Stephen Mejias

Simple, beautiful, majestic: The video for Yeah Yeah Yeahs "Despair," the second single from their recently released Mosquito, has the band on top of the Empire State Building, rocking joyously as the sun rises over the unreal city.

I grew up with the Empire State Building outside my bedroom window. It seemed close enough to touch, but also a million miles away. These days, I walk by it every morning on my way to work and again every evening on my way home. But I've never been to the top.

It was the first time for the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Karen O, who grew up not far from me in Englewood, NJ. Our paths have never crossed.

The video was directed by Patrick Daughters, who also directed the videos for YYYs' "Maps" and "Gold Lion." "Despair" has a touch of those earlier songs' sweet glory.

"I felt like I could give as personal a performance because of our history together," said Karen O, in a press release. "It was important to us that it felt intimate despite being filmed at one of NYC's most famous landmarks and an international cultural icon. It was my first-ever trip up to the top of the Empire State Building, top of the world. We were up there from 3am to sunrise. I'm guessing very few get to see that view from up there at those hours."

I'm guessing she's right about that.

"I gotta say I had a 'the-impossible-is-possible' moment up there with Nick and Brian," O continued. "If someone would have sat us down at the Mars Bar years back and told us that we'd be performing our music on the top of the Empire State Building one day, we probably would have thought that's the stuff that dreams are made of, not us, no way."