Title: The Jenny Thing – “American Canyon”
Runtime: 3 min
Country: USA
Director: Ramesh Nicolas Iyer
Placement: Award of Merit
Competition: March, 2022

Synopsis: In the music video for “American Canyon,” a heroine on horseback charges across an otherworldly desert. Pursued by malevolence known and unknown, she looks back… before ultimately facing her fears head-on. On a different plane of the desolate landscape, California electro-rockers The Jenny Thing perform the title track from their album, American Canyon. Even as singer Matt Easton meditates on the magnetic pull of physical violence, Pyrrhic victories, and the ecstasies of defeat, the band never forgets their pop duties, conjuring up a pounding, new-wave psychedelia that evokes the best of Peter Gabriel, Nine Inch Nails, and even Duran Duran.

If “American Canyon” sounds like the work of a group reborn… that’s because it is. After a layoff of over a decade, The Jenny Thing reunited in 2016, embracing modern technology and integrating elements of industrial, experimental, ambient, and electronic music. American Canyon has received strong critical response since its release, with Take Effect calling it “a flawless blend of New Wave, nostalgic pop and post-punk” and The Aquarian deeming it “one of the most ruminative and stylish records of the 2020s.”