Week 42 of Fresh Friday Festival traded last week's red-carpet anniversary show for a haunted carnival, complete with glowing midway lights, questionable attractions, and a ringmaster far too happy to see everyone. Fenix welcomed viewers inside before 12 premieres took the stage.
TMSTRY opened the night, followed by Blegh_AI_Music, KAI x Cherub in the Ashtray, From June To December, Mad World TV, IONE, Maui Mike x Main Records, Aidan Yagu, Roy Thigpen, Green Lounge Records, and Zanzibar. Melodelight closed the lineup with Atomic Glitter Bomb's “The Remedy.” The videos ranged from offbeat Halloween humor to futuristic hip-hop to some of the most ambitious visual-effects work the festival has shown.
This recap arrives before a winner does. Starting this week, Zinstrel's recaps report the Viewer's Choice standings at the time of publication, and FFF announces the official winner at the start of the following Friday's show, so every artist gets the full voting period. The winner receives a free month of the ElevenLabs Creator plan, a $22 value, through the ElevenLabs partnership announced at the anniversary show.
At publication, with one day of voting left, From June To December led with six votes, Melodelight had four, and TMSTRY had three.
Leading Viewer's Choice: From June To December, “Fun Out”
“Fun Out” started with a photo from a Halloween party, one From June To December thinks may have turned up on MySpace years ago. Among the usual run of sexy costumes, one woman had come dressed as corn. Not a glamorous take on corn. Just corn.
The artist doesn't remember any of the other costumes. The corn stuck, and years later it became “Fun Out,” a Halloween song about the joy of being completely and unapologetically absurd.
The lyrics are original, with music and vocals generated in Suno. Images came from ChatGPT, the video generations from Grok, and the final cut was edited in VN and CapCut. With six votes at publication, it leads the race.
Credits
Artist: From June To December
Lyrics: From June To December
Music & Vocals: Suno
Images: ChatGPT
Video: Grok
Editing: VN, CapCut
Watch: youtu.be/kMKmRVcxaXU
Second: Melodelight / Atomic Glitter Bomb, “The Remedy”
Melodelight's “The Remedy,” performed by the group Atomic Glitter Bomb, returns to Arctek 7, a futuristic world suffering from an epidemic of weak beats, bad flow, and severe style deficiency. The group works as an unconventional medical team. Doctor Jett brings the defibrillator bars, Doctor Artemis handles attitude adjustments, Doctor Vyx provides the interstellar fix, and Doctor Roxx puts the rhythm back where it belongs. Their rounds run from the 808 Clinic to nightclubs, alien wedding receptions, and zero-gravity treatment centers, and the prescription is always the same: beats, style, and unity.
The story widens when the United Federation of Rhymes and the mysterious Galactic Flow Syndicate take notice of the group's work. The reward is access to time travel, which leaves plenty of room for the next chapter. Costumes by House of Sttar give the group its distinctive look.
Credits
Artist: Melodelight
Performed by: Atomic Glitter Bomb
Costume Design: House of Sttar
Watch: youtu.be/9kjsEKvCBL0
Third: TMSTRY, “Small Talk”
TMSTRY's “Small Talk” is about the conversation that runs inside a creator's head: the voice that wakes them at 3 a.m. with another supposedly brilliant idea, and the quieter one that asks whether it's worth pursuing at all. The video gives both voices bodies, two 15-centimeter vinyl-toy characters called the Note and the Rest. One stands for creative restlessness and the other for doubt, and they follow their creator around the house, into the car, and even into the shower.
TMSTRY shot the live footage on an iPhone and composited the digital characters into it in Blender, across 70 visual-effects shots, 5,714 frames, and about 19.6 hours of rendering. A five-centimeter reference grid and real-world objects, including a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 audio interface, set the scale. Every cut lands on the track's 90.5 BPM, and a real dog's movement in the opening scene is matched to an animated character's dialogue.
According to TMSTRY's production notes, the project ran on 22,322 lines of animation code, 321 AI agents, and 122 critical review rounds, with no manually placed keyframes, and took about 38 hours from the first line of code to the final master. The message underneath is simpler. Creativity and doubt both come with the process, but only one holds the microphone at a time, and the creator decides which. TMSTRY also left something after the music ends.
Credits
Artist: TMSTRY
Filming: iPhone
Character Animation & Compositing: Blender
Watch: youtu.be/sq5Y2gFwsC0
Watch it first. Watch it together.
Fresh Friday Festival premieres new AI music videos every Friday on YouTube. The audience watches together, reacts together, and votes for the Viewer's Choice. The Week 42 winner will be announced at the start of the next show. Check out the full Haunted Carnival lineup in this playlist: Week 42 playlist
If you're an AI music creator sitting on a music video and wondering where to premiere it, submission is free at freshfridayfestival.com.
Zinstrel publishes this recap independently, courtesy of Fresh Friday Festival, and no artist pays for placement.