Best known as the keyboardist and co-composer of the iconic hit “Take on Me” by pop group A-ha, Magne Furuholmen unveils today and exclusively for Rolling Stone, a spectacular new video for his latest single “This Is Now America”, from his third solo album, White Xmas Lies.
Released in October 2019 and presented as an “antidote to the carelessness of Christmas carols”, Magne Furuholmen’s album is much deeper, richer but also more committed, with its first single, “This Is Now America”, composed as a direct response to the Donald Trump administration.
“I am particularly obsessed with American politics, especially since the candidacy of Donald Trump.”
“I immediately understood that he was going to win because people hate politicians and reject the system. They feel dissatisfied and one can understand why they are angry. Still, I still don’t understand how they could have thought it was the best choice,” he told Rolling Stone.
A-ha is currently on an international tour to support the anniversary of their first album Hunting high and Low. The “Take on Me“ video, with its original hand-drawn animation, was viewed a billion times on YouTube this week – the fourth 20th century video to hit that figure.
Magne Furuholmen recently responded to Rolling Stone USA after Donald Trump used a video with a similar animation style to “Take on Me” for political advertising, noting: “Even the blind pig can find truffles”.
For this new video, Magne Furuholmen has teamed up with the German experimental theatre and performance duo Vinge / Müller, for a spectacular and disturbing video which, in many ways, is the somber dystopian cousin of the famous video “Take on Me”. In an eclectic, hand-drawn universe, the story follows a teenage character on the brink of self-destruction, hiding from a troubled outside world.
“It is a kind of lament for an idea of America, which seems to no longer exist.”
“I wrote this particular song from the point of view of a woman who rediscovers her youth in a diary and who is shocked to see the difference between yesterday and today. When I was 15, I felt like the world was full of endless possibilities, and an exciting place to follow his dream. Today, young children are growing up in a very different and much more troubling world. To me, the video for “This is now America” talks about the loss of innocence and alienation … just like the song, come to think of it, ” says Furuholmen.
