Brother. – Without It

This music video is one I hold dear to my heart. Why do I cherish it so much you ask? I love this video simply because it is my music video! Yes, you read correctly. This is my song and music video and that it is me walking around with a microphone that is not plugged into any sort of PA or recording system. I am very proud of this even though it seems like a very simple video.

One of the hardest types of filming in the industry, in my opinion, is the one take shot. For those of who do not know what a one take shot is it is pretty self-explanatory. You film the entire video or scene in one continuous shot; there is no stopping, cutting or splicing. These types of shots can be extremely difficult to shoot because every element, whether it be dancing, scene change or costume change or camera placement, everything has to be rehearsed and executed perfectly to get the perfect take. Talk about difficult am I right?

Above is a behind the scenes look at just what goes on during a one take shot.

Anyways back to the music video. Since I wrote the song and directed the video I can tell you all about the symbolism that is going on here.

First, the song is about one of my favorite super heroes and his arch nemesis; The Flash and the Reverse Flash. The song takes the point of view of the Reverse Flash and how he has been watching him and taunting him. The Reverse Flash needs to harvest the Flash’s energy to be able to keep moving fast and fighting.

Second, the story of the Flash dips heavily into time travel. He can run so fast that he can actually transcend time and travel either forward or backward along the spectrum. Well long story short he travels back in time, makes some minor changes and he travels back to the present to find his whole world has changed. THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT AT ITS FINEST. We’ll save that for another day.

In this music video, We show the main character walk out and get into two different cars and ultimately crashes. Time reverses bringing him back to his original starting point only to move in a different direction, step into another car with his mates and swerve all over the road. The simple “Going back in time” allusion to praise the Flash and his time travel.

We had a blast filming this video but it turned to be very difficult at the beginning. We started with high expectations and were hit with a slew of unexpected perks and challenges. We didn’t expect it to rain that day but it made for great lighting or lighting we could work with. We also did not expect a full bathroom set to be in that small garage but it was cool, so we used it. We definitely underestimated how long it would take to get the perfect one take shot. TALK ABOUT HARD! We filmed the microphone catch around 25 times before we got it right.

In short, music videos are a blast to film and they can have a huge impact on the viewer. Some videos can change your views or perception of the world around you or they can simply wow you. I hope this video gave you a little impression.