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No, not one of those toolish people on MTV–do they even have those anymore? This week I picked up D-Fuse’s book, VJ: Audio-Visual Art and VJ Culture.

Here are a few of the segments from the DVD with more info about why I like them below.

D-Fuse::Interview

D-Fuse::Light Turned Down

D-Fuse::Sciarrino

The Light Surgeons::All Points Between (not D-Fuse but I enjoyed their show)

Back when I was but a youngster working on my thesis I spoke to D-Fuse a bit about their work. They are a small group of ex/current graphic designers based in London who now work as VJ’s. I found out about them because they created the DVD that was packaged with the limited edition of Beck’s Guero.

Mike at D-Fuse was extremely friendly and spoke candidly about the experience, saying that Beck gave them creative freedom to create whatever they felt best suited the music. What? A client that is open to a designers thoughts? No, it doesn’t exist.

Here’s a little bit of our exchange which was filed in my “Design Gurus With Whom I Have Exchanged Emails” file. Just in case you wondered my lengthiest exchange was with April Greiman. We were email BFF’s for a while. I don’t think we broke up but I should probably email her just to make sure.

Me: When creating the visuals (for Beck’s DVD), did you create them all, or did Beck have input in creating them? Was it difficult to present the idea to him, or was he open to it?
Mike@dfuse: He gave us 100% freedom

Do you consider these to be music videos, or closer to the VJ experience, or do you see a difference?
I consider them personal experiences for me and they are open to peoples personal interruption. to some extent music videos suck, of course there are some really good ones but generally the principle is lame.

Did you listen to tracks when creating the initial video, or was it all based on pure visual form and then mixed to the music? Or was the music the inspiration in creating the visuals?
Definitely listened to the tracks, but had some pre conceived ideas. Many videos were not used.

Do you see this being a direction that music videos will go in the future? Based solely on form and image, and minus artist shots?
I hope so, most people I know hate MTV, but somehow need direction. Soon as it is acceptable people are up for it. Maybe the beck album will do this

Are there any plans of incorporating these graphics into the stage show?
Yes, we did the gig in London and are discussing the world tour.

<They did do the world tour and it’s on their site under Performances, Beck>

Hugs and kisses and the end.