Lip-synching students bring joy to crusty old blogger's heart

Students at Axe Sud in Toulouse, France, made this stellar, elaborately choreographed lip-synch video to a medley of "Happy Together" and "Paper Planes." Be sure you watch at least to the "Baa baa" part -- that's where my heart grew three sizes, like the Grinch's, and I acquired a sloppy, happy grin.

Lip Dub Axe Sud Toulouse 2010 (via Beyond the Beyond)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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alllie

No wonder they are happy, everyone in the world is good-looking, young and healthy. It’s genocide world where all the ugly and old people have been killed off and only the clone people remain.

BAH! HUMBUG!

And the grinch wouldn’t have lasted 5 minutes in that clone world. They would have killed him like they killed everyone else not like them.
PeaceNerd

Sigh… these poor people look so miserable, crushed under the weight of universal healthcare.
Flying_Monkey

Apparently I am the only person in the world who can’t see anything even interesting about the ‘lip-synching’ fashion. I would say ‘meh’ but that’s almost as pointless in itself…
- Anonymous
  
  Don’t worry, I’m with ya bro.
  
  The first one I watched: “Hmm, kinda interesting, but pretty easy to accomplish, I enjoyed it though as it’s at least original and made me smile – after all art isn’t about complexity”.
  
  Second one I watched: “Seen that before”.
  
  End of story.
- bklynchris
  
  I waited until the Baaaa Baaa, and thought , “what do I hate more, myself or my life, that I am sitting here wasting it looking at this?”. Wax off, excepting email, I am not even checking the weather today.
Anonymous

Oh. Crusty Blogger. I thought he says “Busty Clogger” I was looking for summat else.
Anonymous

aah, Mr. Cory Doctorow. First time you make me like you. Thank you!
Anonymous

I like this video so much…. Good Creation.
ackpht

At a few points they seem to be handing the camera from one person to another. Nicely done. That took a lot of practice.

What amazes me is that they got that many art students to cooperate on one project. I can’t even get my cats to eat from the same plate.
mellon

Wait, are *you* supposed to be the crusty old blogger? It took me a long time to come up with that theory–I was looking around for a link to the crusty old blogger to see who it was. Come on, Cory, if you’re a crusty old blogger, what does that make me (who am, I’m pretty sure, a bit older)? I am *so* not owning this crusty thing.

I am also skeptical that your heart is two sizes too small, but that’s something you’re going to have to work out for yourself. This was indeed a very fun video, and they did a great job editing the transitions.
Anonymous

I want to have fun like that.
gastronaut

Man, what was I thinking going to a school in the U.S. when I could have gone to a place that was full of impossibly upbeat slim attractive people, 70% of which were women?
- Madmolf
  
  What ? Is it not the case in USA, we’re all like this in France…
  
  Not totally so, but our love of fine food helps keeping upbeat and reasonably slim. As for the women, well they’re everywhere we can’t get rid of them, please help us !!!
Anonymous

I see your meme and raise you this from my alma mater:

http://www.youtube.com/user/ShorewoodLipDub
Jon-o

Here’s another: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zcOFN_VBVo

Not that there’s any scarcity of such videos, but that one’s from my town (Montreal).
- toyg
  
  Indeed the Montreal (UQAM) one was the first of the series, and was widely mentioned by mainstream media.
JollyOrc

Damn you Sony Entertainment for not allowing me to view this content from Germany…
W. James Au

I kept waiting for an old crusty blogger to appear in the video but then finally realized Cory was referring to himself. Dude, you’re only 40 or something!
Narmitaj

Their Graphics Art institute appears to be very clean and new. I went to art college one year and the place, which was pretty new at the time, was well cluttered with bits of artwork and junk and drawing boards and spattered with paint and so on.

Fans of long one-take choreographed passages through arty buildings – though with less of the joyful singing and dancing – might like Russian Ark, a 96-minute single-take tightrope walk through the Winter Palace/Hermitage in St Petersburg in 2001. The film visits 33 rooms and dips into three centuries of history, with 2000 choreographed actors in a mix of massive elaborate set pieces (like a 19thC ball) and much more intimate scenes (like a WW2 Leningrad chap building a coffin) – without the actors looking at the camera or the camera bumping into anyone.

I saw it in a cinema, which was best, but unfortunately not with a digital projection, so filmreel changes took a crunchy clip out of the otherwise seamless flow.
spool32

Wonderfully fun, thanks for the morning smile. :)
obeyken

Wow. Can I be an 20ish, attractive, stylish French art student, surrounded by same? Where do I sign up? This 39-year-old shlub thing is getting old.
Anonymous

that shorewood youtube page someone favorited an opie & anthony thing. kinda funny.
Mazoola

Somewhere, I obviously took a very, very wrong turn. I’m guessing now it’s too late to roll up a new character.

Sigh.
rimstalker

this video features content from Sony Music… not in your country!

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
HC66

Fortunately France favors Daily Motion over YouTube.

Lip Dub Axe Sud Toulouse 2010
vert

What the hell? Do they not allow ugly people to go that school?
- murray
  
  Exactly what I was thinking. I didn’t even notice a plain face, let alone an ugly one.
- The Mudshark
  
  ItÂ´s Europe. ThatÂ´s just what we look like :)
- Niklas
  
  It’s something in the language, if you speak it for long enough you will become good looking.
Uhclem

“Youtube has jumped the shark. Youtube is a poodle on the music industry leash. ”

(imagines leashed poodle jumping on shark)

brain explodes
Pres

@mcmrbt “Did anybody else spot the Cory clone?”

Yes, thought it was Cory for a moment, then realized that he wasn’t wearing a cape.
sid8p

There is one ugly person at 1:33, but they made her hold a giraffe pic. I’m assuming it’s a girl because of the nail polish, but then again, you never know.
Anonymous

A consolation prize for the poor geoblocked Germans:
“Fuck Sony Entertainment – Sid der Liedermacher”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niJWmdnxEFc
alllie

The giraffe girl might be pretty as well. She might have already appeared once.

I wonder if they didn’t accept any non-attractive people into the school or just into the video.
- sid8p
  
  I was joking.
marque93

There’s a ‘making of’ up on VIMEO.
http://vimeo.com/8758561
StoicBuddha

Major props to them for using the version of “Happy Together” done by the Leningrad Cowboys and the Russian Red Army Men’s Chorus! (Their version of Sweet Home Alabama is just great.)
InsertFingerHere

I tried mushrooms for the first time last week, and just as it was kicking in (like the climb to the peak of a roller coaster) I tuned in to the to season premiere of the Office.

http://www.officetally.com/the-office-lip-dub-qa

My mind was _blown_. Really set the mood, had a great time.

Pam looked SO hot.
mcmrbt

Looks like a nice school. Private, which in France means outside the state system and can therefore be more nimble in terms of its curriculum. Possibly why it seemed so white – although all the North African students might be at the Marseilles campus, you never know.

Very focused on GETTING A JOB and probably worth the Euros. From what I can gather, between â‚¬5500 and â‚¬7000 per year in fees, which compares well with UK universities – and you can go there for a prep year, which means instead of ‘A’ levels or equivalent.

Did anybody else spot the Cory clone?
- Atvaark
  
  Yup, I saw him (it?) too. I thought it had to be why Cory liked the video so much. Or maybe he just liked a few minutes of pure (and staged) joy.
  
  As a side note, I’m from Toulouse and I had never heard of that school. Hopefully we’re neighbors.
Anonymous

More: http://youtu.be/-zcOFN_VBVo
Matt Tinsley

Here’s one we attempted at a party this summer –
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0-wBEt6m4Y

They are lots of fun to try and do at home in a party scenario.
Anonymous

Not a single person of color in this entire school? a few Asians, but otherwise very, very white.
Anonymous

The Leningrad Cowboys (musicians in this vid) are way more entertaining without the lipsynch. Check, for example, their “Total Balalaika Show:”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAxcETeUiu8
lesbianjesus

vert â€¢ #8

I came here to say this.