See Dinosaur Jr.’s Claymation Video for New Song ‘Take It Back’

Ahead of the release of Dinosaur Jr.’s latest LP Sweep It Into Space this Friday, the indie rock legends have released the video for the album’s “Take It Back.”

The colorful visual features Claymation and stop-motion animation directed by Callum Scott-Dyson, who said in a statement that the video was inspired by the painted creature featured on Sweep It Into Space’s album cover.

That artwork served as a “springboard for its own little adventure, exploring some simple notions of creation, dependence, coming of age, and searching for another like yourself. I wanted to mix those themes with my style of stop-motion animation, everything being very DIY and handmade, using any materials I could get my hands on to bring the idea to life and give it a surreal and otherworldly feel,” Scott-Dyson said.

“Take It Back” follows Sweep It Into Space’s first single “I Ran Away” featuring Kurt Vile, who also co-produced the quarantine-made album.

When recording with Vile was halted by the Covid-19 pandemic, lead singer J. Mascis previously said in a statement he “ended up just mimicking a few things [Vile had] done. I was listening to a lot of Thin Lizzy, so I was trying to get some of that dueling twin lead sound. But the recording session was pretty well finished by the time things really hit the fan. When the lockdown happened in March, that meant I was on my own. But it was cool.”

Sweep It Into Space is out April 23rd via Jagjaguwar. Dinosaur Jr. recently announced an extensive fall 2021/winter 2022 North American tour, but the band has since added a few shows to precede that trek, including a pair of socially distanced May concerts and a headlining slot at their Camp Fuzz II fest in Big Indian, New York, from July 27th to 30th.