This award-winning puppetry/comic book creation follows a put upon heroine enduring jibes from the cool crowd about her hairstyle. She resolves to rectify her situation using a new 'Hairagami Set'. The video was created by duo Trophy Wife (Ian and Rebecca Hart), who later revealed that the Hairzilla monster was a late addition, after US record label Sub Pop felt uncomfortable with "school shooting imagery". The clip won Best Music Video at the 2008 Vodafone NZ Music Awards. Check out the true to life puppets of band members Jonathan Bree and Heather Mansfield.

Frequent collaborators singer Anika Moa and director Justin Pemberton crossed paths again for the music video of this track, from Moa's 2008 album In Swings the Tide — her first, slightly countrified album for EMI. In a tastefully furnished room, Moa wakes in a bed of chocolate satin sheets, only to find the day is nearly done for her and the mysterious bedmate sleeping next to her. Moa exhorts her lover, “please don't be mean to me 'cos I really tried ...”, before stripping the duvet off the relationship to see what's underneath.

After roughly five years with band Cassandra's Ears, Jan Hellriegel went solo and managed to hit the top five of the Kiwi charts with both her first album, and first single. Hellriegel followed her debut hit 'The Way I Feel' with this, the title track from her 1992 album It's My Sin. The song highlights Hellriegel's distinctive voice; Matt Noonan's monochromatic video makes a different kind of music, by concentrating on close-ups of her face. In a 2017 YouTube conversation about the song's lyrics, Hellriegel argued she had become less judgemental about the idea of taking the less trodden path. 

'Melusine' sees Jan Hellriegel swaying to a different beat, at a point of major change in her career. In European folklore, a melusine is half woman, and half serpent or fish. In the music video, Jan Hellriegel performs in a man's suit, her birthday suit and a cocktail dress. Her on-screen transformation reflects the singer's real-life realisation that being feminine could be a place of strength. The video was directed by artist Tracey Tawhiao. Hellriegel recorded the song in-between leaving her record label, and becoming a parent. A remixed version won fans on the Auckland dance scene. 

One of the gentler songs on Shona Laing's 1992 album New on Earth, this warm, Latin-tinged number is in polar opposition to the staunch, synth-laden stylings that won attention on her previous release South. Karyn Hay's purposefully minimal clip concentrates exclusively on Laing, highlighted by red and blue filters as she plays acoustic guitar. Elsewhere, the stylised symbols seen on her face form part of an interstellar background. Laing has called New on Earth "the best record I ever made". Mercy of Love won Laing her second Silver Scroll songwiting award in 1992. 

The lead single off Maisey Rika’s 2009 self-titled EP is accompanied by a delicate and moody music video. After catching up with supportive friends, Rika continues singing her song about starting over in Auckland's Albert Park. Then she hits the road in in the back of a ute, playing her way through Auckland city and on into the countryside. The 'Letting Go' single helped Rika's EP reach the NZ Top 40, following on from her previous double-platinum success — when at age 13 she released an award-winning album of traditional Māori song, E Hine.

Singer/songwriter Sharon O’Neill did Los Angeles inspired, mid-70s pop/rock as well as many of her contemporaries in California — but it’s hard to imagine opening lines as striking as these ones coming from that West Coast. ‘Words’ was the first single from her self titled, second long player which won her Album of the Year and Best Female Vocalist at the 1980 NZ Awards. After years behind the keyboards, O’Neill shines in this video filmed in front of an audience with a band that includes Simon Morris, Wayne Mason and future Mutton Bird Ross Burge.

On this song from her debut EP, bilingual Wellington singer/songwriter Ria Hall marries her respect for tradition and her use of te reo and kapa haka to the very contemporary beats of producer Riki Gooch (Eru Dangerspiel, Trinity Roots). This mix of old and new is echoed in director Jessica Sanderson's video. It casts Hall as four characters drawn from mythology to ward off the evil of Babylon and is set against a strikingly modern dreamscape of video effects, imagery and lighting. It won Best Video by a Māori Artist at the 2012 Māori Music Awards.

When Bic Runga broke out in 1996, 'Drive' was the lead single from her hit album of the same name. Opting to stay with the simplicity of her original demo clearly paid off: the song earned then 20-year-old Runga the 1996 APRA Silver Scroll Songwriting Award. Director Justin Pemberton wisely creates a video that matches the song. Alternating black and white with colour provides a moody feel without drawing attention to itself, leaving Runga to deliver a delicate performance on a song that would have a major impact on her career.

The Katene Sisters were a Shortland Street creation — a vocal group from the past of nurse Jackie Manu (Nancy Brunning), who reformed for a talent quest. The other members were her cousins, but only one (Annie Crummer) appeared, allowing nurse Carrie Burton (Lisa Crittenden) to step in. Though they didn’t win, they were given a brief life outside the show when this song (written by Crummer and ex Holidaymaker Barbara Griffin) peaked at number three in the NZ charts. The video shows them getting down to business in the recording studio, with Crummer in her element.