It’s hard to hear Foreigner’s “I Want to Know What Love Is” and not think of some schmaltzy, maybe even ironic, probably comedic moment from one movie or another. A lot of the track’s poignancy has been damped over the years, even though it still remains a classic. Leave it to a bunch of Swedes to reinvigorate the song’s emotional punch in a completely unexpected way.
Amason is a Swedish supergroup consisting of members of Miike Snow, Dungen, Little Majorette, and Idiot Wind. On last year’s Flygplatsen EP, they turned in a cover of “I Want to Know What Love Is” that was so devoid of derision that the song became captivating again. Amanda Bergman (Idiot Wind) vocals perfectly capture the track’s longing, while her bandmates update the ’80s power ballad clichés to turn it into a moving modern rock song that touches just slightly on folk and electronic pop.
Just as the cover puts an earnest perspective on a somewhat cheesy track, so too does the song’s new video address a silly concept with utterly successful seriousness. Basically, the clip follows a man named Erick in his hunt to track down the ever-allusive Yeti. It sounds ridiculous, but director Filip Nilsson films it with such breathtaking shots of snowy landscapes, picturesque forests, and odd little moments with Erick, that it manages to perfectly capture the true pathos of the song itself.
Watch the clip above, and read Nilsson’s comments on the video’s inspiration below.
“I first heard Amason play the song live, in the summer 2015. It completely swept my feet and reminded me about my longtime friend Erick, the man in the video, who once told me that he can’t even remember the sensation of love. As I’m already blessed to live with a person who shows me love, I shortly after the concert called Erick to ask how he was, and if he wanted to tell me more about his solitude? During this call, that went on all night, I came across a study that said that the Yeti (in some civilizations called Bigfoot) is the most loving creature around. Erick could instantly see why, just like him he thought, the Yeti was misunderstood in all its attempts to intimacy. So we decided there and then, me still high on emotions from the tone, to let everything else be and find the Yeti. We travelled for six months and the search took us to Brazil, Sweden and Switzerland. The video shows pieces of the quest, and what other music to complement it, then the tune that started it all?
As far as I know Erick is still single.”
