Olly Alexander Is 'Starstruck' In Solo Years & Years Music Video

If you've been waiting years and years to hear new tunes from Olly Alexander, and then the wait is officially over. On Monday (April 12), Alexander unveiled the music video for "Starstruck," his first single as a solo artist after transforming the band Years & Years into his own personalized project.


Filmed in the Hotel Cafe Royal just outside of London's famous Piccadilly Circus, the fizzy pop track’s music video highlights Alexander's acting chops as he portrays two very different versions of himself chasing one another throughout the luxurious establishment. In a YouTube afterparty following its release, Alexander revealed that the visual was filmed just a week prior. "It was all very, very quick," he mentioned. “It’s one of those videos that I never expected could be like this. It wasn’t like how I initially offered it, nevertheless I’m so happy with how it turned out.”


Speaking about the effervescent single, Alexander said in a statement that it's about “the rush you get as soon as you’re with somebody you’re really into, it’s about holding onto a good feeling and not letting it go.” He continued: “Like most of us, I’ve spent the past year at residence, and I wanted to prepare something super positive and fun for people (and myself) to bop along to. Whichever we’re doing or wherever we are in life, I think we all deserve three minutes of interstellar ecstasy.”


It's that cosmic sentimentality that inspired Alexander to prepare a TikTok challenge around the song, too, asking fans to show their "finest post-lockdown glow up that is leaving everybody starstruck because you look so fine." He posted his own take on the trend last month, and since then fans have rapidly taken on the challenge to show off their own creative looks too.


The release of "Starstruck" comes a month soon after Years & Years released a statement online that members Mikey Goldsworthy and Emre Türkmen could be departing from the sort. “This upcoming new album has been a Olly task to undertake and we’ve determined that Years & Years will continue as a Olly solo project,” it read. Olly went deeper into the choice to go solo in a interview with Capital FM last week. “Me, Mikey, and Emre met like 10 years back and we’ve been in this musical group for a decade and in that time we’ve sort of grown apart musically,” he mentioned. “It was a straightforward thing. We didn’t fall out. It’s certainly different, nevertheless I’m really excited as well to do my thing this time.”