds featured in the videos on this list that don’t seem quite as unreal, and the fact that Old Crow Medicine Show sits with such ease and finesse makes it better.

85. November Ultra, “The Merry-Go-Round”

This is an extremely clever video about the corrosive nature of toxic love. The clips repeat, slowly degrading as the song progresses until it’s kind of a red mess. It’s always cool to see entropy itself used to make a point.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDLyhhgb1Bk 84. The Flower, “Black Eye”

Lily Lizotte expresses herself like no other singer, and “Black Eye” shows her full palette of sadness and madness at the same time. Shot simply with her staring into the camera as a few visual effects heighten her rapidly flickering emotions, she tells a whole story just with shifting facial tics. It’s an uncomfortable, but fascinating tow watch at the same time.

83. Sad Night Dynamite, “Krunk”

Director Greg Hackett sets up a slightly surreal revenge story about a boy who gets a little too gangsta for his panties and finds himself in a trap. The video is mostly made up of party scenes that go well with the track, even if the ending is a bit unsatisfying. The drive to get there, however, is awesome.

82. Gvllow, “Nightmare”

Look, as long as the 90s are back, I’m just gonna sit here and enjoy all the new videos that seem like they’re straight off the set of 120 minutes. “Nightmare” is a beautiful artifact hat that has fallen from its rightful place in time, and I love it.

81. Ramses the Pigeon, “Where’s the comma in ‘God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen’ supposed to go?”

There are two great a capella pedantic explorations of minutia in sacred chants. The first is Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers in the classic “Atheists don’t have songs.” Welcome to the second, which is a fun joke about the importance of punctuation and also why slapping yourself for sound effect isn’t a good idea.

Tune in tomorrow for 20 more of the best music videos of 2021!