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May 22, 2017 By Christopher Roberts American Football

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It may have taken them 17 years to do it, but emo heroes American Football finally returned with their self-titled sophomore album (confusingly their 1999 debut was also self-titled), American Football, last October via Polyvinyl. Now the band has shared a video for “My Instincts Are the Enemy.” Chris Strong directed the video, which was partially shot in Japan (Tokyo, Matsumoto, and Nagoya) and partially in Toluca, Illinois. It’s about a Japanese person temporarily living in small town America and missing home. Watch it below, followed by their upcoming tour dates.

Strong had this to say about the video in a press release: “I was initially asked to think of some ideas for videos on November 14, a week after Donald Trump was elected president and the same week the first trailer was released for the new Ghost in the Shell movie. There was a lot of talk in the news around that time about the reality for foreigners in the United States. There was also a lot of discussion surrounding the mostly white cast of Ghost in the Shell and the depiction of Japanese people in American film. Since the first American Football video for ‘Never Meant’ had so many Caucasians, I thought it might be interesting to do something that used exclusively Japanese and Japanese-Americans… Mike Kinsella and the band’s manager gave me the names of eight people they knew from previous music tours in Japan, and these people then helped to connect us with people in Japan who were interested in taking part.”

American Football Tour Dates:

May

27 - George, WA @ Sasquatch Music Festival

June

06 - Ebisu, Japan @ LiquidRoom
07 - Tokyo, Japan @ Blitz
09 - Osaka, Japan @ Akaso
12 - Barcelona, ES @ Apolo
13 - Madrid, ES @ Copernico
15 - Milan, IT @ Magnolia Summer
16 - Berlin, DE @ So36
17 - Mannheim, DE @ Maifeld Derby
18 - Hilvarenbeek, NL @ Best Kept Secret Festival

July

16 - Chicago, IL @ Pitchfork Music Festival

September

01 - Brighton, UK @ Concorde 2
02 - Manchester, UK @ Albert Hall
03 - Edinburgh, UK @ Summerhall
04 - Dublin, IE @ Button Factory

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