I know, I know, most everybody thinks I’m just the “Americana” guy; produce rootsy, bluegrassy, country-type videos, etc.
Happy HALLOWEEN!
This one’s pretty priceless. Marketing meeting at Gibson HQ with the director’s team once again trying to comprehend orders. The mission: SELL THE BFG GUITAR! How do we do that master? Uh…
The directive given to us was:
- Find a band. Must be popular alternative, metal band.
- Get them to record an infomercial-ish song about the “BFG” guitar
- Shoot music video of same
So after numerous abortive attempts to get ANY band to fulfill all requirements, and with time running out, I somehow came across horror-core, blood-band – SKULLKIN! And they were local. Not famous, but local. Personally, I completely don’t get this kind of music so I have no way to judge it. But those darn kids sure seem to love it. To their credit, the band was totally on-board and wrote this song, recorded it (in a matter of days), paved the way at the local metal club to shoot, and put the word out to their fans to show up.
I directed, edited and shot (most shooting, I had 2nd shooter also) much of the time lying down on the stage amidst blood, sweat and… not tears. Shot with 2 HVX-200’s, much was shot at a fast shutter speed to get that “Gladiator” nervous, frantic look, a few over-crank shots, plus one headstock lock-off that required me to clamp the camera on the BFG headstock and basically steer it around while the guy was playing. Editing was fairly complex and I went for a vampire-type look on the color grade. Remember, this was shot in 2007, before vampire stuff was trendy.
No matter how much you don’t like this (and so many didn’t!), it’s actually one of the better videos I’ve directed, shot and edited, from a technical standpoint that is. And it sure provoked reaction on the interwebs. Mission accomplished!
Uh, gotta go now and grab this call, “VYKIN” a hot swedish-gore band on line 1!!
