You are now in tune to Everything Ecstatic’s annual “Best of The Year” project. The 8th year highlighting albums of the year and this is the inaugural EE Best Music Videos of the Year list. These videos are a combination of artistic production, artists that hit, engagement and cool concepts. Breaking this up into two editions and this post begins the countdown starting at number 10 through number 6. Enjoy!

10. King Tuff – “Black Moon Spell” 

The black and white component here really reminded me of one of my favorite videos from 2012, Cloud Nothings’ “Fall In,” with the Busby Berkeley theme. The “Black Moon Spell” vid sees Tuff spinning around on a Marshall stack, with the wind blowing his long hair behind his cap. The spinning motion seemingly moves with the epic guitar riff that plays throughout the song. It’s like a scene out of a fucked up road side biker bar. Love it:

9. FKA Twigs – “Two Weeks”

Everything about FKA Twigs is visually stunning. The “Two Weeks” vid feels like that old Michael Jackson video for “Remember The Time” with Magic Johnson, Eddie Murphy and Iman. It’s the kind of extravagance that we’ve come to expect from Twigs as she’s dressed like an Egyptian queen with dancers flanking her from all sides. The beautiful irony here, is that she herself was a prominent video girl before her solo stardom.

8. Sinkane – “How We Be”

A video about dance, in all it’s many global forms. Hip-hop, krump, African, pop-lock, break and ballet with Sinkane’s Ahmed Gallab, looking cool as fuck walkin’ through different parts of NYC. It’s a dope anthology of dance, much like Sinkane’s new record, Mean Love is an anthology of his many global musical influences.

7. Vic Mensa – “Down On My Luck”

Ok…let’s get one thing out there: I fucking LOVE Vic Mensa. Dude is part of the bright future of hip-hop and he works his ass off. He’s tireless, straight up…All day, all night, he’s working on his music. Now “Down On My Luck” is a bit of a depart from Vic’s usual style. It’s a club banger and that’s new ground for him, but the video is solid gold. It reminds me of Kylie Minogue’s classic “Come Into My World” video directed by Michel Gondry, where Kylie goes around town 4 times over and the video just builds visually and conceptually, much like Vic re-creates his potentially disastrous night on the town over and over until it comes out roses. It’s an incredibly clever video and shouts to Vic for experimenting with new styles and creative shit.

6. Ibeyi – “River”

I stumbled onto these French/Cuban twins randomly on a late night and I’ve been enamored ever since. They sing beautifully in their unique tribal style, taking turns holding their breath under water as they harmonize in and out of the track. The detail of the air bubbles when one of them is submerged and then quickly rises above water to sing the verse is mesmerizing. As far as debut singles and videos go, this one is as good as any and no surprise, they’re signed to XL Recordings, who’ve been masters of artistically marketing their artists with a perfect balance of releases.

Check in later this week for the Top 5!