Today’s Track of the Day comes from an obscure German left-field reggae artist named Patrice. It’s a cover of a great, vintage track by Nina Simone. Patrice indeed puts his own stamp on the song: instead of recalling Simone’s smoky, tortured vocal that reeks of the struggle, Patrice instead evokes Tribe Called Quest performing the soundtrack to Hair on a helium binge.

It’s actually far more endearing than that description might suggest, but what really is cool about Patrice’s song is in fact its video – a crazy naked hybrid of Where The Wild Things Are and, like, those raves that always happen in contemporary end-of-the-world movies. In the clip – a collaboration between Paris-based photographer/filmmaker known as JR and director Guillaume Cagniard – the natives assemble an animated portrait of Patrice made out of speakers in different landscapes; there it stands like a religious totem – an absurdist, surreal twist on the mysterious, looming statuary like those in Easter Island, or the obelisk in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Patrice the speaker totem shimmers and ripples in sway with the music’s swing, and it’s a magical thing – this is definitely one of the most original and inventive music videos we’ve seen in ages. There might be some environmental parable at work here, but heck, we just think it looks cool…